Cincinnati Light Rail News

[buildingcincinnati]

^ Have you seen the proposal in Northside's draft land use plan to put a transit facility on the southern side of the neighborhood?  I'll try to dig it up soon.

[Mr Sparkle]

Maybe your urban form and density are such because you got rid of your transit system and started accommodating cars instead of people.

Yes, a while ago, in step with almost every city in the US. we are stuck with it now

[Mr Sparkle]

Mr Sparkle, what is it about your urban form and density that makes you think the system would not get much use?

Low density in most of the region, widely dispersed job centers.

I though 5000 folks per sqaure mile was the density that could support fixed rail.

IMHO, bus rapid tranist is the way to go, routes could be flexible enough, combined with busways...much lower capital costs tha rail

[DaninDC]

You can't gauge appropriateness of transit on the basis of minimum population density per square mile.  You have to examine individual corridors, much as highway engineers do.   

BRT sucks.  There's nothing "rapid" about it, and flexibility is actually a very negative aspect of transit lines.  No one wants to have to guess where the line is going to take them.  You get what you pay for. 

Rail has a proven record of spurring high-density development clustered around stations.  This, in turn, promotes walking, bicycling, and other non-automobile forms of transport.  It also makes the bus system work better, by allowing buses to serve shorter routes, where they are more effective, and feed into the rail network. 

Widely dispersed job centers are a symptom of the disease of highway-mania.  What's your solution--build ever-more highways?  An interstate highway lane can move 1500 cars an hour.  A light rail line can move ten times the amount of people in the same amount of space.  Do the math.

In the 21st century, the cities that remain relevant are those who will stop making excuses, and have the guts to invest in infrastructure.  After all, how do you expect private investors to bring their money, if the public won't even invest in its own city?

[3231]

"BRT sucks.  There's nothing "rapid" about it, and flexibility is actually a very negative aspect of transit lines.  No one wants to have to guess where the line is going to take them."

Not that I am in love with BRT, but are you afraid the bus will take a random left turn and head out to Amish country? They do travel on established and fixed routes.

[KJP]

Maybe your urban form and density are such because you got rid of your transit system and started accommodating cars instead of people.

Yes, a while ago, in step with almost every city in the US. we are stuck with it now

Why are we stuck with it? Gee, I thought human beings decided the form of their cities, not some force we can't control, like Mother Nature!

We decided to promote dispersed urban forms more than 50 years ago, and what we got was an overreaction to the density that had existed. A highway is the antithesis of a rail line in terms of the kinds of urban forms it fosters, but has similarilities as well. A highway represents a long-term public investment investment with an easily identifiable route. And private capital will follow public investments. That's where the similarities end. Cars require everything to be spread out, and development incentives ensure it through interchange zoning plus other zoning codes which force separated land uses and make mixed uses illegal -- requiring people to drive everywhere. Numerous suburban office parks were founded on Ohio's lamentable tax abatement/enterprise zone policies.

Bus rapid transit is a compromise that is little more than a feel-good attempt by skittish public officials to show they are doing something about transit. Problem is, it's still a bus, which I call "the shame train." It's still not going to draw riders having a wider diversity of incomes.

If Cincinnati decides it wants to build a rail line and encourage density along it, then it will happen. Rail has the greatest capability among transit modes of fostering density because of its certainty of routing, extent of investment and message to developers that the rail line is going to be there for decades, if not a century or more. That investment can be enhanced through TOD zoning overlays, tax credits for developing vacant lots or redeveloping historic structures, establishing tax-increment financing districts along the rail line, and working with Fannie Mae and a local lender to provide reduced rate mortgages for structures within 1,000 feet of the rail line. These are things that many other cities have enacted with great success to shape their urban forms in more sustainable ways in terms of expanding their tax base, reducing traffic and providing greater accessibility to housing and job opportunities for people of all incomes.

It is the opposite of effect of what we've seen from our highway-dominated urban forms over the last 50 years, when cities were hollowed out and people of different incomes became isolated from each other. That didn't happen through an act of Mother Nature or even the free market. It was bad public policy that created it, and better public policy can repair the damage.

[DaninDC]

"BRT sucks.  There's nothing "rapid" about it, and flexibility is actually a very negative aspect of transit lines.  No one wants to have to guess where the line is going to take them."

Not that I am in love with BRT, but are you afraid the bus will take a random left turn and head out to Amish country? They do travel on established and fixed routes.

Which is it?  Is BRT flexible, or are the routes fixed?  They don't seem all too fixed to me--who's to say the transit authority won't change the route over time?  It ain't too hard to follow a different street, ya know.  Heck, GCRTA changes routes more than they change their underwear.  If you have ever ridden a subway, and then ridden a bus, you would never EVER make the claim that BRT is an acceptable substitute for rail.

I would love to find one, just ONE person promoting BRT, that is an actual transit rider.  Instead, we get a bunch of cheap bastards who want to stick it to transit riders by giving them the smallest carrot possible, then pour billions and billions of dollars into unfettered freeway expansion, which not only renders the transit system useless by spreading development, but only creates worse traffic problems. 

[Mr Sparkle]

^Why are we stuck with it? Gee, I thought human beings decided the form of their cities, not some force we can't control, like Mother Nature!

terrain has a part to play (note Cinc'y hilly terrain)

^We decided to promote dispersed urban forms more than 50 years ago, and what we got was an overreaction to the density that had existed.

dispersion was happening long before 1955, each stage of urban form was devweloped around the mode of transportation at that time (Walking city, horse..streetcar etc), folks moved as far away from each other as the transportation mode allowed. Cinti's first suburbs developed around the first streecar lines and at the top of inclines

^A highway is the antithesis of a rail line in terms of the kinds of urban forms it fosters, but has similarilities as well. A highway represents a long-term public investment investment with an easily identifiable route. And private capital will follow public investments. That's where the similarities end. Cars require everything to be spread out, and development incentives ensure it through interchange zoning plus other zoning codes which force separated land uses

Why is separate land uses bad? I certainly don't want to live nearby industry or atop a store or bar

^and make mixed uses illegal -- requiring people to drive everywhere. Numerous suburban office parks were founded on Ohio's lamentable tax abatement/enterprise zone policies.

^Bus rapid transit is a compromise that is little more than a feel-good attempt by skittish public officials to show they are doing something about transit. Problem is, it's still a bus, which I call "the shame train." It's still not going to draw riders having a wider diversity of incomes.

It would be a heckuva lot cheaper to re-market the bus, yes trains have a "nostalgia" feel to them. Bus Rapid Transit could be a first stage in the development of a rail line. BRT allows a closer to "door to door" trip, more competitve with the SOV

[Mr Sparkle]

^You can't gauge appropriateness of transit on the basis of minimum population density per square mile.  You have to examine individual corridors, much as highway engineers do.   

Say what??? so a fixed rail transit open would work in low density areas? If you are talking about reducing VMT, then you want folks to walk to the stations, hence denser areas.

^BRT sucks.  There's nothing "rapid" about it, and flexibility is actually a very negative aspect of transit lines.  No one wants to have to guess where the line is going to take them.  You get what you pay for. 

Why would you not know where it is going to take you?

^Rail has a proven record of spurring high-density development clustered around stations.  This, in turn, promotes walking, bicycling, and other non-automobile forms of transport.  It also makes the bus system work better, by allowing buses to serve shorter routes, where they are more effective, and feed into the rail network. 

Thus a denser area...there has to be a minumun density to support rail

^Widely dispersed job centers are a symptom of the disease of highway-mania.  What's your solution--build ever-more highways?  An interstate highway lane can move 1500 cars an hour.  A light rail line can move ten times the amount of people in the same amount of space.  Do the math.

actually 2500 veh/hr, average occupancy 1.2, so 3000 folks per lane, peak

cite a light rail line that carries 30,000 an hour

For one we can get more use out of our existing highway corrdiors...put rail in the medians

In the 21st century, the cities that remain relevant are those who will stop making excuses, and have the guts to invest in infrastructure.  After all, how do you expect private investors to bring their money, if the public won't even invest in its own city?
[/quote]

[DaninDC]

Succinct reply to above:

1.  Note San Francisco hilly terrain.  What's your point?

2.  Physical expansion is not dispersion.  Our metropolitan areas are currently expanding exponentially with respect to population growth.  Witness Greater Cleveland, which has had zero net population change in 35 years, yet continues to sprawl.

3.  Some of us like to get off our asses and walk to things.  Like the store.  Or the bar. 
No one says you have to live next to a chemical plant.  If you don't want to live above a store or a bar--then don't.  Please don't mandate, though, that buying a loaf of bread must be a 45 minute ordeal involving a car trip.  Some of us like to get off our asses and walk to things.

4.  You get what you pay for.  Nostalgia?  Pardon me while I stifle my laughter.  New York must be the most backward, old-fashioned place on earth, then.  People aren't as dumb as you think they are.  Just because you market something heavier doesn't make it a better idea. 

Keep half-assing things, and let me know how it works out.  Next time you're stuck in a horrendous traffic jam, I want you to think of me: crashed out on the subway, listening to my ipod, and going anywhere I need to go for less than what you spend on gasoline.

[Mr Sparkle]

^ If you have ever ridden a subway, and then ridden a bus, you would never EVER make the claim that BRT is an acceptable substitute for rail

Thats the problem, its not a substitute for rail, we are looking for an alternate to the SOV

[DaninDC]

Sparkle, thanks for being an ideological troll.  I give you points for trying.  Any salesman pushing such an obviously flawed and failed product deserves credit for such efforts in the face of incontrovertible evidence against his position.

Density along *corridors* is necessary for transit.  Persons per square mile applies to an area, not a linear strip.

Where do you get your road numbers?  Source for one lane of freeway carrying 2500 VPH at 60 mph?  I've never seen it higher than 1500.  What metropolitan area has an average vehicle occupancy of 1.2 during rush hour???

Highway corridors are the WORST places for rail transit.  Bad pedestrian access (at best) and lack of density (see your own damn post).

Boston's Green Line, which is over 100 years old, carries over 250,000 people per day.  How many freeways do you know have that distinction?  Beautiful city, too.

[jmecklenborg]

>Bus Rapid Transit could be a first stage in the development of a rail line.

Also, Boston began operation of the Silver Line, a BRT line, in 2002.  I rode it once to see it before I moved out.  The buses are definitely more comfortable and yes they program the lights.  But giving it a dedicated lane removed on-street parking from a major arterial road.  Also, they are building a large tunnel downtown so that the line will operate as a subway there  and interchange directly with T subway stations underground.  The downside to this is that the tunnel must be larger than a rail tunnel because there must be room to steer and ventilation is required (although they might switch to overhead electric like the Seattle bus tunnel but I can't remember).  Anyway, there are long-term plans for the Silver Line to be switched to light rail, but at the pace the T is being expanded, don't count on it before 2050. 

BRT can be a reasonable compromise under very specific conditions, where topographical and pre-existing infrastructure come into play.  But it is always a compromise, and an expensive one.  In Boston I believe that line has some chance for success because it is being integrated into subway stations and has extensive underground exclusive right-of-way (not yet though -- that tunnel opens in about 3 years).  But I don't see BRT as any kind of solution for a broad range of applications.   
 

[Mr Sparkle]

^Sparkle, thanks for being an ideological troll.

You are welcome, I assume you don't think yourself as the same

^I give you points for trying.  Any salesman pushing such an obviously flawed and failed product deserves credit for such efforts in the face of incontrovertible evidence against his position.

I'm not pushing anything----I would like to see sensible cost effective alternates...I haven't seen anything that says LRT has been cost effective---its more of a <some city> has it, so it will work for us too. Do I think our cuurent lifestlye can go on forever? No....let the market forces brings change..

^Density along *corridors* is necessary for transit.  Persons per square mile applies to an area, not a linear strip.

What kind of density are you tallkking about, commercial and TOD I asssume...the folks have go to live somewhere

^Where do you get your road numbers?  Source for one lane of freeway carrying 2500 VPH at 60 mph?  I've never seen it higher than 1500.  What metropolitan area has an average vehicle occupancy of 1.2 during rush hour???

Highway capacity manual for VPHPL

1.2 is a little low for rush hour I admit

"In 1995, the average vehicle occupancy rate for all travel in the US was 1.59 persons per vehicle, ranging from a low of 1.14 for work trips to a high of 2.17 for other social and recreational trips". Source: Nationwide Personal Transportation Survey, 1995

^Boston's Green Line, which is over 100 years old, carries over 250,000 people per day.  How many freeways do you know have that distinction?  Beautiful city, too.

Apples to oranges..Boston is a dense East Coast City ( Iwould like to visit BTW)

There are guite a few freeways that carry that much--I-75 just north of DT Cincy has about 168,460 ADT, using the 1.6 per vehicle, thats 269,500 folks http://www.dot.state.oh.us/techservsite/availpro/Traffic_Survey/TSR_Report/2002_TSRmaps/ham_tsr_2002.pdf

Could we not have the same impact of building a light rail line if we could increase the average vehicle occupancy by 1 fold to 2.2?

[DaninDC]

I agree.  The current Administration is trying to sell American cities this false bill of goods as a one-size-fits-all transit solution.  When Jennifer Dorn (FTA Administrator) stops driving and starts taking the bus to work, I might start taking the idea of BRT seriously.  BRT almost never ends up being the locally preferred alternative, even after weighing costs.  In the Dulles corridor in Northern Virginia, several proposals were floated, including building BRT, and then converting to Metrorail (heavy rail subway).  Although the Metro alternative had considerably higher capital costs, the projected ridership was over FOUR times higher due to the quality of service obtained by rail.  Needless to say, Metro (sans BRT prelude) became the locally preferred alternative.

[Mr Sparkle]

Succinct reply to above:

1.  Note San Francisco hilly terrain.  What's your point?

2.  Physical expansion is not dispersion.  Our metropolitan areas are currently expanding exponentially with respect to population growth.  Witness Greater Cleveland, which has had zero net population change in 35 years, yet continues to sprawl.

3.  Some of us like to get off our asses and walk to things.  Like the store.  Or the bar. 
No one says you have to live next to a chemical plant.  If you don't want to live above a store or a bar--then don't.  Please don't mandate, though, that buying a loaf of bread must be a 45 minute ordeal involving a car trip.  Some of us like to get off our asses and walk to things.

4.  You get what you pay for.  Nostalgia?  Pardon me while I stifle my laughter.  New York must be the most backward, old-fashioned place on earth, then.  People aren't as dumb as you think they are.  Just because you market something heavier doesn't make it a better idea. 

Keep half-assing things, and let me know how it works out.  Next time you're stuck in a horrendous traffic jam, I want you to think of me: crashed out on the subway, listening to my ipod, and going anywhere I need to go for less than what you spend on gasoline.

I'm not mandating or marketing anything...but I do get the feeling from you that you want everyone to live like you do

[DaninDC]

Sparkle, do you know WHY Boston is a dense city (the East Coast thing is irrelevant)?  It's because they never gutted the place with freeways.  Cleveland and Cincinnati used to be just as dense.  Please visit that wonderful city.  You might be surprised at how much you learn.

You can start increasing your persons per vehicle by taking someone else to work every day.  Put up or shut up.

[Mr Sparkle]

Sparkle, do you know WHY Boston is a dense city (the East Coast thing is irrelevant)?  It's because they never gutted the place with freeways.  Cleveland and Cincinnati used to be just as dense.  Please visit that wonderful city.  You might be surprised at how much you learn. {/quote]

Well, I have been to Chicago, and realize how much different it is fom Cincy...I have ridden the EL, btw.
I mentioned East Coast, as that is were a lot of dense cities are (an most still have their heavy rail)

You can start increasing your persons per vehicle by taking someone else to work every day.  Put up or shut up.

My point was, if we made a concerned effort to increase PPV (park and rife, tax incentives), we can have the same effect as a rail line.

The "put up or shut up" comment was a nice touch..what do you assume about me?

[ink]

Sparkle, do you know WHY Boston is a dense city (the East Coast thing is irrelevant)?  It's because they never gutted the place with freeways. 

I just watched a documentary about Boston tearing down hundreds of buildings to run an elevated innerloop around the city. The fella who came up with the big dig project had watched this happen in the 50's and didn't want to expand the destruction when the 40 year old steel structure needed replacement. Not taking down any building was a big positive for his plan. Anyways, Boston did at one time.

[DaninDC]

Do you carry 2.2 people in your car to and from work everyday? 

I don't force my lifestyle on anyone.  Where I live, I at least have the choice of driving, bicycling, or taking transit to work.  I have the choice of living in an urban neighborhood or suburban subdivision.  In most places in this nation, the only real option is living in the suburbs and driving everywhere.  Now THAT's forcing someone into a lifestyle. 

We already subsidize driving at tremendous levels in this nation.  Why should we give people tax incentives for behavior that could be changed simply by eliminating subsidies?  As a non-driver, I frankly do not like the idea of my tax dollars going to support further reckless and unsustainable reassignment of population patterns.   

Most metropolitan areas already have park-and-ride lots for carpoolers.  You would know that, though, since you lead by example. 

[DaninDC]

Sparkle, do you know WHY Boston is a dense city (the East Coast thing is irrelevant)?  It's because they never gutted the place with freeways. 

I just watched a documentary about Boston tearing down hundreds of buildings to run an elevated innerloop around the city. The fella who came up with the big dig project had watched this happen in the 50's and didn't want to expand the destruction when the 40 year old steel structure needed replacement. Not taking down any building was a big positive for his plan. Anyways, Boston did at one time.

Boston built one freeway, the Central Artery.  It also retained the Green Line trolleys, three heavy rail lines, and an extensive commuter rail system so that even when people moved to the "suburbs", the jobs didn't have to follow them, and empty the city like has happened in too many places in this nation.   

[PigBoy]

When comparing highways and LRT, don't forget that regardless of how many people are fitting on those highways, there are still going to be a helluva lot more vehicles that are funneling in from various roads and being disgorged onto other roads.

Actually, I guess that's just the congestion argument, so I suppose it's already been talked about here.

[Mr Sparkle]

Sparkle, do you know WHY Boston is a dense city (the East Coast thing is irrelevant)?  It's because they never gutted the place with freeways. 

I just watched a documentary about Boston tearing down hundreds of buildings to run an elevated innerloop around the city. The fella who came up with the big dig project had watched this happen in the 50's and didn't want to expand the destruction when the 40 year old steel structure needed replacement. Not taking down any building was a big positive for his plan. Anyways, Boston did at one time.

Boston built one freeway, the Central Artery.  It also retained the Green Line trolleys, three heavy rail lines, and an extensive commuter rail system so that even when people moved to the "suburbs", the jobs didn't have to follow them, and empty the city like has happened in too many places in this nation.   

IIRC the "128" corridor is a place of very high employment (Silicon Valley -East?)

^I don't force my lifestyle on anyone.  Where I live, I at least have the choice of driving, bicycling, or taking transit to work.  I have the choice of living in an urban neighborhood or suburban subdivision.  In most places in this nation, the only real option is living in the suburbs and driving everywhere.  Now THAT's forcing someone into a lifestyle. 

I disagree, what's happening in Cincy and other places is that there is a reinvestment into the urban core and more folks are living there...its a positive to me (shocking?)...we have more housing choices
I am not saying you fit this, but there are some folks that want to force everyone back into density...

[MayDay]

Dan, I appreciate what you're contributing to the debate but lay off with the personal insults, ok?

You have a lot of information about the topic and I'm glad you're here to offer it but you're turning off more people than you're educating. You have a caustic approach that you've carried over from the cleveland.com forums. While I'm glad that you contribute a lot of great info to the forum, I will not tolerate the unnecessary insults.
 

[jmecklenborg]

Boston most certainly has more than one expressway.  I-93 runs both north and south from the city and I-90 (Mass Turnpike) runs west.  Also Storrow Drive cuts off Boston from its Charles River waterfront to a greater extent than does Ft. Washington Way in Cincinnati.  The East Boston Expressway runs east to the airport then up the coast.  The I-93 central artery is well-known as probably the most spectacular example of highway destruction in the US but it's really (or rather was) only about a mile long.  The North End was completely demolished, as were large swaths of the city center for trophy projects like the City Hall.  The I-95 beltway is as car-oriented as anywhere in the South.  To pretend that Boston is some kind of perfect city, an urbanist's dream, is the view of someone who has visited but hasn't lived there.  It takes large chunks of time to go very short distances there; the subway cars, epecially the green line, are often crowded beyond belief, and people are the rudest anywhere.  Arguments break out between strangers in a way that just doesn't happen elsewhere.  The density and transit system that midwestern urbanists worship is largely responsible for that.  The red line is the only subway line there that actually travels rapidly (like NY or Washington) -- the green line probably only flirts with 30mph a few times.  The green line is also quite easy to incorrectly navigate because the A B C D trains turn around at different points on their way to Lechmere, which is confusing.  Also, some of the letters have slashes through them, and I was never able to figure out what that meant.  Sure, the green line has charm because it's such an anomaly, but that wears off quick when you live there and have to deal with its obnoxiousness all the time.     

Also, in comparing Cincinnati's transit to elsewhere, the hills have always doomed subway construction there.  The original subway which was left unfinished largely avoided the most populous areas outside of the downtown basin because extensive bored tunneling is necessary to get to the UC and Walnut Hills areas.  The cost of dealing with the UC and hospital areas is what has doomed the corridor that would have the most ridership.  The cost of the Mt. Auburn Tunnel meant the line could not afford to travel underground through downtown.   


   

[DaninDC]

Sorry, MayDay.  I'm just a bit agitated.  I don't mean to insult anyone personally, because I certainly don't know anyone on this forum personally. 

We've been doing the same thing in this country for sixty years, intentionally destroying our cities, at exponentially higher costs with exponentially worse results.  Then we try to patch things together just enough to pacify those of us who are working hard to save these valuable places.  Meanwhile, those already receiving the most subsidy demand more and more, but get pissed when those who are routinely ignored ask to be put on an equal playing field.

This is an issue very near and dear to me, and it frustrates me when people don't see how our simple, single-minded number-crunching approach has bankrupted our finances and our culture.  When are we going to learn anything?

[PigBoy]

The I-95 beltway is as car-oriented as anywhere in the South.  To pretend that Boston is some kind of perfect city, an urbanist's dream, is the view of someone who has visited but hasn't lived there.

Wait a second, you can't talk about the view of someone who has visited but not lived there but at the same time say I-95 instead of 128!

[mrnyc]

my biggest issue with brt in clevo is not that its a done deal, i'm over that part, but that rta has dropped mention of possible brt expanion to the west side before the damn thing has even been built --- they have zero experience with brt! ridiculous.

[jmecklenborg]

>Wait a second, you can't talk about the view of someone who has visited but not lived there but at the same time say I-95 instead of 128!

Forgot about that!  I never really got used to how the interstate numbers were often secondary to vernacular terms there.  And btw Boston has the worst road and interstate signage...ever.  There were two on-ramps in the Copley Square area that were completely unmarked.  The one opposite the Hard Rock Cafe looked like an access road to an electric substation.  Those ramps in Chinatown were similarly secretive.   

[KJP]

Why is separate land uses bad? I certainly don't want to live nearby industry or atop a store or bar

Separate land uses are bad for the reason I stated -- it requires more driving than is necessary. Living next to an industry is an extreme example. And, what's wrong with living above a store or a restaurant? Lots of people do it here in Greater Cleveland. Some even live above bars, though I'm not wild about that myself, but people do live there. Imagine living in a neighborhood where you can get almost anything you want (groceries, post office, banks, restaurants, etc.) within a 1-4 block walk, 24 hours a day. And, anything that's not within that short walk, you could get by hopping a light-rail line or even a connecting bus route that fills the gabs between the rail lines.

To me, that sounds like heaven, but you can do that kind of urban living in only one city in this state, and then, only on a limited basis. As Ohio cities strive to compete for young people who want to live in exciting cities, this is the kind of urbanity they are moving to (not an urban oasis or two measuring only a half-dozen square miles or so). 

It would be a heckuva lot cheaper to re-market the bus, yes trains have a "nostalgia" feel to them. Bus Rapid Transit could be a first stage in the development of a rail line. BRT allows a closer to "door to door" trip, more competitve with the SOV

Rail may be nostalgic to people who may not realize that electric streetcars preceded buses by only 20 years. If that's all it takes to be outdated, I certainly won't reveal my age here!

BRT could be a first step, and sometimes it is. And, sometimes BRT is cheaper than rail, but not always. While I'm supplying this link below to a light-rail web page, there are links on that page to BRT websites to get more information if you're uncomfortable with the LRT vs. BRT information.