Some one
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1 hour ago, august948 said:
Agreed. So my metronext plan would be to make all highways (45, 610,10 east, 59/69, 8, 99, 288, maybe a few others like 249) be like the katy freeway west of 610 (26 lanes at it's widest inclusive of mainlanes, feeders, and hov) Add commuter rail down the middle either by taking an hov lane or (preferably) elevating it with hubs at each highway junction. Buses and light rail can spoke out from those hubs. Or, in a cheaper version, scrap the commuter rail and run park and ride style buses on the hov between the hubs all day long.
I think most of them will be more like the 290 hov lanes.
Honestly my preferred vision (which is like yours) would be that you can take the park and ride and commuter rail from the surburbs to the city and from there take the light rail and buses around the city.
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35 minutes ago, august948 said:
I think the best of both worlds would be self-driving buses, wouldn't it? Trains are nice and all, but they can't take you 5 blocks over from where the rail line is. A self-driving bus or self-driving car can take you anyplace there's a road.
Not that I disagree with you, but I think buses (and eventually self-driving buses) work best as feeder for rail.
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Sorry to bring this up now, but this has been bothering me for a while. I'm sure Mr. Gattis is a nice guy, but I can't stand his op-eds on public transportation. They all boil down to nothing but "rail bad, highway good, self-driving car future." The notion that we should stop building rail because self-driving cars are the future is kind of laughable in of itself. Sorry, but I can't buy the whole "self-driving cars and ubers will make traffic better" thing. Nevermind the fact that there's been studies that shows that Uber and Lyft have been shown to make traffic worse, but self-driving cars are something that likely won't come in about 15-20 years (maybe even later, considering the malfuctions that have been happening as of late). Why would we abandon rail expansions for something that isn't even a guarentee. Plus, he seems to forget about the fact that self-driving trains are a thing (heck, some transit agencies already have them). Wouldn't it be better to have self-driving trains than cars?
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I'm not gonna lie, I'm going to miss that ramp.
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On 1/24/2019 at 5:28 AM, wxman said:
Seems like its been a while since we've had a new flag announced at IAH. I don't think we had a single one in 2018. Anybody know of any new flags in the works for this year?
Air India, Philippine Airlines and Ethiopian Airlines have expressed interests in flying to IAH. Problem is, they've said that a while back and we haven't gotten any news of it since then.
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On 1/23/2019 at 11:53 PM, 102IAHexpress said:
Voting for transit and riding transit are not the same thing. Just ask Los Angeles' metropolitan transit authority.
LA Metro's recent line, the Expo Line, garners a daily boarding of about 61,957 riders. I'd say that's a pretty good thing. Heck there's even people who wish that the expo line is a subway. LA Metro light rail is also the most used light rail system in the United States by ridership (67,921,600 - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_United_States_light_rail_systems_by_ridership). As for the declining numbers, like someone else said, when gas prices are at an all times low, it's no wonder that more people are buying cars. Will it last forever? Maybe it will, maybe it won't. Who knows? These articles on LA acknowledges the problem with light rail and what we can do to fix it.
https://www.citymetric.com/transport/los-angeles-metro-great-so-why-aren-t-people-using-it-2742
https://www.planetizen.com/node/86714/light-rail-successes-draw-attention-la-metros-rail-problems
On 1/23/2019 at 11:53 PM, 102IAHexpress said:The data is there. Light rail in America has just not lived up to the hype. Houston has a choice to make. Houston can be brave and cut it's loses or it can double down on more light rail, thinking light rail will be different in Houston if we just spend more billions and spend more time on it.
If Houston wants to build more light rail and not end up like Dallas or Los Angeles, then we're gonna have to start densifying our neighborhoods and build light rail in places where it actually makes sense (and not on old right of ways). Also, METRO is going to have to find a way to speed up transit time and solve the first/last mile issues.
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You're missing my point. I'm not saying that we should have rail to please the "train worshipers" (heck, I agree that they should relocate the current extension to hobby airport because they are better served by the future boost corridors). I'm saying that the BRT extensions being proposed cannot handle the ridership numbers for corridors like the University Line. Considering the fact that the University Line plans on going through dense areas and major business districts like Westchase, Uptown, and Midtown, I think it's better off as light rail.
Also as for the "other cities", that's just an article on Phoenix. If other cities are saying "enough" with light rail then why did cities like Atlanta and Los Angeles approve for a referendum to build more light rail (and other forms of transit)? And yes, there were huge voter support for it and here's proof.
https://la.curbed.com/2016/6/2/11845368/metro-measure-r-data-ridership-transit
https://ballotpedia.org/Los_Angeles_County_Sales_Tax,_Measure_R_(November_2008)
http://www.atlantaloop.com/699-2/
As for Phoenix, a transit prop was passed with a vote of 55% yes and 45% no (https://www.azcentral.com/story/news/local/phoenix/2015/08/25/phoenix-elections-transit-results-prop104/32283455/). As for the anti-rail protesters, this article shows that the anti-rail group are being backed by the Koch Brothers, a company well-known for attempting to kill transit projects
But, at the end of they day I will admit that there are many problems with public transportation and rail in general. This articles gives a good example on the problem with transit and how we can improve it
Sorry it took so long to respond.
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On 1/14/2019 at 1:19 PM, 102IAHexpress said:
Wondering if Metro should just scrap all rail plans? Nation wide auto sales actually increased in 2018 over 2017.
https://www.marklines.com/en/statistics/flash_sales/salesfig_usa_2018
More people are purchasing more trucks and SUV's, if that's even possible. These are national wide numbers not Houston numbers, but generally mass transit numbers are plateauing or falling off nationwide and auto sales are increasing. So, why invest in rail, when buses are more flexible and economical? I think the data is speaking for itself. People in car cities, are riding public transportation only until they can afford to purchase a car, then they stop riding public transit. Which makes sense. Metro should stick to it's founding charter and focus on providing public transportation to people who cannot afford cars, and providing public transportation to people who are disabled.
No offense, but what you're saying makes no sense. So we should stop building rail, why? Because auto sales are going up? So? Even if there are some people who only ride transit until they can get a car, there's still a lot of people who choose transit simply because they don't want to drive. Heck, there are some people who only drive because they have no other choice. Maybe we shouldn't build rail in the suburbs/areas with less ridership potential, but the ridership numbers for corridors like the University BRT shows that there is demand for rail. Plus I'm getting sick of the whole rail vs brt thing and the mentality that we have to build one or the other. Newsflash, we can build both. Build LRT for the dense areas and BRT for the suburbs, heck we can even include commuter rail if there's enough support for it. Same thing for highways and public transportation, they should compliment each other instead of us generally sticking with the former. We've been doing that for a while and look where that's gotten us now.
3 hours ago, j_cuevas713 said:I feel like if this doesn't pass, it doesn't matter how well we develop as a city, having a bad transportation system will keep us well behind other cities for the next 100 years.
I agree. It's already bad enough that we're a few years behind when it comes to public transportation.
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Honestly, this feels more like a plan to appeal to the John Culberson/anti-rail type of people. The plan ignores the potential to add rail on the west side of Houston (arguably the densest parts of Houston), and the light rail extensions being proposed have very little ridership (not to mention very little light rail extension to begin with). It kinda bugs me that Metro is banking on the idea of autonomous vehicles and how they believe it's the "future" when they're forgetting about autonomous trains. I agree with others that we need to build rail to the suburbs (whether it's light rail, commuter rail, or a hybrid). Hopefully the red line extension to Sugarland (or if GCRD can get fundings to build a commuter rail line) can kickstart that.
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I think that buses can work as a feeder to rail and/or for less dense areas. But solely relying on buses just screams disaster to me.
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The University, Inner Katy, Westheimer, and Gessner brt should all be light rail. I really don't think buses can handle those type of numbers and it makes even less sense for them to be brt when they're being built in the densest parts of Houston. I know someone might bring up the cost to build them and while I can understand that, at the same time we're about to spend $7 billion dollars on a single freeway project alone. If we have enough for that, then we should have enough for rail. I also think Metro should include funding to convert the Uptown Line into Light rail ASAP.
The Green and Purple Line should run on the original alignment that was proposed to Hobby Airport. The current paths that they're on right now don't really have much ridership potential and there's already boost corridors running on their paths anyways. I think the red line extension should be dropped for the same reason.
While I do like the plans to have express buses run 24/7 both ways, it seems more like a short-term solution to a long-term problem, especially if more people means that we can expect more cars on the hov/hot lanes. I think Metro should consider building commuter rail to the suburbs (whether it be a part of this plan or another is up to them). Metro should work with other agencies and transportation planners to try and make commuter rail a reality.
I doubt all of these could be done, but one can be hopeful.
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METRO Next - 2040 Vision
in Transit
Posted · Edited by Some one
An aging transportaton system that's way different from ours is breaking down due to a lack of fundings? Color me shocked.