FoUTASportscaster

Man, that's a lot of unincorporated area. How urbanized is it?

Hey folks, I am hoping you guys can help me with a problem. I was doing research on Metro and came across the wikipedia page, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metropolitan_...s_County,_Texas. It says that the service area is 1,285 square miles. When I looked at the member cities section and added up the square mileage, I came to only 668.6 square miles. Can you guys help me with the other 600+ square miles?

In reviewing this thread, I didn't see one important thing in the LRT v BRT debate. I think it should be pointed out that while LRT has higher capital costs, it has lower operating costs than BRT. Electric engines are always easier and cheaper to maintain than combustible engines. If capacity increases on LRT, all you need to do is add another. The train is still operated by the one person and energy costs double. In BRT, you need another completely new bus with another driver, essentially doubling all costs. The infrastructure is easier to maintain. Rails, unmaintained, can last decades. A concrete guideway can not. Central Expressway here in Dallas was completely rebuilt less than ten years ago and already has some potholes. The streetcar on the otherhand is still running on rails that were built in the 1800's. And I don't think I even need to talk about the price of diesel v electricity.

Even if the cost for LRT is higher in the short-term, lower everday costs are a huge plus.

This is getting tiresome.

You ignore further societal benefits. So, ask yourself, WHY are those trips being generated?

You seem to ignore the negative aspects of auto-centric planning, pollution, CO2 emmissions, social isolation, oil addiction, etc. The trips being generated aren't always a net gain. In some instances, these trips are combined into one when there is reason to. When there is access capacity, these can take the form of many more trips. The average suburban household in the US makes 13 car trips a day.

Again, WHY are those trips generated? I'm not talking JUST transportation system benefits, but societal benefits as a whole.

You may look at the benefits, but railed transit has virtually no negative asspects compared to its auto counterpart, no point-of-use pollution, little to no single-use zoning and land hungry development, social integration, less oil use, etc.

And you contend that no benefit to society has occured? Think again.

Again, like many times before, your erroneously put words in my mouth. There are benefits to some degree. However, the negatives far outweigh them.

I'm not terribly familiar with Dallas, but the last time I was there a month ago, the High 5 was congested because of ongoing road work on 635 west of the interchange (at least in the direction we were traveling).

The work is actually east of the interchange and the west is still congested and there is no work...yet.

This is simply not true. You have to build a transit network the same as you have to build a road network. While each line may not need expansion as in a freeway, collector & distribution lines need to be built in order to reach everyone. Even in TOD, you can only fit so many people in there, and people will only walk so far to a transit stop. As your city grows, you have to reach more and more people, and build more and more lines. You are in effect "widening your freeway."

Why are you making this an either or scenario? Railed transit in the Sunbelt will never reach everyone. There isn't a city in the US that has that situation. Rail transit is similar to the freeway in comparison. It is the higher capacity, higher speed alternative to the bus. The more rail, the more the bus serves as the collector road to a degree and brings passengers not directly on a rail stop to the station. For example, when I lived in Irving, the train was a 15 minute bike ride away. The 306 bus was also a 15 minute ride away. When the time worked I could take the bus, when it didn't, I rode. The train station (South Irving) is a transit center where 13 other routes meet. Now that I live in downtown, I can walk the two blocks to Saint Paul Station.

The last two sentences are a complete fallacy. In every instance in the last 50 years, rail has been introduced to developed areas. Here in Dallas, it has been 11 years. So it has never gone beyond the developed areas. However, a UNT study has shown that over 3 billion in development has occured in areas along the line. Like Mockingbird Station, downtown Plano, Galatyn Park, Park Lane, etc have shown, rail has the ability to rework the landscape into a walkable, pedestrian-friendly and auto-independent neighborhood. The rule is most people will comfortably walk 5 minutes in most scenarios. That is roughly a 1/4 to 1/2 mile raidus to get to a transit station from the periphery of the neighborhood. So, as LRT promotes with its stations every 1 mile, you can have an almost continous walkable neighborhood. I will admit it will not always work this way. In Dallas it didn't, the further north you go after Park Lane, the more spacious the stations become.

So, to sum up, the city has grown, thanks in large part to transit, but its geographic footprint hasn't, thanks in large part to transit. It encourages high-density development, unlike the low-density sprawl spawned by the auto. It encourages people to walk, which requires no fuel from unstable areas of the world, encourages interaction with complete stangers from the same area, allowing for social integration, and creates memorable places, not an autonomous suburban shopping center.

How would this increase capacity?

It's apparent you aren't familiar with transit systems. Rapid Transit lines, like the New York Subway, have much bigger cars and can travel at higher speeds. The operate like LRT in terms of physical performance, but have a capacity similar to CRT.

this is really a broad statement IMO. the rail here will be going where things are fairly developed already. not sure how pedestrian friendly/walkable the neighborhoods will become.

As I showed earlier, it is essentially the redevelopment that occurs that promotes that type of walkability. In the case of Mockingbird Station and downtown Plano, it was a rehab of existing buildings. In Galatyn Park and Park Lane, it was a start from scratch. Galatyn Park was a greenfield, while the development going on at Park Lane was a demo of an auto-oriented area. this type of phenomenon is fairly common, with examples from metro areas of Chicago, Dallas, Los Angeles, Portland, Saint Louis, San Jose and Washington D.C., just off the top of my head.

I haven't had the time to devote the level of attention to this topic that is necessary to effectively rebut you...but:

WRONG. Transit infrastructure is depreciable and requires maintenance.

Maintenance is an operating cost, not a capital cost. New York's subway was constructed around the turn of the century over a hundred years ago. Since then, there hasn't been anything but routine maintenance and it carries 4 million people a day. In terms of cost, the rail is by far the better choice, 100+ years later. You're lucky to get ten years out of a freeway before it clogs...again.

Though it should be noted that my statement wasn't entirely accurate. Should LRT get to the point where it has reached capacity, Rapid transit lines could take the place, causing another capital project to proceed on rail ROW.

It is foolish to say that adding capacity will not improve the overall transportation system. What your statement is attempting to describe is known as triple convergence. When a primary route is congested past a traveler's tolerance for congestion, they seek alternate modes, alternate routes, or travel at alternate times. When a capacity improvement is made (be it a widened freeway or a new rail line), travelers will converge on the new capacity from those other modes, routes and times because it provides them with a better travel time. Therefore, that new capacity will quickly fill up and peak-period congestion is just as bad as it was before the improvement.

That is only partially true. That explains half the reasons why short term benefits are lost. another reason comes from further trip generation. When capacity is added, people drive more and generate more trips. When capacity is full, trips are combined and done at one time or sometimes not at all.

So one could say that no improvement has been made, right? Hardly. Those added travelers had to come from somewhere. And the modes, routes and times that they abandoned are less congested than they were before. Alternate roads have cleared considerably. There's more room for others in the rail car. The freeway is free flow at 6 a.m. when it used to be a parking lot at a quarter 'till. Overall, the transportation system has improved considerably.

The first sentence is the flaw. When you add capacity there are actually more trips generated. So the overall transportation system hasn't been relieved as greatly as you suggest. Congestion and capacity are not a linear function as your logic suggests.

"You can't build your way out of congestion" is a cute saying, but it's incomplete. It should be, "You can't build your way out of peak period congestion," because peak-period congestion will always be with us, no matter how many miles of rail line or freeway lane-miles we build. But that doesn't mean that we can't make the peak period shorter, or have it occur in fewer places or on fewer modes.

The last sentence when taken by itself is accurate, if only taken in the short term. In the long term, any benefits are immediately lost as we sprawl further and further out with auto-oriented development, which artificially inflates traffic counts by funnelling traffic into collector roads then on freeways, instead of utilizing an urban street grid. As low-density auto-oriented development spreads further, it further taxes the freeway, causing a need to widen the corridor. Then when capacity is increased, the process continues.

75 here in Dallas is a prime example. When it was widened in the '90's, McKinney and Allen had an almost overnight explosion in auto-oriented sprawl. Now 75 is worse then before. Of course, that can be said of every freeway north of downtown as we sprawl further and further north. Heck, the high-five, the $250 million reconstruction of 75 and 635 was done only a few years ago and it is starting to get worse than before.

Meanwhile, when rail transit is introduced, the development takes the form of pedestrian friendly neighborhoods with walkable streets. While there is parking and auto trips are generated, it is also built to accommodate transit and people walking. When trips are generated, many are in the form of transit which will not need widening in any form, or costly capital projects for widening.

Your calculations are essentially correct, it CAN carry that many. But WILL it? How many branches to that rail line do you have to build before it carries anywhere approaching that volume? Anywhere approaching a freeway lane volume? It's disingenuous to suggest that the mere construction of one line is all that is needed.

I didn't say one line is needed, because more than one line is needed. I'll use a Dallas example, since I am more familiar with it than any other. The TRE commuter line carries roughly 8,500 people every weekday. Almost all of them transfer at Union Station to a Red or Blue line train. If neither of those lines existed, ridership would be way lower on the TRE. Now, in reverse the Green Line will open in 2009 for the State Fair. There will be lots of people who will take the existing Red or Blue to downtown and transfer to the Green Line to go to Fair Park. When the line goes to Love Field, many will get on the two existing lines to go there. So, as more lines are built, more passengers will use the existing lines to get to the new lines.

Go look at a map of the New York Subway. Many people will make many transfers. Rarely would one line carry passengers who won't transfer.

I'd venture to guess that in the Sunbelt, there will never be one line that will carry 25,000 passengers an hour. That still doesn't deny the fact that once rail is built, you will never need to do another capital project for it again, unlike freeways.

And for clarity, I'm not against mass transit at all. I'm in favor of more of it in Houston. But the suggestion that "induced demand" makes freeway expansion projects unbeneficial is tiresome and incorrect.

Tiresome, maybe, incorrect, no.

Just a sample of what's out there.

http://userpages.itis.com/burleigh/issues/traffic_bib.html

http://www.sierraclub.org/sprawl/transport.../congestion.asp

http://www.vtpi.org/gentraf.pdf

http://www.webtag.org.uk/webdocuments/2_Pr...lling/2.9.2.htm

http://www.cts.cv.imperial.ac.uk/documents.../iccts00003.pdf

http://www.smartergrowth.net/issues/transp...ducedtravel.htm

http://bicycleuniverse.info/transpo/roadbu...g-futility.html

http://dsf.chesco.org/planning/lib/planning/pdf/intrindv.pdf

http://www.ptua.org.au/myths/congestion.shtml

Look, in short we need both roads AND rail.

Roads are not only necessary for people to drive around, but also for commerce. The efficiency of moving merchandise and materials to stores and factories is something that cannot be debated. Even stores and bars along the various rail routes need to be stocked SOMEHOW and that can only be done with trucks.

Sorry, I don't see a UPS guy riding the rail. As much as I'm PRO rail, it's unrealistic to shoot to get rid of ALL roads in that particular area.

I won't argue with you there. A balance is indeed needed. However, to say there is a balance now is rediculous. The Houston area has over 500 miles of freeway and literally thousands upon thousands of miles of road. On the other end is 7.5 miles of rail. If congestion relief is truely the goal, there is one way to do that, takes cars off the road. The Sunbelt has a long way to go before a transit system will be in place to do that.

I've addressed this with you before and have never gotten a satisfactory answer, so tell me, how is adding capacity for transit any different than adding capacity for roads? Is that not still "building your way out of congestion?"

If you add capacity to a train, you add another train or a car to an existing train. With LRT, there is no point-of-use pollution and no expensive reconstruction with ROW eminent domain. The plain fact of the matter is that LRT can carry roughly 25,000 people per hour in the space of a two lane roadway. http://onlinepubs.trb.org/onlinepubs/circu...01_Thompson.pdf Freeways, on the other hand, can only carry 2,000 vehicles per lane per hour. With solo occupancy the general trend, it can be deduced that roughly 2,500 people are in those 2,000 vehicles. Therefore, by doing basic math, I come to the conclusion that LRT can carry ten lanes of freeway traffic before any new construction is needed. Even then, there is no need to aquire ROW, as the line is prime for conversion to rapid transit, a la New York's subway.

So, after building a rail line, there is usually no more building of rail lines, just adding cars or new lines. I hope that satisfactorilly answers your question.

I'd say building more highway lanes is like loosening your belt at Thanksgiving.

Building rail is more like having a doctor install a higher capacity esophagus in anticipation of gorging yourself.

I wouldn't really say that. Transit generally leads to self-sustaining mixed-use development. Take Mockingbird Station in Dallas. There are people who live, shop and work there. All they use to move is their feet. There isn't a whole lot of moving around in sustainable development.

The problem isn't traffic. It is congestion.

Which is caused by traffic.

Only if by worse, you mean that the additional lanes make it less costly to travel, thereby inducing more trips. I'd contend that traffic volume, all other things being held equal, is an indicator of the public's well-being.

No, worse means more congestion. By pure numbers, more people are caught in bumber-to-bumber congestion in three lans than four.

I'd contend that your statement isn't the case. The worst places in Dallas aren't served by transit and are essentially a one trick pony. On top of that, the negative aspects like pollution, ozone, time spent away from the family, cul-de-sac kids aren't good for the public.

Good. This is as it should be. If less congested roads weren't in demand, then when they became available, they wouldn't fill up.

That logic is twisted. The point is fairly simple. It is pointless to spend millions of dollars "to relieve congestion" when the outcome will be more congestion. Transporation as we know it in the United States does not work in simple supply and demand terms. The government has screwed with it too much for there to be a marketplace based condition.

Correct. But there are many forms of public infrastructure that have a finite life span. Just because we'll have to replace sewer lines in the future is no reason to stop building them in the present, after all. The same applies to roads and [gasp] even light rail. So long as these public investments generate sufficient benefit over their life span, that they'll have to be replaced is not a viable argument against them.

Unlike the infrastucture you named, the roads aren't or won't be replaced because they are aging, but rather because when we build it and have no other options (and encourage its use in other means like suburban-style-single-use-low-density development), then it will always need constant replacement. Add to that the materials used in roads wear out faster than materials used in other infrastucture (though not because of the materials, but rather the machines they are designed for).

Is that a problem? When people's cost of mobility is reduced, people organize their lives in ways that reflect the lower cost. They are free to live in suburbs, or even in the countryside...and as a side effect, there aren't nearly as many people clamoring to get closer to work, which keeps land prices in the inner city reasonable for those that do want to live there.

Seems to me it is a problem when that outcome is in the form of increased congestion that was supposed to be relieved, now increasing congestion exponentially. For the record, their cost of mobility isn't reduced. They still pay for it in taxes, which the government will get in one way or another. Yes they are free to live anywhere, but that is not always a good thing. And the last point is just misguided. The attractive places "closer to work" are generally the ones that has no vacancy.

Induced traffic is the manifestation of benefits from lower travel costs.

So you admit that building roads to relieve congestion just makes it worse (the induced traffic principle). Again, these costs aren't lowered, just lowered at point of use. I am a big fan of toll roads, because the users actually pay for the road, rather than everyone. If that were the case from the begining, there'd be less limited-access highways and transit companies would likely still be privately-owned and for-profit.

Comparing freeways used by millions of individuals to a single human body makes for a very weak analogy.

It's an effective analogy for those who think about its meaning, rather than physical meaning. If a man eats turkey for thanksgiving, he didn't accomplish anything by loosening the belt. lIt ikely just encourages him to eat a little more. Same thing with freeways and roads. When they are at capacity, building more lanes more lanes is going to cause more congestion.

It repeats itself more slowly than you might think because employers start moving operations out to the suburbs to be closer to their employees. Ultimately, people are not only more able to live in places that they place a greater value upon, but many of them are able to find employment that is close to home. In fact, one of the beneficial side effects of suburban employment centers is that reverse commuting starts to take hold, allowing freeways to be used at full bidirectional capacity during peak hours.

Actually that's only true in a small number of workers. The CEO is always the reason behind the move, not the lame excuse of being close to workers. Not sure what you mean in terms of value. Time and again, the places which have the most value are places in memorable walking environments, both old and new. As far as the reverse commute thsi would already have been the case if we had built traditional neighborhoods with mixed-use zoning. It was the rise of single-use zoning that lead to commutes in one direction. For proof, just analyze older cities such as New York or London.

Please don't post excerpts from Suburban Nation. That book makes a highly convincing argument for market-driven suburbanization--the author just doesn't seem to realize it.

Actually, it seems as though you haven't read Suburban Nation since the authorS make it very that the government has effectively destoryed the market place. It makes the point clear with facts that the suburbs exist today because the government has effectively destroyed the marketplace with its subsidization of roads, zoning practices, parking requirements, etc. The book is more a guideline for responsible development, a return to traditional city-building, sustainable development. The authors make it very clear this is ideal in the urban core, but realize the greenfield is very much a possibilty with the eagerness and inexpense of the suburbs.

The authors need to spend more time talking to traffic engineers and less time talking to urban planners if they want to be taken seriously when quoting traffic engineers.

The problem belongs in specialization. Traffic engineers are focused on one thing. The issue is that traffic is caused by other issues outside their control. Therefore to solve traffic problems, things other than widening roadways have to be considered, but aren't in their control.

The freedom to choose. Car free in Big D is still a self-imposed hardship.

Not really. Living in downtown gives me lots of transit choices. I have 32 bus routes, 10, express bus routes, 2 light rail lines (that connect to 79 other bus routes in some fashion), one commuter line (that connect to roughly 30 other bus routes in Fort Worth) and a streetcar line at my diposal. Then there is the bike that makes some of it unnessecary if I chose, or as I commonly do, use it in conjunction with one of the others listed. Then there are my feet, that allow me to go to the various shops or restaurants nearby on foot, rather than in car. While they all aren't always efficient in terms of time as the car is (though some very much are), they have various other amenities the car can't offer, some are tangible while others aren't.

As for my daily "commute" to work, I have 4 bus routes that pick me up within one block of home and 2 blocks of work. There are another 2 bus routes, the streetcar and the LRT which require a little more walking but give me even more options. Again, the addition of the bike makes even those really easy and convenient.

In addition to the above, the future will be so much better. In 2009, the first phase of the green line will bring easier connections to other urban environs nearby, while 2010 will bring the completion of the 27 mile line. The orange line will connect me easily with Las Colinas in 2011 and DFW airport directly in 2013. Two commuter lines will be up and running between 2010 and 2013 with further connections to places I likely wouldn't go if I had a car, but will visit periodically when a train runs. Also the MATA streetcar will expand a mile or so into downtown, making it more efficient with its connection to a nearby LRT station. And lastly, a new 5 mile streetcar line, connecting downtown to the very pedestrian friendly parts of Oak Cliff will be open. Minus the Oak Cliff line, all are in the construction process now or will be by summer's end. All this gives people in Dallas an option to own a car, but not require it. And on top of that, preliminary work is being done on other expansions to the transit system as well.

One last thing on the above statement. I will acknowledge this, there are places where transit has no reach. Most are bedroom communities afraid of "that" element or who view highway construction as investment and transit as subsidy and therefore transit as wasteful. Those bedroom communities I wouldn't visit if I had a car. They offer nothing different than the places I can reach with transit. I have no desire to drive a car out of my way to go to a McDonald's, Chili's, a car dealership or mall when I can get to plenty with transit. The only exception is my alma mater, which resides in the largest city in the nation without transit. That is really the only sacraficing I do.

You should be proud of yourself for being a trailblazer.

Not sure how to take this, but here goes. I am not proud of myself for any reason. I am just happy that I get to lead a life that I chose, rather than one forced on me by a greedy corporation who have lined the pockets of politicians for the last 60 years to further their profit margins, thereby forcing one lifestyle on the masses. It has been proven that when given competitive options, some will chose the car while others won't and go for something else. We just haven't had that option available in a long time.

Car free loft living...

Sounds like prison.

That's because you are likely a close-minded person who is afraid of the unkown. Being stuck in traffic is actually more prison-like, since by definition, being stuck in traffic means you are stuck there and can't move. A family of four recently moved in to my floor from McKinney, an exurb 30 miles away. The father spent 2+ hours in traffic a day and rarely saw his kids. Now he has a ten minute walk and sees them quite frequently. At the same time, the gave up a car and save nearly 500 a month just from that. Damn that prison.

Native Texans like me enjoy our freedom, even if that freedom is being stuck in traffic or paying a lot for gas each month.

Ahh yes, another tired stereotype. I am native, and enjoy my downtown Dallas loft and car free existence far more than my car-neccesary suburban existence.

Just out of curiosity, how does being stuck in traffic, the price tag (car payment, insurance, maintenance, repairs, registration/inspection, parking, etc.), and social isolation equate to freedom?

Not to mention who wants to share a ride a bunch yahoos in the morning? I need my news and coffee in peace.

I read the news on the bus or train, and the only traffic I fight comes in the form of clueless drivers as to what a pedestrian walk symbol means.

They try to seperate LRT vehicles from traffic except at intersections, but it 1) takes away lanes from drivers, and 2) disrupts the grid.

Taking away lanes from drivers is a good thing. The only way to relieve congestion is reduce capacity, not add to it. An exerpt from the book Suburban Nation: The Rise of Sprawl and Decline of the American Dream illustrates the point very well.

The simple truth is that building more highways and widening existing roads, almost always motivated by concern over traffic, does nothing to reduce traffic. In the long run, it actually increases traffic. The revelation is so counterintuitive that it bears repeating: adding lanes makes traffic worse. This paradox was suspected as early as 1942 by Robert Moses, who noticed that the highways he had built around New York City in 1939 were somehow generating greater traffic problems than had existed previously. Since then, the phenomenon has been well documented, most notably in 1989, when the Southern California Association of Governments concluded that traffic-assistance measures, be they adding lanes, or even double-decking the roadways, would have no more than a cosmetic effect on Los Angeles

let's cut the east side of downtown off from the west side......yeah that's doable.

Speaking from real world experience, passenger rail lines do not do what you say. Here in Dallas, there is no division like freeways do. There is no north or south divide as there is a clear uptown downtown divide that Woodall Rogers does. What is does do is use the land more efficiently to move people and make urban living more efficient in the process. Denver and Portland are other crystal clear examples where the above statement doesn't apply.

Shutting down a street in downtown is problematic because it creates vehicular access problems in some locations. Ideas like that work very well in master-planned urban environments, where you're building from scratch, but implementing them in urban environments that are already existing and that were built to interact with a street grid is frequently infeasible.

And I think musicman's negative reaction to the idea was founded in the phrase "dedicated right of way," which in the absence of either the words "elevated" or "subway" requires that no cars be allowed to travel on or across Main Street. If you couldn't cross Main, that would be a disaster.

I again have to disagree with the honorable TheNiche. Urban environs are perfectly suited to handle a closure of a street. With its square street grid and many possible alternatives, it is easy. Here in Dallas, Bryan Street is closed completely to through traffic and the few garages that opened onto Bryan have a dedicated lane to open to the nearest compatible street. There is on ly one stretch that runs a block, and it goes from Field to Griffin.

There are 15 intersections where the LRT and auto traffic crosses. It is not difficult at all. DART's LRT transit mall is dedicated ROW for the rail line, and it works very well. If applied properly, it is done very well.

They really liked Houston when they went. They were calling it a toilet before they left, but later said wasn't that bad after all, and they would consider going back on their own.

Yeah, I used to work for the Ticket, a sister station to the Bone, and the only show that fits that description is the Walton and Johnson show, which is based out of Houston. Doesn't demerit their point, but does give it some perspective.

Roads have always been around in some form or another, and various levels of improvement have always been available (ranging from a dirt trail to cobblestone to wood planks to brick to asphalt to concrete to a superhighway, and many levels in between). The benefits of roads over a fixed guideway is that 1) it is a fully-integrated and open system; you can take the most direct path; you can go from any one point to any other without numerous transfers; you can detour around obstructions; you can get almost any kind of vehicle anyplace. Can you imagine how difficult construction would be if we didn't have paved roads to move materials? How about supplying the local grocery store? The infrastructure has to exist to accomodate logistical needs.

Usually, governments stayed out of the road buisness. It is a recent phenom, post WWII thing. Developers in the past were the ones to pay for the roads, along with the streetcar lines and utilities. Now it is a government function sinced the suburbs after WWII wanted growth, so they started building them, so the developers wouldn't spend the money.

As for benefits, that depends on the use. In New York and San Fransisco, cities modeled for transit use, your example is not the case. Transit offers the most efficient route. In post-WWII cities, the auto does because we designed the cities around them. However, as DTD, uptown, Mockingbird, downtown Plano, Galatyn Park, Addison Circle, Legacy Town Center, the Cedars, downtown Carrollton and SWern Medical District is showing, transit can be convenient if designed that way. I don't own a car anymore because my lifestyle is now such that transit is more convinient for me. Houston could do the same. It is fact that rail does that kind of development. Buses do not.

Also, there is something considerably wrong about the way we build typical cities anymore. The average person spends 19% of their income on cars. We drive our cars to work, then work to pay for our cars. This puts the 1/3 of Americans who don't own a car at a distinct disadvantage.

I do agree we need the infrastructure. We don't need the mismatched amount of infrastructure. In metro Houston, the ratio is about 71.5 miles of freeway per local passenger rail mile. That is not a good ratio and leads to sprawl.

If government wouldn't pay for it, private industry would by way of the creation of toll roads...you know, those wildly successful profit-generating things that HCTRA builds from its own funds. Likewise, when a new subdivision is developed, the developer pays for roads and passes it on to builders in the form of the lot price, which then gets passed on to consumers. Water utilities are also paid for by consumers by way of a MUD. ...and you'll notice that such a model is very succesful in the Houston area. Consumers pay for it. So with respect to the region's major thoroughfares and freeways, which do receive government subsidy, I'm actually in agreement with you that there shouldn't be as much, and everything should be paid for by user fees. The same goes for transit. ...and you know what? Most consumers would pay for it in a heartbeat because roads are just too efficient. For the time being, roads will prevail, I assure you.

I'm not sure that this level of data is sufficient from which to draw conclusions. Your data are from suburban locales, which will be biased toward the point that you are trying to prove. But LRT serves a much broader base of users than that, and even the addition of these riders probably won't change the conclusion.

Mockingbird Station is somewhat impressive, yes, but it is only a speck in the greater transportation system serving the DFW area. Its marginal impact is extremely small, and even then, it was delayed. After all, if you have to way five years after having made such a large investment, the discounted impact isn't as significant. Also bear in mind that if the real estate investments hadn't been made at Mockingbird Station, they still would've been been felt somewhere in the region. Real estate is itself not an economic driver, but is a secondary sector...merely an indicator of regional economic growth.

That is the answer. If private companies built and ran the thing, then the true cost of driving would be paid for by the consumer, putting transit at a much more even playing field. The Chicago Tribune did a lengthy article about the journey gasoline makes to the pump. They quoted a guy from the Brookings Institute that stated the true cost of gasoline is $8 a gallon, and that was the conservative estimate. If every driver paid for the cost of the freeway they were using, the cost of parking that codes force on buisness in various cities, the true cost of gas, then we wouldn't be a car-loving culture. If the driver paid for everything, and not just the tolls in your scenario, then there'd be a lot less who would pay. We'd be a lot more balanced as a society.

As for the time being, as you suggest, roads will prevail a lot more, because drivers aren't paying for them directly.

Ideally, I wish government never got involved in the transportation buisness, then neither would have to be subsidized. As it was, the freeways essentially forced private transit companies across the nation to sell to municipalities. Some of those freeways were paid for by taxes levied on the transit companies, so essentially they paid for their own destruction.

It's funny you get all offended by a five year delay in the Mockingbird Station example. There actually was no delay that lengthy, as you suggest. It was actually opened five years after the rail station opened. At that time, the sheep we call developers weren't sure if it would work because there hadn't been a similar project done in Dallas, elsewhere, but not Dallas. It took a pioneering guy in Ken Hughes to start it a few years after the station was already operating, and now we have a lot more TOD's, in the examples I gave you, and more in the planning process. In fact, one developer has gotten DART to add a station on the Blue Line for his upcoming project. I also hate to tell you, a lot of projects of Mockingbird scale take a little time. Not the five years as you suggest, but a book called the New Transit Town will go over the lengthy details for ya.

As for Toronto, that's another country. Are you qualified to comment on their political and regulatory environment as it relates to real estate development? I'll readily admit that I'm not.

I made two assertions in the paragraph that you responded to.

Yeah, they are a pro-transit anti-freeway city and have one of the most livable cities in North America. The city has less energy usage per person as well as pollution. The reason is simple, it was designed for people and not autos.

Which one do you believe is false? I'll gladly look into it, but I need you to provide me some direction into what I'm looking for.

Even if parallel routes are eliminated or scaled back (which isn't necessarily desirable depending upon the distance between LRT stations, Dallas being a good example), in an efficient transit system, perpendicular routes would need to be expanded to handle any increased demand for the LRT corridor.

You whole statement is false. Express bus routes are eliminated. They are a little more expensive to operate than standard buses, but have a greater ridership. Rail is less expensive to run than standard bus service, and has greater ridership than both. Now, as in the case of the Red Line I quoted above, there are some routes that operate between stations ferrying passengers to places between the stations. They are smaller, and therefore need less buses to cover the same ground and then therefore cost less. Now as for perpendicular routes needed expanding, I am not sure why you insinuate that. It, too is false and the Red Line is still the example that dispproves that.

DART is infinitely more competent than METRO. Sucks to be us.

DART maybe, but prior to the starter system, DART was labeled every bit as incompetant. Part of the difference is that our congressional district worked to help DART, despite the bad press. How many times did Tom Delay et al work to derail METRO. That doesn't mean their not incompetant. They just really haven't been given the chance. 7.5 miles isn't a chance.

Most of the adverse impacts of the LRT happen outside of downtown Houston, in Midtown and the Museum District, where the grid isn't as well tied together anymore because they closed off a lot of cross streets. Other problem areas are closer to the Texas Medical Center. DART is just better configured outside of downtown Dallas. The only problem in downtown Houston is that it throws off signal timing. The pedestrian plaza could be annoying too if there weren't an easy detour, but I can live with it.

That's what I hear. However, should the drivers obey the law, then they'd be fine. When researching the accidents that METRO Rail has had, there was one where the train operator was at fault. DART's main attribute was that it used existing ROW, but as the Blue Line South has shown, an LRT can exist in street. That maybe due to the fact that DART designed it better. However, there was a rocky period at the beginning of its start in this world, where drivers obeyed the law. That is no longer the case. It maybe due to the drivers learning, less drivers because it isn't in the urban core, a better design, some combo of or neither. The fact is drivers are no longer getting involved in accidents.

Like I said before, Dallas has been planning, negotiating, acquiring, and preserving rights of way for a long time. Houston is far behind. Make no mistake about it: it isn't easy...and if it seems like it, then the transit agency is getting a raw deal.

True. I'd like to think DART was the one to show that rail can exist in Texas, therefore places like HoustonSan Antonio, Fort Worth and Austin realize they are behind the times and working to expand. All have done some sort of rail proposal since DART's system opened.

That doesn't mean METRO can't do it. As I mentioned, the T has been able to negotiate with UP in a couple of years to use one of the most congested rail ROW's in the country. If METRO wanted to, they could. As it is, they appears to be focusing on urban core rather than region. That's neither good nor bad, just their approach.

It is probably easier to overengineer transit to accomodate the stupid than it is to teach them social responsibility.

It also adds millions upon millions of dollars, but that's likely what you want, so you can attack it from that angle too.

Wow, where do I begin? Well let me start with a correction: I erred by using "DCTA", but it always slips my mind what Dallas' METRO equivalent is called. That is the last correction you'll hear from me.

First of all, there is a difference between financial feasibility and economic feasibility. Very few transit projects are financially feasible, and that is frequently done purposefully by transit agencies. If we basically got rid of the FTA and all non-local transit funding, you'd see more consideration for financial feasibility in such a way that the difference between financial and economic feasibility would essentially disappear...but that'll never happen. The market for transit is far too distorted at this point.

Well, you did use the two agencies in the same paragraph.

The market became distorted long ago when private run transit providers were put out of buisness by government subsidized roads and freeways promoting auto use.

The problem with LRT is that it takes most of its passengers from bus systems that are already in place. Some bus routes are then eliminated, others reduced, and still others remain but get less ridership. Here's a simplified example: if you're just taking riders off of a bus system that cost you $0.65 per passenger mile (which is the average, nationally as of 2002) and put them onto LRT at an operating cost of $0.60 per passenger mile (which is the average for DART as of 2002), then all that you've saved are $0.05 per passenger mile. If DART then services 75 million passenger miles annually, the net savings to society is only about $3.75 million per year. If that is the annual savings to society, the time value of money is 3%, and the system has an expected lifespan of 45 years, the most that should be paid in up-front capital costs is only about $92 million, which is the present value of the net benefit to society. I can assure you that DART had spent more than that building their system as of 2002.

Your first point is absolutely wrong under any circumstance. LRT does what buses can't, and that's lure choice riders, those that can take cars. During rush hour, LRT's choice riders are greater than 75%, meaning those people under most circumstances would take the car over the bus. The following ridership of express buses at three transit centers that were replaced with rail's arrival. Ridership is taken from 2003 or immediately after it debuted. It replaced buses that had been in service for almost two decades.

Station Express Bus LRT Ridership

Parker Rd. 896 2,478

Arapahoe 722 2,247

Dntn Garland 656 1,444

So in conclusion, it is false to say that rail replaces bus. What it does is provide a faster, more convienient, more efficient mode of transportation over bus.

So that said, your numbers, which are faulty to begin with, are further skewed when ridership increases are factored in. I currently live in downtown, I recently joined a growing number of people in my building and the area when I gace up the car. The reason is always DART Rail. Something the bus that was replaced never did.

But there is another problem, one that eats away at the marginal benefit and is frequently observed but studied very little because the data is hard to reliably compute: bus routes must be adapted to LRT. LRT proponents believe that this allows many routes to be eliminated, resulting in pure savings, such as is shown in the simple example above. The truth is that adding LRT creates a demand generator for bus transit because relatively few people ever live and work along any given corridor!

This is already skewed. Mockingbrd Station is one of the finest examples of TOD in the nation. It wasn't there when the stationed opend in 1996. It opened in 2001 and wouldn't have done so without rail. As TOD, like downtown, the Cedars, downtown Plano, Galatyn Park, downtown Garland etc keep growing, then the need for buses doesn't exist and at the same time, economic growth continues.

Toronto is a great example of a mature system. Skyscrapers surround stations all along their line. Those weren't there when the stations opened decades ago.

Even if parallel routes are eliminated or scaled back (which isn't necessarily desirable depending upon the distance between LRT stations, Dallas being a good example), in an efficient transit system, perpendicular routes would need to be expanded to handle any increased demand for the LRT corridor.

Again false. The Red line north is a great example. Look it up.

As an aside, it should be noted that the operating cost of light rail by passenger mile varies widely from city to city. It is absolutely not assured that LRT operating costs per passenger mile will be lower than the bus alternative.

In Dallas it is and I beg you to find one example that proves the point.

The Dallas configuration has many grade seperations and as such has less of an adverse impact on traffic. The Houston configuration can cause significant mobility disruptions, especially at peak hours. The Mayor himself was quoted in a recent Chronicle article stating that the City's attempts at timing street lights have been hurt by the Red Line. Any car needing to cross the line has about a 25% chance of having to stop and wait for a LRT vehicle, but at peak times, spots like Fannin & South Loop require a very long wait as LRT vehicles dart by with high frequency, blocking turns to the west. There are also fewer places to cross the LRT line than there had been, which funnels more cars into fewer intersections, causing peak-period congestion, more road miles travelled to make the detour, more emissions, and more wasted time. The problem isn't just felt by drivers, but also with the LRT vehicles themselves. LRT vehicles often have to stop where cars are blocking the route or where the signal timing is off (which is frequently). LRT drivers are also overly cautious at times.

DART downtown has the same thing, yet you hear nothing about it here.

The root of the problem is poor design and implementation, and there do not appear to be any signs of a shift in thinking on the part of METRO. Dallas' configuration is superior and will without a doubt remain superior as Houston's system expands.

Possibly, however, should drivers obey the law, they'd be fine. Plus it is difficult to say what METRO will do. Prior to DART's opening, there were a lot of naysayers proclaiming gloom and doom for the system, just like I am hearing about Metro's system.

What are you smoking! It isn't easy at all to lease freight tracks. Union Pacific and BNSF haven't exactly been very amenable to the idea where it has been brought up in the past. Either METRO has to pay them hefty use fees and agree to shift commuter operations so as not to interfere with freight traffic, or they have to pay the rail company compensation for having to shift freight traffic around. Houston is already something of a bottleneck in the national freight rail system, too, so it isn't as though there is a whole lot of spare capacity to go around.

Yet, somehow DART and the T are able to negotiate with those same freight companies and things get done. The T's Cotton belt line will use of the most congested lines in the nation when it enters UP's section near downtown FW.

Ridership of the LRT system is skewed by bus riders that now have to use LRT as an intermediate leg of a longer trip (which causes frustration among certain groups of predominantly poor inner city transit users). Ridership is also skewed by those who park at Smithlands and previously used an inexpensive shuttle service to get them to the main TMC campus. The shuttles still exist, but now you have to park, walk to the LRT station, wait, ride the LRT north, get off, wait, get on a shuttle, go into the heart of the TMC, and walk to your final destination. Intermediate transfers make up a large amount of ridership.

I will have to take your word for it, as I haven't studied the issue to hard. I do know that if the line is allowed to expand, real world practice shows some of those issues fall away.

U.S. Cities Traffic Problems

Houston ranks 5th worst in traffic congestion and we have only 7.5 miles of rail. DFW ranks 6th and boasts of 45 miles or so of rail. We all know SF, DC and Atlanta have great rail systems (especially SF with its MUNI, BART and Cable cars). But unless we build a sophisticated underground subway system like NY, we'll probably not move up in the ranks by building a few light rail lines. Not that I am against rail, I think it has its place. Interestingly enough, here are the worst cities for traffic congestion:

1. Los Angeles, Long Beach, Santa Ana, Calif.

2. San Francisco, Oakland, Calif.

3. Washington, D.C.

4. Atlanta

5. Houston

6. Dallas, Fort Worth, Arlington, Tex.

7. Chicago.

The city of LA has 173 miles of freeway. Houston has 200. Dallas has 148. These are just the cities. The number is obviously greater in the region. Why o why does the rail system in Houston not take raffic off of 610. I just don't understand.

All sarcasm aside, it is rediculous to say DART doesn't relieve congestion because it ranks 6 with 45 miles of LRT. Now, when rail parallels I-35, 114, 635, DNT, I-30, 408, I-20, etc, then lets talk. We all are so far behind on transit options that we have a long way to go.

As an aside, Arlington is on the list and they don't even belong to a transit agency at the moment.

The economic feasibility of DART was (and even remains) legitimately in question. However, DART has been implemented in a much more effective configuration than the Red Line or the planned expansions. The DCTA painstakingly acquired and preserved numerous rights of way for over 15 years before construction began.

Ours, as implemented, is (and most likely will continue to be) possibly even counterproductive--it hurts mobility, yet we paid about $368 million for it without matching federal dollars. Ours is a joke. [Niche hangs head in shame]

Wow, there is soooo much wrong with this I just have to dive in.

Economic feasability is in question? How? If it based on income, the one cent sales tax is pretty set in stone. If it is costs, LRT has been proven to have lower operating costs than buses, as one driver can move hundreds of people at once, while in bus it does about 40 at capacity, which it rarely is anyway compared to the LRT system.

I do agree that the configuration is great. However in Houston, if drivers were to obey the rules of the road, the configuration would be fine.

The DCTA was formed in 2003 and replaced the city of Denton's system which began in 2002. They had nothing to do with preservation of ROW. DART actually owns the line, and if Metro wanted to, they could buy ROW or lease space for trains. It is relatively easy.

I wouldn't call the system a joke. I think it is admirable and actually, that system has more riders per mile than any other LRT system in the US besides Boston. It is a little misleading, as it serves the urban core only, but to be ranked that high is an achievement.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Unite...ms_by_ridership

concur. i'll bet just finishing the katy freeway will drop us a notch.

I suggest you look into something called the Induced Traffic Principle. In essence, drivers congestion limit is stop and go traffic. Any less than that they seek alternate routes/options. When a freeway/roadway is widened, capacity is increased to the point of congestion, as more people whose limit is stop and go get on. Like I said, Houston has 200 freeway miles in the city and over 500 in the region. That alone should be proof that you can't build your way out of congestion. Lord knows Houston has been trying, yet they still rank 5th. Sounds like wasted money to me.

I have said it before and I will say it again. The best thing to happen to Dallas is the relocation of major oil companies.

From a Dallas perspective, this seems all too familiar. Before DART's system was set-up, the same thing the road people in Houston are saying was said in Dallas. "People in Dallas want roads, not rail" "No one will ride it" "This is poorly planned" etc.

17 years, 45 LRT miles and 34 CRT miles later, DART is in the process of expanding the LRT system to 90 miles, the T is progressing on a 40 mile CRT line and the DCTA is putting the finishing touches on a 20 mile CRT line. By 2013 DFW will have 93 miles of LRT and 94 miles of CRT. 187 miles of rail and through it all, there has been very little of the we need more roads or widened roads or whatever else the pro-road, anti-transit people have said. Now add the fact that DART has just approved the 2030 plan for an additional 40+ miles of rail and the area will have over 200 miles of railed transit.

How many in Houston can say they don't own a car? Few because bus service makes it tough. Rail service is to mass transit what the freeway is to the current road system, just more efficient with the land use. Without rail, no transit system on a large scale can truely be effective in getting cars off the road. The same can be said for one or two lines.

Houston has a decent start with their line, but to truely be effective, they need almost an infinite amount more.

The S&L scandal in the 80s also wiped out 9 of the 10 largest Texas banks. Only Frost Bank survived without folding or being swallowed by other banks.

This event hit downtown Dallas particularly hard. MBank, formerly known as the Mercantile Bank, just completed a new HQ now known as the Bank One Center. They had just moved from a 1.3 million square foot facility to their new 1.6 million square foot facility in '87 when the economy crashed and they were gobbled up in '89. Their former complex went vacant five years later.

Republic bank occupied a 3 building 1.7 million square foot facility when their bank was absorbed.

Dallas Federal Savings had an HQ in DTD when they collasped.

Bright Bank was a savings and loan that collapsed and put a building out of every day use.

While I don't know that it was connected to the '80's crash, Dallas National Bank also had a HQ building that went vacant.

But that tragedy that hurt downtown then has helped it now, as all of the above buildings are either undergoing renovation or are now reopened for residential, retail or hotel use.

You're right that we can improve in some areas...but LRT is an EXPENSIVE improvement. As a society, we've only got so many resources with which to make this a better city, so my concern is with making the best investments possible. And if the implementation of the Red Line is a reliable indicator of what can be expected of METRO, then I'd rather see the Parks Department, Public Works, or HPD get those resources. It isn't as though there are a shortage of worthy projects that can have immediate impacts. A well-designed LRT system will have its place--only that place is at least a decade away (probably more IMO).

At this point, everything is going to be expensive. BRT routes aren't cheap. New buses aren't cheap. The longer you wait, the larger the price tag will be eventually, making it harder to implement in the long run.

The last thing I'll say on the topic is alternatives. Houston has very little. There are several books such as Suburban Nation that makes point after point that you can not build you way out of congestion. Examples include new freeway construction and existing expansion. There are examples of freeway and auto corridors destrction by natual or man-made causes and the traffic doesn't reroute to other auto routes. The majority seeks other avenues, of which some are in auto friendly areas like Houston. And at the same time, economic vitality isn't lost. Once a new route or expanded route happens, the increase isn't linear, but exponential. Meanwhile, transit rarely shoots the exponential ridership, mainly because for every mile of transit, there is many more times of freeway. If transit was built at the same rate as freeway, you'd see similar numbers. Another reason. more people can use a rail line than one freeway lane of traffic. The dimensions of a track and a lane are similar, meaning land use is better for transit.

Houston wants to revitalize their core to a pedestrian-friendly, dense urban environment. The single best way to do that is TOD, transit oriented development. It is happening in every city with transit. Portland is a great example of that. Areas around their stations hit near 20,000 people per square mile.

Places that have rail do not say the things you say about rail. Bottomline the are efficient at moving people and guiding development, both can save money, the latter can bring in more money due to the dense development that it spurs.

Congratulations - on conquering your forumaphobia and making a post, I am sure mommy must be very proud of you for overcoming such a debilitating affliction.

This is Houston - not Dallas, and quite frankly Scarlett I don't give a damn how they did it in Dallas.

As for ruining the name of Metro - I have no need to ruin their name - they do a fine job of it all by themselves.

Oh it wasn't a phobia. Other than a generic comment, I really don't have a lot to add to most discussions on Houston. On the occasion when I do, someone else could have and usually did. But I dislike the Wendall Cox/Randall O'toole wannabe's anti-transit comments and thought I should set the record straight.

While not 100% sure, I am pretty willing to say that Dallas and Houston's development (minus zoning) was pretty similar in the post WW2 era. So it is easy to believe that one neighborhoods like of foresight could easily be repeated here, and likely will be.

As for the Metro name, it is easy to bag on a transit system that has limited funding, has to actually pay for roads, is pretty much is a bus only system for a major metropolitan area, has short-sighted neighborhood groups fighting its every step, and has congressional leaders doing everything it can to keep it from getting federal funds.

DART's system is the complete opposite on all of those and because of it, will soon have one of the largest systems of rail in the US, especially outside the NE.

...and besides I'm not done insulting our newest member FoUTASportscaster because I don't have any facts to refute him!

By the way, FoUTASportscaster-excellent post and information-welcome.

Thank you. As a debater, you know your case is doing well when the opponent has to fall to those measures. An opposite veiwpoint isn't a bad thing, as it allows different angles to come into light. However, what's above wasn't an opposite viewpoint, but I'm sure you all know that.

Hello all, I have been a lurker on this site for near a year now I have been following the news and opinions on this site regarding metrorail. I normally wouldn't post, but I feel I have to give some facts and correct the gross inaccuracies of AftonAg's post. As a transit advocate in general and rail in particular, I feel I have to give some facts to set the record straight.

First, there is not a single transit agency in the nation that recovers its operating cost. The best isn't 90 or even 80, but 74% by Washington DC's system. That means it has to find revenue that's a little more than one quarter of its operating cost. New York, with its huge ridership numbers only recovers 58% of its operating expenses. Even if you look at the transit friendly cities like Toronto and Vancouver in Canada, you won't find recovery numbers like DC's.

Even if you look at the successful system of Dallas's DART agency, you'll only see about 11% fare box recovery, though that number is scewed by the 1% sales tax and their aggresive expansion that adds capital costs to the mix. They are currently undergoing an expansion that will more than double the current system. Coupled with the TRE commuter system's (the existing system, not the planned one that is dependant on Grapevine voting yes in November) 35 miles and the DCTA's new system of 20 miles of commuter rail, The North Texas area will almost 150 miles of rail (though that is a very small amount compared to the amount of highway miles in the area). But the main thing is that they are dependant on the sales tax to get it done. Without it, there is no system at all, even bus.

Also As DART expanded, it faced opposition from neighborhood groups like Knox-Henderson that opposed the rail line and subway station. The line has since appreciated property values by 50% over comperable properties not served by rail. But DART didn't build the station at the request of the neighborhood group. They asked a couple of years later for DART to go ahead and build one. DART said sorry, there are other cities and neighborhoods that want rail, go to the back of the line. Now here they are, 6 years after they could have had a rail station, but they won't get one by 2018 and likely not by 2030, the latest expansion plan in the works. That's a decision that they regret, and likely the case is being in this situation.

So the point is, just like your water, sewer and trash bill pays for the maintance and expansion of the current system of sewers, water mains and landfills, the sales tax does the same for the current system. It has its limitations, but unless TxDoT turns its attention away from subsidizing sprawl by building highways all over the place, that will have to do.

Bottomline is you'll have to do better than that, Afton, to ruin the name of Metro.

As a final goodbye, I have been doing some research on the disbanding of the Dallas streetcar system in favor of buses. This was in 1954. There was a petition signed by the ciizens of the Oak Lawn area north of the Uptown area against the transition. They stated that the lack of transportation would cause a decline on property values. And as most might know, that was the case as the inner city started to decay. What a difference 50 years can make. Now somehow transit cause declines in property values.