Kansas City's Big LRT Expose

In an attempt to jump start the discussion about where light rail should run after the Mayor declared Clay Chastain's voter approved line dead, the Kansas City Star is running a number of small vignettes in the paper today. It's a pretty good job of covering many of the issues and has a cool map to boot. A good links page is located here. I will make a note that if they want to use streetcars for this plan they should have dedicated lanes. It's fine to use the modern streetcar vehicles, but this is a transit spine not a circulator.

And if you haven't been paying attention to KC since the vote passed last fall, go check out KCLightRail.com.

France's Conservative President on Expansion of Transit

What is wrong with conservatives in the United States? Even French President Sarkozy is getting in on the transit revolution calling for a reduction in transport emissions and . When are the ostriches in this country going to get their heads out of the sand?

Outlining the measures, Sarkozy said he was in favor of a moratorium on all new highways and airports as well as shifting trucks off highways and onto railroads. Road transport accounts for a quarter of French emissions.

Earlier, Jean-Louis Borloo also announced a freeze on the building of new roads and airports while consumers will be steered away from gas-guzzling cars through bonuses and penalties. Sarkozy also wants to extend France's tram and high-speed TGV train network.

Why The Decision in Houston is a Big Deal for Everyone

While the decision to go with Light Rail for 5 corridors caught a lot of people by surprise in Houston, it might have opened up a floodgate for cities to get funding for new transit projects. I can't stress enough how big this network effect is to cities who want to build new rail transit networks. Because the federal funding process is getting tighter, cities that want to build rail networks are going to have to get creative and Denver, Houston, and Salt Lake City have so far done that in their quest for funding.

It's interesting to note that some folks around the country might have been paying attention. Mayor Funkhouser in Kansas City believes that its a regional plan or nothing for his area. Some have thought it was a bit heavy handed of him to declare Clay Chastain's plan dead, but if he's thinking about really getting federal funding for a new transit system, he needs to lead the region towards a solution that will eventually get funding. Through the current rules, it looks like a high ridership starter line that can pass the current administration's cost effectiveness test (which Chastain's plan might not have) is how it should start. The other reason is that you'll need this first line to fund an extended network later.

But because the current rules are geared towards low end BRT projects, (The Orange Line and Euclid BRT projects would have not passed the required Medium cost-effectiveness rating rule the administration wants) Houston's recent deal might breathe new life into the application process for new expansion lines in cities that want to drastically expand their systems. Currently cities like Minneapolis are building a line every 10 years, meaning a simple 6 line network could take 40 more years. A problem might arise however with cities that don't have a starter line so that the rail bias can be attained for ridership measures.

It's been pretty easy to get extensions funded by the FTA in the past and they are generally the best modeled in terms of ridership. But the FTA has been making projects cut down their costs to make the rating. The Central Corridor has had a cap on how much it can cost meaning the locals don't have complete control over some of the decisions including a tunnel under the university because of that cost. This is a project that should have been built about 30 years ago but people are just starting to get it. But Minneapolis has plans for two more lines, the Southwest Corridor and the Northwest Corridor. So if cities are going to get serious about building expansive transit networks, Houston has shown the way to go for the time being. With a new administration who knows what could happen, but if you have to dance with who brung ya, it seems like Houston has opened the door to the ball.

Waiting for Austin...

I'm going to wait to hear more before I make an assessment of the Austin rail announcement that was made this morning. I will say however, that if M1ek is right about just an extension of the streetcar plan on 51st street, I will say NO NO NO and more NO! Do I have to repeat it? NO!

Train Splits

Nick over at 295bus asks, why can't we split trains? Well it seems as if the Sprinter in Oceanside will do it. I've heard a lot of people marvel at how trains split to go in different directions once they get to a certain station, mostly in Europe, but often wondered why we couldn't do that here.

Visualize Sprawl

This is a really cool simulation of uncool sprawl. I suggest a look. HT to Transit Miami.

Tram System Logos

More fun from the Europe Trip. Here are some photos of Transit Authority Logos. I thought it was interesting the other day when ColumbusING and Xing Columbus brought us MOTO. Here are some from Graz, Budapest, Prague, and Vienna.

Graz



Budapest



Budapest Metro



Prague Metro



Vienna

Can Transit Cause a Loss of Morals?

File this under: I'm not making this up.

According to a newspaper article dug up by TwoBells (Joe Lacey) on the SFMuni history list and confirmed by other list members, Cable Cars apparently caused one San Francisco woman to become a nymphomaniac. A few weeks after coming to San Francisco in 1964, she was involved in a terrible Cable Car crash which she claims made her go against her Lutheran morals. This in turn made the cable cars more popular (3rd Article). For the whole story you have to read the articles from the San Francisco Chronicle in their entirety below. It's quite hilarious and shows that you never know what could happen on transit or in the court of law.

Six New Subway Lines to Start Construction By End of Year

Some of you might have thought 'awesome!' when you saw the title but I'm sorry to be a downer because no its not LA or San Francisco but rather Beijing which has the luck. From China View via Live from the Third Rail.

Beijing's urban planning authorities have approved planning permission for six new subway lines on which work is scheduled to begin by the end of the year.

The six new lines - the No. 6, 8 and 9 lines, the second phase of the No. 10 line, and the Yizhuang and Daxing lines, have a total length of 152 kilometers, according to the Beijing Municipal Commission of Urban Planning. They will be completed in 2012.

Beijing currently has five subway lines in operation, with a total length of 142 kilometers.

"The city aims to raise the proportion of citizens choosing public transport from the current 30 percent to 45 percent by 2015,and the subway passenger volume will increase to eight million a day from the current 2.2 million," said the commission's Zhou Nansen.

8 million a day is huge. New York City gets about 6.2 million a day. But what is interesting is that they set a goal to reach in terms of percentage of total and figure out what they need to do to reach it. It certainly would be exciting if a major city in the United States was building 6 new lines and LA comes to mind as a city that might want to do that.

LA Rockin The Transit Space Race

After the lift of the consent decree, the LACMTA has been busy planning the next wave of rail lines. Currently under construction are two lines, the Gold Line East Side and the Expo Line Phase 1. But slowly creeping up are the following lines...

The Crenshaw Corridor
Gold Line Foothill Extension
Expo Line Phase 2
Downtown Connector
Subway to the Sea

It's getting busy down there in LA, now if only they could speed it up and build them all at once like Denver, Houston, and Salt Lake City.