Grating on a Curve

I was in Houston for a work meeting last spring and went on a tour with our good friend Christof Spieler who has taken a hiatus from blogging at CTC Houston while he is an active member of the board for Houston Metro.  He was kind enough to take me around to a lot of the new construction going on to complete Houston's three newest light rail lines.  I must say I was blown away at the progress and opportunities that the system holds.

Houston's Light Rail Plans via Christof Spieler

I know there is a lot of consternation in Houston from certain congressional parties that if they had it their way would never have let the city build its first line.  But I'm sure glad they did because it's allowed them so much political support to push forward with the system they are installing now.  While even that had its fits and starts as well as issues with general managers and vehicle orders, I firmly believe that this will be the most European system in the United States when completed.

North Corridor Construction



Unlike any other LRT system in the United States, they eschewed existing freight rights of way and made the conscious decision to run in the major corridors with dedicated guideways.  This is going to bring unprecedented mobility to the newly served areas as well as perhaps a few issues as well.

While many say that Houston has no zoning, what it really means is that Houston has no use restrictions.  Unless your neighborhood has existing deed restrictions, anything is fair game as long as it pencils in your pro-forma.  Making that pro-forma more difficult is all of the setback and parking regulations that are required from the city.  It costs a lot of money and changes development dynamics but the lack of use restrictions allow development such as the housing below.  Townhouses on small lots that would never have been allowed in any other single family neighborhood. 


Southwest Corridor in East Downtown (EDO)



This also raises the issue of affordable housing.  While the lack of building restrictions keeps prices fairly low, extremely low in fact when compared to SF or NYC, it doesn't mean that neighborhoods won't see some drastic changes coming to their neighborhoods.




If you would like to see a few more of the images from the trip, check out my Flickr page

The Seats are Gross

BART is getting a bit old.  It's not New York Subway old or heck Budapest Subway old, but the train cars in the BART system are the oldest out of any in the country.  So forgive me if I get annoyed when Linton Johnson, the PR person for BART says that replacing cars is sexy while routers and other background operational stuff is not.

"Things like routers and train control systems aren't as sexy as new rail cars," Johnson said, "but you can't run trains without those systems."

You know what else you can't run trains without?  Paying customers!  Those BART seats in many of the cars are so gross looking and sagging that I refuse to sit down on many of them.  If anyone wants a tip, generally the last car on the Pittsburgh Bay Point train is refurbished with rubber floors and new seats.  Amazing what that can do to make me feel better about sitting down where a million people have been.



Also, if new rail cars are so sexy, how come we didn't want sexy time faster than 40 years of the system?  And as Ben at Second Avenue Sagas says, make em plastic.  I'm not saying don't fix the bugs in the system.  Being on time also keeps customers.  But don't pit one improvement over another.  You need both. Get it done already.

Off the Line in Houston

Houston has been studying constructing a commuter line down the 249 corridor but if it plays out as usual, it's going to skip a number of employment centers because the freight right of way just skirts them.  Currently the study done by the HGAC states that its not one of the main corridors and that ridership will only be about 5,000 riders.  This is a miniscule amount but the reasoning is simple, it doesn't connect the center of the most important trip destination on the North End, the former headquarters of Compaq computer.

 

Via Houston Business Journal

Since these buildings are going to be the central piece of a redevelopment strategy for the area, it would also be good to start thinking about how to develop the rail line to connect this place.  

But how would that even be possible?  They are so close yet so far apart.  This is part of the problem with focusing on commuter rail in existing freight rights of way.  In this instance, is a freeway alignment better than the freight?  It sure looks like it, because it then becomes at least a little walkable, meaning more workers would use the line.  I'm not holding out hope that this will actually happen though.  

Loop Roads or Bust

It's been open season on long term capital improvements for fixed guideway transit.  First there's Minnesota Republicans looking to hack into transit by stealing operating money.  Then you get the fun times in North Carolina where Republicans are trying to cut out funding for the North Corridor light rail line.  But I found the article a bit funny, especially when they were saying, we don't have enough money for transit but more than enough for a completely un-needed beltway.  

...it would kill Gaston County's proposed Garden Parkway toll road, using money from that project for urban loop roads, perhaps including Interstate 485.

You know, that loop road that developers really want for their sprawl. And then...

"We wanted to target more dollars to maintaining the system we have - as opposed to building new roads, new bridges, new parts of the system," said Senate Leader Phil Berger, a Rockingham County Republican.

How the reporters didn't see this and do a double take on the building loops and not spending on new roads is beyond me.

BART to Livermore a Horrible Idea

There I said it, BART to Livermore is a bad idea. Even if we could make the line downtown less expensive, it would still get minimal riders unless Livermore decided that they were going to make a massive push to make downtown an employment center. We know that's not going to happen, so we shouldn't even be building a BART line there. It's just not worth it.

That's not to say you shouldn't build transit, but if you want to spend 3 billion dollars to get 30,000 riders, why not build infill stations at 30th street and San Antonio? I bet that would cost less than a billion dollars. Then take the extra two billion that you would spend and put it towards a regional Geary Subway and second tube that would end up getting 100,000 riders a day and perhaps allow commuter rail lines from around the region to get into San Francisco's Transbay Terminal. You know, make it more Transbay than just bridge buses.

But it looks like we might not need to even try to kill this line, because the NIMBYs who only want a freeway alignment will do it for us. The only way that a line would have worked out there is if it picked up the employment centers and dense housing in Pleasanton and Livermore.

50 Years for a System?

The Twin Cities finally signed its full funding grant agreement(FFGA) with the FTA for the Central Corridor. This just 7 years after the completion of its first light rail line, the Hiawatha. In the meantime the Northstar Commuter Line was completed. Now they are planning for the Southwest Corridor and gearing up for that long haul fight as well. With any luck, that line will be signing its FFGA in less than a decade. But why does it take so long to build these transit lines and why are regions doing them one by one? Well, the answer as usual is money.

However of all places, Los Angeles has provided a discussion spark. The 30/10 program now nationally renamed America Fast Forward has pushed the Transit Space Race forward at least an inch, giving hope to regions tired of doing things one line at a time. Salt Lake City has proved expansion can be done on time and on budget and now other regions are starting to think, why not us? The Twin Cities is no different, with local leaders seeing the possibilities.

I'm hopeful that this will push the discussion along as to why it took ~40 years to build a network of national freeways but it seems like building out real transit networks in cities might take over 100 at the current pace. It's not like there aren't a lot of projects out there (complete excel sheet on the page). In fact, there are over 600 fixed guideway transit projects and that doesn't even count all of the frequent bus and trolley bus service that is being planned. That's not to say that all those lines are good lines, but they are out there.

I can only hope that we move past the one line a decade mentality and build lines that matter.

Bay Area TOD Policy Might Work

We've had lots of discussions about freeway running light rail and transit and some folks say its ok as long as the major nodes are connected. I probably subscribe to that version, but when it comes down to it I'd rather have the ends of lines not be parking lots. That's why I was glad to see that the BART to Livermore extension was actually going to end in downtown Livermore, not along the freeway. This was thanks in part I believe to the MTC TOD policy, which states that you need to have a certain amount of housing units to build certain technologies like BART. Now of course that policy in itself isn't as powerful as it should be but at least its a good start.

However that won't stop some folks in Livermore from arguing that they thought the line was going down the freeway median all along. What's the point of building a rapid transit line like BART if you're just going to park cars around the stations?! Apparently some people don't get this.

"I guess the thing that's hardest for me to comprehend is that they're putting this train right down the most populated part (of the city) they could come up with,"

Because that's the point! Going to the most populated places so the $3.8 billion line will actually have more riders than parking spaces is the goal. I would personally do it a little differently, but that's just me.

Indianapolis Follows The Wrong Footsteps

In November an Indianapolis group called Indy Connect released their long range vision for transit in the region. It's chock full of all the stuff transit geeks love including lines on maps. I'm not going to go into the details of the plan as Yonah at Transport Politic has already got that angle. Additionally, the locals at Urban Indy have done a good job getting the initial reactions from folks on the ground.

But I definitely approve of bringing down the bus headways to real levels that would start to make ridership equal that of other regions of similar size. Places like Austin, Columbus, and Charlotte are similar size with daily ridership much higher.

Austin - 108,300
Columbus - 58,400
Charlotte - 103,500
Indianapolis - 29,700

But that's not really the issue I wanted to address. Also in the plan are several commuter rail lines, light rail, and BRT that isn't really RT due to its lack of dedicated lanes in the plan. The light rail has been pushed back I'm assuming based on cost and the first rail corridor they want to build is the Northeast Line. While this looks like the deal of the century, they should really take advantage of the fact that they are late to the Transit Space Race by looking at what other regions have done and the consequences of their actions.

Politically it looks like a short term winner with a long term loser. Build the commuter rail line on an existing freight rail ROW on the cheap to get voters in suburban jurisdictions to buy into the plan. They'll vote for it because its cheap and the voters of the main jurisdiction will think they are getting a rail line because that's what you're selling with pictures of commuter lines in Chicago and Philadelphia and Austin. But the people that really want it will just get bus lines for their trouble.

Curious that last city I listed. Because they went first, Austin tested the waters with this type of plan. Back in 2000 there was a light rail election that lost by less than 2,000 votes because George Bush was on the ballot among other reasons. That line would have hit all the employment centers and gotten about 37,000 riders, more than all of Indianapolis' transit does now. But it lost, so in 2004 Austin got the politically palatable solution that is now a commuter rail line taking about 800 riders a day from Leander to the North to the outskirts of downtown Austin. Take a look at these cities aerial photos and let me know if you see something familiar.

Indianapolis - Left Yellow is the University, Middle Yellow is Downtown, State Capital and the red line is the commuter rail.


Austin - Top Yellow is University of Texas, Bottom Yellow is State Capital and Downtown


See a resemblance? Both lines skirt places people want to go. Austin's line gets around 800 riders a day. For the last 6 years Austin has been discussing urban rail to go places where the commuter rail line did not go. However the plan keeps getting pushed back for a number of different reasons that are mostly political. But if they would have done the right line first, neighborhoods all over the city would be begging for extensions to a current system. The politics would be a no brainer but as it currently stands, people are still a little hesitant to put their money where their mouth is in terms of an actual urban rail plan in Austin. That's not to say they aren't working on it, but it's a very uphill battle.

That's the political price that Indy is going to pay if they build the NE Corridor first. Forget all the good will of increased headways and higher ridership for the rest of the system. Charlotte has shown that people won't remember you for your increased ridership. I'm guessing that before the 1998 sales tax increase, Charlotte was in a similar place as Indianapolis is now. But the opposition picked apart the half cent mercilessly and focused on the train. Luckily the train was a success and Charlotte saved their half cent sales tax from repeal, but the attack was on right away. So in a place like Indy where people are much more afraid of taxes for these types of expenditures, if you're going to build a line, do it right or that cheap victory is going to end up being an expensive long term defeat.

But where should the line go? Well let's look at Austin's 37,000 expected ridership year 2000 alignment or Houston's line that passes 290,000+ jobs or even Phoenix which hits the major downtown corridor and Arizona State. It's about the job connections. These lines connected jobs to people. So where are Indy's jobs?

Looking at LEHD data from On the Map, we can see that employment is clustered around the CBD and State complex. The University is a major employer as well to the west of the downtown cluster with the big red dot. (Red = 10k jobs)


But take a look at where the Red line goes, which is the Northeast Corridor. The yellow line is my idea of where a transit corridor should be. And while there are is a fake BRT corridor that goes where the Yellow line is on the map above, it won't get the same type of TOD investment and revitalization they are hoping for unless they rig the headways really high to 5-10 minutes for Rapid service all day or build dedicated lanes for rail or bus.

But the other reason I think that Yellow line is key is because if you look at where the downtown workers actually live at densities that might warrant transit capacity like that, it's not on that red line but up the yellow one. Again LEHD data:

You could also make a strong case for the light rail line if it were a bit north on the West side and crossed downtown and hit the University. While the commuter rail line might be a good idea for a mature transit system, it's future political suicide for expansion prospects. The reason being is that the region is not going to get any worthwhile excitement in terms of sheer ridership numbers for a starter rail line. Houston got ~40,000 riders to start. Charlotte got ~16,000 riders to start and Phoenix is at ~35,000 by connecting major destinations on the corridors. If this line is like Austin and so far its looking like that is the case, I'm going to bet on an anemic 500-2000 riders at most.

Again that is a short term win looking for a long term loss. If I were Indy, I would start pushing hard to have that North BRT line dedicated ROW, or do a tram-train to Noblesville. The tram-train is likely to get killer ridership and suburban support. There is the benefit of learning from those who have gone before and made the mistakes. No need to make them again so that you're hamstrung into the future. I'm all for trains as people who have read this site over the years know, but do it right, or don't do it at all.

Sunday Night Notes

Whew, it's been a little while. Still reading lots of news and tweeting nightly. Wanted to cover these few news articles in greater than 140 characters though:

Utah's possible new Senator is saying he's going to cut off the spigot for transit capital funding from the feds saying that he doesn't believe they should be spending money on state and regional priorities. I happen to disagree with this but its an interesting question of

A. what is a regional or state vs. a national priority
B. what would he stance be if it were regional freeway expansion instead of transit

Seems to me much of this debate seems to be framed by subsidization rather than investment. The language needs changing if the livable transportation movement is going to make any ground.
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The Green Line extension to Boston which is a Big Dig offset is delayed again. I'm not sure how anyone could speed it up, but it seems like the state can't really be punished in terms of money more than it already has.
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Transit Miami gets the scoop on the Heavy Rail plug being pulled in the Miami region. This will set Miami back a lot, though local officials say they will refocus on BRT. How much do you want to bet that BRT means limited stop buses only?
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I think this article about job incentives moving employers from state to state which means no new jobs are gained but tax gains for the region are less is replicated around the country when cities fight so hard for sales tax dollars that they lop off the benefits of those jobs. The one that always comes to mind is Emeryville and Oakland.

Stadium Implosions and TOD

Well today was the day. 39 year old Texas Stadium was imploded as its functioning life was deemed over. However the death of a stadium opens up new opportunities for urbanism and some challenges.



The Loop 12 station is going to be located here when the development is finally ready for it but I question the planning of a station along a freeway or in a place where the freeway can severely hamper residential development. Part of the problem with getting cozy with the highway is that you cut off half of the walk shed from the station. In this instance, it's even more than half with the number of freeways that exist in criss cross. Below is the map of the regional transit plan and below that is the station location sourced from the environmental impact statement.




You can see Texas stadium where the main redevelopment opportunity is on city owned land. But the planned station is on the other side of a major freeway, and most of it is a private shipping company under the white blob I've drawn to show the area without a freeway barrier near the station. It's likely that this area will be best for office and some dense residential, but a grid network needs to be reintroduced on both sides for it to become a walkable urban place. It might be even better to route the transit through the center of the white blob to maximize the station area. It does move the station further away from the stadium parcel, but at the same time, it increases the probability of transit accessibility for buildings within the vicinity of the station.

It's a hard decision, but ultimately we need to stop building stations and alignments that are based on the previous freeway paradigm. Creating walkable urban places that connect to others through transit means that we need to connect opportunities, not freeway medians.

St. Louis Kinda Back in the Transit Space Race

I haven't talked about the transit space race in a while because not a lot of big news has been happening. That and I've been a bit busy lately. But tonight a huge event took place in which a half cent sales tax was passed to better bus service and build light rail extensions to other parts of the St. Louis region, building off of one of the great light rail success stories in this country.

Yonah over at Transport Politic drew a map earlier this year of what the increase could help build over a 30 year period, though some of it is a bit wishful thinking because while $75 million a year is a lot of money, it's not the same as say Measure R's $40B in Los Angeles. But what it also did is trigger a City of St. Louis tax that was approved in 1997, raising an additional quarter cent, valued by some at around $8 million per year.

I hope that they increase the bus service much more because currently the service is subpar. This infusion hopefully allows them to fix that and move forward. I'm hopeful that the anti-tax sentiment out there didn't get to this plan and transit marches forward. Even sweeter in Wendell Cox's backyard.

Movement Depression and the Way Forward

It's been a bit rough lately. With the economy in the tank and people not wanting to spend any money, I've had great hope that some places were continuing to move forward with their urban rail plans. But the opponents fight harder than ever because they see the threat or people don't plan things enough to go forward with any confidence. Just today, the list of articles that show how hard we have to keep working was a bit much for me to handle.

Houston - The Mayor questions whether there is money to pay for two lines of the new five line light rail expansion in the city.

Austin - The Mayor decides its not time to have a bond election to pay for a future urban rail line.

Scotland - The company building Edinburgh's tram wants to delay 30 months after the rough ride they have already had.

Tampa - Ballot issue for rail dead for now due to lack of decision in how much of the funding would go to the rail project.

Bellevue: The city council is a bunch of morons there and don't want to run the line through a dense employment center.

There is a ray of hope out there. The Mayor of Los Angeles made me feel a bit better recently when he decided that he was going to ask to get things done faster. Ask for a loan so you can save billions in construction costs and have something built for your money faster. I would like to think that is how we work in the United States. But sometimes reading all the news I do just gets so depressing. At least someone has suggested a way forward. Whether we follow it or not is up to us.

Public Input in Ogden

I was really shocked by this quote in Standard Net, the newspaper for Ogden Utah:

UTA spokesman Gerry Carpenter said he is impressed with the amount of homework and energy the Trolley District group put in and believes the group has worthy goals, but it may be coming to the table too late.

That last part about coming to the table too late is outrageous considering the group has been looking at the 25th street alignment over the 36th street alignment for over a year and has been very vocal about it as well. They were never allowed at the table, so to say they were late is a bit disingenuous. I know this only because I went to speak about streetcars in Ogden about a year ago, though not to advocate for a specific route. The activists were pounding the pavement in support then and are still on the path now.

It shows a disconnect between the citizen process and leaders such as the Mayor of Ogden who haven't wanted to see the 25th street alignment considered at all because 36th was his idea. There was also thefear of the state DOT who people have always believe would not want the streetcar running on their road, whether in a dedicated ROW or not. Perhaps the upstart group should look to some of the Urbanophile's suggestions for beating state DOTs and apply them to both UDOT and UTA.

Voting for Streetlights, Manhole Cover Locations

I don't quite understand where there is this want to vote for transit improvements that aren't related to tax increases. The most recent example of this after Cincinnati's issue 9 is Boise, where local city council member Dave Lister is looking to put a measure on the Ballot that would require a 50% vote to build a streetcar even though there is no tax increase involved.

The precedent for this is Capital Metro in Austin, which is the only public agency in the United States that has ever required a vote for city services for which it already had the money to construct. In fact if a vote was required for every rail project in the United States we might not have successful rail projects in San Diego, Houston, or Denver who's first lines were built with existing funds without voter approval.

We don't have votes for road expansions, only bond measures to pay for them. We don't have votes for water treatment plants or new sewer systems that we have money for. Perhaps if we need to raise money we would ask the people. What is so different about rail transit infrastructure that requires a pure democratic vote? Isn't that why we elect city council members? To make more informed decisions on these issues than the general electorate can take on.

It's actually a road we've been traveling down in California and other places where elected officials wimp out behind expected voter mandates instead of taking a strong stand. Many places have councils that have taken a stand against streetcars and other projects which is great because they are stepping up to say yes or no, but whenever a council gets close to making a decision in their favor, it seems like these pure democracy votes pop up for something that doesn't require a tax increase. Ultimately infrastructure decisions shouldn't be left up to a vote unless there is a tax increase involved. I imagine that nothing would ever get done if it were the case that every infrastructure decision needed a vote. It's bad enough as it is with lacking political will in this country to do anything forward thinking, why put another layer on it?

Abu Dhabi Moving on Tram Plan

When I think of Abu Dhabi I think of Nermal. You know, the cat that Garfield always wanted to get rid of and send to the middle eastern region.

Jim Davis, Garfield via Photobucket

But soon you might be thinking about tramways as Abu Dhabi looks to potentially build 340km of tramways.

The project, known as the Abu Dhabi Light Rail Transit/Tram study involves 340 kilometers of tram lines and is one of several major transportation projects that make up the Surface Transport Master Plan. The department expects the LRT to start operating in 2014.

What I'm wondering about with these tram plans in middle eastern cities is are they connected to urban development plans that focus on walkability? It seems that a common complaint about the system in Dubai is that buildings aren't really in sync with how the transit operates. But that is likely a building design issue with urbanism in the area around the line. I say this mostly because it looks like there is a good grid pattern in the city.

Network Expansion

New Orleans is looking to build three new lines while Portland has approved a reference plan for a streetcar network. The catch, New Orleans is looking for TIGER money, which is about as scarce as, well, Tigers in the United States. All of these proposals hinge on money. What's new?

Two Types of Approval

There's a dustup in Seattle over a voter approved streetcar on First Hill. Candidate Mallahan thinks it's not so smart and would oppose it on the grounds of its expense. Of course he's showing his true colors faster than anyone expected but his even bigger mistake in my eyes is stating that the tunnel deal between the city, state, and county is more of a done deal because of the years it has taken to come to agreement. As if voter approval was just something for the plebes. While its nice that they came to agreement, it's not what voters even wanted and shows a disconnect between what voter approved means and what politician approved means.

"Secondly, when voters vote for something and fund it, as they have with the First Hill Street Car, we should build it. And Mr. Mallahan doesn't seemto think that's the case. But he also seems to think we should build a tunnel that 70 percent of Seattle voters oppose."
...
Mallahan's campaign shrugged off the attack and accused McGinn of inconsistency and hypocrisy because he wants to thwart the $4.3 billion Alaskan Way Viaduct replacement tunnel project that took years for the state, City and King County to agree on.

I don't quite understand the inconstancy, but this is coming from someone who believes unfunded backroom highway deals are more important than voter approved funded transit deals.

Preservation & Resevations

As a former runner I appreciate trails of all kinds. It's easier on your legs and trails are a good way to get around without having to be in traffic. With that being said, the idea that we should be reserving our right of ways for trails alone instead of trails and transit seems shortsighted. While I applaud the rails to trails folks for what they've been doing, the creation of a trail while the use for rails waits for a project only encourages a permanent trail.

In the case of Whittier, the construction of a trail has likely built up political will and precluded the ROW from ever being used for transit ever again which is a real shame since it would be possible to share. It's also possible that it won't be the best alternative. Eventually though it might come in handy. The trail is on the far right alternative within the city of Whittier.


On a similar note, short term gains should not outweigh long term benefits. In the case of Buffalo, the transit authority is looking to sell some ROW that could be used for long term gain. I understand there are trying times around the country, but these types of decisions that aren't looking at the long term consequences are trouble and it points to the loss of long term thinking in how we make decisions.

Think Different

I think Atrios has the right idea:

I'm not saying travel time is not an issue at all, but fundamentally such projects are about reducing car dependency and changing land use patterns. We generally don't talk about them like that, and the Feds mostly don't think about them like that, but that's really what they're about. Simply speeding people from point A to point B isn't the purpose, the purpose is to provide a different way to get around and eventually a different environment in which to get around. If travel time is too important, then basic utility might be sacrificed by, for example, reducing the number of stops.

The feds put way too much emphasis on travel time savings. There is no way that 3A and 3C are going to have the same ridership contrary to what the models say. By skipping one of the densest neighborhoods in Minneapolis, you're reducing the ability of the line to serve more people for more trips as well as change the land use patterns even more. Yonah also makes an important point:

As a result, transit networks are encouraged to extend out into the suburbs, rather than be densified and reinforced downtown. This policy encourages sprawl; though more suburbanites may find themselves taking transit to work, they won’t be using it to go shopping or out on the weekend.

But there's another aspect as well. I believe you have to connect major destinations in a region and this is something the Southwest LRT is doing. Connecting Eden Prarie to Downtown is an important goal, and doing it quickly is important as well. However there is a trade off between the goal of speed and the goal of actually connecting destinations and origins. If there is a corridor that might be a little slower, but ultimately connect many more people, it shouldn't be discounted based on speed, but should increase the value based on access. This is something that is currently lacking in the New Starts process and something that needs to change if we're ever going to build meaningful transit lines that connect people with where they want to go.

Doubling Down - Town

The New York Times has an article about the railyards in Sacramento changing into a new neighborhood. While the market is somewhat down from mid-decade, it seems as if industrial areas adjacent to downtown are still a hot commodity.

When completed, the old Union Pacific property will become an extension of the downtown, effectively doubling its size...

Although it is playing up the history of the site, Thomas Enterprises plans to make new and old buildings harmonize through the use of similar materials, notably brick and glass.“This will not be ‘suburban urban,’ ” said Mr. Rich, alluding to the faux-historical style of many recent outdoor shopping centers. The Railyards, he said, will be “gritty, like a city.”

This will also be the pass through for the DNA line phase 1.