$2million for a study that determines the cost will be expensive to cap certain parts? Perhaps they can re-coop some money from the property above, but, I'd imagine affordable housing is what would be desired.

There was a promise to speed up CT's trains. What will it take to make it happen?

By John Moritz
CT Insider
Dec. 28, 2022


"NEW HAVEN — Departing Union Station at 5:09 in the morning, the fastest of Metro-North’s new “super express” trains into Grand Central Terminal makes the trip in as little as 99 minutes, the quickest commute between the two cities in years and the fulfillment of Gov. Ned Lamont’s promise to reduce travel times by at least 10 minutes by the end of this year.

But finding ways to shave another 15 minutes from the trip — part of Lamont’s longer-term vision for the state’s busiest rail line — will likely prove much more difficult and costly, according to experts and the state’s own planning documents.

The new express trains, which debuted in July, reduced peak-hour commutes by 10 to 12 minutes by slashing the number of stops between New Haven and New York from five to two on the quickest routes, according to a review of train schedules..."

https://www.ctinsider.com/connecticu...k-17664738.php

Some recent Subway photos of mine

https://photos.smugmug.com/Infrastru...DSC_2302-L.jpg

https://photos.smugmug.com/Infrastru...DSC_2412-L.jpg

https://photos.smugmug.com/Infrastru...SC_2208-XL.jpg

https://photos.smugmug.com/Infrastru...SC_1158-XL.jpg

https://photos.smugmug.com/Infrastru...SC_9391-XL.jpg

Nice.

the city car fleet goes electric -- now take their freaking free parking placards away !!! :haha:



Mayor says 925 electric vehicles will replace gas guzzlers in city fleet, backed by $10.1M federal grant

more:
https://www.amny.com/transit/925-ele...federal-grant/

So good you're back Nexis!

nexis back from da ded! :tup:

I shifted over to reddit , but i've decided to come back to SSP... Sadly SSC is a former shell of itself.

^ i dont look at city reddits very often, but i will try to remember to cash you ousside over there too! :cheers:


***


i posted this on another forum -- but i thought some here would find this topic interesting too:


i dont advocate jaywalking -- its dangerous, but i am certainly not against it and do it a lot, with care, i hope.

there is a serious and perpetual battle regarding who owns the streets and the history of jaywalking that is pretty interesting.

if you are into it here is more:

a brief jaywalking history:
https://gothamist.com/arts-entertain...walking-in-nyc

an informative jaywalking history in america podcast:
https://99percentinvisible.org/episo...modern-moloch/

My issue with many jaywalkers is that they do it so carelessly and unpredictably.

IMO (one that could be better informed, admittedly), traffic works well when all elements travel at a similar set speed and is predictable. That's why in traffic engineering theory, the highest Level of Service (LOS) on limited access freeways occurs when all cars travel around 45 mph. 45 mph allows the highest density of cars to travel through any one point on the highway. Faster speeds requires a further spread between cars due to physics and safety reasons, decreasing the LOS. Slower speeds means there are fewer cars traveling through any one point compared to at 45 mph, also decreasing the LOS.

Back on topic. My opinion is that many of the most reckless NYC jaywalkers have never driven a car extensively in the city. Because it they have driven in the city before, they would never do things like walk behind a parallel-parked car whose tail lights are on (even worse, whose braking or reversing lights are on). They would also walk behind a big truck unless they were very cautious and absolutely certain the truck wasn't backing up.

The sheer unpredictability of many pedestrians drives me (pun unintended) up the wall, as a pedestrian, driver, and cyclist/scooter rider. I hate to victim blame, but there are certain vehicle-pedestrian deaths that could have been avoided if the pedestrian was more aware of their surroundings.

At the same time, I am an advocate of heavily reducing our dependence of cars in NYC. The mathematics just doesn't make sense for cars in NYC. They require way too much space per-capita, and most of the time, they are sitting idle doing nothing. Why give up so much of our precious NYC real estate over to drivers for free (roads, on-street parking, shopping center parking lots)?

We would do much better in the city and the denser outer boro areas with drastically improved transit, more micromobility lanes (micromobility = bikes, scooters, other faster-than-pedestrian micro transport devices that aren't cars or trucks), and more pedestrian walkways and sidewalks. Cars and pedestrians don't mix particularly well in the city. Cars don't particularly mix well with anything, and it's best to reduce their dependence by making it easier and faster to travel between boroughs.

^ a major new problem is the steep rise in the use of e-bikes. i’m not against them, except because that completely asleep at the wheel moron diblasio legalized them without requiring them to make some of low clicking sound or noise. instead they come flying around corners at you completely silently and its dangerous as hell. i have seen people yelp and groceries literally flying in the air like a cartoon because of those dam things tootling around. not to mention the bootleg batteries starting apt fires.

I think that regulation, registration, and insurance should be required for bigger & faster e-bikes and e-scooters. Some of these things are ridiculously large and fast. The more powerful ones can weigh over 100 lbs and go as fast as 40-60 mph. To class the lighter and less-powerful ones with these monsters is dumb.

The big issue is that we all need to be aware and defensive of one another. This goes for car/bus/truck drivers, e-scooter and e-bike riders, normal bike riders, and pedestrians. I've seen pedestrians just walk into a bike lane or against the crossing light. I've seen car drivers make wide sweeping turns without looking for bicyclists or pedestrians. I've seen e-bike and e-scooter riders act as bullies to push pedestrians and slower e-bike/e-scooter/bike riders out of the way because they want to get somewhere faster.

It's dumb that these 100 lb e-bikes and e-scooters get to use the same lane as a slower bikes, e-bikes, and e-scooters. But if we push them into the normal traffic lane, then they feel vulnerable to getting run over by multi-ton cars and trucks. Guess what? They make slower bicyclists and e-riders feel the same way when they bully them out of the way.

We are on the path to delegating and designing better road infrastructure for both pedestrians and bike/e-riders, mainly by removing much of the infrastructure currently dedicated to grossly inefficient private cars. We shouldn't make it too onerous for people to own and operate e-vehicles since they are part of this big plan to democratize mobility. But we also need to define their weight & speed limits to properly legislate them and plan out our roads.

PS - the battery fire issue is due to bad quality batteries & chargers, mainly from cut-cost Chinese manufacturers. It's also due to civilians not understanding electrical limits of outlets and wiring, and charging near flammable objects. Most outlets are designed around 15 amp outlets (except in the kitchen and bathroom, which use 20 amp outlets, often with GFCI trippers). Higher amp charging = higher temperatures. The battery often acts as the spark, tinder, & fuel in fires, but the rest of an apartment or house also contains plenty of tinder and fuel to sustain a fire. Besides, we also have many other lithium-ion battery devices around the house, including in smartphones. Remember the Samsung fires?

The main issue is the Li-Ion fires are much harder to control, which is why getting high quality batteries and chargers that are UL-certified is important. And we also need to discourage people from continuing to use damaged batteries or chargers, or buying cheap replacement batteries from sketchy dealers.

just for comparison to our rail h8rin’ country, but china opens i think its 9 (!) more rail lines at the end of 2022:


China opens more metro lines as year comes to close

New lines include the 30.7km Line 4 in Qingdao.

January 6, 2023
Written by David Burroughs


CHINA continued its tradition of opening new metro lines and extensions at the turn of the year, with a number of projects entering service towards the end of 2022.


more:
https://www.railjournal.com/passenge...omes-to-close/

Just kill me

Fuck, the light rail option was chosen

Move Forward on Light Rail Option for the Interborough Express
https://mobile.twitter.com/2AvSagas/...79344518537217

Extremely disappointing. Extremely short sighted.

On the other hand it offers the ability to link up with HBLR in the future with a harbor tunnel, for a true orbital line. Ideally with a slight detour to St George.

That's already mostly the case. In the US it's only ebikes with motors no more powerful than 500w and with assist speeds limited to 20mph that can be classified as bicycles and avoid insurance or licensing. I don't believe there's a restriction on weight, however.

If you're not going to do heavy rail with the ridership they eventually project they really should consider a fully automated system that can sustain extremely high frequency.

Looking at the study, apparently the light rail option will cost $5.5 billion, while the heavy rail option would have cost $8.4 billion. These costs make no sense at all!

https://new.mta.info/document/103686