mfastx

Those areas still receive bus P&R service which should be enough to justify the tax. They benefit from HOV lanes as well, paid for by METRO. I know the argument for GM payments, but I still fail to see the need. Somehow every other major city doesn't need those GM payments. It's just political, there is no actual need.

Sorry to butt in here, but I think that he's talking about the University line, not the uptown line. And I would say it is the most critical because it has by far the highest ridership estimate (and realistically would obviously have higher ridership than the North, Southwest, and East lines). Agree on the last point. Culberson is ideologically opposed to rail (which I am still trying to figure out why) but Houston as a whole wants better public transportation, as they have voted for more buses and rail when it's been proposed the last couple of referendums. However I will say that lots of major politicians seem to be opposed to investing any significant amount of money into public transportation, as shown in their vehement attempts to keep bleeding money from METRO in the form of GM payments.

Interesting plan, I like the subway in downtown but I also think that the TMC/Midtown sections should be subway as well. Especially TMC, traffic is really bad out there. For the subway lines elsewhere, they seem to link into the light rail, I'm assuming that when you say "subway" you mean "light rail in a subway?" For the east-west subway line, I'd like to see heavy rail instead. Much faster and higher ridership. Over long distances speed of heavy rail is a huge advantage. Unless you get a light rail car designed to go fast (which is rare) but then capacity issues arise.

There are so many uninformed and misinformed residents in the area. They don't know a thing about public transportation, only what politicians like John Culberson tell them.

Remember, for the Main street line, initial ridership numbers were a paltry 17,700 boardings/day for the first quarter of 2004. It took a few years for ridership to rise to current levels, and I expect the same thing to happen with this line.

Ha! Nice one..

That's encouraging.. but realistically any HSR line between Houston-Dallas or Houston-wherever is going to eat a lot of market share from airlines, who will lose a lot of money on those routes.

The highway and air lobby that overwhelms Texas is going to make it very hard for something like this to happen. It's a fantastic idea and would easily capture the majority of the air/rail market share if done right and not half-assed. It would be a very large but great investment. I hope something like this happens in my lifetime, but I am not holding my breath.

I know, I just think it's rather silly how everyone immediately says we can't tunnel or build subways because of our water table, and we were doing it over half a century ago. There's got to be a way around this.

I'm not sure I understand. Why does it matter if it's gasoline polluted soil or not? They built a tunnel under the ship channel, don't tell me that soil wasn't polluted somehow.

That Day's Inn is the biggest eyesore in downtown IMO. That and the parking lots.

You must be confusing me with someone else. I am not opposed to suburban development. I understand that there are many more builders building in suburban areas, which is precisely why the lobby for building highways to nowhere is so strong. So what is the conspiracy theory again? That the suburban development lobby is stronger?

Firstly, let me make a couple of disclaimers. 1) I am for interstate projects and think maintaining our freeways is necessary and 2) I would rather heavy rail be built than light rail so I am arguing more because of the principle rather than me thinking that surface light rail is the best fit for the University line corridor. It's just hard for me to imagine that developers make as much money buying already developed/owned land rather than completely undeveloped land and building hundreds of the same house on it. Not only that, there are a lot more of those types of developers that build suburban areas than urban areas. When I say rail is cheaper I am assuming that it doesn't need a total rebuild after 30 years or so, rather minor improvements. And rail is more permanent in the sense that citizens/developers can rely on the fact that if a rail line is constructed, it will be there for centuries. Which, contrary to what some believe, is actually a good thing. In addition, carrying passengers via rail in the vast majority of cases (and in the long term, always) cheaper than carrying them by bus, which is the alternative Culberson wants. It's painfully obvious he knows nothing about transit, as he is apparently is pushing for a lower ridership, higher cost route along 59. He also further cemented his lack of knowledge about public transit when his office compared Metrorail to the system in Atlanta (and called it "light rail," lol) when it isn't even the same technology. It's quite discouraging that someone with so little knowledge about public transportation is in a position to make such key decisions on it. If you are fine with our elected officials worrying more about the wishes of developers than the citizens they represent (and no, I do not consider a few citizens directly along the light rail line to outweigh the entire region - who would probably be all in favor of the line if Culberson told them it was a good idea). Fair point, but I'd like to see profit margins of suburban developers, do you know where I could find those? Those are very unusually high numbers, sounds like they are doing a total system overhaul if that is the case. In that article they cite extensions being <$1 billion and yet "repairs" to stations and new rolling stock being that insanely high number? Of course every 50 years or so rolling stock and station upgrades will be necessary, but to my knowledge they usually do not cost more than the original line. Hell, give me $15 billion and I'll build 3 or 4 heavy rail lines in Houston that would serve the area beautifully.

I think it is sick and wrong for politicians to act in the interest of developers rather than the citizens of the city and the will of the voters. You see more lobbying for highways than rail because highways lead to cheap, undeveloped land where developers make more money. Rail is generally (and especially in the University Line's case) built on already developed/expensive land where developers make less money and see less potential, which is why you don't see any lobby for rail here. Of course, you'll have the renegade politician who lobbies for rail because people in his district will benefit from it (oh the horror) but this is a rarity. Although rail is much cheaper in the long term (over a period of centuries) and has a more permanent effect, it's not where the money is short term. It's just the political system we live in unfortunately.

I believe so, yes.

There are many other freeways in the Houston area that fit my description. If you are implying that rail receives even close to the same amount of lobbying as freeways do in the Houston locale, I would vehemently disagree. Obviously I do not have real proof since I am not in close relations with Culberson, but anyone who has followed his policies and reasoning the last decade or so can plainly see it.

Culberson didn't lobby so hard for those I-10 funds to make commute time shorter, or improve regional transportation at all. His motive is money, and that's where the money was. This is why all the freeways are being built to nowhere, because developers have snatched up those lands. It's not about good regional transportation solutions, not about improving commute times, it's about money.

OT, but it's too bad that they just finished an excellent restoration on that building on the right yet they are still trying to lease it.

Exactly why developers lobbied so hard for this to be built, they are going to make a lot of money developing this land.

Okay, it's two blocks away, and all over the world there are many large towers that loom over heavily utilized pedestrian areas. It's all about street level interaction. No matter how tall the building is, if it engages the pedestrian then they will be comfortable.

And just a block away there's a 72 story building lol.

Most light rail vehicles aren't built with speed in mind. Our cars are the exception, for example the newer cars we ordered are only certified up to around 45mph. Once Houston gets bigger voters will demand more transit. Look no further than Los Angeles. Houston needs to develop more, grow in population to the point where our traffic is actually bad (not only on freeways but also on surface roads), and grow politically. We are decades away from that so it's hard to have a serious discussion about improving transit when we are locked in for over a decade of paltry funding.

Just disgusting. Classic dirty politics at its finest. Wonder how much Culberson got paid to pull this off. Anyway, I'd prefer any rail line down this street to be a subway instead. Better yet, tunnel it down Westheimer, all the way out to Beltway 8. Of course that'll never happen, but that'd be the best rail line in Houston.

Quoted for truth. I am not a fan of commuter rail in Houston. We have already sunk so much cost in the P&R system already and it does a decent enough job. Besides there isn't enough demand for transit in low density suburbs to provoke enough people to switch to justify the costs of a commuter rail system.

Right, heavy rail configurations usually have higher average speeds than LRT/BRT because of stops and grade separations, but it is also more efficient on a cost-per-rider basis, and can travel up to 85mph. But of course it's a lot more expensive. Kind of wish we got started on heavy rail when Kiepper proposed it in the 80s when the feds were handing out money for transit systems. We are going to have to build a ton of BRT for it to be as effective and transformative, and I don't see how we can even afford that with METRO's financial structure the way it is.