livincinco

Every transit agency has problems - no one has a perfect solution. MARTA was just an example because it still has riders and isn't a total failure.

I wonder what the percentage of jobs are inside Loop 610? Would be interesting to know. I would think the total percentage of all workers in Houston is quite high inside the Loop. So the need to connect the work zones together via alternative means over the next 2 decades is there - and will continue to grow.

I'd love to see that data about number of jobs inside the loop, but I've never been able to find it. I don't think that its as high as is generally assumed though. I'm also not really sure that it's a fair barometer when considering potential impact of commuter rail. Commuter rail (like all rail) works great if you can move a large number of people from point to point, but overall transit time starts to become a factor if you're asking people to switch modes during their commute.

I agree with your comments about MARTA, I wouldn't consider it a complete failure, but I wouldn't necessarily consider it a success either. It's borderline in my opinion and definitely an interesting discussion as to how much value it has provided.

I gave LA as an example - not Vegas.  Don't get angry!  Don't yell - use big words to convey a point but not a whole sentence.  And why would we want asses in the seats?  We want people in the seats not donkeys!

 

Obviously Light Rail here has failed (that's a pretty clear statement you made - did I miss the point?).

 

You ignored my MARTA start-up question.  Clearly there are dense pockets in ATL now, but when Marta started how many pockets were there?  Houston suburbs will be prime areas for transit orriented developement.  A commuter rail line to Cypress needn't have 30 stops, more like 5-7 so how hard would it be to restructure transit to feed into that line?  Probably so hard we should just turn transit development over to NASA.  Would it be impossible to have a rail station in/around the current park and ride stations?

 

I think of a lot of things everyday - I seem to have trouble grasping how hard it would be for a metro area of 6.2+ million to have rail transit?  That's one of the things I fail to see.  I'll ask this:   How many of DC's METRO riders actually walk to the stations versus driving or taking a bus or carpool?  Speaking about the "suburban" stations.  Because if transit only survived off of commuters who walked to the stations then it would fail in 95% of the cities that currently have it.  NYC and maybe Inner Chicago would thrive, everything else... fail.

 

Part of my job is to be creative and imagine possibilities... transit isn't about getting riders on it today but building so that when tomorrow comes riders/commuters have other options.  A heavy rail/commuter rail system in Houston might take a decade to reach full ridership.  It might?  I'll bet if gas hits $5 a gallon and people have a chance to use it rather than spend $150 dollars per fill-up on the vehicles they will gladly use it.

 

Look, if you really love rail you would be clamoring to have it here even if you and I were the only people to ride it and we held each others hands in jubilation every day.  How many of Metro's Red Line South riders use the park and ride lot?  I did.  It was almost always full when I had the ability to use transit to get to/from work.

 

I think that it's relevant to point out that MARTA has had a lot of issues with declining ridership over the last decade and has had to elimiate planned rate increases for 2013 and 2014 because of projected impact on ridership.  I attribute a significant amount of those issues to the low percentage of jobs in the CBD, similar to Houston.  I really don't see anything that indicates that MARTA has done anything to minimize congestion or sprawl either.

 

The most recent data I could find on percentage of jobs in the CBD were 2010 census numbers that show Atlanta at 7.1% and Houston at 6.9%.  By means of comparison, the most successful rail cities are as follows:

 

New York - 22.1%

San Francisco - 14.4%

Chicago - 11.4%

Washington - 13.1%

Boston - 10.7%

 

Also, I do think that it's relevant to point out that a large percentage of transit oriented development is subsidized by government incentives similar to what is happening in Houston.  A perfect example of this is Atlantic Station which is one of the biggest examples of transit oriented development there.  Development at Atlantic Station was heavily dependent on the development of the Atlantic Station Tax Allocation District which provided government incentives to back the TOD that occurred there.  Very similar in pattern to the current residential growth that's happening in Downtown Houston.

 

I do tend to think that the impact of fuel prices is not going to be as dramatic as is generally imagined by transit advocates due to increases in government mandated CAFE standards.  Don't forget that US standards for 2025 vehicles is 54.5 mpg which is an approx. 60% increase from 2012 standards.  It's very reasonable to expect that there will be a continued shift to smaller, fuel-efficient (hybrid) cars during the next 10-15 years which will mitigate the impact of fuel price increases that are going to occur in the same time period.

Having lived in both Houston and the Bay Area, I have to say that the lack of willingness to promote itself is one of the things that I have found refreshing about Houston.  In general, my take on the Bay Area was that people were generally very conscious of their image and the perception of others.  By comparison, I have found Houston to be much more conscious of actions and results. 

While I'd love to see Red Line expand at both ends, I'd be curious to see what the ridership of the Red Line extension actually is. North of downtown you've got a sizable residential base but very little retail (Fiesta and Walmart), practically no restaurants, and few reasons to go up there.

 

Suppose the Red Line got a 1.5 mile sunken (tunneled) connection and was in 288's median (surface) to Pearland. Besides the logistics of METRO going that far south (that is, it won't), would it even get a sufficient amount of riders to justify the amount of money spent for track? Same with north--running a tunnel of a few miles underground to get in the Hardy Toll Road's median for the airport.

 

And if the University Line was nearly as popular as some claim it is, then the money spent on tunneling underneath the road would more than be enough to make it worthwhile.

 

The Red Line had an increase of approx. 2,800 average weekday trips in March 2014 v March 2013, I think that's a more accurate number than the approx. 4,000 daily boardings that has been publicized.  Probably highly likely that the decrease of approx. 1,200 on the previously existing stops is due to people that shifted their boarding location as new stops became available.

 

The official projection for ridership of the University Line is 32,100 average weekday trips in 2020 and 49,000 average weekday trips in 2030. 

 

http://www.fta.dot.gov/documents/TX_Houston_University_LRT_Profile_FY_2013_final_pdf.pdf

 

Denver, Salt Lake City, Phoenix, Seattle, Portland, Oakland, and San Jose are all expanding.

 

So what?  You just identified seven out of the 52 major metros.  You provide no data regarding ridership and cost and this has nothing to do with whether subways are possible in Houston.

 

Just because something is getting built doesn't mean it makes sense. 

 

If I recall correctly, you pointed out Los Angeles, which is currently adding a $40,000,000,000 new subway line extension. "Regret" would be a pretty light word if it didn't reach its lofty goals/drove the city into bankruptcy/etc.

 

I think that it's important to point out that LA is financing this project primarily through local sales tax revenue and they are able to do so because they have the highest transportation sales tax in the United States.  That tax was passed even though it required a 2/3 majority.  Federal and state money is less than 40% of the total that is going to be spent on the subway extension

 

METRO gets approx. 50% of the sales tax rate that is designated for transit in Los Angeles and I question whether there is sufficient support for an increased sales tax in Houston.  METRO has squandered a lot of goodwill through their mismanagement of finances in the past.

 

Incidentally, LA didn't support transit until it got far bigger than Houston is today.  The first rail line in LA opened in 1993 and the population of LA county was 9.2 million at that time.  (By comparison, the current population of Harris County is 4.3 million).

You always point out the density numbers but I keep giving you cities with similar density that are expanding rail systems and your only argument is they will have rail regret.

 

Actually, my response is that they have poor ridership and are losing huge amounts of money.  We've reviewed the example of DART multiple times to that end.

 

I doubt the people working there could afford to live in the apartments above. Which is a shame. Even if Houston had a Walmart going up like this I would still not shop there. Just thought it looked cool.

That's kind of the rub with "walkable urbanism". Great idea in concept, but generally ends up pricing out the middle and lower class.

True. But the original stretch of the main st line was like 375 million and has spurred well over 2 billion in development along it since it's inception.

And 15 million? How do you figure that.. The whole 5,000 units are 75 mil in incentives. Wouldn't the original 2,500 be 37.5 mil? Still it was an excellent investment, but so was light rail IMO.

I think that we're starting to divert from the topic, but would be happy to discuss on an appropriate thread.

You're right in the likely cost estimates, I was just saying that a heavy rail line in Houston would likely only be submerged in certain areas, like downtown, uptown, TMC, Greenway Plaza etc.

I believe the original heavy rail line proposition (which would have been a subway downtown and elevated elsewhere) would have cost about $4 billion in today's dollars, and it was 13 miles or something.

Downtown, Uptown, and TMC are the only locations that I think could have arguably made sense to do underground in Houston, especially if downtown could have been directly connected to the tunnel system. I disagree with you on the others and even the ones I've listed would only make sense in limited areas. I've pointed out several times the coorelation between transit ridership and greater than 10k and 25k/sq mile density and since no one has questioned that, I'm staying with it. Look at density inside the loop with those numbers in mind.

All the "light rail doesn't spur development" people better get their licks in now, clock is ticking...

I don't think that whether light rail spurred development was really the question. The question is whether it spurs proportionate development to the cost and that is very much an open question.

The downtown residential incentives cost about $15 million to date and I would suggest that they have generated more development than light rail has for considerably less money.

Interesting study if a little out of date.  (note - Cape Town's BRT has seen some significant ridership increases since this article was published).

 

I was a little surprised though how difficult it was to find exact information on the extent of the program.  It looks like the three trunk lines (and at least some of the feeders) were constructed for $450 million, but I don't know the total amount of mileage that was built.

Define "isn't that dense"?? Hillcroft Transit Center is in the single densest part of Houston (which I've mentioned before).

UH-- 40,000 students plus 6,000 faculty and staff= 46,000 persons traveling to and from main campus

TSU-- 10,000 students plus 2,500 faculty and staff= 12,500 persons traveling to and from main campus

That's a 58,500 member daytime population... more than half the working population of the Texas Medical Center.

You should come and spend some time at UH and just watch the number of cabs that people bring to school. There are a lot more people in this city without regular car usage than people realize.

There is a very high coorelation between transit usage and density. If density is below 10,000/sq mile usage is very low. Usage starts to increase above that point, but doesn't really take off until density gets to 25,000/sq mile. I'm not arguing that there are some pockets of moderate density in there, but large parts of the proposed line are well below those density levels.

^  Thanks for posting.   Just a couple notes:

 

-- Those numbers are for the 1st half of Metro's fiscal year (October-March), not first quarter.

 

-- The average weekday ridership for the 6 month period was 40,442

 

-- The average weekday ridership for the first 3 months of CY 2014 were: 

January, 2014:  41,780

February, 2014:  43,181

March, 2014:     42,722

 

Total Rail Ridership (compared to 2013) was up 10.9% in January, 11.3% in February, and 16.7% in March.

 

Thanks.  I missed that METROs fiscal year starts in October.  I'll break out the Q2 numbers later.

 

Not to get into another tangential discussion, but that's what Peak Oil is, it's not when we run out, it's when the production peaks. In the 80s in the USA it was different cause there were other sources of oil, so it was pumped till dry for cheap. When the world production hits peak, if demand doesn't slow down, that will be really bad (assuming alternatives aren't available). It's also different because unlike the 80s, the price will go up, and as that price goes up it makes economical sense to go after harder to reach deposits.

 

So all this fracking that's happening in the US right now, they're going after stuff they knew was there, it just wasn't economically feasible (and the technology didn't exist either, but if it had made economic sense to go after it then, they would have developed the technology then) to go after it at the time.

 

Anyway, it's not when we'll run out, but when the cheap to get stuff that is still being produced runs out, the price will keep going higher. Eventually, the cost of the product will be too high for people to sustain and they will move to other energy sources. demand will slow down, production will slow down, but since the price to produce will still be high, the price won't go down. How this impacts Houston overall (from an economy that, so far as I know, is still nearly 40% O&G related) is gloomy, I think, much less whether we have a subway built by that time.

 

It's a really interesting question and one that would make for a fun discussion.  Fully agree that prices will likely continue to increase over time (it's currently comparable to historical price peaks when adjusted for inflation), however given current known supplies, a gradual rise seems more likely than spikes.

 

I agree that continued increases will make other energy sources more attractive as prices continue to rise.  (Shell predicts that the last gasoline fueled cars will be produced in about 2070). 

 

The key for Houston though is that the petroleum companies are the best positioned to take advantage of the rise of alternate fuels.  Whether they are able to do so is a completely different question.

 

 

MODS - can I suggest that we pull this to a different thread?

 

METRO has reported their ridership numbers for Q1 and they are reporting that net ridership for METRORail has increased by 6.8% YTD (total, full system comparison).  The North Line recorded an average of  4273 weekday boardings, but that was offset by a decrease in ridership of 1680 on the Red Line (possibly existing transit users that changed their boarding station).  The result is that the net increase of average daily weekday boardings YTD is 2,593 vs LY.

 

For reference, the parallel bus lines (24 and 56) have seen a combined decrease of 649 average weekday boardings vs. LY  (possibly existing transit users that have switched modes.)

 

http://www.ridemetro.org/News/Documents/pdfs/Ridership%20Reports/2014/0314_Ridership_Report_FY14.pdf

 

JamesL disproved this to you a long time ago. You need a bus to run every two minutes right now to satisfy demand on the university corridor.

 

The highest recorded throughput volume of an active brt system is 37,700 passengers per hour per direction.  The projected ridership of the University Line in 2030 is 49,000 average weekday boardings.

 

http://www.acea.be/uploads/publications/20th_SAG_HR.pdf (pg.16)

 

 

 

There seems to be a lot of discussion about the LA costs of $1 billion/mile. Keep in mind that is a pre-construction estimate,very few government infrastructure projects of this magnitude come in on budget. Expect actuals to run higher.

$20 billion would get you a lot more than 20-30 miles of subway. In Houston, it only makes sense to subway in certain high density areas. A heavy rail system would be above ground in a lot of areas, bringing the cost down.

$20 billion of spending on heavy rail would get a lot more ridership than the same amount on BRT.

We're just going to have to respectfully disagree on that. I think a $700 million - $1 billion per mile cost is pretty much in line with the very limited amount of subway construction going on in the US. I also think that you're overestimating the amount of demand on the discussed University corridor. Transit ridership tends to coorelate very heavily to the density of the area near to the stations and the area along the proposed University line really isn't that dense.

That's really the question about subways though isn't it? If we could get $20 billion in capital transit spend, I'd much rather have 200-300 miles of quality BRT than 20-30 miles of subway.

To be fair - LA must build for an earthquake zone and simply put projects are more expensive there due to the cost of living/wages etc being higher than in Houston.

 

Why would it cost $40 billion to build 10 or 5 miles of subway here, when it costs that much to build 28 miles in LA?

 

 

And yes, to a point money spent on large public projects should always be scrutinized extra... though building something that large will always be expensive.  And as a citizen of this area (Metro service area) I would be fine to pay extra money to access that system, and also happy to pay extra money to build a better transit system in Houston.  If that means higher taxes for a while, or more fees when purchasing certain things or renting cars or going to a game - then so be it.  I mean we added ridiculous fees to everything to build a useless stadium for an even more inept team owned by a billionaire, yet we can't build a transit system for our burgening city and metro area of 6.3 million?  Seems odd.

 

We may not need 100 miles of heavy rail now, but when out population tops 8 million we will!  Will we have it?  Nope.  We will follow LA's example and be so mired in traffic that we will have no choice but to spend $40 billion when it may have cost only $20 billion.

 

 

Actually LA's per mile cost is considerably lower than New York's.  Just to clarify, I'm all in favor of spending $20 billion on transit in Houston, it would be well spent money for the future.  The way that money should be spent is a different question.  I don't agree with spending billions to build a single subway line (University Line) in an area that doesn't even have the density to justify it.

 

Yes, but to counter that point about townhomes not really adding density...

 

single family home: occupied by 1 family

same property with 6 townhomes on it: occupied by 6 families

Yes a Midrise would have more residents (assuming a 4-6 floor building would have upwards of 20 families), but they also need parking and in Houston you have little access to the transit you need for something like that in most places- Midtown or the Museum District not withstanding.  And developers willing to spend that kind of money on a mid rise can simply build 40-60 townhomes and make more money off of those being sold than off of a midrise with rentals or condos.

 

Honestly what surprises me more - is that there aren't more developments with townhomes that have rooftop terraces?  Or apartments for that matter.  Granted I realize a lot of places utilize the roofs for a/c units but still... There is a townhome complex 4 floors with a terrace that presumably had great views of the city off of Hazard or Dunlavy.  Always thought those were cool.

 

I agree with you that townhomes add density, however I'm not sure that gentrification does.  There's quite a few older apartment complexes that are getting torn down with upscale apartments/townhomes going up.  I don't think that it's a stretch to assume that those older apartments held a lot more people (families) and that many of them are being driven outside the loop due to increased rent.

Look, comparing NYC to Houston is silly.  New York is an amalgamation of cities (called boroughs) and did not become the "great" city that it is today overnight.  In fact it took centuries and to think otherwise is fallacy.  It was also founded in the mid-1600s by the Dutch, grew in importance under the Union Jack and kind of became the US's finacial capital after the Panic of 1819 (though I could be exaggerating that events importance - thought prior to that event Philadelphia was a sort of commerical capital for the country) and the complition of the Eire Canal.  Add in the "joining" of New York City and Brooklyn (two seperate towns in their own right until 1898!) and the fact that NYC was the immigration hub for the exodous of Serf Class Europeans in the 1850s-1900s and OF COURSE its not only bigger, but also more important.

 

Houston, which is MUCH younger still needs to do a lot of maturing and the realization that while we do need to work on any number of issues (major and minor) in this city, we can't just do so over night.  The implementation of a transit system here is a major point to address.  We have the start, perhaps not the "backbone" but a piece of the puzzle.  What needs to happen is people need to realize two things:  1) Rapid Transit doesn't "end" freeway congestion, it helps give people a different means to move around.  2) Houston WILL HAVE TO HAVE more than it does.  In fact in 20 or 30 years we will need Light Rail, Commuter Rail and probably heavy rail to far off  places like Brenham/College Station/Wharton/Victoria etc. where we WILL have people who commute to work from.  Sounds crazy but it will happen.  Already does in the east, so it will eventually happen here when property becomes so expensive there is no where for some people to go but far, far away and hope there's a system in place that will allow connectivity.  Maybe it will take 50 years, but it will happen eventually.

 

if that makes any sense?

 

Agreed that comparison to New York is pointless.  NYC has very different challenges that are not applicable to other cities and conversely, solutions that are implemented for New York are not necessarily relevant to the rest of the country.  New York City passed the current population of the City of Houston in the 1880's.  However, it's also relevant that NYC's population stagnated during the post WWII period and that its 2010 census population was only about 300k people higher than its 1950 population (a net increase of about 5% in 60 years).  As a result, the transportation solutions that were put in place pre-1950 are still very relevant today.  (Even the 2nd Avenue subway which is currently under construction was planned in the 1920s).  By comparison, CoH had a population of 596k in 1950 and was 2.1 million in the 2010 - an over 350% increase in the same time period, but even with that growth, Houston is less than 25% of the population of NYC.

 

I'm not so sure that I agree with the second part of your comment though.  CoH is currently 1/4 of the population of NYC on twice the land.  Even in 50 years, it won't be close to the population or the density of NYC. If we assume that the population of CoH doubles in the next 50 years and the geographical size of the city remains the same, then the density of CoH becomes about 7,000/sq mile which is comparable to current population densities of cities like Oakland, Minneapolis, and Seattle.  That's still only about 1/4 of the density of current day New York.

 

Subways are great for moving large number of people on specific routes and there may be a very limited number of locations that require that in 50 years, but the majority of our needs, even in 50 years, are still most likely to require us to move smaller number of people to a number of different areas.

Not sure why no one has brought up the Midtown Redevelopment Authority. Hard to not give them at least some degree of credit for the development that has occurred.

http://secondavenuesagas.com/2010/11/30/in-los-angeles-a-subway-system-grows/

Heres an article about L.A. spending $40 BILLION in 2010 just to expand their subway system, and explaining how Mayor Villaragosa did it.

So again I ask, to the posters who keep bringing up "cost", whats your point? You say it as though no other cities are spending that much on rail.

Is your point that Houston is just somehow inept and incapable of doing it?

Or is repeatedly bringing up "cost" just a red herring to get people to think "oh thats right, $16 billion is way too much money, that means its impossible to ever have rail in Houston"

 

I'll turn that question right back around at you.  How can you possibly look at a multi billion dollar project without considering cost?  LA is spending $40 billion to build 28 miles of subways.  Don't you think that its important to understand whether that's cost efficient?  Would you be ok with Houston spending $40 billion and only completing 10 miles of subway?  5 miles? 2 miles?  Are there other and better uses for that money that should be considered?