Houston Area Train Design Ideas

[cspwal]

Not sure where the thread went, but a while ago there was a design charrette (sp? Chrome is no help) for trains in Houston.
I was fooling around with ideas for the University line or a line down Washington Ave, and one thing led to another and I drew up something for the whole Metro.
 
I found this interesting site that lets you draw lines on Google maps, so I'm going to try posting that embedded.
 
 <iframe width="550" height="400" frameborder="0" src="//widgets.scribblemaps.com/sm/?d=true&z=true&l=true&mc=true&lat=29.749884246120615&lng=-95.38051181907656&vz=13&type=road&width=550&height=400&id=Igcc5IIBLF" style="border:0" allowfullscreen></iframe>
 
Here's the link to the actual map:
http://www.scribblemaps.com/maps/view/Houston_Light_Rail_Design_Ideas/Igcc5IIBLF
 
I extended the Red line up to IAH along Airline, passing by Greenspoint.  I didn't add too many stops since you wouldn't want to make that trip too long
 
For the Green line, I extended it further along Harrisburg down to Hobby, where it terminates.  To the west I had it go along Memorial Drive to meet up at Uptown park with the Uptown line.
 
The purple line I extended along Center st to the NW Transit Center, and South towards Hobby as well.
 
For the University line, I had it just stay on Richmond the whole time, becoming a subway in Afton Oaks, and resurfacing after it passes Sage Dr.
 
For the uptown line, I extended it significantly, so that it starts in Meyerland, goes north through Bellaire, becomes a subway through uptown, cut and cover under Post Oak Blvd, and then resurfacing to go past Memorial park to the NW Transit Center, and then extended to the NW Mall (more on that later)
 
I added 2 new Light rail lines, the OST line (brown) and the Shepherd Line (pink).  The OST line starts at MLK, and goes to the Med center, and then follows Braeswood out to Meyerland.  I thought to turn the Smithlands station into a sort of southern transfer station, since it's a little less congested than the TMC transit center to get new light rail into.
 
The shepherd line I had start at the Smithlands station, and then continue up Shepherd except for a detour into the Rice Village (and avoiding Rice).  I had it split between Shepherd and Greenbriar up to Richmond, and then had it go up all the way to the Heights where it splits again.  I terminated it once it got outside of the loop.
 
Station locations were largely random, based on what looked like a good spot with the POI on Google maps.
 
 
I made 8 commuter lines:
 - The Sugar land line (90A/59)
- The Eagle Lake Line (Westpark)
- The Katy line (10)
- The Brian College Station line (290)
- The woodlands line (Hardy)
- The Kingwood/Cleveland line (59)
- The League City line (roughly along 45)
- The Pearland line (along Telephone road)
 
 
I imagined the HSR going down 290, stopping at either Jersey village or NW mall, continuing into downtown to the Post office site, and then going down to Galveston.
 
The Katy line might actually be the most popular, though hardest to build (build in I-10's median, elevate the managed lanes around it) especially with the Park and Ride in Katy getting full constantly.
 
I appreciate thoughts or improvements.

 

Edit: I can't get the Embed to work, just follow the link to see the whole thing.  The inner loop part is here:

 

[cloud713]

its stickied at the top of the Traffic and Transportation subforum..

i love some of the ideas. some of the ideas.. not so much. i don't see rail ever working on Washington or Shepherd.

thanks for the link to the site to mess with maps though. looks like it could be better than the path tool on google earth.

[mfastx]

Interesting ideas, is all of that inner-loop stuff light rail? 

 

I think heavy rail would be more effective at getting people to ride, but it seems like Houston is "all in" on light rail so there's probably not a good chance of heavy rail happening in the next few decades at least. 

 

 

[cspwal]

Yeah all the inner loop stuff is light rail, though sometimes I did try to bury it as a subway. Houston does seem very much all in on light rail.

I don't even know why I didn't check the main forum first for the thread I figured it would be in the trains sub forum

[Luminare]

shameless plug for this thread >.>

 

http://www.houstonarchitecture.com/haif/topic/30590-design-charrette-houston-railtexas-rail/

[Tumbleweed_Tx]

you don't wan anything underground on Richmond in the Galleria area.. that street floods when someone spills a drink on it