slumcat

OK, some of you guys talk about parades. In my posts above I take the position that the Canucks teach us that streetcars and crowds go together as naturally as beer and hockey. But parades....yea that's a whole different problematic thing. It's the maximum height allowed on a float...and not only that, the maximum allowable height of anything any performer might be doing on top of a float...(ie twirling batons, waving flags)... High voltage overhead power lines and parades are not exactly natural allies. I'm in Dayton and most municipalities have a max height restriction on anything that enters our territory, great but think about how to enforce...I've heard all kinds of urban legends about things that have gotten tangled up in our overhead trolleybus power lines. As far back as I can remember, if some organization has taken out a parade permit our Dayton RTA simply assigns diesels to the trolleybus route for that day. Not really much of an issue because they haven't run the trolleybuses on weekends/holidays for years. I think when a bus route is running all diesel they can just shut off the power on the total route so there's really no issue. I was in a parade a few years ago on West Third Street, riding on top of a high profile truck, my damn head was like 2 feet below the 600 volt DC power lines. I was sure the power was off but didn't really want to shake hands with the wires to check it out :) As I understand your streetcar, it's a single overhead wire system, at the side of the street near the curb. That's all well and good as it resolves the safety issues I've seen with streetcars and trolleys.

In my younger days I spent a lot of time up in Toronto. I hung out with locals, rode streetcars--first the PCC's, later the CLRV's---got to know people. They have had at least 100+ years to address the whole broad issue of streetcars, crowds, public safety etc. Their approach to managing crowds is to assign extra streetcars into the crowd to help disperse the crowd. The best example is the 70 year tradition of hockey fans outside Maple Leaf Gardens celebrating a Leaf's victory on Carleton St.--one of their busiest streetcar lines. Basically it's a thing of public education and understanding. Streetcars have been part of the local culture for over 100 years. The locals just understand they are not supposed to walk along or stand on streetcar tracks. Cyclists understand they have to cross tracks at a right angle, not parallel. By far the most problematic issue with streetcars and public safety...Toronto tracks are in the middle of the street, mixed traffic. When a streetcar stops and opens his doors autos must stop. Its no different from a school bus and its the law. Locals seem to know this, my sense is the problem is with tourists who assume that traffic laws are the same everywhere in North America. It's a public education thing, and yes I expect Cincinnati will need to do some public education. I don't live in the Cincinnati metro area, so can somebody clarify for me, your system will have curbside tracks, am I right? This avoids the huge problem here: check out this website: http://www.ttc.ca/Riding_the_TTC/Safety_and_Security/Streetcar_Watch.jsp

Here's the way other cities handle it, check this out. The storyline..."service change effective Aug 16 2013...special streetcar service will be added" (to handle the large crowds expected at the Canadian National Exhibition in Toronto.) http://www.ttc.ca/Service_Advisories/Service_changes/aug521.jsp

The Enquirer reported today that Messer donated to Cranley's campaign, and that they say they are also planning on donating to Qualls'. What's up with this?

Is this a termination fee if the city wants to cancel the project? I'm all for getting as much sunk costs into the project now, before the election.

Right, for the most part. The response I wanted to hear...but I fear it's a bit more complicated. What I remember from my days managing Federal grants (in a different time/place) is this. "Allocated" as used here embraces two different concepts: 1 awarded, and 2 obligated. Cincinnati has funds awarded-ie promised to a particular grantee for a specific project. Obligated funds are monies which have been awarded to the grantee and subsequently contracted to a specific vendor (usually private contractor) by way of the grantees approved procurement process (example for building rolling stock or laying rails). Normally federally-awarded funds must be obligated within a period of time (normally a few months but sometimes longer) or the funds can be recalled by the Feds. State money can be more flexible, but I wonder if this may have been one of the technicalities Kasich used to yank the State money. Anyway, the decision to recall money usually has political overtones, and this is exactly what scares me. Based on Romney's campaign statements he is no friend of passenger rail. I assume the City is fully aware and I'm certain they are moving to lock the Federal funds safely into the project.

Exactly! What's the possibility that a Romney DOT could yank in the Federal dollars the same way Kasich did with the state money?

I am given to understand, through other discussions I have had recently, that Ohio has a 40,000 pound gross vehicle weight rating limit for buses used in urban mass transit. GVWR I believe is the curb (empty) weight plus payload and fuel. The 40,000 lb. limit would seem to cause problems because some of the newer hybrid diesel-electrics weigh in at more than that. For example, New Flyer's Excelsior hybrid diesel-electric has a GVWR of 40,350. A limit of 40,000 lbs would seem to restrict competition and keep out products that we might need. I am also aware that the 40,000 pound limit may have been a factor in discouraging vendors from bidding on Dayton's next generation of Dual Mode Diesel/Electric trolleys to replace the 14 year old all-electrics they are currently running. Anybody out there working on researching and amending this law? Is the law enforceable inside municipal corporations where the city has adopted higher weight limits? Seems like Ohio Public Transit Association (OPTA) should be all over this.

Very interesting question. What happens if the streetcar loses ballot initiative round #3? Normally halting a project retroactive is a huge can of worms. What kinds of escape clauses are in the contracts and grant agreements already signed? The vendors and private contractors for the project have presumably long since ramped up for construction and have taken on costs related to the project. Would the city be liable for costs already incurred? The Federal money in the project...if they have already started spending that...could be another Pandora's Box if the city has to back out now. Houston is the only case I know of where a rail project was subject to a referendum after the project had already started construction. The project won and was continued and ultimately completed. It would be interesting to look back a few years and research what kinds of issues came up there with trying to halt a project retroactively.

And a rare single-wire example operating just north of the Cincinnati city limits with the traditional yellow & green stripes. (Credit both photos, this and the one above): http://www.davesrailpix.com/csr/csr.htm

There's definitely a working Cincinnati PCC in Kenosha, WI. I've ridden on it a few times. I believe that the systems that operate these heritage cars represent the paint livery as being authentic, but the actual streetcar could have run in any number of cities. Cincinnati's PCC's had two color schemes...the yellow with green stripes was the main one but they did a really unusual lavender livery on a few of them. The PCC design was so standardized (and compatible with today's power systems I might add) that it wouldn't be that difficult to do a heritage PCC on your system. The only problem, to achieve real authenticity...remember that Cincinnati's PCC's were a double-wire system because of alleged electrical interference with underground utility systems as mentioned earlier in this thread. There were a few PCC's that ran outside the city limits that were exempt from the twin wire law, which applied only within the city. I'll try and post a few pictures. (I assume your modern system will be a single-wire system.)

LIG: Do you teach at DAAP? I graduated from DAAP in the 70's. I know streetcars because I rode them as a kid and teen...but when I was in planning school at DAAP I was amazed by the way I kept having to explain to other students what a streetcar is. And for that matter, many had no basic understanding of any kind of mass transit technology. With all due respect, the students from the east coast, and the foreign students, had a much better perspective.

Yup, the website of the American Public Transit Association has a lot about this with frequent updates. If you google "APTA," look down the page because American Physical Therapy Assn. comes to the top. APTA comes up next. Also a lot of info...google "National Corridor Initiative Destination Freedom". The House Ways and Means Committee is trying to eliminate dedicated Federal funding (from the gasoline tax) for Mass Transit. Under their plan there would be no Federal Mass Transit funding after 2016. AS IF massive Federal spending for highways, loans to automobile manufacturers, tax breaks for investment in oil, subsidies to airlines...and on and on and on...were the stellar examples of free enterprise and limited government! Hmmm :wtf:

I'm still calling it "Western Reserve"...but just curious. Does it appear that the top (3rd) floor was built originally for habitation or was that an attic. From the looks of the windows from the exterior photo it appears as finished living area...but was it designed that way or converted later? My guess, it was converted later.

Being from out of town, I haven't been following this until just recently, when it became apparent to me that the streetcar is really going to happen. A week ago I had no opinion about who had the stronger argument: Duke or the City. Eighth & State has done a good job of being the devil's advocate by presenting the things that Duke will almost certainly come up with if this goes to court. I have experience with trolleybuses but not streetcars, so I've been posting a lot of stuff trying to get answers to numerous engineering questions that apply to your situation (the 'stray power' problem, & the 3' issue for example). At this point after reading all of the above, I would side with the City if I were a juror...but of course it's not that simple! My point is y'all have done a great job collecting a lot of information. Even if it's not specific enough to be evidence in court (as is the point I think 8th & State has been trying to make)...I hope that some of you locals have the contacts to get all this information to the Mayor and appropriate City staff. Certainly the hundreds of hours we have collectively spent doing this research can galvanize the opinions of supporters around the legitimacy of our position. Never forget...Power is the ability to get the right information to the right people at the right time! As for me...I'm going to the groundbreaking and celebrating after... :drunk:

Just read the letter for the first time...I would agree "edge of streetcar" probably is roughly equal to Charlotte's "edge of slab" or whatever they called it. Last streetcar I was on did have an overhang that extended out beyond the rail, for the steps and lift. I'm gonna go to the groundbreaking...think I'll go celebrate after. :clap: Anyway, it does sound like Duke is trying to impose a higher standard of separation based on the precise wording of this letter.

Yikes! You may be right but I sure hope this isn't the case...

Yup...that's why somebody went to court years ago and forced Cincinnati to put in a dual wire system that grounded above like the trolleybuses, not underground. I think over time it was proven that the ground wire above didn't make much difference as far as protecting the utilities. Anyway, now that we have a statement from Charlotte that does seem to put things in a slightly different light. Just the thing about "3' from the edge of the slab" ...that's different from saying "3' from edge of rail." And you can bet they probably are thinking of the electrical current problem...but still, I have trouble getting my mind around the 12-million-is-it? difference in cost estimates.

Thanks Eighth & State, what I'm wondering now...suppose Cincinnati is saying 3' from the "edge of slab bed" (as is Charlotte as noted above by another user) and then Duke says "yea...we mean 8' from centerline between tracks to the edge of manhole rim". In that case the city and Duke are really saying the same thing if you round up to the nearest foot. So the whole measurement thing becomes almost moot. So is there something else out there (besides excavation cost) that could explain why their estimate is--what, 12 million!!--higher than the City's??

Here it is: What I'm thinking...Duke's engineering staff and our City staff might be saying the same thing but just measuring differently...which begs the question: if they are basically talking about the same amount of excavation then how the heck do they come up with millions more dollars for basically the same job!??

I like this picture that another user posted Saturday, but it's Portland not Charlotte. The "slab bed" appears to extend no more than 2 feet beyond the outside rail. I'm not a civil engineer but 3 feet beyond the edge of the slab bed sounds like no more than about 5 feet from the edge of the nearest rail. (This manhole is way closer, but we don't know whose power it is, it may be for the Portland streetcar itself.) Five does not equal eight, but has anybody clarified yet how Duke is measuring? As another user pointed out earlier in this thread, they could be talking about eight feet from the centerline of the two tracks--which would be about 7' from centerline to edge of manhole rim.

"Utilities that are...within 3' of the edge of slab bed..." Anybody know what does this mean as far as the distance from the rim of the manhole to the edge of the closest rail? "Edge of slab bed" is how far from the edge of the closest rail? Our streetcar is comparable to the proposed Charlotte Streetcar, not the Lynx light rail. "In Charlotte we (meaning the city I assume) are mandating" ...OK. Assume just for the sake of argument the practice described here for Charlotte is basically standard for the USA. So the question is if Duke Energy "mandates" a different standard I suppose they are well entitled to do this. But why should any City be required to pay costs associated with that more restrictive standard? What checks and balances are in place to prevent Duke Energy from asking for ten feet, or fifty feet for that matter?

If you want to see trolleys in Dayton avoid coming on a weekend or holiday. At present they operate weekdays only. Mostly they run on line#4 which traverses an east-west axis through the city and through downtown. There is a separate thread about these, under the City photos section I think.

Interesting...thanks for the info. I saw Charlotte right before it went into construction but I haven't been back since. I like our trolleybuses in the City of Dayton, as there's rarely an issue with underground utilities since the infrastructure is all overhead. With smaller excavation projects the trolley has the "reach" to just detour around. Larger projects involving overhead utilities, it's not that expensive to take down the trolley lines and re-install them when your project is finished.

Jimmy is right...What did they agree to in Charlotte?? OK, OK, this photo is from Charlotte...the light rail project in Charlotte, not the streetcar. Only problem is I can't read any marking on the manhole cover. Would be nice if it said "Duke Energy" wouldn't it :clap: Also, wish I had something in the photo to scale it by...it just might be close to the 8' they want. Standard light rail gauge is 4' 8.5" still, I think.