DwntwnGeo

That doesn't sound very good, but a question I would ask is: Did the convention center in Pittsburg collapse because of an Architectual design error or another reason?

Thinking about space and ROW requirements in the DT area, if we cannot bring the Commuter/Light Rail right into Central Station at least bring it to the outter core where people can transfer to streetcars to get where they need to in the DT area.

Here are the proposed routes mentioned in the GR Press: I am sure this will have to be done in stages and not all at once. EDIT: oops, GRDad beat me to it again

I am hoping that it can be used for both the street car staging area and have one lane left open for the Amtrak train

I don't know for sure, but when the weather is cold like it has been for a while, they cover buildings with plastic, so they can do concrete/brick work. When it gets below a certain temp, you cannot do this type of work because it will freeze before it gets hard and cured. Builders will wrap an area with plastic so they can maintain the heat and continue working.

These renderings showed up recently in my email Entrance Rendering Lobby Rendering Child's Guest Room Spectrum at Twighlight Spectrum at Night Spectrum in Grand Rapids Skyline Please note, I did not take or create these pictures and renderings.

I thought I read/saw somewhere that the I-196 cooridor was going to be done in stages (Bridgework/lane improvments etc). I thought I saw somewhere that is mentioned 2010-1012. On the MDOT webpage, it looks like there is a lot of bridge work to be done. They also want to upgrade/redo the interchange with I-196/I96/M-37.

The article mentions laying new concrete between West River and 10 Mile Road. I wonder if they will widen the road to 3 lanes. I know there had been talk of this and some of the bridges had already been widen to three lanes.

I am interested in how that an additional sales tax would work too. It sounds like a nice source of money that could be used for transit improvements and/or extensions etc. Does it require State approval or just a vote on a county level?

Just an FYI for all you wings lovers..... The new BW3s/Wild Buffalo Wings will be open on Saturday, February 3, 2007. They will be open just in time for the Sunday Super Bowl Parties.

Great summary GRDad The real thanks should really go to the person that was able to forward it on to me.

Article about Transit Millage on May 8th ballot: "The Rapid transit authority's board Wednesday voted 11-0 to seek a renewal of its 0.95 mill for operations and a new 0.17 mill for other services. " "The new services would include another regular bus route to the Northwest Side of Grand Rapids around Union High School, increasing the frequency of runs on five other routes and the addition of weekday evening and some Saturday runs on another five routes." "The 1.12-mill proposal would cost the owner of a $100,000 home about $56 a year. It would raise about $12.2 million for the transit service in 2008."The complete article can be read on Mlive.com at: http://www.mlive.com/news/grpress/index.ss....xml&coll=6

I don't think they talked about specific busses. They said that the route would need 10 busses, 8 would be running and two for reserve when other busses were being worked on. If they did say a specific name or type, I must have missed it.

Yes, I would agree that a street car would bring more investment down Division, but LRT would bring even more, so where do we stop? If we were to go with Streetcar down division, who would pay for it? We do meet the requirements for any Federal and State funding, so the $21-$24 Million per mile will have to be paid for by us locally? The 9 mile stretch would cost $189-$216 Million dollars. Say we get half from private donors/employers, would a proposal/millage pass for the remaining $100+ Million? Even if we cut it into thrids, 3 miles would get you roughly from Futon down to Hall. I don't know if there would be enough ridership to show placing the next 3 mile phase? I could be wrong though.

Sorry for the poor sketch quality, but here is a sample what I think would be some good route to choose from. Granted they cannot all be built at one time and even the two loops probably would be buit one side at a time and then connecting them when completed. The Wealthy route is in there because there was a good comment from, I believe one of the GVMC members, that said that Wealthy into East Grand Rapids is a strong route and he would like to see a line (BRT or Streetcar) built there in his years in office (at least that is how I took it, maybe he meant in his remaining life

Everything I have read/heard about loops is that they should be only be 1-3 blocks inbetween eachother. The Portland route shows this very well. GRDad, on your GR map above, are you suggesting that your loop be in one direction (meaning only clockwise/counter clockwise) are you are suggesting a track system with cars going both ways. I don't think your loop will work with just one track in one circular direction because your loop is too many blocks apart. I dont know if the streets you highlight will support two tracks for bi-directions.

I don't see why they couldn't, but this isn't my area of expertise. The rails are buired in the decking of the road and the electrical wires are strung together by wire and the poles are sometime decorative like light poles are now. There may be a little more construction work (cost per mile) to go over a bridge incase they have to re-inforce the sub structure to support the extra weight or enlarge the decking to support the buried rail protion. Didn't the original GR streetcars go over Bridge and Pearl Streets?

I wasn't in the study group so I don't know all the information that was collected. It was mentioned they wanted to hit the key employers of downtown with this route. The key employers they sited were, St. Mary's, GRCC, and Medical Hill. I don't know how many if any survey's they already conducted, but in this next phase, there will be more public input as they set the final route and locations for the fixed stations. One of the requirements for the Federal Very Small Starts Program is that you need a minium of 3K daily weekday riders. They sited that the Division route was the closet to this figure and wasn't expected to reach it until this year. I don't know why the GVSU route wasn't considered. The only thing I could think of was that during the summer, there wasn't the average 3K riders per day The study didn't say this directly, but they mentioned that some transit systems (Portland included) have started out only with private/local funding. These systems did very well and as these cities went on to build phases II & III etc. They were able to get more and more funding from the Feds because they were able to show their growth and strength around the original phase. Similar to what they would like to do here, first is the BRT down Division as phase I. When it comes time to create phase II, maybe there will be enough ridership to prove in funding for street car or LRT. So to answer your question about BRT going through downtown, maybe it would be only temperary until we can create the downtown circular loop through multiple phases. Meaning later the BRT downtown section (between St. Mary's and Medical Hill) will be changed over to the downtown street car circular route.

A lot of the Board Members asked some very good questions to the GT2 study group. One question in particular was the differences between BRT and Streetcar? One of the major factors is price. The BRT system can be constructed around $3 million per mile, in contrast, Street car was priced out at between $21 - $24 Million per mile. After the cost per mile was explained, the same Board Member understood that BRT is cheaper to build than a streetcar but wondered what the difference was in the amount Developers would invest in the area after the line is completed. The GT2 group did reconize that Developers like to see fixed assets (rail, overhead power lines etc) and have normally invested more in an area where rail was placed rather than places where rail wasn't placed. They didn't have any specific numbers to give the Board. They went on to explain, to get Federal funding, the BRT system has to have more fixed assets than a regular bus line. They sited that the BRT will have marked bus lanes on the road and the BRT stops will have "fixed" stations and not just a bus stop sign off the sidewalk with a covered waiting area. Having these features the GT2 group mentioned, will give developers confidence in the stability of the area and spur added projects. In theory, the parallel parking will still be there. In most areas along Division, there are two driving lanes in each direction. The BRT will take one of those driving lanes only during the peak rush hours. This leaves the parallel parking along the sidewalks intact for businesses.

I went to the meeting this afternoon/evening. The 19 stops you are mentioning are for a round trip. Meaning 9 stops into downtown, 10th being Central Station and the same 9 going back to 60th St. The route they showed on the presentation leaves Central Station North along Monroe, East on Michigan, South on Lafayette(?), West on Wealthy, South on Division to 60th Street. Stops will be every mile (60th, 54th, 44th, 36th, 28th, Burton, Hall) and as you get closer to the core, stops will be ever half mile (Hall, Franklin, Wealthy) until Wealthy. Then the route stops at St. Mary's, GRCC and Pill Hill before going to Monroe and Central Station. The motion passed to continue the process for BRT down Division Ave. The BRT plan has to be adopted into the Master Plan and approved by the GVMC. Then we continue to move forward and apply for Federal funding on July 1, 2007 under the Very Small Starts program. Once federal funding is approved, then we have to go to State funding for approval and than approval a local millage for the remaing funds needed. The motion passed to give the go ahead to research a streetcar for downtown. No real location has been mentioned, just that it sounds like it will include Monroe's downtown section (Fulton-Michigan). The additional research will develope who will ride, where they want to go, where they are from. This information will help provide where the first segment in a multi segement should be placed/created. The motion passed for the millage renewal and millage increase for phase II improvements. The proposal will be on the May 8th election. Lets all show our support and vote! Over all it was a good meeting and there was a lot of people there to support all causes. I just wished the couple behind me didn't whisper the whole time the meeting was going on

When I was in Madison, WI last year, I saw a bus lane on a main road in the suburb area. It was marked with a diamond in the middle of the lane and written underneath was "BUS"

I think the Feds mean by dedicated lane being a lane that is curbed off from the rest of the street or where "no" traffic can be in the lane except the BRT busses at any time. The rumor I heard, was there will be a dedicated BRT lane at certain times of day, but not 24 hours a day. I asked how this will be enforced and didn't get a clear answer other than tickets will be issued if you are caught in the BRT lane during the posted times.

I just assumed the location of interurban track was more in the center of ROW, but now that you mentioned the bridges it makes more sense to me.

I agree, I am not trying to argue with any one here and I didn't take your posts that way either. I think we are both on the same page, just had different ways of spelling it out. Hopefully we will know some more details this coming week after the Wednesday Board meeting.

The section that I was thinking/talking about is between 54th and 36th street. It appears the Transmission Towers are built on the Eastern side of the ROW and there is a small paved biking/hiking trail on the Western edge. I was told the biking/hiking trail was added later, but maybe I misunderstood.