On Locking Grids

Given many cities don't have grids anymore, I find it interesting that gridlock is still in the lexicon, specifically because if we did have a grid system, its likely there would be less lock. And to my current point in the last post about congestion and its endless war, I think the editors of the Rocky Mountain News have it wrong that the whole purpose in life of transportation funding should be to keep travel speeds at current levels through increased road and transit capacity. That's hardly a laudable goal given the number of people that will likely live in Denver in 20 years and how much more VMT that would mean, more than likely wiping out reductions in emissions.

It's not only FasTracks that is short of funding, after all. Revenue for the upkeep, improvement and expansion of metro roads and highways is also far below what would be needed to preserve today's travel speeds over the next 20 years. Unless lawmakers and civic leaders think FasTracks alone can prevent future gridlock - a naive hope for reasons we'll explain - they should make sure that any future ballot issue includes more than a FasTracks bailout.

I think there should be money for maintenance and repair, but beyond that, Fastracks is just a regional commuter system. There needs to be funding for local circulation and greater frequency that will help spur denser walkable neighborhoods. Don't get all scared at density either Denver. Maybe it means a few granny flats or maybe it means high rises. Depends on the neighborhood.

Is Obama's DOT Team Just Setting Up for Wall Street?

It's an interesting question and I really don't know enough about these folks or their backgrounds to make a judgment. I do know that none of these people have been at the forefront of the push for greater transit or livable streets. Perhaps they have mentioned it in passing but they likely don't see it as most important. Most DOT types only care about a question that shouldn't be at the top of the list. Congestion. And usually the only answer to them is road capacity. But the problem is that its kind of like the War on Terror, there is no specific end and no one really knows what congestion eradication means. If we were to eradicate congestion, it just means we're probably wasting space or have too much capacity that is only used in peak hours.

H/T Anonymous poster that I can't credit because they posted anonymously.

Grocery Store Proximity

So the last few times I went into the Bell Market on 24th street in Noe Valley I noticed the selection of items getting worse and worse each week. This was down from an already small selection of groceries due to the fact that it was rather small for a grocery store.

It is only a quarter mile from my house and the best part is that its a flat walk. Being so close, I would not worry about forgetting something because I could just run back and get it in no time without having to hop in my car. In fact, getting in my car would be the worst idea ever because I would spend more time looking for a place to park than walking there, shopping, and walking back home. Now I'll have to go either 1 mile North or South to the Safeways' located at both of those locations.

In any event, I just learned today that Bell Market was closing and would be replaced with a Whole Foods. I'm not really sure what I think about that. Whole Foods tends to be overpriced and will in all likelihood turn 24th street into a fun traffic jam on Saturday mornings (Not that it matters to me since I walk, but I'm sure others will complain). Some merchants have called for it to be turned into a parking lot, but in all actuality having WF as an anchor will bring more foot traffic to the other businesses on the street.

During the time period I have lived here, I noticed that one of my biggest trip generators is groceries. Work trips are the largest with trips to the grocery store the second largest and trips to hang out with friends third. It made me realize just how important grocery stores located close by are for my and more than likely everyone's transit oriented lifestyle.

TOD Still Going

Despite the downturn, developers in Dallas are still moving forward with development near transit. Though in Farmers branch took a few false starts after pulling property together.

Over the years, Farmers Branch has spent nearly $10 million to accumulate land and set up zoning for the roughly 144-acre station area. Of that, the city owns about 50 acres, about 18 of which are available for development.

McDougal Cos., which is also working with Irving on a development project, would buy the land from Farmers Branch.

And city officials say they believe that this, the third time, is the charm. Farmers Branch had memorandums of understanding with two previous developers for projects in the station area, but both fell through.

After 20 years of hoping, they might get their town center. And all it took was a transit connection.

Punctuality in Cali...Columbia.

German engineers trekked to Cali Columbia, a place made famous at least in America by drug cartels, to fix up the transportation system in order to make it more punctual.

The fight between good and evil is represented by the colors green and red, at least that is the way Miguel Castro sees it. Castro is a bus driver in the Colombian metropolis of Cali, and the two colored lights on his dashboard tell him whether he is behind schedule or not. For Castro the panel of lights is a small revolution. Prior to their arrival, there were only the timetables to rely on -- treated by drivers more as a broad recommendation than as hard and fast rules.

H/T Planetizen

Lazy Saturday Links

Looks like BART will get some WiFi after all.
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Where will the next commuter line be?

Fred Hansen: “This is the first state’s first commuter rail project. I don’t think it’ll be it’s last.”

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54% of Cincinnati jobs (City of, not region) are in the core. That is some pretty good job density, excellent for transit.
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In DC, 43% of folks in the core walk or take transit. Would biking get them over 50%? In transit zones in DC, in and outside of the core, the number of people who walk bike or take transit was 42% in 2000.
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Personally I think asking bikers to pay a user fee on roads that are generally paid for out of local sales, income, and property taxes is silly. A lot of the times bikes aren't even allowed on freeways which are paid for with gas taxes that people think pays for streets, but doesn't. This is the same as asking urban dwellers who do own a car but don't use freeways or state highways to subsidize the folks who do even more. Sure they get indirect goods movement benefits but they could also pay indirectly for that with a little higher price at the store, much like people pay for free parking at grocery stores through more expensive goods.
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The Aces train we talked about last week is on the go.
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Mad press for Streetsblog. An article in Planetizen about discusses how they are trying to change the urban discussion. And the founder Mark Gorton got some good press in Wired. For those annoyed with Muni, Gorton is looking for the solution!

Portland, Oregon has already used his open-source software to plan its bus routes. San Francisco, whose MUNI bus system is a frequent target of criticism, could be next to get the treatment. Gorton says he's in talks with the city to supply transit routing software for MUNI that will do a much better job of keeping track of where people are going and figuring out how best to get them there. San Francisco "overpaid greatly" for a badly-supported proprietary closed-source system that barely works, according to Gorton, putting the city under the thumb of a private company that provides sub-par support.

"They're frustrated and thinking about replacing it completely, and see the value of open-source because then they won't have any of these support problems," he said. "And they won't be constantly at the mercy of the private companies that have these little mini-monopolies."

Good luck with that. We hope it works out.

Gold Line Pull

They're testing on the Gold Line Eastside Extension in LA. In the video a service truck is pulling an LRV but those new Bredas are quite heavy. Looks like the truck has some torque.


Gold Line Trains In Movement from curbed los angeles on Vimeo.

H/T AF

Information Underload 101

This is about the 100th article by Ben Wear about the cost of the Capital Metro Commuter Rail Line. Sure it's something citizens want to hear about, but in a more intelligent world, he would be asking questions about how the system is only going to have a few runs a day and the technical details of what would fix that or how it got to this point that anything even needed to be fixed. You know, information that would keep something disappointing like that from happening again. Or possibly how light rail downtown could possibly realign development in Austin or even how there are a billion different ways to fund transit lines with innovative ideas. But no, Austin is stuck with yet another article about the cost of the line.

As you all know, I'm not a reporter. But if I were to write a column on transportation, I would probably educate myself about what the best practices are around the country and fill my feed reader with every single piece of transportation information I can to inform my writing. I try to do that anyway but I don't get paid to write and I don't have a whole city to inform. But newspapers wonder why they are losing readers and market share to other sources and I would say its because the information they give is just too basic, especially on issues such as transportation.

While blog commentary will never take the place of reporting, they are creating an elevated discussion about niche issues such as transit and development. As I was discussing with a colleague the other day, if we were relating blogs to college courses, newspapers are often the intro courses and blogs the upper level electives. Feel free to look at the course schedule.

Update 1.30.09: David has more on newspaper issues including simple things they can do like linking out.

Thursday Links

Portland Transport has photos of Oregon Iron Works first American made streetcar.
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A high speed rail connection will soon be forged between Helsinki and St. Petersburgh Russia. I imagine that would be quite the beautiful trip.
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Looks like Gavin was talking a bit too fast for the bus boys at AC Transit.

Fernandez told Newsom that if he wants the first phase of the Transbay Terminal project delayed until funding is secured for the rail piece, terms of an agreement between AC Transit and the Transbay board may be ''threatened or violated.'' He asked the mayor to clarify his intentions.

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The Fort Worth Streetcar is moving forward. Kevin updates us and notes that they are thinking of paying for part of the capital with toll revenue.

The Marketing Worked...Too Well?

No one I know thinks the Caltrain baby bullet is actually fast in terms of overall speed. Especially when compared to say a Shinkansen, TGV, or ICE train. But the marketing seems to have worked so well, some on the peninsula are asking, why do we need high speed rail if we've already got the Baby Bullet. The HSR Compatability Blog answers that question in full detail. The short answer, there is a reason it's only a baby.