Crime and Transitment

Finally an article that discusses crime and light rail using the facts instead of hysteria.

That has not happened. MetroLink security has not been perfect. But, by any reasonable measure, the system is safe.

Serious crime is rare. According to agency data, there were a total of 14 robberies and 24 assaults at the system's 26 Missouri stations during 2007 — out of 19 million passenger boardings that year. The figures are consistent with national research that shows transit stations are as safe as or safer than the neighborhoods in which they're located.

In Case You Didn't Know...

In case you didn't know already, Joe Biden takes the train.

Beginning of the End

The death of streetcars started this way.

Where Else Will It Go?

NBC is planning a massive TOD project on top of the Universal Metro Station. People are complaining about the traffic impacts, but where else is this project going to go? The two office towers worth of employees and studios are going to go somewhere, so why not near good frequent transit? This is the type of development that should be encouraged, however the minimum parking requirements shouldn't. Max out the parking charges and allow people to cash out for transit passes. And Conan O'Brien should ride the Subway to do the Tonight Show when its done.

A Loss in the Transit Family

It's hard to lose a fighter. It's hard to lose an ally. Mr. Glover will be missed.

Pulling Together Land Use & Transportation

It passed. AB 375 got the votes it needed to move forward bringing together transportation and land use planning.

Senate Bill 375 – commonly referred to in the popular press as the “climate change smart growth bill” – is going to become a law. The newspapers have been calling the legislation “precedent setting,” but it’s got nary a new idea in it. If you peel back the layers, you’ve got what old-timers like me call a “growth management law” – one that ties transportation funding to growth patterns.

It'll be interesting to see how this works if it works. According to Bill Fulton, Contra Costa County has adopted similar measures, but that hasn't stopped the sprawl in Brentwood and other places or moved transit funding away from roads there. Much of the transportation funding is going to a 4th bore in the Caldecott tunnel.

In somewhat related news, the Governor changed his mind and decided that he will sign bills that will go to the voters, not wanting to withhold them from a public vote. This means HSR prop 1a will be on the ballot.

DART Ridership Up Up Up

70,000 riders a day is no small change. Think about when they double the system!

Proof of Payment Around the Country

Does anyone know of a light rail system that is not in a subway tunnel that doesn't use proof of payment? I can't seem to think of any.

Monday Night Can't Watch the DNC Because I Don't Have Cable Linkage

Augusta is looking at streetcars. One of the points that Streetcar Salesman Charlie Hales talks about in this article that I don't see in too many of them is the difference in pedestrian traffic before and after the streetcar. This is one of the things I think Jan Gehl talks about that I just love, prove things with data. Data data data. Jan is all about doing ped counts to tell shop keepers that their shop isn't suffering because they don't have parking if they have 1,000 people walking by per hour.

The Albany Times Union has an article stressing something that should be adopted as one of our memes. Public transit is an investment, not an expense. Ed Tennyson says this all the time and it certainly makes a lot of sense. Since it is an investment, we need to amortize over the life of the transit to get its true benefits and operational costs.

Finally, Dave Reid at Urban Milwaukee has an awesome post on drinking and not driving.

As a society we say “don’t drink and drive” but in this case actions speak louder than words. Zoning and land use policies have an impact on the built environment that often promotes driving and limits other transportation options. These regulations to some extent mandate how we get home from work and unfortunately how we get from the tavern, home. Many regulations are involved in this problem but with adjustments to the three below a real reduction in drunk driving can be promoted.

Space Race Update: Denver's Whiners

I like the Fastracks program. What it has done is lead the way for other regions to start thinking about how transit is being built in this country, usually one line at a time over many years. But now that the budget has gone up a few times, a lot of people are freaking out, mostly the people that didn't want the project in the first place, like the Rocky Mountain News. Part of the problem is that they never saw the importance of the project, but another part is that they are stuck in the car oriented world of roads are the greatest thing since sliced bread.

An editorial at the Rocky Mountain News this weekend states that Fastracks should be pared down in order to deal with the cost, which sounds reasonable when you think about it, until you read what they feel like should be the priority instead.

Some of those new revenues could come from whatever tax plan for transportation emerges from the legislature in the coming years. But transit should be far behind highway and bridge construction as a priority for state transportation planners. There simply isn't enough new revenue likely to materialize.

Because new highway construction to make the problem Fastracks is trying to help solve worse is a great idea. Look, for over 60 years in Denver, hundreds of billions of dollars have been spent on road infrastructure just like everywhere else. I don't see why making even a $10 billion investment in transit is such a big deal.

I do think RTD is doing the best it can with a bad situation created by the people that love roads anyways. It's not their fault that costs have skyrocketed because of issues outside of their immediate control, but to say that because of the cost, this type of project shouldn't be completed is wrong headed and short sighted. In fact, if the money for expanding (not fixing) freeways in the state was shifted to transit to complete the project, they would get done faster and help direct growth more intelligently sooner. The funds used on expansion would have just allowed people to sent more of their money to foreign oil companies and increase VMT.

There was a poster who replied to the editorial saying he was tired of North Denver getting the shaft when it came to funding allocations. The favored quarter of the Southeast is getting a lot of the investment and the northern end is paying for a lot of it, yet there is a lot going on in the Northwest as well.

I can see where the corridor gets even more congested between Boulder and Denver as population fills in the gap between the two cities. The need for an alternative development strategy is great and its not going to happen with BRT going down the center of a huge freeway, contrary to what people think. I have a lot of problems with the southeast corridor light rail because it was run down the side of the freeway. Many of the stations including those in the area of the tech center are not able to help the district turn into a more walkable pattern because the stations are on the other side of the freeway. The line should have shot through the center of the building density, not around it.

But I digress. We should be measuring mobility projects on whether they can get us out of the hole we have dug. The Denver projects move the region in that direction and the locals will have to step up and push against the road building interests of newspapers and the status quo.