Photo Flashback

When I was at the Bellview Station in Denver a few months ago I snapped this photo. Would have been cool if I got an LRV to shadow the sun...perhaps next time. Also, Richard Layman mentioned the Siemens Combino Ultra in a recent post about streetcar vehicles. Here is a photo you all have probably already seen of the Combino Supra in Budapest I took while I was there in October.

High Ridership = Rail Bias

So the FTA does this thing to cities that haven't had a rail project where the first project is not given a rail bias. We know a bias exists and is about 34-43% according to a TRB report by Ed Tennyson. So in cities like Portland and Denver where they are extending their lines, they were able to use their bias. However cities like Minneapolis and Charlotte weren't able to. In 2020, the Hiawatha line was supposed to get 24,000 riders a day. But here it is 2007, 13 years away from the goal and ridership is at 29,000.

So after a year's worth of ridership data, Charlotte planners will be able to use the bias that they weren't able to use on the first line, which if the FTA used current regulations, wouldn't even have been built. Charlotte got a medium low on their cost effectiveness rating, which now the FTA says you must have a medium to even get into Preliminary Engineering. But guess what they use to calculate cost effectiveness? Ridership! Which seems to be behind recently; Houston, Minneapolis, St. Louis, and Denver have all opened lines recently and have had much higher ridership than predicted. So higher numbers lead to better CE measures, but new lines aren't allowed the bias. Does this mean that new lines aren't afforded the right numbers? Ask the folks in Columbus Ohio. Early indications say that ridership in Charlotte will be exceeded. 9,000 riders were expected and so far daily numbers have been around 12,000. I expect it will die down a little but as more development on the South Corridor comes online, more ridership will be added. What this tells me is that more cities are going to get the short end of the New Starts stick. Is anyone else ready for a new administration that cares about urban issues?

Moving from Colors to Numbers

I've been noticing as part of the space race that most cities operate their rail lines in a color system, meaning each line has a color. A good national goal should be to get cities off of the color system and to numbers and letters like New York City. Why? Because if you have numbers and letters that means you probably have more options. There are a limited amount of colors to use for light rail lines. ROY G BIV comes to mind but of course there are others in between. In Austin you could have a burnt orange line. However if you have a color system, it most likely means there aren't a lot of choices of places to go in the city. If lines are as prolific as most bus systems, I think we'll start to see good things happen. What do you all think? Is this a good goal?

Lake Oswego Rapid Streetcar Steps Toward Reality

They discarded the Rapid Bus and now are doing the EIS with either rapid streetcar or bus with system management. The best part about the streetcar is that the Tri-Met Capital funding coffers wouldn't even receive a small dent due to the fact that the ROW is worth so much. If they get a federal match, the ROW would be worth $75 million and the FTA could possibly take care of the rest of the total cost.

This would be the first modern application of the Rapid Streetcar idea. It would connect to the City of Lake Oswego to the South Waterfront Streetcar while using the same vehicles.

Miami Surprise + Subway Rangers

Initial funding was approved today as a part of the port tunnel plan for the Miami Streetcar.

Also, there was an article in the New York Times on how the Rangers take the subway to work while the Knicks park their cars wherever they want. Streetsblog has the coverage in the link above.

Two Seattle News Items

Lots of coverage over at the Seattle Transit Blog Triad...

South Lake Union Streetcar Opens
Seattle Transit Blog
Orphan Road Overlords
Orphan Road Opens

New Viaduct News
Carless in Seattle
Orphan Road
Seattle Transit Blog

Transit & Acupuncture

So I've been kinda sick for the last few months with a number of things like vertigo and sinus infections. I've decided to go get acupuncture and see if it changes anything. So today was going to be my first day and I wanted to go to my Gramma's afterwards so i decided to drive. Well the transit gods were not happy about that so they smited my car mid bay bridge. I pulled off onto treasure island as my engine temperature light was flashing at me and checked the temperature. It was above normal but wasn't to the red yet. So I let it cool off for a little bit and started to drive again. I go to the other end of the bridge before I had to stop again. Eventually I got the car to the Volkswagen dealership in Oakland and took the 51 to work downtown.

So now I had to get to the acupuncturist in Montclaire. I left an hour before the appointment as the 59 comes every hour from Lake Merritt BART. I sat in the back of a 30 foot VanHool bus and watched the really nice houses pass by on the hills. It was actually a nice ride if not a little bumpy. But there was a catch. My appointment was going to be over at 5 but the last 59 went to the Rockridge BART at 4:15 or so. Not good. So I had to figure out a way back. Well where the 59 dropped off the 18 picked up and I was lucky enough that it ran every 15 minutes into the evening. So when I was done at 5 I hopped on the 18 and traveled on the other side of the hill from the 59. It took me to the 12th Street BART station and I hopped on the 24th street and mission turn around train to go home since I wouldn't be going to my Gramma's house.

I was thinking a bit negatively that there wasn't a 59 but my roommate pointed out that we are lucky to live in a fairly transit friendly place in the bay area and the fact that there was an 18 at all was good. It was still at 15 minute headways so yes, that was pretty good. I imagine that if I were in Houston or somewhere else this wouldn't have worked. So my car died, but i knew that I could depend on transit to get me where I needed to go. It took a little more time, but I got to watch the world go by instead of having to slog through traffic.

Evil Twins

Transit Miami brings us Walk Score's evil twin. Drive Score...dun dun dun.

Houston vs. FTA Update

As it turns out, Houston had submitted documents to the FTA describing rail ready BRT lines that could be converted at some point. They just decided to go straight to light rail instead. In an article today in the Houston Chronicle, the information requested from the FTA was found to be mostly documents that Metro had already submitted. The letter that was sent seems like a last ditch effort by the FTA political appointees to scare Metro into keep moving towards the FTA's currently favored mode.

The FTA's motives for withdrawing its approval after earlier approving the planned conversion to rail are unclear, but the move smacks of partisan vindictiveness. Although Little claimed in her letter that federal guidelines required the proposal to be resubmitted, Metro officials pointed out that the document's harsh tone was a striking change from previous cooperation between the agencies.

Metro's initial plan called for rail to be laid and covered on the BRT routes in preparation for an eventual shift to trains. After the FTA allowed different formulas to be used in measuring potential ridership for the lines, Metro officials decided rail construction was feasible for all the routes.

Hopefully by next November all this political jostling will be over. However I would also like to see the transit agencies stand up to the FTA and tell their congressmen they are tried of having to deal with ideology when building their transit systems. With agencies not wanting to bite the hand that feeds them, they have just let the FTA continue to push towards higher and more ridiculous standards that keeps some cities from even applying for federal funds. Perhaps this move by Metro is the first in a set of moves by the transit industry to fight back. The Chronicle editorial says it best and speaks for all transit agencies in its comments below.

Houston needs an expanded mass transit system sooner rather than later. Our elected federal officials who support that plan need to make their voices heard at the FTA to counter rail opponents and make sure backroom power plays do not delay construction.

When Alternatives Analysis is a Wasteful Exercise

JMD at Transit in Utah points out a few projects in Los Angeles that will have to go through the AA process to get federal funding and finish their environmental assesment when it ends up wasting money. 1. The Subway to the Sea - Why would you do an AA with a BRT alternative when there is already BRT running on the street? 2. Expo Phase II - The first half is Light Rail, why require a transfer to BRT? 3. The Downtown Connector - This was supposed to connect the gold line to the blue line directly without a transfer. But why would you study a BRT connection between the two when the point was to connect the directly.

I understand doing an AA on a new corridor and in some places BRT is the best tool for the job, but forcing a study of it as an alternative when its obviously a waste of money is ridiculous. Use it to study different route alternatives instead. Besides, it looks like we are going to have to save all the money we can with the crazy inflation that is going on and the lowering of the dollar's value against other world currencies.