CATS Long Term Transit Plan - Silver, Red Lines

[LKN704]

A potential Mt. Mourne station would likely be in a completely different fare zone that would incorporate some type of penalty fare/surcharge to account for Iredell County's non participation in the project. 

BART does this with trips to/from/within San Mateo County as it isn't a member of the BART Transit District. 

Granted the usefulness of this is likely minimal as those who would normally board at Mt. Mourne could just drive to Davidson and avoid the fare. 

[kayman]

Also another thing I can add without revealing too much,  Amtrak is working behind the scenes to get more passenger service to and from Washington to Charlotte.

Amtrak won't overtly admit that publicly but that along with more long-term passenger services to Charlotte in general.  These movements will likely elevate desirability of passenger rail in Iredell and Mecklenburg from the north,  which will yield more TOD philosophy to planning & long-range development along the Red Line and eventual Charlotte to Winston-Salem passenger rail corridors.

However, the state (NCDOT Rail & NCRR) have aimed at connecting Raleigh to places like Columbia & Wilmington first.

There are talks of something else transit & rail-related that might satisfy those who complaining about a certain regional hub, but I'll wait for David Hodges of WBTV 3, Joe Bruno of Channel 9, or WCNC scoop that. The state has basically admitted they dropped the ball on this and attempted to blame Charlotte for this but might own up to it by creating a possible fix. When it happens then I'll confirm it's true and incoming. 

[kermit]

17 minutes ago, kayman said:

However, the state (NCDOT Rail & NCRR) have aimed at connecting Raleigh to places like Columbia & Wilmington first.

Columbia??????

Don't drop this casually and then leave us hanging.

 

Edited April 3 by kermit

[kayman]

27 minutes ago, kermit said:

Columbia??????

Don't drop this casually and then leave us hanging.

 

Technically I'm not even allowed to say anything publicly not even on SM. Stay tuned  

Edited April 3 by kayman

[kermit]

Nashville residents are likely to vote on a new transit plan/tax in November.

everybody is moving forward except us…

https://www.tennessean.com/story/news/local/davidson/2024/04/04/vanderbilt-poll-transit-vote-mayor-freddie-oconnell-see-majority-support/73196249007/

[CLT2014]

33 minutes ago, kermit said:

Nashville residents are likely to vote on a new transit plan/tax in November.

everybody is moving forward except us…

https://www.tennessean.com/story/news/local/davidson/2024/04/04/vanderbilt-poll-transit-vote-mayor-freddie-oconnell-see-majority-support/73196249007/

Looks like Nashville is doing a much less ambitious and much less expensive transit plan than Charlotte was going for: Just ~$1 billion over 30 years in Nashville to build sidewalks, improve signals, improve roads with street lights, and improve bus frequency. Will it transform Nashville to being dramatically less car dependent? Probably not. Will it be able to get approved at a relatively low price tag and improve walkability in neighborhoods... probably. Everybody likes sidewalks. Rail transit will not be a key component of the 2024 referendum in Nashville. 

Edited April 4 by CLT2014

[DavieNative]

On 4/3/2024 at 3:42 PM, kayman said:

Also another thing I can add without revealing too much,  Amtrak is working behind the scenes to get more passenger service to and from Washington to Charlotte.

Amtrak won't overtly admit that publicly but that along with more long-term passenger services to Charlotte in general.  These movements will likely elevate desirability of passenger rail in Iredell and Mecklenburg from the north,  which will yield more TOD philosophy to planning & long-range development along the Red Line and eventual Charlotte to Winston-Salem passenger rail corridors.

However, the state (NCDOT Rail & NCRR) have aimed at connecting Raleigh to places like Columbia & Wilmington first.

There are talks of something else transit & rail-related that might satisfy those who complaining about a certain regional hub, but I'll wait for David Hodges of WBTV 3, Joe Bruno of Channel 9, or WCNC scoop that. The state has basically admitted they dropped the ball on this and attempted to blame Charlotte for this but might own up to it by creating a possible fix. When it happens then I'll confirm it's true and incoming. 

As a Winston dweller for most of my life the connection to Charlotte via Mocksville would be an awesome addition to intercity transit in NC.  I've always thought it made sense on the underutilized L/O Lines since there is a pretty decent urban population center in Winston Salem with a good city owned station alread in place. Can't wait to see what they do with this!

[tozmervo]

CATS has begun the community meetings for Red Line commuter rail redeux. 

Red Line Commuter Rail - Charlotte Area Transit System (charlottenc.gov)

Virtual meeting: Virtual Red Line Public Meeting (youtube.com)

Maps: Red Line Project Existing Conditions (arcgis.com)

 

[tozmervo]

OK, informational post aside: my thoughts -

• There is no discussion of what becomes of the existing park & ride network, which has no relationship to the rail line. Those park and rides have hundreds and hundreds of parking spaces on pretty valuable land. 
• 30 minute headways suck BUT that could be a reasonable trade-off if the train is predictably on schedule. 
• Really none of the "original" station locations have capacity or potential for much on-site parking, which I think is a huge unaddressed elephant in the room. There 1/2 mile distance has a pretty decent population concentration, but they will loose any ridership on the west side of 77 that the metrorapid buses currently carry.

[tozmervo]

Well, don't say there isn't interest in the Red Line project. I just left the Davidson in-person meeting early because it was way, way too packed. I'll just leave my comments online!

[Nathan2]

Why is CATS still treating this as a commuter line instead of a regional line? CATS even addresses the fact that riders wouldn't necessarily be following the traditional commuting schedules because of the new reality of working from home. Hourly frequencies outside of peak hours will push almost everyone to their car. As someone who works in Huntersville but lives in Charlotte the proposed schedule just would not be reliable enough to use. 

Edited April 17 by Nathan2

[DEnd]

On 4/17/2024 at 9:18 AM, Nathan2 said:

Why is CATS still treating this as a commuter line instead of a regional line? CATS even addresses the fact that riders wouldn't necessarily be following the traditional commuting schedules because of the new reality of working from home. Hourly frequencies outside of peak hours will push almost everyone to their car. As someone who works in Huntersville but lives in Charlotte the proposed schedule just would not be reliable enough to use. 

1 because it is a commuter line. and 2: Likely because of the realities of the line.  IIRC there is still at least one customer on the O-line, and the Y at Graham is still used for turn arounds, also it will go through the classification yard in Charlotte.  That means heavy rail, which kind of requires larger trains, which likely requires higher paid operators.  That means there is a substantially higher operating cost per vehicle, over say a bus or light rail.  It's unlikely to ever really be able to do 5 minute service due to having to interoperate with NS, but it is also a start.  

[blt23]

On 4/27/2024 at 7:35 AM, DEnd said:

1 because it is a commuter line. and 2: Likely because of the realities of the line.  IIRC there is still at least one customer on the O-line, and the Y at Graham is still used for turn arounds, also it will go through the classification yard in Charlotte.  That means heavy rail, which kind of requires larger trains, which likely requires higher paid operators.  That means there is a substantially higher operating cost per vehicle, over say a bus or light rail.  It's unlikely to ever really be able to do 5 minute service due to having to interoperate with NS, but it is also a start.  

One would think that heavy/mainline rail having the highest cost structure should also mean it gets held to the highest ridership standard.

Thankfully we haven’t had to learn from watching almost every “it’s a start” commuter rail line around the country turn into a financial/ridership disaster.

[kermit]

I don’t think there is much we can say about the specifics of mode choice / frequency on the Red Line without knowing what NS is willing to do with the tracks. If NS is not willing to sell outright, or at least time shift freight to the middle of the night, then CATS has very few options due to FRA regulations and NS scheduling windows. CATS has done a pretty good job keeping any negotiations confidential, so speculation is kinda pointless. There is also a NCDOT intercity route to Winston wildcard here as well which will preclude any non-heavy rail mode choices.

Limited Service yard locations, lack of electrification, capacity limitations at Gateway and the CSX grade crossing in Uptown are likely to prevent any super-high frequency, all day service options. If the Red Line was built 20 years ago many of these problems would have been solved, but here we are.

Edited April 29 by kermit

[Nathan2]

On 4/27/2024 at 8:35 AM, DEnd said:

1 because it is a commuter line. and 2: Likely because of the realities of the line.  IIRC there is still at least one customer on the O-line, and the Y at Graham is still used for turn arounds, also it will go through the classification yard in Charlotte.  That means heavy rail, which kind of requires larger trains, which likely requires higher paid operators.  That means there is a substantially higher operating cost per vehicle, over say a bus or light rail.  It's unlikely to ever really be able to do 5 minute service due to having to interoperate with NS, but it is also a start.  

Commuter lines around the county are failing to attract riders so investing in a commuter line and not a regional line that people can use at all times of the day is not a smart investment. We will have to wait and see if the thing holding it back is NS, but the goal should be frequent and all day or people are not going to use it in high numbers. 

[49er]

Years ago, I remember seeing 5,000 as the projected number of daily riders. Will adding stations bump this a little or is there even less demand post pandemic?  It looks like Austin's commuter rail is only carrying 2,100 people per day after nearly 15 years of service.  https://www.capmetro.org/about/performance-dashboard/route-performance . 

 

 

[kermit]

On 4/29/2024 at 9:12 AM, 49er said:

Years ago, I remember seeing 5,000 as the projected number of daily riders. Will adding stations bump this a little or is there even less demand post pandemic?  It looks like Austin's commuter rail is only carrying 2,100 people per day after nearly 15 years of service.  https://www.capmetro.org/about/performance-dashboard/route-performance . 

 

 

Original ridership projections were low due to very limited frequencies (basically only one way service from Lake to Uptown in the morning and then back again in the afternoon). It sounds like Red Line 2.0 (if it happens) will have significantly higher frequencies and ridership might get another marginal bump from population growth. The models will also show some ridership growth from the existence of the Gold Line connection to Tryon (but in practice this means nothing at the current frequencies). However, ridership on this better service is going to be negatively impacted by a) hybrid work; b) the existence of a faster BRT transit option; c) less congestion (I am not sure about this one, but my limited trips on 77 have seen less traffic post-pandemic). From an initial ridership perspective Red Line 2.0 looks mediocre. But it is a political winner, and it will pay off long term with land use change (which park and ride focused BRT can’t do).

In terms of ridership alone, there are more effective ways to spend our mobility money. But politics are super important in this case.

Edited May 1 by kermit

[turbocraig]

Looks like the Red Line may finally have a pathway to reality.

https://www.wsoctv.com/news/local/all-aboard-city-charlotte-reaches-historic-agreement-red-line-records-show/AGX6PI5T6VA43IBX7K4OI4RZPM/?outputType=amp

[RANYC]

57 minutes ago, turbocraig said:

Looks like the Red Line may finally have a pathway to reality.

https://www.wsoctv.com/news/local/all-aboard-city-charlotte-reaches-historic-agreement-red-line-records-show/AGX6PI5T6VA43IBX7K4OI4RZPM/?outputType=amp

Holy cow this is so good.  

[kermit]

^ The devil is in the details here (and none are reported yet). Lets wait to hear more before rejoicing.

I am just back from Minneapolis where they run the North Star commuter rail just four trips per morning inbound four outbound in the afternoon and none on weekend (unless their is a Twins game when they run a single trip). That sort of service benefits no one.

Edited Thursday at 02:11 AM by kermit

[DJ8hep]

3 hours ago, turbocraig said:

Looks like the Red Line may finally have a pathway to reality.

https://www.wsoctv.com/news/local/all-aboard-city-charlotte-reaches-historic-agreement-red-line-records-show/AGX6PI5T6VA43IBX7K4OI4RZPM/?outputType=amp

I heard about this as well! 

https://www.linkedin.com/posts/teshoakindele_big-news-for-charlotte-and-camp-north-end-activity-7201712947948068864-OEAp?utm_source=share&utm_medium=member_ios

1 hour ago, kermit said:

^ The devil is in the details here (and none are reported yet). Lets wait to hear more before rejoicing.

I am just back from Minneapolis where they run the North Star commuter rail just four trips per morning inbound four outbound in the afternoon and none on weekend (unless their is a Twins game when they run a single trip).

How was the weather up there? I’ll likely be there later this summer!

Edited Thursday at 02:14 AM by DJ8hep

[kermit]

It’s much too early in the morning for this level of grump but, it appears the MTC has agreed to a new transit plan that should a) pass muster with the anti-urban nutjobs in Raleigh: and b) effectively kill rail transit expansion (other than perhaps some rudimentary Red Line service).

https://www.wfae.org/politics/2024-05-29/new-transit-plan-puts-silver-line-at-risk-by-capping-rail-at-40-of-sales-tax-revenues

The plan caps rail projects at 40% of sales tax revenue. 20%is allocated for bus and micro-mobility and 40% for roads (including the Orphan roads which are just a straightup sprawl subsidy).

This allocation ratio basically kills the Silver Line in any phased form, and (probably) limits the Red Line to crapty, low frequency commuter service. I would also bet that the 20% allocation for bus is insufficient for most BRT projects and we will end up with more fancy looking buses and zero dedicated lanes and label it BRT.

This effectively ends any chance for Charlotte to change its land use into something more sustainable. This is really a shame since the Blue Line showed that this sort of change is actually possible here.

Edited Thursday at 01:43 PM by kermit

[CLT2014]

I'll be voting No. Would prefer to wait until there is a change in the political environment for a tax that supports rail. This will be a tax increase to just stay car dependent.

Edited Thursday at 12:23 PM by CLT2014

[kermit]

^I am inclined to agree with you on this. There will not be another sales tax for transit after this, so this would effectively permanently throw away 40% of these funds on a mode that already has a dedicated revenue stream. Why can’t they just raise the gas tax if they need more road funds? 

[49er]

Agree. The sales tax $$$ would go to a low frequency commuter line with low ridership and to roads. We would likely have to wait 30-40 more years for any significant light rail expansion. 

We already have express buses that serve north meck. It makes no sense to spend more than a $1 billion to ferry a few thousand people back and forth