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M II A II R II K

Sep 22, 2014 1:42 AM

A System to Cut City Traffic That Just Might Work

Read More: http://www.wired.com/2014/09/a-new-s...le-and-useful/

Research Paper PDF: http://media.jgao.org/pubs/roadrunner_itswc2014.pdf

Quote:

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Two MIT researchers think they’ve got a better way of doing things. They’ve tested out a new method—and won an award doing it—that eliminates the need for the cameras and sensors in the streets that see where cars are going. That makes the system as a whole much more flexible and useful, since borders can be changed on the fly to reflect actual traffic conditions. As an added bonus, the system doesn’t just penalize drivers for entering certain zones, it helps them avoid them altogether.

- The “RoadRunner” system, developed for Singapore by graduate student Jason Gao and his advisor Li-Shiuan Peh, issues a digital “token” to each car entering a congestion-prone area. Once a given number of tokens are assigned, a car can’t enter unless another vehicle leaves. Everyone else gets turn-by-turn directions to avoid the area. In computer simulations using data from Singapore’s Land Transit Authority, Gao and Peh saw an 8 percent increase in average car speed during periods of peak congestion. They also did a small scale test in Cambridge, Mass. to prove the technology works.

- The exact details about how pricing would work aren’t important just yet. What’s innovative about RoadRunner is the way it liberates the tracking system from infrastructure. Singapore now requires all vehicles to have a dash-mounted transponder, which is read by radio transmitters on gantries (overhead structures like the ones that hold road signs and traffic lights) built at entry points to congestions zones.

- Gao and Peh fit cars with transponders roughly the size of a standard electronic-toll device like E-ZPass or FasTrak. They run on 802.11p, a standard similar to Wi-Fi but with a larger broadcast range, and communicate wirelessly with a central server. It may be possible to embed the technology directly into cell phones in the future.

- The big advantage to this system is that urban planners can actively manipulate the location of congestion zones in real time, without the need for construction. “With our system, you can draw a polygon on the map and say, ‘I want this entire region to be controlled,’” Gao says. “You could do one thing for a month and test it out and then change it without having to dig up roads or rebuild gantries.”

- That flexibility “has some very interesting implications,” says Sarah Kaufman, adjunct assistant professor of planning at New York University and digital manager at the NYU Rudin Center for Transportation. “It could help to re-route drivers around major temporary events (such as UN sessions here in NYC that gum up traffic quite a bit).” Tolling can be adjusted based on changing road priorities. The bit about the directions to avoid the demarcated zones is less impressive, Kaufman says. “The problem I see is that a lot of people are not driving through congested areas, but to them. Because congested areas are where their jobs are.”

M II A II R II K

Sep 22, 2014 4:23 PM

Global shift to mass transit could save more than $100 trillion and 1,700 megatons of CO2

Read More: http://www.news.ucdavis.edu/search/news_detail.lasso

A Global High Shift Scenario PDF: http://www.itdp.org/wp-content/uploa...nario_WEB1.pdf

Quote:

More than $100 trillion in public and private spending could be saved between now and 2050 if the world expands public transportation, walking and cycling in cities, according to a new report released by the University of California, Davis, and the Institute for Transportation and Development Policy. Additionally, reductions in carbon dioxide emissions reaching 1,700 megatons per year in 2050 could be achieved if this shift occurs.

- Further, an estimated 1.4 million early deaths associated with exposure to vehicle tailpipe emissions could be avoided annually by 2050 if governments require the strongest vehicle pollution controls and ultralow-sulfur fuels, according to a related analysis by the International Council on Clean Transportation included in the report. Doubling motor vehicle fuel economy could reduce CO2 emissions by an additional 700 megatons in 2050.

- “The study shows that getting away from car-centric development, especially in rapidly developing economies, will cut urban CO2 dramatically and also reduce costs,” said report co-author Lew Fulton, co-director of NextSTEPS Program at the UC Davis Institute of Transportation Studies. “It is also critical to reduce the energy use and carbon emissions of all vehicles.”

- The report is being released Sept. 17 at the United Nations Habitat III Preparatory Meeting in New York, in advance of the Sept. 23 United Nations Secretary-General’s Climate Summit, where many nations and corporations will announce voluntary commitments to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, including new efforts focused on sustainable transportation.

- “Transportation, driven by rapid growth in car use, has been the fastest growing source of CO2 in the world," said Michael Replogle, co-author of the study and managing director for policy at ITDP, a global New York-based nonprofit. “An affordable but largely overlooked way to cut that pollution is to give people clean options to use public transportation, walking and cycling. This expands mobility options, especially for the poor, and curbs air pollution from traffic.”

- The authors calculated CO2 emissions and costs from 2015 to 2050 under a business-as-usual scenario and a “High Shift” scenario where governments significantly increase investments in rail and clean bus transportation, and provide infrastructure to ensure safe walking, bicycling and other active forms of transportation. It also includes moving investments away from road construction, parking garages and other steps that encourage car ownership, freeing up resources for the needed investments.

- Under the High Shift scenario, mass transit access worldwide is projected to more than triple for the lowest income groups and more than double for the second lowest groups. This would provide the poor with better access to employment and services that can improve their livelihoods.

.....

M II A II R II K

Sep 25, 2014 2:54 PM

Personal Rapid Transit Is Probably Never Going to Happen

Read More: http://www.citylab.com/tech/2014/09/...happen/380467/

(ATN): A Review of the State of the Industry and Prospects for the Future PDF: http://transweb.sjsu.edu/PDFs/resear...t-networks.pdf

Quote:

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Though the concept has been around for half a century, only five completed systems in the world can be reasonably defined as personal rapid transit: those in Morgantown, West Virginia, which opened in 1975; Rotterdam in The Netherlands (1999); Masdar City in Abu Dhabi (2010); Heathrow Airport in London (2011); and Suncheon Bay in South Korea (2014). While there's been a noticeable uptick in the past 15 years, four projects in that span is still, in the report's own words, "not enough to claim that there is an active market sufficient to support an industry."

- That's especially true if you consider that four of the systems hardly qualify as full-fledged. The podcars in Masdar and Suncheon are really just shuttles at the moment. The one in Rotterdam is a feeder that links suburban offices to a rail station on a guideway that isn't even exclusive all the way. And the one in Heathrow is basically an alternative to an airport people mover. Other proposals and plans have surfaced in this time—an elevated podcar system in Tel Aviv being the latest—but nothing has come of them.

- The Morgantown system shows the promise of personal rapid transit, and probably explains why the idea has hung around for so long despite rarely being realized. Transit advocates like it because such systems have the potential to reduce car reliance in cities. Transit opponents like it, too, because the on-demand service, relatively private pods, and direct-to-destination trips kind of make it public transportation without the whole bothersome public thing.

- Upon closer inspection, it's this attempt to be everything to everyone that creates some problems for personal rapid transit. As more people use the system, it becomes less able to accommodate individual demand for destinations, which renders it more of a traditional rail transit system—but without enough capacity to handle rush-hour crowds. Meanwhile, the direct-to-destination element still can't beat the door-to-door service offered by taxi networks. In other words, personal rapid transit reproduces modes that already exist in the city, only less effectively.

- Then there's the problem of integrating such systems into the existing urban landscape. Between the need to dedicate lanes to high-capacity transit, create space for cyclists and walkers, and reduce road capacity overall where possible, there's just not much room for new low-capacity fixed systems on city streets. That leaves elevated podcar systems, which opens up a world of complexity with existing city infrastructure—exemplified by an awkward image in the Mineta report showing a PRT line blasting through sidewalk trees above the heads of pedestrians:

- For airports and new cities, PRT could supplement other mass transit systems rather effectively and encourage people to live car-free lifestyles by providing them destination-to-destination service with minimal walking to and from stations. In newly built environments, PRT could be constructed cheaply and it could be installed in such a way that does not disrupt its surroundings. But there aren't many Masdars out there. And regardless, there's an even simpler reason why it's probably not going to happen for podcars: driverless cars.

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http://cdn.citylab.com/media/img/cit...lead_large.jpg

dubu	Sep 26, 2014 12:11 AM

http://i462.photobucket.com/albums/q...ps63b0ec91.jpg

cool electric bike, perfect for the nw

THE ENCLOSED PEDELEC BIKE

edit: it isnt electric but it should be

Busy Bee

Sep 26, 2014 1:58 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by M II A II R II K (Post 6742950)

Personal Rapid Transit Is Probably Never Going to Happen

Good Riddance. #dumbestideaever #foolserrand #makesnosense #weirdandsillyfromthesixties

M II A II R II K

Sep 26, 2014 4:04 AM

It works great as a horizontal elevator system within a large complex.

GlassCity

Sep 26, 2014 4:28 AM

I never understood the difference between PRT and cars.

fflint

Sep 26, 2014 7:28 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by GlassCity (Post 6744252)

I never understood the difference between PRT and cars.

PRT combines the spacial wastefulness of cars with the inconveniences of public transit.

KevinFromTexas

Sep 27, 2014 12:55 AM

http://www.kvue.com/story/news/local...alks/16287483/

Quote:

Austin City Council approves rainbow crosswalks

KVUE.com 6:21 p.m. CDT September 26, 2014

AUSTIN -- Downtown Austin just got a little more colorful.

On Sept. 25, 2014 the Austin City Council passed a proposal for rainbow crosswalks on Bettie Naylor and 4th street.

https://fbcdn-sphotos-e-a.akamaihd.n...80354463_o.jpg
https://www.facebook.com/austinpride...type=3&theater

dubu	Sep 30, 2014 9:22 PM

• Video Link

driverless shuttle

M II A II R II K

Oct 1, 2014 12:54 PM

Edmonton: what a great transit debate looks like

Read More: http://www.humantransit.org/2014/09/...ooks-like.html

Quote:

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Unlike many transit debates, this one is about a real issue that affects the entire city: how to balance the ridership goals of transit with the competing coverage goals, where "coverage" means "respond to every neighborhood's social-service needs and/or sense of entitlement to transit even if the result is predictably low-ridership service."

- When I briefed the Edmonton City Council last year, as part of their Transit System Review, I encouraged the council to formulate a policy about how they would divide their transit budget between ridership goals vs. coverage goals. This solves a fundamental problem in transit analysis today: too often, transit services are being criticized based on their failure to achieve a goal that is not the actual goal of the service. For example, almost all arguments about how unproductive North American bus service is are based on the false assumption that all bus services are trying to be productive.

Nothing makes me happier than to hear elected officials debating an actual question whose answer, once they give it, will actually affect reality. This is what's happening in Edmonton now. So far, articles in Elise Stolte's series have included:

- A nice backgrounder on the whole issue, in which I was interviewed.

- Iveson_mapMayor Don Iveson scribbling a hand-drawn map of his ideal Frequent Network, rich with evocative ball-point ovals and clear hints of grid, and explaining the Frequent Network concept that is the foundation of many high-ridership networks.

- A city councilman from an outer suburban district arguing against too much service to his own low-density constituents: "If you want good transit," he says, "live where it already exists."

.....

M II A II R II K

Oct 1, 2014 1:12 PM

The 4 Transportation Systems You'll Meet in the Future

Read More: http://www.citylab.com/commute/2014/...future/380904/

Website: http://reprogrammingmobility.org/

Quote:

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Re-Programming Mobility conceives four fictional-but-fact-based urban-mobility scenarios set in roughly 2030. The 15-year window is far enough away for mobility to be uprooted—the U.S. interstates were largely completed between 1955 and 1970, after all—but still close enough to be reshaped by public input. While each scenario feels a bit far-fetched in its own right, together they offer plenty of food for thought to anyone concerned with the future of urban movement.

- There's something here for everyone to like (and hate). Townsend says no scenario is intended to be a favorite or ideal, and expects the "real outcome" to be a mixture of each. "Really, the purpose of the scenarios is to try to get people to understand the messiness of the future," he says. "There's not a single technology, or a single decision, or a single economic force that's going to shape the outcome. It's actually the interplay of lots of different forces, including the policy and planning choices we make. That's what we're trying to call people's attention to."

Atlanta, 2028

For years, metro Atlanta suffered terrible traffic congestion, brought on in large part by sprawl and decentralization. In response, Atlanta decided … to sprawl more. This scenario supposes that Atlanta resisted calls for transit and transit-oriented development and instead tried to "grow its way" out of traffic problems. Facilitating this shift are solar-powered roads run by Google—G-Roads—were driverless cars connect commuters to the city at 90 miles an hour. Congestion does fall in this scenario, but exurbs and edge cities expand considerably.

.....

Los Angeles, 2030

Driverless cars have arrived in the Los Angeles of 2030, but they don't play nicely together. L.A. roads carry a mix of tiny Google pods, bigger luxury models, and low-cost Chinese knock-offs—each with varying degrees of automation and poor overall connectivity. The result is enormous congestion. (Adding to the problem, driverless cars now circle in traffic to avoid paying for parking, increasing vehicle-miles traveled by 30 percent.) Youth interest in transit has waned, because digital disengagement is just as easy in a driverless car as it was on a train.

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New Jersey, 2029

Major climate events have crushed New Jersey's road network, but from the wreckage has emerged an incredibly sustainable mobility system based on bus-rapid transit corridors. Commuters can arrange a BRT trip on demand or rely on predictive schedules developed by Big Data. The suburbs have collapsed around BRT hubs situated within walkable areas near bike-share stations. Private cars still exist, but they're heavily tolled to pay for BRT upgrades, and commute time into New York has fallen considerably.

.....

Boston, 2032

In this scenario, Boston becomes a dense city to the extreme degree. Freed of possessions by the sharing economy, young people flock to micro-apartments just 135 to 160 square feet in size. The possessions they do own exist in local warehouses, with a system of driverless valets to pick up or drop off items on demand—a sort of "goods cloud." Autonomous bikes thrive, reducing the need for car-ownership and creating streets friendly to pedestrians by day. At night, however, driverless urban freight vehicles take over the roads to replenish and relocate the shared stream of goods.

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Atlanta had become a garden city on a once-inconceivable scale, providing millions of people access to both urban amenities and the countryside.

http://cdn.theatlantic.com/newsroom/.../1b167e681.jpg

No one had ever considered the risks of incomplete automation, and now planners everywhere are trying to figure out ways to accelerate the adoption of these technologies and avoid getting stuck in transition like LA.

http://cdn.theatlantic.com/newsroom/.../5204e7848.jpg

The nation’s most densely populated state, which had reached the limits of sprawl ahead of all others, was now a model of planned, transit-oriented development. By crafting a novel, uniquely American approach to mass transit, New Jersey had preserved its economy and its landscape.

http://cdn.theatlantic.com/newsroom/.../cbe1afcba.jpg

In less than a generation, Boston had splintered into two new cities, living side-by-side but rarely touching—one of people and one of stuff, one existing by day, the other by night.

http://cdn.theatlantic.com/newsroom/.../b8cce2a49.jpg

llamaorama

Oct 1, 2014 5:21 PM

Electric trucks powered by overhead wire similar to trolley buses planned for Long Beach area to reduce pollution caused by diesel trucks serving port:

Los Angeles Is Building an E-Highway

Quote:

The road would eliminate truck emissions, and is being tested in a corridor that connects the port to downtown.

link

Picture from article:

http://cdn.citylab.com/media/img/cit...lead_large.jpg

M II A II R II K

Oct 2, 2014 1:54 PM

How the Shinkansen bullet train made Tokyo into the monster it is today

Read More: http://www.theguardian.com/cities/20...japan-50-years

Quote:

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The world’s first high-speed commercial train line, which celebrates its 50th anniversary on Wednesday, was built along the Tokaido, one of the five routes that connected the Japanese hinterland to Edo, the city that in the mid-1800s became Tokyo. Though train lines crisscrossed the country, they were inadequate to postwar Japan’s newborn ambitions.

- The term “shinkansen” literally means “new trunk line”: symbolically, it lay at the very centre of the huge reconstruction effort. All previous railways were designed to serve regions. The purpose of the Tokaido Shinkansen, true to its name, was to bring people to the capital.

- All foreign visitors to Japan invariably ride the trains and come away with the same impression: Japan’s public transportation is the cleanest, most courteous in the world, run by uniformed, be-gloved men and women who still epitomise a hallowed Japanese work ethic that most companies struggle to maintain in an economy that has remained sluggish for two decades.

- But the most vital aspect of this efficiency is that trains run on time, all the time. This is not just a point of pride. It is a necessity, given the huge number of people that have to be moved. Transfers are timed to the split second, and the slightest delay has the butterfly effect of delaying connections. The Shinkansen is no exception, as exemplified by the “angels”: teams of pink-attired women who descend on a train as soon as it arrives at its terminal and in five minutes leave it spotless for the return trip.

- In an interview in the Tokyo Shimbun newspaper last week, Takashi Hara, a political scholar and expert on Japanese railroads, said the policy of extending the Shinkansen was promulgated by Kakuei Tanaka, Japan’s prime minister from 1972 to 1974. “The purpose was to connect regional areas to Tokyo,” Hara said. “And that led to the current situation of a national Shinkansen network, which completely changed the face of Japan. Travel times were shortened and vibration was alleviated, making it possible for more convenient business and pleasure trips, but I have to say that the project just made all the [connecting] cities part of Tokyo.”

- And where the Shinkansen’s long tentacles go, other services shrivel. Local governments in Japan rely heavily on the central government for funds and public works – it’s how the central government keeps them in line. Politicians actively court high-speed railways since they believe they attract money, jobs and tourists. In the early 1990s, a new Shinkansen was built to connect Tokyo to Nagano, host of the 1998 Winter Olympics. The train ran along a similar route as the Shinetsu Honsen, one of the most romanticised railroads in Japan, beloved of train buffs the world over for its amazing scenery – but also considered redundant by operators JR East because, as with almost all rural train lines in Japan, it lost money.

- Meanwhile, the bullet train has sucked the country’s workforce into Tokyo, rendering an increasingly huge part of the country little more than a bedroom community for the capital. One reason for this is a quirk of Japan’s famously paternalistic corporations: namely, employers pay their workers’ commuting costs. Tax authorities don’t consider it income if it’s less than ¥100,000 a month – so Shinkansen commutes of up to two hours don’t sound so bad. New housing subdivisions filled with Tokyo salarymen subsequently sprang up along the Nagano Shinkansen route and established Shinkansen lines, bringing more people from further away into the capital.

- The Shinkansen’s focus on Tokyo, and the subsequent emphasis on profitability over service, has also accelerated flight from the countryside. It’s often easier to get from a regional capital to Tokyo than to the nearest neighbouring city. Except for sections of the Tohoku Shinkansen, which serves northeastern Japan, local train lines don’t always accommodate Shinkansen rolling stock, so there are often no direct transfer points between local lines and Shinkansen lines. The Tokaido Shinkansen alone now operates 323 trains a day, taking 140 million fares a year, dwarfing local lines. This has had a crucial effect on the physical shape of the city.

- Deepest of all is the new Tokyo terminal for the latest incarnation of the bullet train – the maglev, or Chuo (“central”) Shinkansen, which is supposed to connect Tokyo to Nagoya by 2027 and is being built 40m underground. The maglev is the next technological stage in the evolution of high-speed rail travel. It is meant to be a morale booster for Japan’s railway industry, which no longer boasts the fastest trains or the biggest ridership in the world, distinctions that now belong to Japan’s huge neighbour to the west.

- The Chuo Shinkansen will cut the time it takes to get to Nagoya to 40 minutes, theoretically putting the central Japanese capital within commuting distance of Tokyo – in much the same way that the proposed HS2 will make Birmingham a bedroom community of London. “The Chuo Shinkansen will make Nagoya feel like a suburb of Tokyo,” said Hara.

- If you have any doubt about that, consider that the maglev – short for “magnetic-levitation”, and known in Japanese as “linear motor car” – has to move in as straight and as level a line as possible in order to reach the speeds that will make it the fastest train on Earth. But since Japan’s topography is mostly mountainous, 86% of the journey will be underground.

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http://static.guim.co.uk/ni/14120760...ain_011014.svg

202_Cyclist

Oct 2, 2014 2:33 PM

The Highway Really Is Raising Your Blood Pressure

I am not aware of any adverse health effects of living next to bike lanes.

The Highway Really Is Raising Your Blood Pressure
Is building housing developments near major roadways a bad public health practice?

Sam Sturgis
Oct 1, 2014
CityLab

http://cdn.citylab.com/media/img/cit...lead_large.jpg
Image courtesy of City Lab.

"People may heart New York, but cities in general are hard on the ol' ticker. As previously reported by CityLab, exposure to traffic noise may increase rates of hypertension. Living near a foreclosed home could increase your risk of heart attack, too. Now, another heart-health risk factor has been added to the list: living close to major roadways.

New research from the Journal of the American Heart Association indicates that those living adjacent to large roadways may be at greater risk to develop high blood pressure. Among 5,400 San Diego women, high rates of systolic blood pressure were 9 percent more frequent among those living 100 meters or less from freeways, freeway ramps, and major arterial roads compared to those living 1,000 meters or farther. Given that one-third of American adults are estimated to suffer from high blood pressure, these results could have important urban planning implications. Could a move to build residences away from major roadways, for example, improve public health? (Even though that convenience factor might be what brought you to the city in the first place?).."

http://www.citylab.com/housing/2014/...essure/380992/

electricron

Oct 2, 2014 4:00 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by 202_Cyclist (Post 6752405)

Interesting reports. If noise was the root cause of the high blood pressure higher occurrences, will there be a followup study close to higher capacity railroads which are just as noisy?

Swede

Oct 3, 2014 7:10 AM

That noise is bad for you is already a well established fact, isn't it?

Here in Sweden, the regulations for new build housing has had noise regulations for decades. Regulations that need to be updated since they're stale and stiff.

How do we reduce noise then, to make cities more livable? The way to do it is already known, but a very hard sell politically:
Lower the speed limit to 30 km/h. On all streets in an urban area. That would reduce noise immensely.
As to railroads the trick is to get noise barriers as close to the source of the noise as possible (i.e. as close to the rails as possible). Ideally there's be noise barriers between parallel tracks even. Hard to retro-fit and a nightmare if there is ever snow.

M II A II R II K

Oct 6, 2014 12:59 AM

The Koch Brothers’ War on Transit

Read More: http://usa.streetsblog.org/2014/09/2...ar-on-transit/

Quote:

Transit advocates around the country were transfixed by a story in Tennessee this April, when the state chapter of Americans for Prosperity made a bid to pre-emptively kill Nashville bus rapid transit. It was an especially brazen attempt by Charles and David Koch’s political network to strong-arm local transportation policy makers. But it was far from the only time the Kochs and their surrogates have taken aim at transit.

- The Kochs also have plenty of ties to widely quoted, transit-bashing pundits like Randall O’Toole, Wendell Cox, and Stanley Kurtz — people employed by organizations that receive Koch funding, like the Cato Institute and the Reason Foundation, and who spout the same talking points against walkability and smart growth. Fake experts like O’Toole and Cox have been making the rounds for ages, but the Nashville BRT story raised new questions. How many local transit projects are drawing fire from the Koch political network? And what impact is it having?

- Ashley Robbins, policy manager at the Center for Transportation Excellence, which supports transit ballot measures around the country, said the Nashville case was an eye-opener. ”We’re definitely going to be watching it as we see more conservative efforts pop up in Milwaukee and Oregon as well,” she said. “We’re starting to keep an eye out to see if it’s going to be a trend.” --- In Tennessee, the local Americans for Prosperity chapter failed to enact the transit lane ban, but it did undermine and weaken the Nashville BRT project, which won’t be as robust as first planned. The Nashville example got us wondering where else Koch-backed groups are attacking local transit projects.

Indianapolis

- Americans for Prosperity Indiana was a leading opponent of efforts to expand transit in the Indianapolis region. The group lobbied state officials to kill legislation that allows Indianapolis to hold a tax referendum to expand its transit network. --- Americans for Prosperity was unsuccessful in completely stopping the Indiana legislation, but it made its mark. The language of the bill that eventually passed was amended to forbid the Indianapolis region from pursuing light rail with any funds raised from the tax.

Virginia

- Americans for Prosperity Virginia fought a new tax in Loudoun County to pay for Metro’s Silver Line extension. The organization issued robo-calls calling the extension a “bail-out to rail-station developers,’’ according to the Washington Post. The county Board of Supervisors voted to proceed with the project anyway.

Boston

- A report by the Pioneer Institute created a “manufactured controversy” over the costs of service at the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority, Ellen Dannin wrote in Truthout earlier this year. The Pioneer Institute is part of the State Policy Network, a group of think tanks with “deep ties to the Koch brothers” according to the Center for Media and Democracy [PDF].

- According to one of the institute’s studies, maintenance costs at the MBTA are “out-of-control,” but Dannin, an author of two books on labor issues, wrote in Truthout that Pioneer relied on metrics that were bound to arrive at a predetermined outcome. For example, it chose to compare bus maintenance costs on a per-mile basis, a standard that puts a dense, crowded city like Boston at a disadvantage.

Florida

- Koch-backed organizations were instrumental in sinking Florida’s high-speed rail plans. In 2000, Sunshine State voters passed an amendment to the state’s constitution requiring the state to establish high-speed rail exceeding 120 mph linking its five major cities. But when Governor Rick Scott was elected in 2010 in a wave of Tea Party governors, he fell in line with fellow members of the Republican Governors Association who were killing rail projects on Ohio, Wisconsin, and New Jersey.

- Scott hired the Reason Foundation — where David Koch is a trustee — to write a report about the proposal. To the surprise of no one, the foundation’s Wendell Cox found the project would cost way more than projected [PDF]. Scott used Cox’s dubious claims as the basis for killing the project. Since that time, private investors have taken up the project, which is, in itself, pretty compelling evidence of the financial feasibility of the concept.

Los Angeles

- The Reason Foundation was also critical of the Los Angeles Exposition Line extension, a $2.5 billion, 15-mile light rail line that will connect Santa Monica to downtown. In May 2012, the week the first phase opened, Reason conducted a “study” in which staff went to Expo Line stations and counted passengers.

- Researchers counted 13,000 passengers, short of the 27,000 daily ridership forecast for 2020. The organization concluded that even by “the most optimistic figure Reason can come up with,” ridership projections had been “vastly inflated.” --- Proponents of the line argued that counting passengers during the first week of service wasn’t a fair way to measure its long term success.

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http://usa.streetsblog.org/wp-conten...rs-620x412.png

M II A II R II K

Oct 13, 2014 5:58 PM

The Future of Transportation Is Not All Flying Cars

Read More: http://www.citylab.com/commute/2014/...g-cars/381333/

Future Of Transportation Series: http://www.citylab.com/special-repor...ransportation/

Quote:

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American cities have started a gigantic pivot away from complete car-reliance toward multi-modal transportation systems that balance the needs of drivers alongside those of bus and train riders, pedestrians, cyclists, and taxi users. Instead of only a car key in our pocket or purse we have a metro card and a bike-share fob and a smartphone with an e-hail app. We're going to need roads where we're going, but we don't need just roads, and we don't need to use them the way we use them now.

- That's the clearest lesson to emerge from our Future of Transportation series, which began nine months ago and wraps up today, some 85 stories later. Writers reported from pretty much every big city across the country: from Boston down to Miami in the east, Minneapolis to Chicago in the Midwest, New Orleans and Houston in the South, Salt Lake City and Denver in the mountains, and Seattle to Los Angeles in the west. Meantime, experts and planners and officials shared their thoughts and local lessons that can apply to cities of all shapes and sizes. In both a physical and intellectual sense, we covered a lot of ground.

- Much of that travel came by modes other than automobiles. The trends in public transportation range from mobile ticketing to all-day service demand to quicker project completion to fully automated systems. The related rise in transit-oriented development is both promising from a mobility standpoint and potentially troubling from an equity one. Bus-rapid transit and light rail will both play big roles in our multi-modal future, and if they're designed right, streetcars can, too.

- High-speed passenger rail—some of it privately funded—has been slow going for now but remains potentially transformative. Bike-share has arrived in a major way, and electric bikes may soon follow. Even the oldest form of human transportation will also get a fresh start with new sidewalk and shoe technology (power laces notwithstanding).

- Some of the most-shared articles in the series—at least to date—touch on Portland's new multi-modal bridge that bans cars, Denver's multi-billion-dollar push to become the leading transit city in the West, how to make cycling more popular among low-income city residents, and whether the best way to end drunk driving would be to end driving altogether.

- Judging by reader comments, the pieces that sparked the most discussion include Nate Berg's adventures in a Tesla electric vehicle; Yonah Freemark's analyses of light rail systems and the federal government's failed high-speed rail plan; and Emily Badger's clear case for raising the cost of driving. Jeff Speck's triumphant look at why urban roads should be 10-feet wide instead of 12 is hot on these heels despite coming late to the game.

- This interest in alternative modes doesn't deny that highways and cars will still play a dominant role in the future of city mobility. But the edges of that domination are inching inward. Some cities are pushing against increasing traffic congestion with new forms of road pricing. Others are attacking the problem with wholesale shifts in land use and grand new plans for densification. Parking will become greener, odd as that sounds, and potentially less plentiful.

- Roads and traffic lights alike will become more intelligent. Most urban interstates are here to stay, but some will be torn down in an effort to return cities to the people. Those Millennials that do eventually buy cars may be able to snap a dashboard selfie to celebrate the occasion.

- The biggest wild card in tomorrow's transportation, of course, are driverless cars. They're pretty much here—we learned that much up close when we got the first live look at how Google's autonomous car is learning to navigate city streets. Cities and states are already preparing for the not-so-distant day when these cars will hit the market and the roads. But enormous questions remain about the ultimate impact they'll have on urban mobility.

- In the brightest scenario, driverless technology combines with smartphone-based, on-demand taxi service to all but eliminate car-ownership within the city and complement transit access in the suburbs. In the dimmest, the ceaseless flow of driverless traffic might grind our streets to a halt, and we'll be wishing for flying cars after all.

.....

• Video Link

New Brisavoine

Oct 15, 2014 7:28 PM

The new express subway lines of Paris, with their completion dates. The map was published yesterday, following the press conference by the French prime minister on Monday.

The map shows the 208 km (129 miles) of new lines and extensions planned before 2030 (mostly in tunnels).

http://m0.libe.com/infographic/2014/..._at=1413281063

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