Light Rail Boom

[CONative]

Denver isn't new to light rail either, and the "ambitious" plan discussed is after light rail has already been in place for some time in Denver. The dozens and dozens of EXTRA light rail miles are on top of the 39 miles already in place before Denver's "ambitious" FasTracks light rail/commuter expansion plan passed.

[M II A II R II K]

The Case for Streetcars


January 10, 2011

By Ginger Moored

Read More: http://thecityfix.com/the-case-for-streetcars/

In this post, we talk to Dan Tangherlini, the former DDOT director under Mayor Anthony Williams, who committed to building one of the first two lines, about why streetcars matter for the nation’s capital.

- The streetcars were conceived in 1997, when Mayor Marion Barry’s Department of Public Works published “A Transportation Vision, Strategy, and Action Plan for the Nation’s Capital.” The plan called for circulator buses and streetcars to connect existing Metrobus and Metrorail lines and activity centers close to the city’s core. Planners think these additional connections are important since current rail lines connect neighborhoods to the city center but not necessarily to each other; this sometimes makes travel between neighborhoods and activity centers on different transit lines difficult, despite the 106 miles of Metrorail track and 319 Metrobus routes that exist today. Plus, as one presentation of the city’s transportation department puts it, overcrowding on Metrorail will be “unmanageable by 2013” and several Metrobus lines are already over capacity.

- When the streetcar network is complete – sometime after 2016 – it will span 37 miles over eight lines and will connect to the Circulator routes. The streetcars will run on above-ground, electric-powered rails; some streetcars will share lanes with traffic while others will run in lanes for streetcars only. Like the Circulator buses, the streetcars will have sleek red exteriors with large windows and doors at curb-height. And they too will connect activity centers both downtown and in city neighborhoods and have headways of 10-15 minutes.

- Why Streetcars? Metrobus lines already run on at least part of all of the proposed streetcar routes, for example, the “70s” line on Georgia Avenue, the “X” line on H Street and Benning Road, and the “A” line on Martin Luther King Avenue. So why install streetcars, which require track installation, overhead wires, and power substations? Why not upgrade the buses that already run on these corridors, instead, by replacing older buses with new ones, running more buses, decreasing headways, and in some cases, creating bus-only lanes?

- Economic Development. Tangherlini says that one advantage streetcars have over buses is that the tracks “give a sense of permanence, and that encourages long-term investment.” Portland, Ore., which started operating North America’s first modern streetcar system in 2001, can attest to that. A 2008 study by the city says that since streetcar plans were unveiled in 1997, “$3.5 billion has been invested within two blocks of the streetcar alignment.” The study lists “grocery stores, restaurants, galleries, shops and banks” as amenities that have been built near the streetcar lines.....

- Increased Capacity. The X1, X2, and X3 Metrobus lines, which run along H Street and Benning Road NE, are 34 percent over capacity, and many other bus routes have similar crowding issues (the District of Columbia Alternatives Analysis (DCAA) has a list of overcrowded routes). Tangherlini says adding streetcars can help alleviate overcrowding. He estimates that a typical Circulator bus holds 50-60 people, while the streetcars will hold around 100. More than 95 percent of Metrobuses hold between 26 and 78 people and less than 5% hold 100 passengers.

- It’s Not A Zero-Sum Game. “With each new level of transit, the assumption is that the older ones will disappear; that’s not true,” says Tangherlini. He says at public meetings, bus riders were wary of the streetcars because they thought bus service would disappear. But all along the plan was to have the streetcars and buses form an integrated network, with streetcars at the network core and Circulator and Metrobus lines radiating out from there.....

- You Know Where It’s Going. “Rails have a good psychological effect,” says Tangherlini, “because you know where it’s going.” And, according to a 2003 WMATA survey of non-bus riders, this is a big deal: 30 percent of the survey respondents said that “better information about the services offered” was one of the most important improvements WMATA could make to its bus service. It’s likely that anyone who’s been on a bus that took an unexpected turn would agree.

[M II A II R II K]

Light rail produces a burst of development, but not everywhere


March 22nd, 2011

Read More: http://newurbannetwork.com/article/l...erywhere-14344

PDF Report: http://ctod.org/portal/sites/default...l_20110321.pdf

The Denver, Charlotte, and Minneapolis-St. Paul regions all opened new light-rail lines between 2004 and 2007, aiming to enhance their transportation systems and at the same time encourage efficiently-placed real estate development. They got much of what they were looking for. “All three transit lines experienced a tremendous amount of new development” — 6.7 million square feet along the Twin Cities’ Hiawatha Line, 7.8 million square feet along Denver’s Southeast Corridor, and 9.8 million square feet served by Charlotte’s Blue Line, says a new report from the Center for Transit-Oriented Development.

- The 80-page analysis, Rails to Real Estate: Development Patterns Along Three New Transit Lines, says residential construction came on particularly strong. In the Twin Cities, 86 percent of the development near the 12-mile Hiawatha Line was housing. In Denver, 68 percent was housing, and in Charlotte, 54 percent. But if anyone expected development to crop up at every station, there was cause for disappointment. Transit-oriented development (TOD) concentrated primarily in areas that already had plenty of jobs or amenities to offer.

- Seventy-two percent of development along the Hiawatha Line clustered in downtown Minneapolis. Sixty-four percent of development served by the Blue Line arose in Charlotte’s downtown. Much residential construction along Denver’s Southeast Corridor appeared to be the result of being near the Denver Technology Center, a major employment center. Rails to Real Estate suggests why some rail-served locations appealed to developers and residents, while others didn’t. The answers vary from one metro area to another.

- While freeway adjacency provides increased accessibility to the area, it also poses major barriers to TOD. The exhaust and noise of the freeway limit the building forms and land uses of parcels that abut I-25 and the stations. New projects are often built in a way intended to mitigate these effects, forming visual and physical barriers between the freeway and nearby areas; unfortunately, because the stations are also next to the freeway, these also form barriers to transit.

- Pedestrian bridges have been constructed to enhance access to the stations from both sides of the freeway, but the presence of the highway limits the amount of land that is truly transit-accessible. Finally, the excellent automobile access provided by the highway encourages driving and necessitates the provision of a large amount of parking, which limits both development density and the potential for a vibrant pedestrian-scaled environment.

- In both Minneapolis-St. Paul and Charlotte, “the introduction of light rail coincided with a boom in downtown development,” the Center says. The downtown boom in these cities “appears to be in large part an outgrowth of long-standing efforts at revitalization.” “While the light rail was not a major factor stimulating development in these two downtowns, improved access to downtown entertainment and cultural amenities [was] an important factor making nearby station areas newly connected to the downtown attractive places for development,” the report suggests.

- “These condominium towers took many years to sell out, but have reportedly been very popular with empty nesters and second homeowners who value the transit, including accessibility to the airport,” says the report. The developer designed the project to maximize the benefit of being situated near transit. Transit has apparently not boosted the prices of the units, but it has been “a key factor” in generating sales, according to the report.

- The Center for Transportation Studies at the University of Minnesota recently found that near several stations of the Hiawatha line, the light-rail line had a significant positive impact on property values — but only on the line’s west side. The geographic limitation was attributed to the influence of major industrial uses and a four-lane arterial road, which largely cut the stations off from residential neighborhoods to the east.

.....

[M II A II R II K]

Study says DC Streetcar could add $10-15 billion in value


April 7th, 2011

Read More: http://newurbannetwork.com/article/w...on-value-14461

The Washington, DC, streetcar certainly looks like a good deal. The 37-mile system, the first corridor of which is under construction and expected to be completed by 2012, will increase the value of existing properties by $5-7 billion, according to the study by Goody Clancy & Associates of Boston. Add to that an estimated $5-8 billion of new development over 10 years attracted by the streetcar, and the total increased property value is $10-15 billion. Half of the tax increment from that total could support $600-$900 million in bonds to help support property development and streetcar capital costs, the study says. The streetcar system is expected to cost $1.5 billion.

- The study used target-market methodology to determine the streetcar's substantial potential appeal to households across the demographic spectrum. The study predicts a 20-50 percent increase in demand for new housing and up to a 15 percent value increase for existing housing. On the commercial side, the study found that up to 95 percent of any new office development is expected to locate around streetcar corridors. Such figures may sound fanciful, but the development and property value increases generated by smaller streetcar projects in Portland and Tampa, and light rail lines in Denver, Minneapolis-St. Paul, and Charlotte, have demonstrated the substantial economic development potential of urban rail.

- The city commissioned the study to “identify how and where streetcar service would offer the most significant opportunities and challenges.” DC will use it to:

1) Prioritize which streetcar segments should be built in which order;

2) Identify the most promising strategies for funding the streetcar, utilizing both Federal and local sources; and,

3) Update city policies, touching on everything from zoning to housing, to optimize benefits and minimize challenges.

- The benefits sought fall in two primary categories: quality of life and economic development. Community quality of life is addressed through the broadening of transportation choices, which is expected to bring new alternatives for housing, jobs, retail, recreation, and education that will crop up around the newly constructed transit corridors. The biggest challenges are identified as housing affordability concerns, rights-of-way issues, and potential loss of future development in non-streetcar corridors. In most cases, strategies are proposed to mitigate these challenges.

.....

[Illithid Dude]

Los Angeles is actually doing the whole light rail thing right, for the most part. They build Heavy Rail along the densest corridors, and connect those dots with Light Rail. Even that Light Rail is often times grade-separated, with lines being either elevated, submerged, or running on a separate ROW.

[djlx2]

Originally Posted by Illithid Dude

Los Angeles is actually doing the whole light rail thing right, for the most part. They build Heavy Rail along the desist corridors, and connect those dots with Light Rail. Even that Light Rail is often times grade-separated, with lines being either elevated, submerged, or running on a separate ROW.

I hope the grade-separated transit is the right idea, although I'm mostly familiar with this in Chicago, which had a similar idea in mind with their underground additions to the El, but which (deservedly) gets a lot of complaints because transit there connects in the loop with individual lines apparently all heading off in various directions without again intersecting. It was an earlier era in construction, however. The LRT transit system, however: that one I'm wondering about quality on the tracks, but I'm also running about exchange with tracks on a different ROW, both elevated and submerged, and where or how or if they connect with each other.

[Illithid Dude]

Originally Posted by djlx2

I hope the grade-separated transit is the right idea, although I'm mostly familiar with this in Chicago, which had a similar idea in mind with their underground additions to the El, but which (deservedly) gets a lot of complaints because transit there connects in the loop with individual lines apparently all heading off in various directions without again intersecting. It was an earlier era in construction, however. The LRT transit system, however: that one I'm wondering about quality on the tracks, but I'm also running about exchange with tracks on a different ROW, both elevated and submerged, and where or how or if they connect with each other.

I'm a little confused with what you are trying to say. Are you asking if the lines can connect to one another if they have different grade separations? Yes, they do. In fact, the Gold Line has at-grade, below grade, and above grade segments. All of the lines have the same style of Rolling Stock. Is that what you meant?

[M II A II R II K]

What Cincinnati Can Learn From Portland

Video Link

[electricron]

Originally Posted by M II A II R II K

What Cincinnati Can Learn From Portland

The last quote by Aaron Sweet in the video best sums up the public debate over rail transit in this country, imho.

"The streetcar --- it's like a cherry on a cake for Portland's public transit"

Meaning it's not an essential service, but is nice service to have. Just like a cherry atop the whipped cream atop a cake. The cake is the substance, the whipped cream and cherry aren't. Some people buy economy cars, others buy luxury cars. Modern day streetcars are just luxury buses. What can your city afford?

[M II A II R II K]

It can either play the role of being the backbone of the system or supplementary to it.

[zilfondel]

Nobody takes the Portland streetcar anymore, because its too crowded.

[Jasonhouse]

Originally Posted by electricron

The last quote by Aaron Sweet in the video best sums up the public debate over rail transit in this country, imho.

"The streetcar --- it's like a cherry on a cake for Portland's public transit"

Meaning it's not an essential service, but is nice service to have. Just like a cherry atop the whipped cream atop a cake. The cake is the substance, the whipped cream and cherry aren't. Some people buy economy cars, others buy luxury cars. Modern day streetcars are just luxury buses. What can your city afford?

Rhetoric is nice. Now prove your assertion.

[Beta_Magellan]

If it doesn’t solve capacity issues and have a separate ROW, your streetcar is just for show.

In other words, the main advantages of streetcars are that they can carry more people per driver and, if they’re given their own lane with signal priority, they can move people and greater speeds more reliably. Most of the new American streetcar projects leave out the latter, forcing the vehicles to stay stuck in traffic at low speeds, and often they’re implemented to serve as an amenity for new urban developments, not to deal with capacity issues in the city’s network. To me, this seems a waste—if you’re going to spend less than a hundred million on your transit system, it would be better to upgrade existing bus facilities, put in signal prioritization, jump lanes or even traffic lanes where possible, than to blow it on a short corridor and hope it sparks Pearl District-type redevelopment.

[ardecila]

Originally Posted by Beta_Magellan

If it doesn’t solve capacity issues and have a separate ROW, your streetcar is just for show.

In other words, the main advantages of streetcars are that they can carry more people per driver and, if they’re given their own lane with signal priority, they can move people and greater speeds more reliably. Most of the new American streetcar projects leave out the latter, forcing the vehicles to stay stuck in traffic at low speeds, and often they’re implemented to serve as an amenity for new urban developments, not to deal with capacity issues in the city’s network. To me, this seems a waste—if you’re going to spend less than a hundred million on your transit system, it would be better to upgrade existing bus facilities, put in signal prioritization, jump lanes or even traffic lanes where possible, than to blow it on a short corridor and hope it sparks Pearl District-type redevelopment.

But that's why streetcar investments are feasible in certain cities. They're not sold as a way to improve mobility, but as a way to establish a preferred zone where increased development is encouraged. If the streetcar does spur development, that's an increase in tax revenues that wouldn't have occurred otherwise.

[electricron]

Originally Posted by ardecila

But that's why streetcar investments are feasible in certain cities. They're not sold as a way to improve mobility, but as a way to establish a preferred zone where increased development is encouraged. If the streetcar does spur development, that's an increase in tax revenues that wouldn't have occurred otherwise.

Not when TIFs are used to finance the building of the streetcar. All increase taxes collected go to subsidize the streetcar. Additionally, streetcars are sold as a way to improve mobility.

[Beta_Magellan]

Originally Posted by ardecila

But that's why streetcar investments are feasible in certain cities. They're not sold as a way to improve mobility, but as a way to establish a preferred zone where increased development is encouraged. If the streetcar does spur development, that's an increase in tax revenues that wouldn't have occurred otherwise.

Seconding electricron’s point, they often are sold as providing better transit—though they might be better from an emissions and ride quality standpoint, a streetcar hardly provides the mobility improvements of something like light rail. Furthermore, one thing I’ve noticed is that people have begun to conflate the Portland streetcar and Portland’s light rail, which can only be detrimental to anyone trying to advocate for more regional mobility investment.

I’m also a little queasy about directing transportation funding towards redevelopment schemes—IMO transportation dollars should go, first and foremost, to where transportation dollars are most needed. This way, even if redevelopment fails, the city isn’t stuck with infrastructure invested in the wrong place. Also, the urban circulator program reminds me a little too much of the urban people mover program that gave us the elevated systems in Miami, Jacksonville, and Detroit—investments in short-haul circulators seem to be very hit-or-miss to me.

[miketoronto]

There is more to building a vibrant downtown than a streetcar. And sadly cities like Cincy think a streetcar is going to bring downtown back, as this is the fad right now to have a streetcar.

I am not saying Cincy should not have one. But these videos that make streetcars seem like the be all and end all to city revival don't really tell the whole story.

[Nexis4Jersey]

Originally Posted by miketoronto

There is more to building a vibrant downtown than a streetcar. And sadly cities like Cincy think a streetcar is going to bring downtown back, as this is the fad right now to have a streetcar.

I am not saying Cincy should not have one. But these videos that make streetcars seem like the be all and end all to city revival don't really tell the whole story.

I don't its a fad , Streetcars are only being built in cities were Heavy & Light Rail wouldn't work.......your right there is more then building a streetcar to a vibrant Downtown , Cincy has plans on making it more vibrant , so does every city with the proposed Streetcar plans. The Streetcars are the final or critical piece in redeveloping that area...like you'll see in Philly , New Haven , Stamford , Providence and DC those streetcar plans will be used to connect neighborhoods and bridge gaps in the transit system.

[ardecila]

Originally Posted by Beta_Magellan

Also, the urban circulator program reminds me a little too much of the urban people mover program that gave us the elevated systems in Miami, Jacksonville, and Detroit—investments in short-haul circulators seem to be very hit-or-miss to me.

New Orleans had a rather odd scheme... The buses provide quicker travel times, but on really low frequencies. These low frequencies force people onto the streetcar, because it's actually quicker (and more pleasant) to wait 15 minutes for a 40-minute ride to downtown than it is to wait 30 minutes for a 25-minute ride to downtown.

At rush hours, the buses run on a 15-minute frequency (so they're competitive) but after that, they quickly drop down to 30 minutes, and then 60 minutes after about 8pm.

Apart from commuting, the streetcars are used as ways to bring tourists from the CBD to attractions in outlying parts of the city, like Audubon Park/Zoo, the Riverbend neighborhood, City Park, the Fairgrounds racetrack, etc. Tourists, especially from the South, are pretty reluctant to use buses to get anywhere, but they seem to love the streetcar.

The latest round of proposed streetcar lines involves two downtown circulator lines and one longer line out into the neighborhoods. This is on top of one existing downtown circulator and two longer lines into the neighborhoods. These lines don't offer rapid transit, but it's a mistake to compare them to downtown-focused systems like the 80s people-movers. A group here is pushing for some minor changes that will improve the average speed of the streetcars (signal priority, exclusive lane, etc).

[min-chi-cbus]

Originally Posted by M II A II R II K

Light rail produces a burst of development, but not everywhere


March 22nd, 2011

Read More: http://newurbannetwork.com/article/l...erywhere-14344

PDF Report: http://ctod.org/portal/sites/default...l_20110321.pdf

This article hits the nail on the head. I also questioned the growth attributed to the Hiawatha Line in Minneapolis as being 100% due to the existence of the light rail. It's impossible to measure and every time I see statistics either touting the success of a line or lobbying for the funds for future lines it makes me cringe, as a professional analyst. This is not to say I don't want rail -- I do -- but I don't always think that building rail ONLY where there can be the most potential for redevelopment is a recipe for disaster and it's easy to sell to people who just aren't good at thinking objectively. In Minneapolis, they recently passed approvals for a new (and VERY needed) Southwest rail route from Minneapolis to the rich and business saavy Eden Prairie, but it's going through an industrial and non-developed, under-populated area of Minneapolis and its inner ring suburbs to get there, in hopes to attract new development and jobs as a means to coherse lawmakers to approve the project. Instead, it SHOULD have gone through the Uptown area of Minneapolis and frankly, probably should have been a subway from downtown to Lake Street (3 miles) to avoid conflicts with existing infrastructure and street traffic. That area has a population density of between 10,000 and 20,000 ppsm depending on the tract, but the density of the area they very well may be building it through is less than 5,000 ppsm.

Unfortunately, this is the only way to get things done.