DaninDC

That was a fun time. I went to visit a friend in Manhattan that weekend. I got off the train at Penn Station around 9:30 PM, and was greeted by hordes of police with bulletproof vests and machine guns. Proceeding toward the 1/9 subway station under Seventh Avenue, I remember a line of police forming a human wall in front of the Seventh Avenue entrance to Penn Station, and effectively blocking the escalators to the LIRR tracks. Kinda bonkers until you got through the station and onto the subway.

Compare and contrast to the Euclid Corridor Landscaping Project. Fairfax Co. Backs Trolley Proposal Along Columbia Pike May 1st - 11:56am http://wtop.com/?nid=25&sid=776346 FAIRFAX, Va. - On a voice vote, the Fairfax County Board of Supervisors Monday backed a proposed streetcar line along busy Columbia Pike. Officials from both counties said they hope the convenience and nostalgia for rattling trolleys would help spur development along the 4.7-mile corridor stretching from the Pentagon City Metro station to the Skyline area in Fairfax. Arlington officials approved the plan for a $120 million dollar system last week.

Buckeye B, I'm right with you. What's lost in all this is that NOWHERE does it say that anyone is entitled to live in 3000 sf McHouse on an acre of landscaped, manicured lawn, driving 40 miles each way to work in a military-grade assault vehicle. When questioned, most of the people who live in places like this defend their right to choose where they live. Why can't they now choose to pay $3+ a gallon for gasoline? No one is addressing the root of the problem, and that is, we have created an entire nation where you have to drive to get a lousy loaf of bread. To mention this as the real problem, though, would require we admit that the American Dream is a load of BS, and that we've built our human environment improperly for the past 60 years. It's so much easier to tack $10 billion onto our deficit and mail out $100 checks to everyone.

Is it possible, that in five years time, Mr. Hauser was able to gather more supporting documentation and build a stronger case?

Nah, a wedding, but that isn't stopping Mom from guilt-tripping me into a late Sunday evening flight!

Hey all! I'm happy to announce that I'll be visiting from DC for a weekend--May 12-14. I'll have some time to kill, and I'd like to do so by checking out some of the new construction in town. Any volunteers to show a native-cum-East-Coaster around? There may be a Slyman's reuben in it for ya. Dan

^ I wholeheartedly agree with KJP and David. I know no less than three people, all around 25 years old, who bought condos in DC within the past 4 months. Mind you, studios here start at $200,000. Never mind a 1 BR. It reeks badly of the stock bubble. Most people believed there was no way the bottom could fall out, and they ended up losing their ass by buying on the high end and having nowhere to go but down.

From my experience, the Blue and Green lines always seem to be Pay Boarding Outbound, Pay Departing Inbound. With the WFL, all bets are off, apparently.

I find that's one of my least favorite experiences on RTA--figuring when and how much to pay. As you mentioned, the SmarTrip card in DC requires no thinking whatsoever. At the end of the month, I get $105 in farecards from my employer, which I dump onto the smart card (which holds up to $300). Then, all you do is touch and go--literally--and it works on the subway and the buses. The card automatically calculates the cost of a transfer to a bus, so no paper transfers are required. What will be really cool is when the suburban bus and commuter rail systems start accepting the SmarTrip card. RTA, on the other hand, is almost always a debacle. I'm never sure if I'm supposed to pay when I get on the Rapid, or when I get off. Sometimes you need to swipe the card. Other times you apparently don't. I'm still not sure when I need a transfer. When you do have to pay while boarding the Rapid, there's about 20 other people who have to pay before the train can start moving, which makes it no better than a bus. What would happen if ridership was any higher? If RTA had a couple hundred people boarding and deboarding at each stop, there's no way they'd be able to move the trains. They really need a more efficient (and consistent) system of fare collection.

Honestly, I don't see how the neo-rednecks can be so xenophobic. I'd much rather eat at a neighborhood Mexican/Ethiopian/Thai/Etc. restaurant over that Applebee's BS.

Wanna see something interesting? Live in a transitional neighborhood. The Safeway on Capitol Hill (formerly the "un-Safeway") has recently upgraded its store and selection due to the massive wave of gentrification (as well as the soon-to-be-open Harris Teeter two blocks away). It's kind of interesting to be able to get a cup of Starbucks and gourmet cheese as well as chitlins and collard greens. Take that, Whole Foods!

I wouldn't be so quick to assume that businesses in the U.S. are much more profitable than elsewhere. Ever hear of General Motors? A friend of mine works at the Urban Institute here in DC. She worked on a study, about to be published, that examined spatial relationships between food stamp recipients and availability of healthy food. I don't know much more than that, since it's still classified, but the way my friend describes the study, it doesn't seem very optimistic.

One of the points lost in the debate about illegal immigrants was raised by a contractor on one of my projects. He said that what most people don't realize is all the illegal immigrants contribute Social Security and Medicare taxes, of which they will NEVER see a dime. I would think more citizens would take the jobs performed by illegals if they actually paid decently, which they would if employers weren't capable of paying cut-rate to illegals. The big argument against a living wage, though (seriously, how can you advocate against a living wage?) is that the cost of everything would go up. I seem to remember a study that showed prices would only increase about 1% if living wages were mandatory. Wish I could remember where I read that.

It seems like there is plenty of track capacity. Amtrak runs two trains an hour in each direction. What kind of headways would be required? I know Chicago's Metra runs about every 15 minutes during rush hour. I think the big issue in DC, though, is the available space at Union Station. Then again, more frequent service would get some of those trains out of there! Don't even get me started on Metro to Dulles Airport. What a waste of money. In this area, it seems we have the opposite problem--people want MORE transit, but they want it to come to their front door no matter how far out they move, even if they live in Centreville, which is exactly in the middle of nowhere. Those people CHOSE to live in the hinterlands. They should choose to drive to work. It doesn't make any sense to extend high-capacity subway lines into areas with low population densities when the District needs more subway lines.

Yeah, those 2 year old kids should get jobs and start contributing to the family.

noozer, I about puked when I read the "Metro to BWI" article. How wasteful to build an expensive subway into a sparsely developed area, especially when there is a good existing commuter rail service!

"In 1993, the Oregon state legislature authorized formation of a regional transit plan. The Central Puget Sound Regional Transit Authority (Sound Transit) was created, encompassing the urbanized areas of Snohomish, King, and Pierce counties-an area that stretches almost 100 miles north and south from Everett to Tacoma." Wow! I didn't realize the Oregon state legislature was so powerful! Maybe they can establish a commuter rail authority in Northeast Ohio, too!

Getting people on transit is a good idea, but overemphasizing the nostalgic aspects of trolleys only cement the idea that transit is about nostalgia, and not economics.

From what I've seen, the best functioning highways are actually parkways. The two examples that stand out in my mind are the George Washington Parkway in Northern Virginia, and Rock Creek Parkway in DC. Both of these roads are "commuter" roads, i.e. no truck traffic, with two lanes in each direction. Speed limits are relatively high compared to city streets--about 45 mph in town, and the number of interchanges is limited. Traffic typically seems to keep moving on both of these roads. The key, however, is that there is greenery on both sides of the roadway instead of mega malls and other sprawl-type highway-oriented development.

Rob, I agree that the higher level of freight rail traffic in the U.S. (versus Europe) somewhat hinders our ability to develop high-speed rail. I don't think the public is unwilling to spend money to improve rail, though. Virginia, for example, is spending millions of dollars to add river crossings and third tracks to the CSX line between Washington and Richmond so that delays on existing service can be reduced, as well as accommodate future service (including high speed rail to Charlotte).

In other words, to build a quality passenger rail system, right? :-)

Scale is not subjective--it's geometric. Even if it were subjective, any moron can tell you that a 4200 sf wanna-be castle built to the curb does not belong on a block with 1950s vintage ranch houses. Suggested rule of thumb: all bigfoot houses require approval of a third-grader. Prior to World War II, zoning regulations actually had pictorial guidelines to make it very clear what was appropriate construction given dimensions of the street, lot sizes, neighboring buildings, and such. Since then, we've adopted idiotic zoning regs that rely on numbers, which are meaningless without the context. The illustrations and graphical standards are gone in favor of machinated pre-fab housing.

While I agree that one should be able to do as he pleases with his own property, property rights end at the property line. Once you start changing the scale character of the entire neighborhood by your actions, you've violated the precedent established by the entire community. This is not difficult. If you want a big house, then buy a big house in a neighborhood of big houses. Otherwise, find a way to blend it in with the existing character of the community. Many townhouses from the turn of the century are in excess of 3000 sf, but fit in context just fine with smaller homes and even multi-story apartment buildings. The problem that Bigfooting presents is someone will try to build a chateau on a block of low-slung ranch homes, which is nothing short of pretensious and ridiculous. How is it that builders were able to build homes of varying sizes in the same neighborhood 100 years ago, but we cannot do this now without transforming the block into a cartoon?

The purpose of riding transit is not to see cars sitting in traffic, as enjoyable as that may be. Placing a rail line in a median severely restricts pedestrian access to the stations. The freeway is a major psychological (and for some, a physical) obstacle. For example, on the Dan Ryan line, once you reach the platform, you go up a set of stairs and walk a good 1/4 mile over the freeway just to get to the street. The second problem, which closely ties in with the first problem above, is that TOD around the station is severely limited, due to the vast amount of real estate consumed by the highway. It is far more productive for the transit line to have its own right-of-way, where dense TOD can be fostered, generating more ridership. If you place the stations in a freeway median, the line becomes nothing more than a "commuter" line, largely based on park-and-ride. Those familiar with the RTA Red Line know this too well. With a linear increase in walkable neighborhoods surrounding stations, there is an exponential increase in transit usage, as each new station would create a new destination for each possible point of departure, and in turn, a new point of departure with multiple destinations, instead of the A-B and B-A "commuter" operation that is better left to commuter rail. Often, increase in development at or near stations can be used to justify the capital costs of the line and stations. If the line runs through a freeway median, you're not going to see a whole lot of increased development, and hence little increase in tax revenue to justify the investment. In turn, ridership never reaches its full potential. Thirdly, by putting a transit line along side an interstate highway, you put the two modes in direct competition with each other. One is going to succeed, and the other will fail. Why would anyone think it a good idea to ensure that a public investment will fail? In a nation run by road and oil interests, it's not difficult to figure out which of these two is going to lose out.

A freeway median is the worst possible place to put a transit line. Unless I'm going crazy, the Red Line on the South Side of Chicago, and the Blue Line on the West Side pre-date the Interstate highway system. This would mean that the freeways were built on either side of the L tracks, and not the other way around. I need more research to confirm (or debunk) this, though.