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  #101  
Old Posted Aug 26, 2014, 4:35 AM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by sphansen
You build heavy rail because of speed and capacity needs. If Light Rail isn't capping out either of those needs, you don't need heavy rail.
Light rail vs heavy rail isn't an on-off switch between bare-bones versus subway. It's a whole spectrum. You can have light rail lines like Seattle or Honolulu with many of the features of heavy rail, and you can have heavy rail systems like Cleveland's Red Line that really work more like light rail.

Even within SLC you see differences. The S-Line only has a single track, while the others are double-tracked. Do you think the S-Line being single-tracked proves that every double-tracked light rail line in SLC is over-built? Obviously it's possible to build light rail like the S-Line, so why bother going to the trouble of 2 tracks? Or longer trains?

Even subways have spectrums. BART is built to handle trains up to 10 cars long. DC's Metro is built for 8. Both of them are 100% double-tracked, which sounds nice until you see the 4-track lines in New York, Chicago, and Philadelphia capable of running express trains that skip most of the stations.

It's all a spectrum. You design to your needs.

Quote:
Originally Posted by s.p.hansen View Post
Why does the station I posted a pic of have two sets of escalators on each side of the platform?
Probably because escalators inevitably break down & have to be rebuilt, and that station is so high up that making people walk on stairs (ie broken escalators) would seriously (and dangerously) slow down circulation. So they add a redundant set, to make sure there can always be working escalators in both directions.

Here's a more extreme example from DC: Imagine if this station had been built with only one escalator, and it broke down. Would you want to huff it up those steps?


Dee on flickr

And before you mention that station has only 3 escalators: We've been finding in DC that the stations don't have enough access points, and have been adding new mezzanines, escalators, and elevator banks to several stations like this one in recent years, at great expense. It would have been cheaper if we'd built them with enough vertical circulation capacity originally.
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  #102  
Old Posted Aug 26, 2014, 7:03 AM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by s.p.hansen View Post
I understand what you are saying. I understand topographical challenges. I understand different priorities. But Cirrus, you are like the biggest transit nerd around in the Mountain West, you understand the differences between heavy rail, commuter rail, light rail, streetcar, BRT, etc, better than all of us.
I didn't know you were familiar with Cirrus. Handsome nerd, certainly.

Quote:
It's literally like they hired the people who did BART and then last minute decided, "well shit, we still want busses underground and we want street level engagement in one of our poorest neighborhoods, let's just keep the BART design, edit a few things, and switch the mode to light rail."
I wouldn't doubt that your guess is that far off. Still, while your questions are valid and totally fair, we're making blind assumptions w/o a Seattle rep to shed some light.

Quote:
They spent 2.4 billion on 16 miles of light rail (bearing in mind the tunnel under downtown was already built in the 80's and cost very little to outfit with rail as part of those 16 miles). We spent about the same to get 44.8 miles of light rail and 60 plus miles of commuter rail with more overall riders (over twice as many riders not counting commuter rail).

The amount of money Denver and Salt Lake City have expended on light rail (we'll say pre FasTracks) opened up transit options to a greater amount of the population. Denver and Salt Lake City = Less money with more people out of cars
I couldn't recall specifically but it seemed you spent about $40-ish million per mile for light rail. Denver is spending roughly 50% more per mile. Seattle spent a cool $150 million per mile. Wowser!

But such simplistic comparisons don't explain differences in ROW acquisition costs, bridge and unique infrastructure costs, utility relocation costs, maintenance facility needs, storm/drainage costs, labor costs etc.
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  #103  
Old Posted Aug 26, 2014, 8:20 AM
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Originally Posted by bunt_q View Post
In the end, Honolulu went with an all-elevated third rail system... using small people-mover style vehicles (like Vancouver Skytrain) that have about the same capacity as light rail. But they can run reliably at 2.5 minute headways with 2-car consists, 5-minute headways with 4-car trains, because they're fully automated and fully-grad separated. What it also does is go exactly where it needs to.
Stats on the Hawaii line - one line:
Cost: $5.2 billion
Length: 20 miles
Stations: 21
Ridership: 119,600 (weekday)
Fleet: 20 four-car trains (800 person capacity) by AnsaldoBreda
Phoenix started their new SkyTrain service Spring of 2013. Stage 1 is 1.7 miles long. Stage 1a will open next year and add 7/10 of a mile. At this point they will have spent about One Billion Dollars. They're using Bombardier cars that hold 53 passengers, the same as used by DFW Skylink and at London's Heathrow airport.

It's the 1st airport people mover that will bridge over a taxiway rising 100 feet to accommodate a Boeing 747. It originates at a light rail stop and Park 'N Ride. It's pretty cool.

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  #104  
Old Posted Aug 27, 2014, 6:50 AM
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s.p.hansen s.p.hansen is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by TakeFive View Post
Well someone should pick on Salt Lake City and Yonah Freemark said he'd be happy to (hehe).

What say you?
It totally agree. I won't defend our 37 million dollar streetcar. As it stands right now it goes nowhere and moves 10 miles an hour while the bus does 25 miles per hour.

They did the bare minimum to get TIGER federal money they moved fast to get it before the deadline. Phase II will double track it which will raise the speed to 25 mph and frequency to every 15 mins. Phase II will actually bring it to the developed part of sugar house and onto the streets (you know, like a streetcar...) from the old freight corridor.

Basically they jumped on phase I to get some federal money they knew they had a shot at. I can't fault their strategy too much, but as it stands now, it's an incomplete line and not viable.

Last edited by s.p.hansen; Aug 27, 2014 at 7:08 AM.
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  #105  
Old Posted Aug 27, 2014, 6:54 AM
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s.p.hansen s.p.hansen is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by TakeFive View Post
I didn't know you were familiar with Cirrus. Handsome nerd, certainly.
I mean it with the uttmost respect. I mean, I'm not saying I would be cirrus's fluffer, but I'm not saying I wouldn't either.
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  #106  
Old Posted Aug 27, 2014, 7:22 AM
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s.p.hansen s.p.hansen is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Cirrus View Post
Light rail vs heavy rail isn't an on-off switch between bare-bones versus subway. It's a whole spectrum. You can have light rail lines like Seattle or Honolulu with many of the features of heavy rail, and you can have heavy rail systems like Cleveland's Red Line that really work more like light rail.

Even within SLC you see differences. The S-Line only has a single track, while the others are double-tracked. Do you think the S-Line being single-tracked proves that every double-tracked light rail line in SLC is over-built? Obviously it's possible to build light rail like the S-Line, so why bother going to the trouble of 2 tracks? Or longer trains?

Even subways have spectrums. BART is built to handle trains up to 10 cars long. DC's Metro is built for 8. Both of them are 100% double-tracked, which sounds nice until you see the 4-track lines in New York, Chicago, and Philadelphia capable of running express trains that skip most of the stations.

It's all a spectrum. You design to your needs.
Fair enough, I concede to this and bunt's good point earlier about frequency.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Cirrus View Post
Probably because escalators inevitably break down & have to be rebuilt, and that station is so high up that making people walk on stairs (ie broken escalators) would seriously (and dangerously) slow down circulation. So they add a redundant set, to make sure there can always be working escalators in both directions.

Here's a more extreme example from DC: Imagine if this station had been built with only one escalator, and it broke down. Would you want to huff it up those steps?


Dee on flickr

And before you mention that station has only 3 escalators: We've been finding in DC that the stations don't have enough access points, and have been adding new mezzanines, escalators, and elevator banks to several stations like this one in recent years, at great expense. It would have been cheaper if we'd built them with enough vertical circulation capacity originally.



Really take a moment to take this pic in. There is one set of escalators going up and down to the first story which limits the carrying capacity of the whole station to one set. When you move to the next two sets (one leading to each side of the platform) you don't get benefits if one set breaks down because one cannot walk across the rails (like a system with electrified rails). So you get no additional capacity improvements and no spares for breakdowns. So I do not concede on this. This is a dumb design.
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  #107  
Old Posted Aug 27, 2014, 3:37 PM
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bunt_q bunt_q is offline
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That photo looks completely normal to me. I think you're just generally underestimating the bulk of any elevated rail station built today. Looks the same as every station going in in Honolulu.

Also, there could be a plan to not allow crossing of tracks, once you get to 2.5 minute headways. Anybody know if the FTA has any guidelines on that? It seems like you'd get to a point where that is no longer advisable to allow, when you have high pedestrian areas (we have a few in Denver where crossings are at least controlled) and trains coming every 75 seconds, potentially, from one direction or the other. That's my guess, is that they are planning to prohibit pedestrian crossings, if not today, then someday.
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