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mfastx

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Everything posted by mfastx

  1. mfastx
    I think you are thinking of commuter rail. Heavy rail doesn't need to utilize existing ROW at all. BTW, one of the reasons DART is achieving lower than desirable ridership is that it is trying to cover large distance with slow light rail. Heavy rail is a lot faster and would be more successful in place of light rail in DART's network.
  2. mfastx
    MARTA would have been in much better shape if they had built out the full system from the original plan. What they have is an incomplete system. It would have been like if we built the initial line in the 1980s then stopped after that. MARTA still attracts more riders than most other post WWII growth cities.
  3. mfastx
    The first quarter that the Red Line opened there were only about 12,000 riders a day. So don't be disappointed if initial ridership numbers are low. It will take at least a year or two for folks to really start using this thing.
  4. mfastx
    Not sure, I remember years ago you could see the studies for the lines on METRO's website and I believe they had the ridership estimates there. I'd imagine that the North line will eventually have around 25-30,000 riders when it's all said and done. Might take a couple years for it to reach full ridership potential though.
  5. mfastx
    That would really only work for grade separated systems, which ours isn't unfortunately.
  6. mfastx
    Having a system similar to BART would certainly improve our transportation outlook in Houston, but unfortunately that is just an unrealistic proposition in our current political climate. First and foremost, we need to get people behind transit and fund it more. Cities with great transit don't allocate a full quarter of transit dollars to roads, they actually create additional taxes to help fund capital projects. Houston almost built something similar to BART (heavy rail) in the 1980s. If they had built out the full proposed system back then (with multiple lines going out west and centered around where the people are) we would have a much better transit system today. Heavy rail is almost twice as fast as light rail and in an area where covering ground quickly is important to a transportation rider it would have been the most successful technology we could have built. But that ship has sailed now and we must make do with what we have. Hopefully at some point in the next 50 years there will be more dollars allocated to public transportation and something like BART can be built here. Putting a subway all the way down Westheimer to downtown would be genius.
  7. mfastx
    Really excited for this one. With the three new hotels in the area, this is going to look really nice. I'm surprised something this big went on that little lot, I was expecting it to stay surface parking for decades. Glad the pessimistic me was wrong!
  8. mfastx
    Running test trains would be an interesting idea, but it wouldn't accurately reflect demand. For instance, the majority will not consider the option unless it is reliable and frequent.
  9. mfastx
    Heh, I read this right after your post in the Chinese thread, where you suggested that the government make driving more expensive for the Chinese people. As we are facing a similar problem here, you do not like the exact solution you suggested in the other thread. Ironic lol.
  10. mfastx
    DART gets more funding than METRO.
  11. mfastx
    It's so funny that this forum autocorrects "m e h" (spaces included to avoid the autocorrect) with "moo." Bunch of cows here.
  12. mfastx
    Underground would have been best. Less traffic disruption, and better access to the tunnel system underground as well, which is what the majority of people would like to access their buildings from.
  13. mfastx
    I'm not too bummed honestly. A signature station at street level would just look weird and out of place. It would be overpowering. It would be a lot better if it were all underground, with a mega transfer station with different levels. They could have done something amazing with that.
  14. mfastx
    What a shocker. NOT
  15. mfastx
    Hopefully by the time this is built, the Astros have a team worth looking at instead of the skyline.
  16. mfastx
    Was really bored tonight and after a devastating Rockets loss, I decided to cheer myself up by counting the number of developments on the map and seeing how many of them replace surface lots or lots that are mostly surface parking. I got 16. I also counted how many blocks in downtown Houston are surface lots, or mostly surface lots/grass lots and I got around 62. Amazingly, within the next 5 years or so, roughly 26% of blocks downtown that are currently surface lots/abandoned buildings will be developed! Exciting times indeed for Houston.
  17. mfastx
    It's pretty hilarious that a bunch of parking lots downtown was designated as a "district" in the first place lol.
  18. mfastx
    Apologies for the double post earlier.
  19. mfastx
    I disagree that a rail line to downtown from the airport is impractical, because that won't be the only line in a much larger more comprehensive system. In a larger system, people from all over town can hop on the train/bus close to them and transfer to the line that goes to the airport. Much cheaper than taking a cab, and much MUCH cheaper than paying for parking at the airport. Plenty of people would use it.
  20. mfastx
    I disagree that a rail line to downtown from the airport is impractical, because that won't be the only line in a much larger more comprehensive system. In a larger system, people from all over town can hop on the train/bus close to them and transfer to the line that goes to the airport. Much cheaper than taking a cab, and much MUCH cheaper than paying for parking at the airport. Plenty of people would use it.
  21. mfastx
    I know! That's almost as exciting lol, never heard of that project either.
  22. mfastx
    Doesn't look like too much is going on, besides new windows.
  23. mfastx
    Too bad this wasn't able to get off the ground. Would have been a tremendous gateway to the city of Houston arriving by train. And a perfect place to send HSR off to Dallas when the time comes.
  24. mfastx
    That's correct. Perhaps the tunnel option is still on the table with the 59 segment? It's doubtful obviously.
  25. mfastx
    TxDOT wants to do it cheap, so they can make more money 20 years later by performing another patch job. A tunnel option is as viable as any other option, many cities throughout the world tunnel their freeways. Sure it's expensive, but sometimes you gotta do it right, not cheap.
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