Quote:
Originally Posted by Brandon716
...This makes sense for cities that are actually urban/transit oriented. Light rail makes sense for cities that really just have it as a supplement to an auto-oriented culture, such as in St Louis or Denver. Its better to have something than nothing, especially if we ever begin to have major energy supply disruptions. That's the only time I could see cities like Portland, Denver, St Louis, etc start to build serious amounts of TOD development with tens of thousands of housing units around transit and business office parks around transit.
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I'm just not following you here. I'd say 98% of Denver's existing and planned Light Rail is completely grade separated in dedicated ROW. As I mentioned, the small downtown portion which isn't, has been bypassed with the CPV line to Union Station and is being converted into more of a streetcar starter line.
You say we'll never see major transit usage in Denver in our lifetimes, yet it's being projected to surpass 20% transit usage by 2025. That's fairly major for American cities, especially for medium sized American cities.
You say only if we have major energy supply disruptions, will cities like Portland, Denver & Saint Louis start building major TOD's. Again, I don't get it. Denver's Union Station neighborhood is a downtown TOD which will add over 3 million sq.ft. of office, thousands of residential units and a couple hotels and substantial retail. Then there is the countries largest TOD in Denver at the former Stapleton Airport which is less than 50% built-out and at full build-out will have 35,000 residents, and millions of sq.ft. of mix-use office/retail. There are dozens of other significant TOD's in various stages around Denver (some equally as impressive to the two I described). What exactly would qualify as substantial?
The trend is growing towards these TOD's and sustainable growth. I don't see why this trend will reverse. The next decade should see a lot of urban infill, LRT and EMU construction and increasing transit ridership in Denver.