rantanamo

The Kinkisharo vehicles that DART uses are not what I'd call urban people movers. They are designed to be commuter type trains, and can link up vehicles to a desired length and capacity. The longest I've seen together is 3, which is about the length of most of the stations. I don' t know the possible top speed. But if you've ridden while the train was at 65(you know because there are speed signs all over the lines), that speed is easily reached. 65 may be a limit DART wants for timing issues in the current system. These vehicles are not the same as the Houston vehicles in their construction or purpose except for the fact they use overhead wire(which doesn't limit speed in and of itself as we know from super fast trains in Europe). The term light rail vs heavy rail differs in that third rail of heavy track vs a lighter overhead wire to close the electrical circuit.

I wouldn't mistake the current downtown alignment of DART for what will be there in the future. That will be a subway line downtown, eliminating that limit in speed. The rest of the line has its own ROW, whether elevated, at street level or underground. They don't stop for lights, cars, etc. Downtown is the exception.

For your vehicle type in Houston, that may be an issue. I dunno. But speed and capacity hasn't been an issue so far because of reasons mentioned above. You also have the Super Kinkisharo vehicles that seem to be slowly phased in with a few each time new vehicles are bought. These are basically two of the standard model linked together with a platform level middle section. Two of those linked together = 4 of the old trains that can be loaded in the current stations.

There was supposed to be a stop at Knox-Henderson, but residents fought it initially. Now they want it, but have to get in the back of the line.

The new lines have subway possibilities at Love Field, and if the 'middle' alignment is chosen at DFW. All depends on the level of funding.

The U of Dallas location could really be something spectacular. It sits on a hill near the current Texas Stadium, and with the city of Irving's help, could probably occupy that land when the Cowboys are gone.

The SMU proposal could be really unique itself. That's a really tight squeeze, so you'd have something more unique and urban than you'd get elsewhere. Not to mention it being right on Central Expressway and right across from Mockingbird Station. There are already talks of a pedestrian bridge to go over Central in this location. Not to mention, that area has lots of plans in the works.

Little tidbits that I've not seen mentioned here:

- The Bushes lived in nearby Preston Hollow for a while

- Laura Bush is an SMU alumnus

- The Bushes have purchased a Highland Park Mansion and apparently a Turtle Creek residence of some kind.

- Believe it or not, Dallas officials are supporting the U of Dallas proposal. the location would literally be right at the Dallas/Irving border, would likely spur development on the Trinity River Corridor, and the name of the school has Dallas in it. Its an interesting take, that makes a lot of sense. I don't think Dallas officials are against the SMU location, but just trying to increase their chances.

Considering that Dallas was 12 inches behind on rain, what you call this past weekend was a sheer anamoly. Officially, DFW is still in a decent drought and unless it continues to rain, will go right back to fire hazard pretty soon.

- White Rock Lake and Arboretum

- Lakewood Village and check out nearby Swiss Avenue and Lakewood for some great unique architecture. Actually there are great homes in that whole area along Gaston

- Bishop Arts in Oak Cliff. There are some nice little spots in there to see music and grab some local food and art. Great, great architecture in North Oak Cliff too. Really nice hilly landscape as well

- I even took some people up Turtle Creek into HP, and then to Preston Hollow and Bluffview to see some of the amazing homes. Great for any architecture lover.

- Museum of Flight at Love Field(touristy, but most don't even know its there)

- World Aquarium downtown(touristy, but most don't even know its there)

- I think most people even miss the trolley in Uptown because they stay downtown

- Texas Queen on Lake Ray Hubbard(another thing most don't know is there)

One thing I would suggest is to just get on the train and ride. There is a ton to do, and the trains actually have guides on what to do just right off the trains. The system is just small enough to where it shouldn't be intimidating, but big enough where it could occupy one. Plenty of shopping big and small, some arts venues, lots and lots of food, and plenty of shows.

Whether the spire counts should depend on whether its part of the structure or if its just an added on communications tower. The Republic Center tower is part of the structure, but Rennaissance Tower(Dallas) added their's on. I wouldn't count it.

The Republic Center's spire is not wimpy and wasn't built to make it taller than anything. I don't think anyone in Dallas knows or cares if its the tallest residential in Texas.

This will all be moot once The Mandarin Victory(45 stories and 600ft) and Hall's tower in the Arts District is completed. The Hall tower(50 stories and undisclosed height, but from the model, will be in the 800ft range) was assumed by all to be a no go or simply pie in the sky. Then Hall came out with a statement about wanting to start when material prices lowered a bit. Now we now see that Hunt Construction has been awarded the construction contract to build it starting this coming fall.

The Merc brings about mixed feelings. For those that don't know much about it, the project is huge. Bigger than the Pavillions project in Houston. The Mercantile complex involves 3 or 4 structures I believe. A couple will be demolished and two new towers built, while the main tower and other structure will be renovated. So its not just an ordinary renovation. The amount of area, street surface down Main and number of units it would add are almost as much as what's currently there. Otherwise, it would be demolished and Dallas would hope that something else is built. So its a hard choice. Demolish and distribute to other projects that might equal the retail and residential units, or spend it all on the Merc and the Atmos complex(can't forget that part. It will equal a large amount of renovation and residential units) So there you have it. Guranteed units, vs potential a more projects. So who knows which is best. I certainly don't.

I don't agree with that reason it was OK'd. If they just look around and see all the cranes and blocked streets downtown, they'd know that plenty is going on.

This thread is funny to read. Does anyone realize that the AAC is pretty much the northern end of Victory? The House and Terrace Condos are indeed across the street from the West End, not the freeway. Woodall Rodgers is not the border of the West End. There are actually several buildings, like Hooters that are actually north of Woodall Rodgers. They are considered downtown. They are literally 100 ft from The House which is part of Victory.

Agree on the Merchantile comment. That's more comparable to Pavillions. Victory is more like adding half of a downtown to downtown.

I have said it many times and will say it again. I really like the way Dallas has pushed hard for development in the areas around downtown as well as around DART stations;. It has actually pushed real demand into/towards the adjacent CBD as Uptown prices swell and land grows scarce, especially the Arts District. As East Dallas and the Cedars continue to grow the way Uptown did early on, I wonder if the same effect will happen to their adjacent CBD areas. It would have been cool if these efforts were put into the CBD first, but wow is a large swath of urbanity being taken care of very quickly. The DART station development is simply a bonus of infill and functionality. I would prefer not to need any revitalization, but I do like the way in which things are happening. We say it all the time, but wow will things be nice, not just for downtown, but for intown Dallas as a whole in less than 10 years. That can't be denied whether you like Dallas or not.

Do you know the actual over under of construction/renovation of Uptown vs downtown? I bet you don't, and I bet you'd be surprised. Renovations are simply not as visible, but those actually happening right now are huge in unit numbers. You probably didn't know there are two high rises under construction right now in downtown, with many in various pre-construction stages. Bet you don't know of the parks plan that's already started with construction.

don't let the truth get in their way, Rosewood.

This will be a damn impressive sight next to the W

http://forum.dallasmetropolis.com/attachme...tachmentid=7219

appropriate for the thread title

yes, and houston rules the universe. We already know that.

There's a photo thread of Oak Lawn on Dallasmetropolis

Urban Market is a smaller downtown grocery store that will mostly seves the swarm of new residents and downtown workers. Its not only under a parking garage, but is the groundfloor retail of the Interurban Building that is being renovated into aparments. The garage is just newly attached to it. This place is not trying to be huge or blow anyone away. Its for people downtown that have had to drive elsewhere for groceries.

What you may not know is there there is a neighborhood Wal-Mart about a block from downtown on the edge of Uptown as well as an Albertsons a few blocks from that in Uptown. Both are full service larger Supermarkets. There are also plans for a full service large supermarket at CityLights, which will be one block from I-45/US 75 in east Dallas. Infact, a whole urban "power center" with Home Depot, Best Buy, etc. along with residential. Also Victory's The House will also house a grocery store in its retail portion. So Urban Market has plenty of competition.

* I realize that passengers per mile isn't the best measurement for determining transit system efficiency. A better measurement is traffic density, which is measured in passengers-mile per route-mile, but that requires knowing the average passenger travel distance and I don't have that data for either METRO or DART. DART probably has a longer ATD than Houston due to its suburban orientation, but I still doubt that it has higher traffic density than the Main Street line.

Glad you pointed that out. Its not really a valid comparison. DART ridership per mile was very high when the line was much shorter. Now its just serving its much more intended role as a larger scale commuter transport systerm. You can't take out the whole picture with DART either and the amount of development it spurs and how many employment centers and transportation options it does/will serve. It really is like a teenager now that's making good grades and doing whatever else it needs to do to be a successful adult. Great future. Great planning, and they take their time and get lots of citizen input.

I think the design of DART is genious. This statement is key: In Dallas, DART's president and executive director, Gary C. Thomas, who also helped design the system as an engineer, played guide on a recent tour, pointing out often how the tracks skirt residential and commercial areas but stay close enough to lure riders. This has allowed some incredible development opportunities at stations. There are current examples like the West Village/Cityplace development that any system would love to have in its future. The most prime example of the genious placement is the future Parkland/UT Southwestern station. The placement of this station was hotly debated for years. Run west of Parkland, right through Parkland or above the street northeast of the Parkland and UT Southwestern complex. If you ran it east, it would serve the hospital and the parking lot as does the TRE currently. It obviously boosts numbers when it opens. If you run it through the complexes, you serve the hospital greatly. Definitely boost numbers when it opens. Many favored this option. But then there was the last option to run it on the northeast edge of the complexes. Of course, it will boost ridership. Its a large complex of hospitals. What was different about this alignment was that it has lots of developable land to the northeast. Some owned by the hospitals, some by private developers. Well, voila, this week a new TOD called CityVille at Southwestern is officially announced to break ground in the winter that will have hundreds of various urban units, retail and office space. None possible if you run the rail directly through Parkland. Pretty much the whole system outside of downtown has been designed in this way. Its genious. Dallas is pretty suburban in most areas and landlocked. If you just run the rail stops right in existing suburban commercial or residential areas you have a little better current ridership. But if run it on the 'edges' you open yourself up to mold the city and create a much much greater future ridership. I will take smaller current ridership if it allows a future filled with West Village, Victory, Park Lane Place or CityVille at Southwestern. Huge projects that can change the landscape of a city for the future. Creating an environment that is more conducive for more people to ride the rail This is even the plan in the suburbs. Look at Las Colinas. The rail will run on the undeveloped side of Lake Carolyn. This has provided a great opportunity for urban planning, and developers are building like crazy already even though they are 4 years from opening. I'm glad that DART actually thought about this. It really makes sense in the long term. In 5 years, you'll land at DFW or Love Field and have TODs at every stop on the system because of the station placement. And to say that placement is away from business is false.

BTW, ridership dropped by 1,000. Very small number considering no hockey and a few corporations moving to other metroplex locations.

shakes head in disbelief at some of the statements.

I love mostly the one that started it.

I went to Dallas this week to study its many urban projects.

You took the entire temperature of the city in a few days?

I really, really do encourage you guys to read Dallasmetropolis and the actual issues we discuss on the city. You will see where the actual political boundaries lie, where the business community's heads really are. Perhaps you'll actually catch some facts.

Six Flags didn't move anywhere. Premier Parks of OKC bought Six Flags back in the late 90s. They are the ones that began the rapid expansion of the franchise name. Six Flags parks, then Time Warner owned Six Flags.

The private sector could end a lot of the crap going on in the next 5 years. All I have to say is we shall see. The opportunity is there. Will anyone take advantage or will they continue to run as far north as they can?

As for why such tension, I believe the physical seperation as well as lack of new guard leadership in certain communities always kills any progress.

Sorry about that. Just hard to stay on topic sometimes. I apologize if I was bashing Houston or straying off topic too far.

Like I said, you guys have very interesting ideas.opinions on how others percieve themselves.

It's just funny. You rarely hear about Houston wanting to model itself after some other city.

Personally, I don't give a rats ass about Dallas and would much rather be considered with LA or Chicago, not Dallas. Houston is gaining on that class of city, Dallas is not.

kettle............black. Glad that you recognize that. Don't know why you guys expect us to hate Houston. Read our forum sometimes. A lot of us have actually lived there and actually discuss your issues intelligently. Just because some yahoos on the street like to make disparaging comments doesn't mean Dallas hates Houston. If I went off of my college roommate and his friends, I would think Houston halds its nose up at Dallas. I don't do that though. That's ridiculous.

I would also ask why do you think Houston is gaining on Chicago or LA, while Dallas is not? Neither is gaining on them as they aren't sitting still themselves. I'm more wondering exactly what Dallas isn't doing that is preventing it from gaining on such status?

Not being hostile. Don't know where you got that from. Just interesting how you guys are always commenting on other cities being insecure towards you guys. Especially in light of some of the posts and comments here like Dallas' "illusions' of grandeur. Just very interesting. Not saying anything good or bad, nor am I upset. Its just interesting.