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Happy 20th anniversary, DART! (Dallas's light rail system) This great piece celebrating the anniversary also provides a good overview of the system's history and future, and how it has and hasn't impacted transit in Dallas.
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Jun 14, 2016 15:37
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Columbus, Ohio has won a total of $140 million in grants from the U.S. Department of Transportation's Smart City Challenge! This is also an excellent opportunity for tech companies like Alphabet to begin circling around the freshly acquired funds. The Guardian offers a look inside what their urban planning division, Sidewalk Labs, has been up to, and while like usual they're sounding the alarm about Those Dangerous Tech Companies! their plan to shift people onto ride-sharing services does seem...suspect.
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Jun 27, 2016 22:40
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The Maroon Hawk posted:I would like to think that eventually our commuter rail aspirations will see us laying tracks to places like Greeley, Ft Collins, and Colorado Springs (none of which are much further from Denver than Longmont, the current endpoint of the planned B Line), so perhaps those cities will invest more in their local transit services once they have connections to a broader, statewide RTD system, but that's decades into the future so it's anyone's guess at this point. I've actually considered running for CO state legislature with the key objective of pushing to expand mass transit throughout the state like that. RTD is only allowed to operate where voters approve it. Since it is a "special tax district", this means voting for higher sales taxes. Castle Rock voted themselves out of the RTD district and keep voting to stay out. No light rail can go from Denver to Colorado Springs until that outlet mall in Castle Rock is part of the tax district and they want to keep their sales tax lower for the outlet mall. Also, the state car dealer association puts a lot of funding into killing RTD's plans to expand. My Imaginary GF posted:Look, I understand this. You understand this. How the gently caress do you effectively communicate this to the commercial establishment owner in a downtown that their business is dying because of too much parking and not enough residents immediately surrounding their location, without them just bitching about the weather? 1337JiveTurkey posted:Rooftop parking is a bit unusual because it requires the building to be able to support the weight of all the vehicles and that structure isn't cheap or unobtrusive. Rules of thumb for the cost of a structured parking space seem to start out around $15,000 and increase significantly as you go up or down. Multi-level subterranean parking can be over three times as expensive and is impossible in places with a high water table. Surface level parking is closer to $5,000 a space which is why it's so ubiquitous but some of that is driven by inordinately high parking requirements.
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Jun 28, 2016 08:25
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Huttan posted:RTD is only allowed to operate where voters approve it. Since it is a "special tax district", this means voting for higher sales taxes. Castle Rock voted themselves out of the RTD district and keep voting to stay out. No light rail can go from Denver to Colorado Springs until that outlet mall in Castle Rock is part of the tax district and they want to keep their sales tax lower for the outlet mall. I just want to say that no light rail should be going to Colorado Springs (or Castle Rock for that matter), that should definately be a heavy rail commuter line. But more importantly most of the communities in the south Denver area hate taxes and public transit, so I think that for the most part they should be ignored. Maybe they'll change their tune in thirty years when they see what a commuter rail interconnection and strong public transit does for the communities in the north. Anyway, speaking of Denver transit chat, a couple of weeks ago I used public transit to get door to DIA and it was a very pleasant experience. It's nice that Union Station is a terminal for many bus routes and the A line, which makes the ride way less stressful.
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Jun 28, 2016 15:46
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Yeah, you're right about the RTD thing. This will pretty much doom Colorado Springs to never have rail to Denver since this is a city that doesn't keep its loving streetlights on at night just to save a little tax money. Also, I just moved into an apartment that's a five minute walk from a lightrail station, and having that access has made life so much easier and more fun in just the five days since I've moved 
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Jun 28, 2016 22:55
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Combed Thunderclap posted:Columbus, Ohio has won a total of $140 million in grants from the U.S. Department of Transportation's Smart City Challenge! Columbus resident checking in! While this is awesome, and is mainly a reflection us of being the largest metropolitan area in the US without any rail service, I do have my doubts regarding the self driving car paradigm. I hope it works out but it is yet untested. I would really love a commuter rail system and it would make my life so much easier. There have been numerous pipe dream rail proposals as well as advocacy groups for a while now trying to stem state investment in mass transit systems but they have gone no where. My personal favorite is this one:  However that will never happen. Due to trends in population in the Ohio region, creating a feasible and more often utilized mass transit system is becoming increasingly important. Franklin county and surrounding areas are projecting to grow in large amounts while the older cities of Cleveland and Cincinatti are seeing migration. https://development.ohio.gov/files/research/P6095.pdf The city is quite sprawled out making mass transit a challenging issue and rail development along busy corridors (i.e. High street) would be extremely expensive, so it is not an easy task to take on. The city is starting a BRT program soon from downtown north to the Polaris area along the Cleveland Avenue corridor and I am interested in seeing how that goes.
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Sep 17, 2016 01:24
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The Maroon Hawk posted:Yeah, RTD actually discontinued a fair number of airport busses and rerouted others to Union Station for transfer to the A Line. It's definitely proven to be a more efficient system in a lot of ways that aren't readily apparent. This is why I think having buses is stupid. If you can switch a route any time willynilly, why the gently caress would anyone want to invest around it? Trains, now those you can rely on. You can even see the route and know where they're heading!
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Sep 17, 2016 03:36
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Let us imagine, if you would, that you is council P of a city of ~100k. Also that you loving hate buses b/c they bullshit without times telling ya when they arrive and now fixed RoW's You the council P, what motions you wanna table in your community? What are some loving easy policies I can get implemented and win on, I'm asking.
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Sep 17, 2016 23:28
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My Imaginary GF posted:Let us imagine, if you would, that you is council P of a city of ~100k. Also that you loving hate buses b/c they bullshit without times telling ya when they arrive and now fixed RoW's A law banning panhandling, probably
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Sep 18, 2016 02:39
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The White House just put out an urbanism wet dream of policy prescriptions: https://www.whitehouse.gov/sites/whitehouse.gov/files/images/Housing_Development_Toolkit%20f.2.pdf The essential message is that heavy-handed zoning restrictions cost money, increase inequality, and exacerbate segregation. The recommendations are: -by right development -tax or donate vacant land -streamline/shorten permitting processes -eliminate parking minimums -allow ADUs -establish density bonuses -zone more high-density and multifamily -inclusionary zoning -development tax or value capture incentives (not sure what this means as I haven't read the full paper yet) -property tax abatements
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Sep 26, 2016 16:47
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Badger of Basra posted:The White House just put out an urbanism wet dream of policy prescriptions: https://www.whitehouse.gov/sites/whitehouse.gov/files/images/Housing_Development_Toolkit%20f.2.pdf Too ambitious. Local politicians won't forget that their votes come from current residents and not DC or prospective residents. Focus first on one or two things that can be tied to federal funding. Otherwise it's too easy for the city council to say "Obama wants all the 'undesirables' to move in."
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Sep 26, 2016 19:26
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I mean anything is too ambitious considering the federal government has very few ways to change local zoning rules (the grants mentioned in the intro). I think the biggest help from this is that now urbanists in left-leaning cities can point to this and say "if you're calling us astroturf pro-developer shills you're saying the same thing about Obama."
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Sep 26, 2016 19:31
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The DC City Council put out a resolution calling on Metro to restore late-night rail service when the system-wide reconstruction program ends next spring. Metro claims they need the extra time for maintenance. How do other two track systems handle 24-hour service? Do they just close down lines periodically overnight?
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Oct 12, 2016 15:59
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There are almost no 24 hour rail networks in the... world. According to this which seems in line with what I've heard, there are only 8 in the world. I don't think WMATA was ever a system with 24 hour service, they're just complaining that they can't do the maintenance in the 5-7 hours they'd get normally every night so they want more. WMATA is bad at running a subway.
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Oct 12, 2016 16:03
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Neon Belly posted:The DC City Council put out a resolution calling on Metro to restore late-night rail service when the system-wide reconstruction program ends next spring. Metro claims they need the extra time for maintenance. In NYC we do maintenance and repairs on live, in use tracks on a regular basis. While very large, disruptive jobs require removing a section of track from service, rails, signals, stops, and switches can be (and generally are) replaced or overhauled under traffic. To make this safe, we have flagging rules, and where CBTC trains operate, we diable automatic train operation and require manually driven trains in the area. Flagging refers to the setting out of colored lights (at night or below ground) or flags (above ground during the day) at set distances from the work area, which tell train operators to reduce their speed, or to stop until given a proceed signal by an employee dedicated solely to flagging for that job.
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Oct 12, 2016 16:35
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FISHMANPET posted:There are almost no 24 hour rail networks in the... world. According to this which seems in line with what I've heard, there are only 8 in the world. It's not a system with 24-hour service, and that's not what they are being asked to return to. I was just curious because they claim that they need the extra time for maintenance, but there are viable systems that appear to work well with less allotted time.
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Oct 12, 2016 16:44
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Living in one of those 8 metro areas with 24/7 (though only barely, of Minneapolis/St Paul's two rail lines, one runs hourly overnight) I will say that occasionally the rail system just gets shut down for a weekend and replaced with buses. We've also got enough crossovers that a section of track can be closed and run single tracked. That only works because of our comparatively low frequencies though, 10 minutes normally, and they would have to 15 minute or something to run single track.
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Oct 12, 2016 17:04
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FISHMANPET posted:Living in one of those 8 metro areas with 24/7 (though only barely, of Minneapolis/St Paul's two rail lines, one runs hourly overnight) I will say that occasionally the rail system just gets shut down for a weekend and replaced with buses. We've also got enough crossovers that a section of track can be closed and run single tracked. That only works because of our comparatively low frequencies though, 10 minutes normally, and they would have to 15 minute or something to run single track. Calgary lacks both 24-hour service, and the train gets shut down all the time over weekends. The worst of all worlds!
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Oct 12, 2016 17:32
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Neon Belly posted:The DC City Council put out a resolution calling on Metro to restore late-night rail service when the system-wide reconstruction program ends next spring. Metro claims they need the extra time for maintenance. The DC Metro has never run 24 hours; "late night" means "until 1 or 2 on weekends." That's it. As for other systems: Other systems usually have an extra track. The DC Metro, in their wisdom, was built with only the two tracks along every line. So most systems, when they need to do maintenance on a section of track, can just route trains around it. DC has to single-track past any maintenance, meaning it shouldn't be done during the day, and absolutely can't be done during rush hour. So, they do all the maintenance they can in the middle of the night, between closing (midnight) and opening (5am). Considering how much time it takes to just get equipment set up and taken down, they get maybe 3 hours of actual work done in a given night.
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Oct 12, 2016 17:54
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No no no, NYC is absolutely exceptional in its 4 track layout. Nobody was short sighted building WMATA as a 2 track system. 2 tracks is standard practice throughout the world.
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Oct 12, 2016 17:55
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FISHMANPET posted:No no no, NYC is absolutely exceptional in its 4 track layout. Nobody was short sighted building WMATA as a 2 track system. 2 tracks is standard practice throughout the world. Yeah, Paris runs (roughly) 5:30 AM to 12:40 AM every single day (and until 1:40 AM on Fridays and Saturdays and days before a holiday) and has insane frequency and a massive network. They only use 2 tracks and somehow manage to get their maintenance done (and not have things on fire, most of the time). More tracks are useful, but they aren't representative of system resilience.
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Oct 12, 2016 18:13
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Neon Belly posted:It's not a system with 24-hour service, and that's not what they are being asked to return to. I was just curious because they claim that they need the extra time for maintenance, but there are viable systems that appear to work well with less allotted time.
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Oct 12, 2016 20:14
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probably also that WMATA is in a jurisdictionally weird position where they do not have dedicated funding nor a single stable state government supporting it but rather have to petition for funding from two states, an independent district that lacks many state powers, and the us congress
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Oct 12, 2016 22:47
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Right but it's not even a funding thing, they seem to be uniquely incompetent and unproductive. For example, the stories about FTA inspectors being purposely locked out of Metro's control center.
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Oct 12, 2016 23:19
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FISHMANPET posted:There are almost no 24 hour rail networks in the... world. According to this which seems in line with what I've heard, there are only 8 in the world. mmm mmm mmm fuckin love that the only line of 24 hour rail in my entire country is a single direct path to channnel the suckers from the city centre to a fuckin casino mmm love that nsw state government priorities 👌👌👌
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Oct 13, 2016 00:32
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Divorced And Curious posted:mmm mmm mmm fuckin love that the only line of 24 hour rail in my entire country is a single direct path to channnel the suckers from the city centre to a fuckin casino mmm love that nsw state government priorities 👌👌👌
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Oct 13, 2016 09:34
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Golbez posted:The DC Metro has never run 24 hours; "late night" means "until 1 or 2 on weekends." That's it. Which I acknowledged. Golbez posted:As for other systems: Other systems usually have an extra track. The DC Metro, in their wisdom, was built with only the two tracks along every line. So most systems, when they need to do maintenance on a section of track, can just route trains around it. DC has to single-track past any maintenance, meaning it shouldn't be done during the day, and absolutely can't be done during rush hour. So, they do all the maintenance they can in the middle of the night, between closing (midnight) and opening (5am). Considering how much time it takes to just get equipment set up and taken down, they get maybe 3 hours of actual work done in a given night. Two track systems are the norm, not three/four track, and much better run systems do just fine with them. boner confessor posted:probably also that WMATA is in a jurisdictionally weird position where they do not have dedicated funding nor a single stable state government supporting it but rather have to petition for funding from two states, an independent district that lacks many state powers, and the us congress This is probably a huge part of the problem. Too much ambiguity in funding makes it really hard to plan.
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Oct 13, 2016 18:14
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Neon Belly posted:This is probably a huge part of the problem. Too much ambiguity in funding makes it really hard to plan. This is almost certainly the root of it all, though there's bound to be other factors-- you're right that WMATA appears to be uniquely incompetent and it's hard to say exactly why; shakeups in management have appeared to make little headway in that regard. It's hard to say how to solve the dedicated funding problem, though. I suppose you could amend the WMATA Compact, which gives the agency its borrowing and operating authority, to give it tax-levying powers or something, but it's an interstate compact and requires authority from all involved state-level bodies and Congress and loving  at that ever happening. Plus then I'm pretty sure constitutionally it'd need to be an elected board and I honestly have no idea how the WMATA board is chosen. Appointed by governors I think?
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Oct 13, 2016 18:20
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Minnesota has a regional government (Metropolitan Council) that has taxing authority but isn't elected, just appointed by the governor. So unless there's something in Virginia and Maryland expressly forbidding it, or if it being multiple states changes things, it should be possible.
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Oct 13, 2016 18:28
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I've had this idea that if I were in charge of Metro, I'd just shut the whole rail system down immediately, and do as much maintenance catch-up work as possible until DC, MD and VA agree to give it regular funding. Two birds, one stone.
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Oct 13, 2016 19:25
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Quorum posted:This is almost certainly the root of it all, though there's bound to be other factors-- you're right that WMATA appears to be uniquely incompetent and it's hard to say exactly why; shakeups in management have appeared to make little headway in that regard. It's hard to say how to solve the dedicated funding problem, though. I suppose you could amend the WMATA Compact, which gives the agency its borrowing and operating authority, to give it tax-levying powers or something, but it's an interstate compact and requires authority from all involved state-level bodies and Congress and loving Basing this theory off of my somewhat brief experience working for a state government, it probably boils down to a lack of direction or clear hierarchy. I mean you're talking about an organizational body that is in a hyper-political spot that basically has to appease 2 state governments, the federal district, and the U.S. congress. So you have managers that are paralyzed from making decisions for fear of pissing off anyone higher on the chain from them (or god forbid the external shareholders) and as a result, the rank and file have no direction and no clear vision to follow, so they'll just do as little as they can get away with while still holding their jobs.
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Oct 13, 2016 19:30
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Cock Democracy posted:I've had this idea that if I were in charge of Metro, I'd just shut the whole rail system down immediately, and do as much maintenance catch-up work as possible until DC, MD and VA agree to give it regular funding. Two birds, one stone. Pretty sure this is the glorious fantasy of any public transit enthusiast, which lasts exactly as long as it takes to remember the economic impact on people who really can't afford it.  New NYT story about the slow degradation of the New Jersey transit system. Christie deserves every ounce of pain that's coming his way.
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Oct 13, 2016 19:36
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FEC is for sale: http://trn.trains.com/news/news-wire/2016/10/14-fec-sale Hot take: NS buys them out to compete with CSX in Florida.
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Oct 14, 2016 18:53
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Updates for OP: Your DC section in the OP could use a mention of DC's klutzy attempts to restore streetcar service, which last I saw was years behind track and runs just a couple miles of a hipsterifyng corridor and takes a goodly stroll through a huge train station to reach the subway proper. Also the Maryland extension you mention is the planned Purple Line, which afaik is an incremental nod to the much earlier intent to have a line tracing the entire Beltway. Your movie section of the OP needs to add The Taking of Pelham One Two Three, a 1974 film where criminals take a NYC subway train hostage: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Taking_of_Pelham_One_Two_Three_(1974_film) . Apparently NYC dispatches are named for the originating station and time, and for years following the film the system deliberately avoided having traIns on the Pelham route leave at 1:23 so as to avoid any association (like avoiding naming future ships The Titanic).
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Oct 16, 2016 03:56
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One point about automation: I love systems that have designated gates only for tap-systems. DC does not, so in tourist season it sucked when I was trying to get to work, and all four inbound gates in front of me are tied up by multiple members of the Swenson clan of North Dakota who spread out across all lanes trying to figure out which slot their paper card goes into so they can get over to the Smithsonian. I love helping tourists find their way when I'm not in a hurry, but the gate clusters are the single worst thing about tourists. Except for when they ride a packed escalator to the next level, take one step off and then pause to get their bearings as the elevator shoves a dozen people into their backs. For a little international flavor, I will say that Bogota, Colombia's transit system does a really impressive job of mocking rail using conventional buses. The main corridors aren't chintzy little stops with one signpost and a bench, they're huge building-sized covered structures in the road median that each service dozens of routes, ticket kiosks, transit police, automated doors closing off entries until the bus aligns, etc. And for some major thoroughfares, dedicated lanes and some downtown tunnel. don't know if they have any intent to eventually replace some of the buses with rail, but for the main corridors it seems Also Bogota has some really decent bike lanes, which also allow <?kph electric bikes and scooters, with entire stores downtown dedicated to small electric vehicles. And while not functionally huge, culturally it's awesome that there's a once-weekly Ciclovía where they close down about thirty blocks of a major thoroughfare and restrict it to bikes/skates/dogs/pedestrians. Between great transit, great Uber and also regular taxis that are so heavily smartphone-hailed that it's semi-pointless trying to hand-flag one, Bogota is just awesome. TapTheForwardAssist fucked around with this message at 02:31 on Oct 17, 2016 |
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Oct 16, 2016 04:23
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I discovered this thread last evening and quickly read through a lot of it, although I'll admit not all. I live in Denver within two miles of work and bike, which has given me a new appreciation for urban design. I love cycling to work, but the stretch of Colfax around the Bluebird is a pain to deal with. I've been on Strong Towns per a link in here. It has a lot of interesting ideas I haven't been privy to. I'm wondering if people have other sites they use to stay up to date on policies, philosophies, etc in regard to transit? I mean this for general stuff and also for Denver specifically. I'd love to learn more, especially as this topic intersects with my beliefs about social justice and environmentalism.
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Oct 17, 2016 00:34
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TapTheForwardAssist posted:One point about automation: I love systems that have designated gates only for tap-systems. DC does not, so in tourist season it sucked when I was trying to get to work, and all four inbound gates in front of me are tied up by multiple members of the Swenson clan of North Dakota who spread out across all lanes trying to figure out which slot their paper card goes into so they can get over to the Smithsonian. I love helping tourists find their way when I'm not in a hurry, but the gate clusters are the single worst thing about tourists. Except for when they ride a packed escalator to the next level, take one step off and then pause to get their bearings as the elevator shoves a dozen people into their backs.. The worst thing about DC metro from a tourist's POV are the loving incomprehensible fares and corresponding ticket machines. I even had to try to explaim it to some locals (well, Americans, at least). In think Munich had something similar, except also in German, so there I just gave up and just drove straight to the center. God bless NYC and its one ticket one ride.
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Oct 17, 2016 06:46
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TapTheForwardAssist posted:One point about automation: I love systems that have designated gates only for tap-systems. DC does not, so in tourist season it sucked when I was trying to get to work, and all four inbound gates in front of me are tied up by multiple members of the Swenson clan of North Dakota who spread out across all lanes trying to figure out which slot their paper card goes into so they can get over to the Smithsonian. I used to have a fun commute: 15-minute drive to commuter rail, 1.5 hours to DC, 20-30min on DC metro. One way. Even got mentioned in a Post article. To be honest, as awful as it was, many days I prefer it to my 1.5-hour round-trip by car that I do now. Edit: Hah, I sound kind of dumb in my quote. I wasn't trying to say "TRAINS CAN'T POSSIBLY TRAVEL FOR TWO HOURS," I was trying to say "The MARC commuter train seems to have been designed for passengers to take a 30-45 minute trip. Any longer and those seats are massively loving uncomfortable." The Macaroni fucked around with this message at 18:49 on Oct 18, 2016 |
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Oct 18, 2016 18:46
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TapTheForwardAssist posted:One point about automation: I love systems that have designated gates only for tap-systems. DC does not, so in tourist season it sucked when I was trying to get to work, and all four inbound gates in front of me are tied up by multiple members of the Swenson clan of North Dakota who spread out across all lanes trying to figure out which slot their paper card goes into so they can get over to the Smithsonian. Hope I can make your day by saying that DC has obsoleted paper tickets, so the Swenson clan will be able to get on their merry way much quicker. 
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Oct 18, 2016 19:04
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Combed Thunderclap posted:Hope I can make your day by saying that DC has obsoleted paper tickets, so the Swenson clan will be able to get on their merry way much quicker.
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Oct 18, 2016 19:24
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