DENVER | Transportation Thread

[mhays]

Seattle doesn't try to "force" people to not own cars. With housing, we simply let developers decide how much to build vs. trying to force minimums. They try to hit what actual demand will be; rents are a strong incentive to get it right, while the savings can be enormous. With offices, there's a hard cap on the number of spaces (1 per 1,000 sf in the core, higher elsewhere), but even then it's your perogative to outbid other people.

[wong21fr]

Originally Posted by bcp

I find this interesting..and always felt the same way - until i moved to Chicago... the probelm with denver bus system is that the routes are AWFUL...they bend and twist and go down some awful rathole routes with way too many turns. Chicago? Straight line for the most part until you reach the end of the line.... easy and predictable - you hop on and know where you are going.

Denver had planned a massive straightening of the routes to coincide with FT being completed...is that still in the works? Curious if that would change your perception and willingness to bus

They did do that, but generally it straightened the routes going to rail stations and ones that were complementary (such as the 43 and the A Line). If you want to go from Union Station to the Highlands or Berkley the route would still be twisty turny.

[TakeFive]

Originally Posted by PLANSIT

Denver Mayor Michael Hancock wants to create a Cabinet-level transportation department

YUGE step in the right direction. Let's see if we can keep the momentum going.

State of the City: Denver Mayor Hancock seeks to slow gentrification, speed transit growth

Arguably the most ambitious part of Hancock’s agenda — and the city-focused message that received the most applause from the crowd strewn on folding chairs and gymnasium bleachers — was the $2 billion Mobility Action Plan, which aims to get 30 percent of Denver commuters to walk, bike or take public transit to work by the year 2030.

Can you break that down for us, Mayor?

Using both unidentified new money and proceeds from a proposed bond measure Hancock hopes to get voters to approve in November, the plan would involve:

• Building more protected bike lanes along city streets,
• Deploying Bus Rapid Transit along the busiest city corridors like East Colfax Avenue,
• Repairing sidewalks,
• Upgrading crosswalks,
• And making existing bus service accessible to more people.

[Jiffy]

The problem I see is that trying to force people to give up their cars is going to be very difficult seeing that so many people move to Denver for the proximity of the Rocky mountains, but giving up your car can mean sacrificing a convenient way to get to the mountains

[TakeFive]

Sad sad RTD

Cross Tie

Happy happy RTD



RTD needs lots and lots of money. They need many bucketful's of money.
RTD needs a Big Bucket full of cold hard cash for rail transit.



RTD needs Buckets that will grow...


...for Operating Expenses, for Contingency Funds, for Reserve and Replacement

RTD needs a security bucket for increasing security needs and applications.



Lastly, RTD needs a big ole tub bucket for the coming bus routes from slo-mo local to whiz bang BRT style routes.



Please...

Steam

[mhays]

Originally Posted by Jiffy

The problem I see is that trying to force people to give up their cars is going to be very difficult seeing that so many people move to Denver for the proximity of the Rocky mountains, but giving up your car can mean sacrificing a convenient way to get to the mountains

There's that "force" thing again. That keeps coming up when the topic has nothing to do with forcing anything. It's more like improving options to people have the freedom to choose. BTW, did you see that the statement was about trips to work?

[BG918]

Originally Posted by Jiffy

The problem I see is that trying to force people to give up their cars is going to be very difficult seeing that so many people move to Denver for the proximity of the Rocky mountains, but giving up your car can mean sacrificing a convenient way to get to the mountains

With ride-sharing and services like Car2Go that is becoming less of an issue though Denver's share of people with cars will always be high.

[PLANSIT]

Originally Posted by Jiffy

The problem I see is that trying to force people to give up their cars is going to be very difficult seeing that so many people move to Denver for the proximity of the Rocky mountains, but giving up your car can mean sacrificing a convenient way to get to the mountains

You can keep you car, drive it to the mountains and STILL ride a bike, walk, or take transit for the other 98% of your trips.

[TakeFive]

Originally Posted by PLANSIT

You can keep you car, drive it to the mountains and STILL ride a bike, walk, or take transit for the other 98% of your trips.

Yes, that is the refreshing positive point to make as opposed to how others might express the issue. And even if it's only 75% it's still a yuge change and benefit.

[TakeFive]

bunt... Curious minds want to know: are you at all involved in this or do you stay plenty busy with the Central 70 P3 side of things.

[TakeFive]

The Mayor blew the top off the 2017 GO Bond package that he will present to City Council for their approval. Including $50 million in Contingency Funds the Grand Total is now $937,418,500. As a reminder the total that was referred to the Mayor by the Executive Committee was $749,240,000

[Cirrus]

Here Are the Transportation Projects Mayor Hancock Wants to Fund With the November Bond
via Streetsblog Denver

[TakeFive]

According to Sachs these projects were added by Hanock.
http://denver.streetsblog.org/2017/0...november-bond/

Here are the other projects Hancock restored to the funding list:

• $8.4 million for a pedestrian-oriented overhaul of Colorado Boulevard and Buchtel Boulevard at Colorado Station
• $7 million for bicycle and pedestrian connections between Auraria Campus and downtown
• $5 million for pedestrian safety fixes to Hampden Avenue
• $3.7 million for walking and biking connections to the High Line Canal
• $1.2 million for pedestrian safety fixes around the Yale RTD station
• $1 million for bike lane and sidewalk improvements to Yale Avenue

The one he seems to have missed was the addition of the Alameda Ave Underpass Replacement (Sante Fe to Broadway)
With the exception of this and Auraria the other added transportation projects come from SE Denver which had been previously left out of the fun. Need all Councilors to have something to brag about to prospective voters.

[bunt_q]

Originally Posted by TakeFive

bunt... Curious minds want to know: are you at all involved in this.

Yep, sure am.

[ddvmke]

Originally Posted by Cirrus

Here Are the Transportation Projects Mayor Hancock Wants to Fund With the November Bond
via Streetsblog Denver

Couple of thoughts and questions for those in the know:

So happy to see the full $20m allocated for Colfax Corridor improvements all the way across the city, could completely transform east and west sides of the city as far as commercial activity and adding residential density are concerned IMO.

At a quick glance, it looks like more than half of the money allocated here is for deferred maintenance, road expansion or reconstruction, as well as sidewalk construction, which seem like things that should really have an ongoing funding source rather than the GO Bond, which I thought was supposed to be for more transformational projects. Not that I don't like the work being done, but seems as though these items have leaked over into the actual transit and mobility funding beyond the $101m earmark. Is the $20m (I think?) expansion of transpo funding in the budget expected to continue and satisfy these needs on an ongoing basis rather than taking portions of more lump some borrowings to catch up in the future?

As far as the Colfax "BRT" (how are they still able to call it that?), have there been any proposal/design releases since this? I am all for bus improvements and faster frequency along this corridor, but a bus lane that is dedicated only for part of the route and part of the time seems like a real weak attempt at some true rapid transit only aimed to stave off complaints around current vehicle traffic rather than building toward their projected future demand. Isn't this almost exactly like what we have on Broadway currently, which while not ineffective, is hardly dedicated rapid transit? Also, are we really still going to have to wait 5 years for this given the accelerated funding here of $55m? Along with the $20m for pedestrian/crosswalk improvements and RTD's initiative to improve the bus shelters, etc., I'd hoped we could get this moving sooner (unless I'm mixing mutually exclusive improvements by DPW/RTD).

[mr1138]

I'm very curious about the current status of the Colfax BRT plans too. I believe that within the last year, the possibility of a center-running "true BRT" alternative was at least considered - though I don't know if that scenario was a serious one, or if it is still on the table.

I am no big fan of the side-running, "only certain times of day" scenario, and think that we definitely need to know more before getting excited.

[TakeFive]

Originally Posted by ddvmke

At a quick glance, it looks like more than half of the money allocated here is for deferred maintenance,

If I assume you're talking only about Transportation then the $101 million is what's designated for deferred maintenance. Before Hancock organized all the various (sub)committee meetings there was an extensive list (like $2 billion) of unfunded projects which had been identified, qualified and many estimated as a part of the Elevate 2020 CIP program. That has been updated since I first studied it but in any case there were many projects that had been on the list for years many of which were considered high priority projects.

Originally Posted by ddvmke

which seem like things that should really have an ongoing funding source rather than the GO Bond,

That's certainly the Streetsblog - urban crowd argument. Sorry, it is what it is.

The last bond issuance The Better Denver Bonds had more signature type projects IMO and also included a lot of deferred road maintenance and city owned properties being updated including energy efficient upgrades. Additionally they asked for a mill levy increase for the purposes of keeping up better. IIRC it started out with an extra $25/26 million per year. Guess it wasn't nearly enough. I suspect RiNo projects are one reason.

Originally Posted by ddvmke

Is the $20m (I think?) expansion of transpo funding in the budget expected to continue and satisfy these needs on an ongoing basis rather than taking portions of more lump some borrowings to catch up in the future?

I assume that's the intent but my crystal ball broke as soon as I asked it that question. I hope that doesn't mean....

Originally Posted by ddvmke

I am all for bus improvements and faster frequency along this corridor, but a bus lane that is dedicated only for part of the route and part of the time seems like a real weak attempt at some true rapid transit only aimed to stave off complaints around current vehicle traffic rather than building toward their projected future demand.

I've used more Americanized sites/definitions for BRT but what I can tell you about RTD's use of BRT was defined well enough on your linked presentation. I know as BRT-hopeful fans we would ask "why not all-day dedicated lanes?" The answer to that is within the Colfax Alternatives Analysis Chapter 6 Screen 3 Analysis and Results Focus on the Total Person Trip Analysis. IIRC, the upshot was that all-day dedicated lanes made only a very minor benefit to bus ridership while the difference in total person trips was noticeably higher with only rush hour dedicated lanes. The decision was made easy with this analysis (seems like thinking in percentages versus nominal differences made it more clear) not to mention the merchant stakeholders were much happier.

Originally Posted by mr1138

I'm very curious about the current status of the Colfax BRT plans too. I believe that within the last year, the possibility of a center-running "true BRT" alternative was at least considered - though I don't know if that scenario was a serious one, or if it is still on the table.

I heard the same rumor but don't know nothing.

It's also important to realize that this project is heavily dependent on getting FTA funding. Without that you can expect much of Cirrus' now famous "BRT Creep."

[TakeFive]

Originally Posted by bunt_q

Yep, sure am.

Best of luck.

I get so frustrated. I've been reading quite a lot from Streetsblog sites; not only Denver's but others as well. While informative, it's clear that if you want to be a Streetsblog writer it's obligatory to use the same agenda and talking points - over and over. If I were to close my eyes I could as easily be listening to TAlk Radio. Connecting dots that don't; cherry picking info; Right or Left it's all the same silly nonsense IMO.

[ddvmke]

Originally Posted by TakeFive

I've used more Americanized sites/definitions for BRT but what I can tell you about RTD's use of BRT was defined well enough on your linked presentation. I know as BRT-hopeful fans we would ask "why not all-day dedicated lanes?" The answer to that is within the Colfax Alternatives Analysis Chapter 6 Screen 3 Analysis and Results Focus on the Total Person Trip Analysis. IIRC, the upshot was that all-day dedicated lanes made only a very minor benefit to bus ridership while the difference in total person trips was noticeably higher with only rush hour dedicated lanes. The decision was made easy with this analysis (seems like thinking in percentages versus nominal differences made it more clear) not to mention the merchant stakeholders were much happier.

Cheers, hadn't seen that analysis previously. I'm definitely for the improvements they plan on making, just hopeful that, given the "diet-BRT" that's going in, it wouldn't then take until 2022 to implement. I think the sooner they get it in place and see the benefits, the sooner we could see some improvements to the Broadway/Lincoln lanes as well.

[TakeFive]

Originally Posted by ddvmke

... it wouldn't then take until 2022 to implement. I think the sooner they get it in place and see the benefits, the sooner we could see some improvements to the Broadway/Lincoln lanes as well.

Drives me nuts... Tempe AZ started with a vision for a streetcar line about the same time as Denver/RTD created the Colfax Connector vision/project.
That project has already broken ground.

I agree that it's important to get something done so people can experience the benefits. That, in essence is what led to FasTracks passing.

Although the GO Bond transportation sub-committee had to start at the back of the line they did have a positive impact overall and I suspect they've help to create a paradigm shift, PLANSIT's Denveright - Denver Moves Transit should also serve as a catalyst going forward.