Slick Vik

LA is pretty dense, and it's quickly expanding its rail system and possibly converting bus lanes to rail as well.Also rail has been fairly successful in Seattle, Portland, and San Diego. Also other cities are expanding: Phoenix, Salt Lake City, and Denver, in addition to the aforementioned Bay Area and Seattle. There's a reason all these sun belt cities are expanding. But keep thinking you're smart and everyone else is stupid.

What are you saying? Look at all the traffic that comes 288 into the medical center and downtown every day. If there was a fast rail service it would take cars off the road. And that's why certain politicians that are backed by special interest groups are hellbent against rail. Having as many cars as possible is in the best interest of car companies, oil companies, construction companies, concrete companies, and others. Notice the never ending freeway construction? It's been going on for more than fifty years. Would rail clear congestion probably not but it would have an effect for sure. This is what I'm saying if people are already traveling these routes putting a good rail system makes sense for a lot of people, not just low income. In fact saying public transit is for low income only is an excuse to make a crappy public transit system. Once it crosses over into the mainstream makes it a success to me.And for all this talk about downtown being irrelevant as a job center why every day is traffic coming into downtown bad in the morning and bad in the evening? Evidently it's still very important in reality. And your grocery store analogy is just nonsensical rambling.

This is a great point. About 100 years ago cars were considered a foolish investment because reliable public transit was so much cheaper. That's why in cities like Houston the oil/concrete/construction/car lobbies do anything in their power to keep things in their favor, because financially speaking for much of the population, purchasing and maintaining a car is not a good use of money. It's a never ending pit.

When did I say nobody uses our railroads? I think they should be built in the right corridors and not just on abandoned right of way. Of course if you build them where there's no demand nobody will ride. But a lot of time it's about getting free government money.

Freeways are a huge loser financially, per person mile moved is a clever statistic at best. Also when for almost 100 years the thought of decent alternative transit has been shut down in this city what do you expect? People are almost pressured into driving because it's what the power brokers made convenient. But it's only a matter of time before there's a reckoning like LA and people in power figure out they have to invest in more rail. There are only so many widening projects left, and even once they complete the freeway is just as full as it was before, totally pointless projects.

I didn't miss the point, if you knew anything about LA's lines you would know that there is heavy expansion in progress, more than any other city in North America. It's a major undertaking and will have big effects when complete.

Actually LA is investing heavily in rail and actually wants to accelerate projects, learning from mistakes of not investing earlier. http://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-ln-train-to-lax-metro-sales-tax-20151007-story.html Pretty much every major city in the world is investing in some kind of expansion/improvement rail project so there is something to be said for rail mass transit. This includes many sun belt cities.

Just ignore them and move on. A lot of people are just scared of blacks and Mexicans. Like quivering scared. It boggles my mind.

Great location for them to be by a light rail station and the downtown transit center and in the center of the city in general.

Realistically from fannin south the commuter line down 90 will start. And any light rail would probably go to hobby airport. Highways tend to be a bad cost benefit proposition but you advocate for those. You're ideologically against rail we get it.

Double stack was the plan all along just had to wait for cars from CAF

Trollolololololololol

On some routes like bellaire and westheimer west to highway 6 but inner city should be rail I think.

Or those that don't want to pay for parking. What does aslo mean?

It's a remarkable change. I'm shocked Houston had the foresight to do this honestly

BRT is good until the demand is too much. I took it in Leon Mexico, Bogota Colombia, Quito Ecuador, Mexico City and Istanbul. In every case the buses were packed despite 2-3 minute frequency, causing many people to not be able to get in and keep waiting. At that point heavy rail is needed. So why not just build it to begin with if you know the demand is pent up? BRT is ok for a speculative route but that's about it.

A lot of people didn't even know the new rail lines were open.

Have you taken the bus since the new system was rolled out? It's all about frequency which matters most to bus riders. Ask someone who has ridden a bus and a rail and see what percentage say they prefer riding a bus? It's a necessity but the more rail the better.

I guess we should eliminate 100% of park and ride numbers also then. By the way all the park and ride combined ridership is less than the original red line. What a success.

That's how any system with rail works, buses feed into the rail

Take a grammar class.

I think you underestimate the rail effect as compared to buses. There is a significant segment of the population that would ride rail that refuses to ride the local bus. And for those that would ride either the bus or train, the train is reliable and extremely frequent two things the buses usually are not. And I don't care if one thoroughfare is removed people can find alternative routes. Allen parkway and center and memorial are all parallel to Washington I'm tired of this city pandering to drivers and saying to hell with everyone else. Deal with it and find an alternative if Washington has light rail.

Jesus quit with your negativity. No no no it's not possible. We get it you're stuck in your ways and hate rail transit and love cars.

Downtown is actually fairly easy to get in and out of once you learn the street grid. Also this grid makes it remarkably efficient to exit as well since there are so many roads that you can take to get out not just one. Give me a break nothing is going to convince you. The major disruption is the freight that's already there HSR is much less disruptive and quiet. All I hear from your neighbors is NIMBY ignorance and fear of the unknown.

Geographically it is the center.