natininja

New Urbanophile article about transit: FTA Administrator Peter Rogoff Delivers Tough Love to Transit Advocates FTA Administrator Peter Rogoff, in a recent address that drew heated debate, gave some tough love to transit advocates by telling them to get over their infatuation with rail, and to focus on maintaining and operating the system we’ve got vs. expanding it. Rail vs. Bus Here’s Rogoff on rail: Supporters of public transit must be willing to share some simple truths that folks don’t want to hear. One is this — Paint is cheap, rails systems are extremely expensive. Yes, transit riders often want to go by rail. But it turns out you can entice even diehard rail riders onto a bus, if you call it a “special” bus and just paint it a different color than the rest of the fleet. Once you’ve got special buses, it turns out that busways are cheap. Take that paint can and paint a designated bus lane on the street system. Throw in signal preemption, and you can move a lot of people at very little cost compared to rail. A little honesty about the differences between bus and rail can have some profound effects. Earlier I pointed out that our new estimate for the deferred maintenance backlog for the entire transit universe is roughly $78 billion. But you should know that fully 75 percent of that figure is to replace rail assets….. Communities deciding between bus and rail investments need to stare those numbers in the face. Some communities might be tempted to pay the extra cost for shiny new rails now. But they need to be mindful of the costs they are teeing up for future generations. Read more: http://www.urbanophile.com/2010/05/27/fta-administrator-peter-rogoff-delivers-tough-love-to-transit-advocates/ Hopefully, arenn will stop by and relate it to his support for the streetcar.

^ And what is Cincy's rank? Edit: I see on your blog it is 32nd.

I'm sorry for accusing you of trolling. I thought we all had common ground knowledge that 3C trains are to be run on tracks used for freight. Now that you know this, you must surely see why your appeal to the trains not delivering to grocery stores makes for an argument with an invalid premise. Again, I'm sorry for misinterpreting your statement. I thought you were making a point about the endpoints of shipment/delivery, rather than the entire process.

Yet again you are trolling. If a train carries groceries 95+% of a trip, but doesn't actually carry to the loading dock behind the grocery store, that does not make road infrastructure between shipping and delivery points more integral to the trip than rail infrastructure. And, yes, that is something you were implying. We get that you are skeptical, but try harder to come up with points to be skeptical about. Are you having trouble articulating what points you're skeptical about? Do you even believe what you post? Or are you just trying to play devil's advocate? Not totally relevant to the topic at hand, but: I will also point out that groceries are a special case, because shipping time is much more integral (as it relates to shipping cost), with perishable goods. Other products are probably even more likely to be shipped by train (I am speculating, I don't know stats), though that is not to say that perishable groceries aren't quite often shipped by train. (I know OJ isn't the quickest expiring of groceries, so this maybe isn't the best example, but it's a fun link. It also highlights the issue of refrigeration.)

j-Meck, you should send in some of that commentary as an LTE.

^ "The train isn't faster than a car, but it is less expensive for those who ride it, and more expensive for those who don't." Well, that is really easy to say, but shouldn't they do a bit more analysis? How much does a train rider/non-driver pay for the roads between Royal Oak and Ann Arbor? How much development has the rail line produced, per dollar, versus money spent on the highway (in some fixed timeframe)? What about emissions and related costs? More lazy reporting, intended for a blissfully ignorant audience. Why they even bothered to send reporters to ride a train in Michigan is beyond me.

Are you looking for a new houseboy to go with your new house? :mrgreen:

I just wrote another letter. You guys should, too. Let's keep it up, one a day.

^^^ I think your counting helps serve as a call-to-action for proponents. I know it helped get me to commit to writing LTEs. Of course, the poll had a wee bit to do with that, as well.

^ They already are. His name is DanB! :lol:

Are you making fun of my post?

I don't know if the Enquirer is being honest about posting letters in numbers representative of what they receive, but I will say this: Those people with jurassic-period landlines who answered that poll and are against modern transportation technologies are the same types who kick-it oldschool by writing LTEs. Meanwhile, the people without landlines, who are all for switching to better transit technology, are busy tweeting, blogging, and surfing UrbanOhio, to get their opinions out there. This gives us the upper-hand, but we have to double-up the efforts and conform to the old-paradigm LTE format, in addition to doing what comes naturally to us, if we want to get the message out to everyone.

We all need to write LTEs constantly. I just sent one in.

Which colors shouldn't be worn in which neighborhoods?

I still think it was a gang war. Most of them were retaliations for the others. If I'm wrong, it was a pretty darn weird statistical anomaly. But this is exactly what gang wars look like from the outside, and none of us should be so naive to think Cincy doesn't have gangs. Perhaps not Bloods and Crips and MS13s, but Cincy has gangs.

In case of flooding, there could be limited service out of CUT. no? Nevermind, I see we're on the other side of the Mill Creek.

I prefer the action-oriented park for that location. It's not even big enough for a natural oasis, nor does it have appropriate geographical attributes. The area could really use the eyes on the street which the attractions should bring.

I think the main thing he objects to is all the programming. My interpretation is he wants a serene, green space, minus the hustle and bustle created by a big playground, water playground, event lawns, dog park, etc. He'd like a more natural environment as an oasis of nature and privacy in a dense part of the city.

That's why I said it should be separate from the road. I actually thought this was part of where they were building a network of paths in the valley. I thought they were going on SG by the cemetery down to the Mill Creek. Seemed like an opportunity to advance that. Maybe I don't have an accurate picture of what they are doing. As for the diet...some of the parking could be removed. Why maintain something unnecessary? Then there are all the double turn lanes.

If it's that wide and untraveled, they should have implemented a road diet. Off topic: Is anyone doing anything with that factory building there, between Winton and Clifton?

The trick is to convince straight boys they can prove how not-homophobic they are by inserting themselves into compromising situations. :wink2: You've gotta give Atlas some credit!

^ Yup, that's what I'm talking about. Baaad omen, lol.

Nope...just sad when a team sucks so badly they can't even inspire cross-state trash talk. Meanwhile, the Reds are in first place in their division... :evil: Some good ideas. Just don't spend too much money on them while they continue to suck.

One interesting thing to note is people with an income lower than $40k were significantly less likely to approve of using bonds for funding than the people who made more, who would actually foot more of the bill.

My word.