ADCS

They're taking one block. For a project of this magnitude, that's fairly impressive. Again, compare this to the takings that went on with the Katy Freeway reconstruction. The reduced crossings may be a blessing in disguise, by creating a clearly delineated set of arterial streets in downtown, reducing traffic on other streets and setting the stage for quality of life improvements such as separated bike lanes and sidewalk expansion/street beautification. There is already considerable overcapacity in downtown surface streets, which means that the land is being used inefficiently. I'm a bit puzzled by the characterization of a "car canyon". There's currently a 1970s-era elevated freeway there. Compare that to, say, the Central Expressway in Dallas. I don't think you'll have too many people preferring the former over the latter. Furthermore, the caps are by their nature a long-term project. It's not necessarily for a better Houston for us, but for our children and grandchildren. I'm also a little confused by an elevated freeway being removed as a problem east of downtown, but one remaining being a problem north of downtown. If it's an issue up there, certainly it's a bigger one down the 59 corridor? Thing is, I'm not sure congestion reduction is the goal here, nor should it be. By the time this is done, there will be 7-8 million in the Houston metro area, and the City of Houston proper will be around 3 million in population. With those numbers, there simply is no feasible long-term congestion reduction strategy, short of implementing road pricing (and even that is temporary). This may be a point we fundamentally disagree on with respect to traffic design, but to me, the goal of our freeway system going forth should be to direct unnecessary trips away from downtown, as opposed to making it easier to get through downtown. This design balances that with practical concerns about current habits. Truth is, as long as Houston continues to grow, traffic will only get worse. We can build out of it to a point, but making it our only priority leaves Houston a city for cars, and cars alone.

Not at all. If it were impractical, I'd be opposed to it. For example, outright removal of I-345 in Dallas is one of those projects that doesn't make sense, even though the ground-level benefits would be nice. My position comes from the experience of having lived numerous places, each with different approaches to freeway construction. Through this, I've seen that what might be a boon to a suburb isn't necessarily the same to a dense, urban area. I'm willing to take a look at decisions made in the 1950s and evaluate which were successes (Beltway 8), insufficient (West Loop, north-south arterial system), and which ones time has passed by (Pierce Elevated). I think Houston risks losing its dynamic character if we insist on keeping certain things the way they are for no other reason than they've always been that way.

If there were a substantive opposition to this project beyond normal NIMBY and takings concerns, then it would be easier to understand. As it stands right now, the opposition seems more like an ideological aversion to any freeway removal, with the concerns about the 59 expansion being a disingenuous red herring. Did you have similar concerns about the Katy Freeway expansion? I'm not at all surprised that there's at least one person who did not like the trenching of the Southwest Freeway. It's impossible to please everyone.

I'm sorry, I'm failing to see how the conversion of an elevated freeway (59 downtown) to a submerged one somehow worsens the fracturing effect, rather than improving it. If we assume that they'll be looking at the Southwest Freeway for design cues, try crossing on Graustark or Dunlavy sometime. If it weren't for the bridges, you could be forgiven for not realizing that one of the busiest freeways in the country was just ahead of you. Other than MaxConcrete's well-reasoned analysis, I truly do not understand the opposition to this project.

I'm speculating, but I'm fairly certain that TxDOT wouldn't have even considered removing the Pierce if there weren't good practical reasons for doing so. The 1997 work was fairly slapdash and substandard, as I understand it. It's sort of funny to think - by the time construction is done and the Pierce is finally demolished, it will have lasted in its current form for 30 years, just like its predecessor. The columns will have lasted 60 years. It's not a particularly wasteful solution from that perspective.

When they built the Pierce, no one quite understood yet what the effect of urban freeways would be. Nor did I state anything to the effect of it being a blight at the time; please do not put words in my mouth. It is a blight now. It currently interferes with Houston's urban fabric, which is why relocation would be ideal. In exchange, we will see more lane-miles in downtown (as of the current revision), with less interference with the Downtown-Montrose-Upper Kirby-Uptown corridor, Houston's central spine. The infrastructure has to be rebuilt anyway, which is why TxDOT did the study in the first place. Let's do it right.

That money's going to get spent somewhere. Why not reintegrate part of our fractured urban environment? Why do we need a multitude of high-speed through highways in downtown anyway? Why should we design the infrastructure to encourage the sort of traffic flow that simply doesn't fit how Houston is built nowadays?

What are your priorities when it comes to mobility in Houston?

http://keranews.org/post/opponents-call-more-transparency-dallas-houston-bullet-train Saw this on Swamplot this morning. A few things to note: 1. “We had gone from nobody knowing anything about the high-speed rail project between Dallas and Houston to the entire state budget being held up over it,” said Kyle Workman, the group’s president. “So from our standpoint, it was much different than a failure. There was no such thing as a failure in our case.” Workman admits to being a troll. 2. The opposition's strategy seems to be attempting to evoke empathy with plainly self-centered desires where fearmongering does not work: “If it was your house that you built that was going to be your retirement home; plans have been made your entire life to be here; or it’s land that’s been in your family for many generations; and it's suddenly fixing to be taken away, I would be curious if they had the same opinion,” said Gary Bennett, an Ennis lawyer and landowner.

https://www.reddit.com/r/houston/comments/3ltib2/interested_in_learning_about_the_highspeed_rail/ Looks like they're starting a media blitz.

You can say that about any project. This opinion seems valid until a bridge collapses and dozens are dead.

And? That's keeping water out of neighborhoods.

Yes. Shiro is in the center of Grimes County.

I'm beginning to think it won't be any time soon. Reading between the lines, I'm guessing the site is on indefinite hiatus until a new staff takes over.

That's just it - they managed to cram a six-lane freeway into an extremely tight right-of-way. That's impressive no matter how you look at it.

I'm all on board as long as they have a toll-by-plate option, which HCTRA facilities do not. It's absurd and unbelievably unwelcoming that half the Houston freeway network is unavailable to those who don't have an EZ Tag/TollTag/TXTag.

Media coverage outside the DMN seems to be slanted against the project. Any reason why that might be?

My suspicion is that they rely heavily both on the $10-15 activation fees and sitting $10 account balances in the EZ Tag program for leveraging purposes, and do not want to surrender that capital stream. I'm probably completely wrong, but that's what it seems like.

Why couldn't that function be contracted out to a third party? NTTA is a government entity as well, and they manage to run a pay-by-plate program.

Why won't HCTRA install toll-by-plate readers like every other toll road agency that uses all-electronic tolling in this state?

A lack of zoning actually helps heavy rail - the line is fixed, but the use of the surrounding property is not. That will lead to more development more quickly that takes advantage of the heavy rail line.

I'd guess end of quarter, if not end of year.

Houston has plenty of buses. Frequent access to ridership has just increased by leaps and bounds. If there's anything Metro can't be criticized for at this time, it's ignoring the nuts-and-bolts in favor of glamour projects.

I'm sorry, but that's absurd. That's like saying we shouldn't count pedestrian traffic on the train, because they wouldn't have taken the train if work weren't so far away. It's like saying we shouldn't over inflate auto traffic counts, because people walk from their cars to their desks, so really, they walked to work. Each one of these examples involves a mode shift because of reduced accessibility in the other mode. Adapting mode usage to maximize accessibility and usability is the very essence of modern transportation.

Ridership is inflated because people are using the line? We should eliminate the numbers because too many people are using a particular segment of the line?