The Transportation and Mass Transit Megathread

[Guest]

18 hours ago, RonCamp said:

Put aside any discussion of bias or larger takeaways from the article for a moment.  The statement quoted above is not universally true.  Not by a long shot.

A more accurate version of this statement might be:

• In the average American city, where the amount investment in roadway infrastructure is a large multiple of the investment in transit infrastructure, single occupancy vehicle (SOV) travel is therefore usually faster and more convenient than transit

I'd argue that, if the USA decided that transit investment was as important as investment in highways and other roadways that encourage SOV travel, and realigned its funding structures to reflect as much, the speed and convenience advantage that SOV travel often has over transit travel, particularly during non-peak travel times, would in many cases be reduced or disappear entirely (or perhaps in some cases be inverted).

I want to be clear and say I have absolutely nothing against single occupancy vehicle travel.  But we have to keep in mind that we have the transportation system that we do because roads are (and have been) heavily subsidized by the government - and are not the only way to travel.  SOV travel spreads us out, reduces chance interaction with neighbors, makes us more overweight, causes more deaths than travel by other means, and contributes (as someone noted above) to untold hours of lost productivity and economic output.  And, as anyone who sits on I-40 or I-24 or whatever on an afternoon knows, commuting in traffic just sucks.  

The fact is that by applying the same litmus tests we apply to transit in the US as it is currently funded, structured and implemented, we'd never build highways or roads.  Roads "lose" enormous amounts of money(they cost much more to build and maintain than user fees, i.e. the gas taxes, raise).  

Please do note that, on the flip side, transit *will not solve* our traffic problems either.  

Universal allegiance to any one method of transportation is a recipe for disaster in the long term and is why we find ourselves in a traffic quagmire as things currently stand.     

In the vast majority of the cases the assertion stands. However you are correct that it is not absolute.

To argue that the the superiority of SOVs is primarily based on the historical investment our nation/state has made into SOV infrastructure does not invalidate the claim. In no way I well versed in transportation policy (though I do consider government spending concomitant with waste and inefficiency), but I would offer that the gas taxes fed/state would go somewhat farther towards paying the full 'nut' on the SOV infrastructure if 1/5 - 1/4 of it was not diverted into Mass-transit funding. 

Further, I do not believe it is the responsibility of a government that works for me, not the the other-way-round, to institute a transportation policy with ancillary goals such as you list. In a SOV can one not go to the gym, visit a neighbor, or more importantly go to a bar, or avoid a quarrelsome neighbor? Ha

I am not intransigent in my 'SOV rulz' view as I do believe there are cities (as mentioned NYC, London, Paris, Rome) where a heavily subsidized mass-transit system is preferable. I am all for looking at trolleys, BRT, and the investment light options that do not load us down with 'investment' costs just as the paradigm is changing.


 

[PruneTracy]

1 hour ago, nashville_bound said:

I do not disagree with your viewpoint, but I will add that one of the main hopes of the automated vehicle technology is the reduction, in absolute terms and not just year-over-year growth of the number of vehicles on the existing roads.

While that is a possible outcome of the development of the technology, it still doesn't change the hard limit on the number of people that can be moved in personal vehicles for a given street.

In densely-developed areas such as CBDs, there is a balance between the area devoted to transportation and the maximum density of the buildings in the remaining area. So you might have a lot of area to build an office tower on a block surrounded by two-lane streets, but you can't build a tall one because only so many workers can get to it at once in personal vehicles. You can replace all the two-lane streets with six-lane streets, and get more workers in the door, but now you have less space to build on.

Of course this example assumes that everyone commutes to work in cars, no mixed-use or downtown residents, and so on, but for any given CBD you have a certain number of people who need a certain amount of space to circulate in, out, and around it. The variables are street width, building density, and space per circulating person; if you change one of the first two it affects the other, so if you want to increase density without sacrificing your buildable area you have to reduce the amount of space each person takes up on the street. That's what transit, walking, biking, carpooling, etc. does for you.

1 hour ago, nashville_bound said:

I am interested in your explicit policy recommendations for the comment referenced below. In my mind , "protect that investment through development policies" sounds very ominous... can you clarify? Thanks

I can assure you that it is extremely ominous.

A lot of transit agencies play with house money; transit lines typically don't even come close to recovering their construction and operation costs at the farebox. As such, we all end up paying for transit whether or not we use it, and with the amount of federal and sometimes state funding floating around people in a city who want or use transit services are a bit insulated from bearing its actual costs. I'm not saying this is a bad thing or that it doesn't apply to roadways to some extent, but it is what it is.

But the idea is that if cities are going to use their money (and often the rest of the nation's money) to build a transit system that usually operates at a loss, they need to do everything they can to make sure it gets used to the maximum possible extent. This means not only encouraging development near transit lines but restricting it elsewhere. It means taking a hard stance against developers who want to rezone and go against master plans. It means forgoing roadway improvements and making it easier for people to decide to drive rather than use transit.

Understand that I'm not generally the authoritarian type, and I'd wager that more people than not would find this arrangement undesirable. Most cities try it to some extent with varying results. But our current methods of funding necessitate its use, and in any case the nature of a city means that people who live in it should expect a certain level of central planning and administration for it to function well.

In my perfect world, we would price transportation usage (i.e., transit fares, gas/VMT taxes, tolls, etc.) such that large-scale components of the system were self-sustaining and address the economic impact on individual users separately at the user's level where needed (i.e., vouchers, tax refunds, etc.). In that way agencies as a whole would be self-sustaining as well, and their decisions about expanding or upgrading services and infrastructure would be based on where they would maximize their return on investment rather than where they can get the most grant money or what luxuries potential customers with no skin in the game might want. But if we're going to continue down this road of federal programming and low farebox recovery ratios and whatnot, then we should at least go whole-hog about it rather than continuing to throw good money after bad.

[Vrtigo]

1 hour ago, nashville_bound said:

I am interested in your explicit policy recommendations for the comment referenced below. In my mind , "protect that investment through development policies" sounds very ominous... can you clarify? Thanks

On 3/4/2016 at 4:24 PM, PruneTracy said:

If we're going to drop this kind of dime on transportation then municipalities like Nashville need to protect that investment through development policies that make it realistic to see butts in seats rather than relying on the hypotheticals offered by vanity riders. Otherwise, there's a pretty extensive and reasonably cost-effective bus system whose ridership actually needs transit.

Fortunately, the Nashville Downtown Code removed the minimum off-street parking space requirement in during the past several years. Hopefully other areas will follow suit...

[donNdonelson2]

Many of the metered parking spaces might just as well be removed, considering the same cars seem to remain parked there all day in many cases. No money in the meter and no ticket. It is a pet peeve of mine that street parking is seldom available for those quick stops because the time limits are so seldom enforced!

[Hey_Hey]

There will undoubtedly be improved capacity on the roads with autonomous vehicles compared to now.  There also should be dramatically decreased parking requirements as there should be very little personally owned vehicles.  

There are still capacity caps with autonomous cars, but the capacity may very well be 50-100% higher than where we are now. 

[Guest]

Somewhat off topic, but this is an small example of government policy being incongruent with government goals.

We are a family of 4 who have lived downtown with 1 car since '04. This works well because both my wife and I travel for work and our flat only has one titled parking space in our building. This winter my oldest son turned 16 and we bought him a car. We looked at all the options for parking with most in-out spots costing $115 monthly. Instead we pursued Metros GreenParking Initiative and paid a $60 carbon offset for his Jeep and received a tag that allows him to park in any CBID-metered spot free for a year. Additionally, the $60 went to a 3rd party (runs it out of his house) that certifies the funds are going towards planting a tree or some such silliness.

Winner - ME

Winner - the 3rd party tat pocketed $60

Loser - Metro

[smeagolsfree]

2 hours ago, donNdonelson2 said:

Many of the metered parking spaces might just as well be removed, considering the same cars seem to remain parked there all day in many cases. No money in the meter and no ticket. It is a pet peeve of mine that street parking is seldom available for those quick stops because the time limits are so seldom enforced!

Its all the people that illegally have handicap placards. I parked all the way up on third one day close to the interstate and that's where the fat cops on motor cycles were writing tickets where is does not affect anyone. These are the guys that could not catch a slow moving bus in 5 o clock traffic.

[grilled_cheese]

4 hours ago, nashville_bound said:

 that certifies the funds are going towards planting a tree or some such silliness.
 

The horror.

[Rockatansky]

23 hours ago, nashville_bound said:

Further, I do not believe it is the responsibility of a government that works for me,

The Government should work for all the people, not just you.

[Guest]

The horror is the inefficiencies in the government..do you really believe a tree was planted for my car and that in fact it cost $60? ha

On March 9, 2016 at 8:04 PM, grilled_cheese said:

The horror.

I was not trying to be cryptic. In fact, if you actually read my post in context (as opposed to picking a sentence fragment) you would understand my point. That is, a government that works for me, you, all of us should not abuse their power by trying to control our lawful actions under the guise of an ill-conceived transportation plan. Pretty simple, and I would hope non-controversial. If, in your opinion, the government's role is to control the very people that voted the politicians into office, then our views are indeed far apart.
 

10 hours ago, Rockatansky said:

The Government should work for all the people, not just you.

Finally, I find it quite humorous that the only response to an utterly failed Metro policy is condemnation of me. Ha, you guys provide a perfect illustration of why the government is out of control. You give them a free pass. Here are some questions that I actually asked the Davidson County's registrars office...

Is the program working?

Does anyone audit the 'green nonprofit" that receives the money. I will also note that there is only 1 of these and the person running it also owns a construction company. I did ask if he can plant a tree on a lot on which he is constructing a home/building? Would this satisfy the requirements of the program?

What is the cost to operate this program?
Is there a cost to not operating this program?

To no one's surprise the answers were in short supply.

Edited March 10, 2016 by Guest

[titanhog]

This morning, I had to run to Nashville at about 6am (from Smyrna) and pick something up at my office.  I ran back home and at 6:45am, traffic was bumper to bumper, going less than 10mph, all the way from Smyrna to the I-40 split.  That's just insane...that early.  

There's got to be more to life than sitting in traffic several hours every week...and working 40+ hours.

[MLBrumby]

I think the population of Rutherford County has climbed by 40,000 since the 2010 census. And southeast Davidson has probably grown by at least half that amount. 

Edited March 14, 2016 by MLBrumby

[titanhog]

Thankfully, I can do a lot of work from my home in Smyrna now...but if I had to work in Nashville every day, living in Smyrna would no longer make sense.  My last doctor's appointment at the Frist Clinic, I left there at 4:30...and the normal 30 minute drive took me 2 hours.  

We can talk about future mass transit from the suburbs to downtown...but it's already too late for those in SE Davidson and Rutherford.

[markhollin]

Initial input from public on mass transit plans: Go big and light rail….

http://www.bizjournals.com/nashville/blog/2016/03/early-public-input-on-transit-plans-go-big-and.html

[PruneTracy]

7 minutes ago, markhollin said:

Initial input from public on mass transit plans: Go big and light rail….

http://www.bizjournals.com/nashville/blog/2016/03/early-public-input-on-transit-plans-go-big-and.html

I'm hearing a lot of "We should invest $X more in transit" but not a lot of "I'm willing to pay $X more in taxes to build transit". Just sayin'.

[dmillsphoto]

16 minutes ago, PruneTracy said:

I'm hearing a lot of "We should invest $X more in transit" but not a lot of "I'm willing to pay $X more in taxes to build transit". Just sayin'.

I'd be willing to bet that even if we had the latter example, we'd still have state reps who'd still be saying their constituents "don't want it."

[Guest]

Would offer that a self-selected survey is not an optimum way of accurately gauging pubic opinion. Hold a referendum if they truly seek a public buy-in. Of course that would involve them answering the question I posited several weeks ago.

Edited March 21, 2016 by Guest

[smeagolsfree]

I am telling you that the folks that shout the loudest are too lazy to attend the meetings and give their input. They should be required to go to a meeting in order to vote on any plan that calls for a referendum. There are a bunch of idiots everywhere, and claim "we aint never heard bout that railroad thingy"

[Guest]

SF,

I do not think you can be any more insulting to your fellow citizens? Consider that you are making a lot of assumptions in your post...assumptions that I think you as a moderator would from upon if they were applied on other subjects.

All of us on this board are urban fanboys , we are genuinely interested in the built environment and thus transportation. The vast majority of our fellow citizens use their time living their lives and pursuing other interests....no reason to cast wide insults that for the most part are utterly wrong.

 

19 minutes ago, smeagolsfree said:

I am telling you that the folks that shout the loudest are too lazy to attend the meetings and give their input. They should be required to go to a meeting in order to vote on any plan that calls for a referendum. There are a bunch of idiots everywhere, and claim "we aint never heard bout that railroad thingy"

 

[smeagolsfree]

I can tell you Todd from what I have seen is that there are so many folks in this town that are old school and uninformed its laughable.

For example when the news is doing street interviews many times, the majority of the people think the cranes are all condos and nothing but rich people are moving into them.

When I ride the bus and get to talking to people on the bus, they think the same thing. The majority of our resident are under informed, misinformed, ignorant, or just plan do not care. They have no idea about current events and believe everything they see on TV, hear on the radio, or read in the Tennessean.  These are the same ones that look at the newspaper to see if they know anyone that died this week and to get local sports section and bi pass the rest of the paper.

 

I can go on and on, because I get out and talk to people that some on the board might not want to talk to. There is a lot of supposedly educated people that live in Nashville that are in their box and do not want to let anyone or anything new inside.

 

Not to be harsh at you and I get where you are coming from, but I call what I see.

[fieldmarshaldj]

1 hour ago, smeagolsfree said:

I can tell you Todd from what I have seen is that there are so many folks in this town that are old school and uninformed its laughable.

For example when the news is doing street interviews many times, the majority of the people think the cranes are all condos and nothing but rich people are moving into them.

When I ride the bus and get to talking to people on the bus, they think the same thing. The majority of our resident are under informed, misinformed, ignorant, or just plan do not care. They have no idea about current events and believe everything they see on TV, hear on the radio, or read in the Tennessean.  These are the same ones that look at the newspaper to see if they know anyone that died this week and to get local sports section and bi pass the rest of the paper.

 

I can go on and on, because I get out and talk to people that some on the board might not want to talk to. There is a lot of supposedly educated people that live in Nashville that are in their box and do not want to let anyone or anything new inside.

 

Not to be harsh at you and I get where you are coming from, but I call what I see.

From what I've seen of the "new school", their level of willful ignorance and stupidity is epic. I would agree that those who believe only what they read in the Tennessean is utterly frightening.

[smeagolsfree]

I agree Davy. There are a number of the younger generation that are just as clueless. The same ones that think Washington DC is a state and Judge Judy is on the Supreme Court.

[fieldmarshaldj]

1 hour ago, smeagolsfree said:

I agree Davy. There are a number of the younger generation that are just as clueless. The same ones that think Washington DC is a state and Judge Judy is on the Supreme Court.

And those are just the Ivy League graduates.

[Guest]

SF,  I look forward to reading your posts. They are reasonable most of the time. I am not trying to censor your views or opinions, but I do believe that someone with your intelligence is able to convey your point without generalities and insults to the broadside...Elitism is an ugly face for anyone to wear...and classist slang to insult those that you feel superior to is beneath you, IMO.  Would you as a moderator tolerate ebonics to slam blacks, or broken English to deride Asians? I think not.

If, in your opinion, the mass-transit plans are not known outside the politico/business/fanboy/education/etc... communities then that is a failure of the messengers and the message not the people. 

As PruneTracy added above ... it is easy to say one supports a major mass-transit undertaking in Nashville with the pretty renderings.....but once certain answers are forthcoming I think much of the support will fall by the wayside ... I continue to be amazed at all the mass-transit boosters on this board that are unconcerned with 'pesky' details like a dedicated revenue source.... 

Edited March 22, 2016 by Guest

[smeagolsfree]

If you want ideas for a dedicated source, then let's look at a regional auto inspection, if not a state vehicle inspection. Additional wheel taxing based on the age of the vehicle. Normally the older the vehicle the less someone will have to pay vs someone with a newer vehicle that or should be able to pay more.

Pay to drive in the HOV lanes is another option for communters. If someone is willing to pay ten dollars a day to drivein that lane, then I say let them. Or, we could start enforcing the HOV lanes by fining 500 dollars and 5 points on their driving record. Not unheard of either.Toll roads are an option, but it will take a while to ever get that going.

Now, that is addressed, there is tons of very ignorant people out there and I can make fun of the hill Billy's because I R one being from the mountains of East 10EC. Seriously, I get what you are saying but it is absolutely the truth. Get into some conversations with the regular people out there, outside of the groups you hang with, weather it is lower income whites, blacks or any other group of people living in Nashville. Many of the regular folks in and around Nashville are not informed until some nimbly starts stirring the pot and calling one of the  TV stations to complain.  I don't make fun of them to their face as I just bite my tongue and go on. There are plenty of those affluent folks in Nashville that do not want may transit because they don't want to be taxed for something they refuse to use. That is not fair either. They have to pay taxes for schools their children dont go to because they are sending them to private school. These are the same folks that can afford it. Not to step on you in anyway, becuase I know your kids go to privvate school, but it is nearly impossible to do anything other than generalize, because I know not everyone is that way, but a large outspoken group that do stir the pot is.. Bringing up a comment from the AMP discussion,  there was the woman that lives in Richland Park that came right out and said she didn't want those people coming into her neighborhood. 

 

I am not picking on you, just letting folks know that the people that wil scream the loudest, will never get involved in the discussion until word finaly gets around through the rumor mill that this is going to cost money, and they were too Stupid to stay informed on what their government is doing. Yes, I dare to call them Stupid, because that is what they are. They are not interested in the transit discussion will never get involved and complain because no one told them about it or that didn't watch the news or read the business section. I stand by my comments.

 

I do apologize if this has rubbed the wrong way, but the way Nashville is handling things is horrible, and Every now and then I take my frustrations out here.