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biker16

Kettering Tower 408'
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Everything posted by biker16

  1. does anyone remember this? what was Phase II of the waterfront line?
  2. I think moving The justice center From it's central location is mistake. Here would be my preferred locations.
  3. I lament that we have reached this point in Ohio. for all the funding schemes and ideas. we have this fact, we are providing 55% of the peak service we were providing in 1991. # of vehicles need for maximum/ peak service 1991 630 buses, 38 Redline trains, and 28 Blue/green line trains 2013 350 buses, 20 redline trains, and 14 Blue green trains. in effect we are providing 55% of the Service we were providing in 1991 The Core of the matter is Transit is considered discretionary spending in Ohio there is no guaranteed source of revenue like there is for Roads. So the common theme in Columbus when it comes to increased funding for Transit is To force Transit supportive legislators to choose between funding transit and funding another program like education of healthcare. Transit never wins, unless it is funding from the Transportation budget. Which always leads to the Gas tax, which is the logical source of revenue for Transit not the general fund. Until We as a group stop cowering in fear and come together t address the Gas Tax we will never see sustainable funding for Transit in Ohio.
  4. You forget, that Detroit was, pre merger, a NW hub and was bigger than the United and AA hubs in Chicago. I couldn't care less what Detroit has in terms of airline connections. Detroit's a mess. And all I know is that many metro areas Cleveland's size have overseas flights. I'd even argue that the city or Positively Cleveland or a collection of larger businesses should subsidize an overseas flight such as to Heathrow, Amsterdam or Frankfurt. I'd even take Dublin or some airport that has US Customs pre-clearance so we wouldn't have to establish all of that infrastructure here for just one flight. Metro Detroit is twice the size of Cleveland metro. the auto industry provides alot of demand for international flights. Plus Detroit can handle A340s, A380s, 777s and 747s Cleveland cannot.
  5. biker16 replied to StuFoote's post in a topic in Mass Transit
    Sandusky Transit uses a private operator too, it a Little different that the operator the article mention. BTW there is no way that Boston is paying $12 per passenger trip.
  6. A draw like that should be on Euclid not on Chester. Placing it on Chester kills any hope for this not being so auto centric.
  7. why do they need parking?
  8. Excellent infographic on the issues with cold and old trains
  9. It was the air brakes. cold affects every Pneumatic system, doors and brakes in particular. you are definitely correct that Air brakes should operate in an always on positions just like trucks. The difference between Trucks and Electric trains is the fact that most braking by Trains is going to be through Dynamic braking not friction braking. dynamic brakes turns the motors into generators and feed that recovered energy into resistor banks that convert that energy into waste heat, with Regenerative braking it is sent to the OHL to power other trains (on the blue and Green lines). Dynamic braking is most effective at high speeds where energy recovery is highest, and lest effective at low speed where the energy created is weakest and cannot "stop" a train but only "slow" the train down. Thus a smart system would design less capable Friction brakes only to handle low speed stopping not higher speed slowing where Dynamic braking is more effective. In theory: it could have been that the air lines were Frozen leaving the brakes ON, and the train continued to operate and the brakes finally failed as they wore down, leaving the train able to slow down but unable to stop. Maybe.... Cold weather knocks old streetcars out of service
  10. you only go so far in a Work envroment like RTA. I know of many good people who have left because of the Culture there.
  11. It's very intuitive... I don't see how can't be with 100 buses (some 24-hour) and 80 trains going through/near OC's core retail district . The Rapid station, a block away, is highly visible and is even marked on colorful Ohio City maps at major intersections... I think you meant that it is confusing to drivers, not transit users, casual or otherwise, because RTA service to OC is a snap. I don't care about drivers, because these folks will drive no matter what and will up excuses not to take transit. Don't be so gruff. It is confusing because the frequency is inconsistent and the wait can be as long as 20 minutes off peak. Plus the stops for Ohio city buses are all over down town not consistent. This intimidating to visitors who are not familiar with the 7 different routes going to Ohio City.
  12. Until (and if) Baltimore builds its LRT Red Line subway through downtown, Little Italy and Fells Point, Cleveland's downtown and close in hot spots are considerably better connected than B-More's -- hot areas like Fells Point and Federal Hill have no rail service at all, with the latter not scheduled to get any anytime soon... I do think some kind of reestablishment of a community circulator and/or trolley service connecting OC and Tremont could be useful, as the oft-infrequent #81 bus, alone, is not a viable alternative for such a popular neighborhood. (RTA might be wise to divert some of those W. 25-southbound buses over to Tremont then reconnecting with W. 25 southbound at, say, Clark Ave). ... but the trolley should NOT go all the way downtown; only between Ohio City/Market Square and Tremont, only. I'm tired of RTA constantly duplicating viable rail service with buses (ie Trolleys to the Rock Hall when the WFL is right there)... Ohio City is a major transit hub in itself. I get the concerns about that, but getting from downtown to Ohio City via transit is still far from intuitive and not very convenient for the casual transit rider. Thus the idea for a west w25th St streetcar. Clevelandstreetcar.org
  13. How far north of Franklin? It's the area between the Shoreway and the old river that IMNSHO has mega potential. Lakeview terrace is a bad location develop... why? because it often smells like the sewage treatment plant it is next too. imagine this... $300,000 condos, with a view of a salt mine and mountains of bulk minerals, matched with a unique odor of raw sewage, mmm. that is prime land for development, which is why they built the housing project there in the first place.
  14. the problem IMO with the justice center is its lack a permeability, It sits on a huge mega block and there is no way for pedestrians to walk through it. you have to walk around it. to add insult to injury its Setbacks are out a character for a downtown district creating huge windswept Areas of emptiness around the building. If the county was smart they would look to push the building out the sidewalks much like CSU did with their remodling of thier law collegae and their main classroom.
  15. Yonah Freemark August 28th, 2014 | 32 Comments » A new station on Boston’s Orange Line prepares for opening, but infill stations of its type are all too rare. Want to know a secret? One of the best ways to increase transit ridership at a reasonable price requires little additional service. It requires no new line extensions. And it can be done to maximize the value of existing urban neighborhoods. This magic solution comes in the form of the infill station–a new stop constructed along an existing line, between two existing stations. Next week, Boston’s MBTA transit agency plans to open a new stop, Assembly Station, along the Orange Line in Somerville, a dense inner-ring suburb just to the northwest of downtown Boston. Assembly is the latest in a series of recent infill stations in the U.S. located along older heavy rail lines whose other stations were generally constructed decades ago. Washington, D.C.’s NoMa Metro Station opened in 2004; the San Francisco region’s West Dublin/Pleasanton BART Station followed in 2011. In Boston, new stations have been constructed along the upgraded commuter rail-becoming-regional rail Fairmount Corridor. And Chicago has had success with the opening of two infill stations in 2012, the Morgan Station in the city’s West Loop and the Oakton-Skokie Station in the northern suburbs. Yet those expansions are exceptions to the rule. Two infill stations are currently planned in Northern Virginia, at Potomac Yard along the Metro in Alexandria and at Potomac Shores along the VRE commuter line, and one new station is under construction along the Green Line in Chicago. But few other cities or transit systems are even considering the possibility of investing in infill stops, even as line extensions are proliferating around the country. That’s a big disappointment.
  16. what is wrong about this picture? how could you not describe the effect of this elevated highway as deminishing the value of the buildings and land around it.
  17. except when they are replace it will include 1,200 new parking spaces.
  18. I just love the urban renewal of the 1960s and 1970s. Expletive.
  19. I would just like to refer people to the Bike share study presentation and implementation plan. http://www.gcbl.org/files/resources/finalclevelandbikesharefeasibilitystudy.pdf Zagster is a good start but it falls far short of the system envisioned for cleveland with 700 bike and 70 stations for both University circle downtown and the near west side. Zagster system is also a Lease type of system not the conventional capital intensive system that Cities like Columbus and Cincinnati have invested in. and every bike share Station has to be Renewed by Each station sponsor every year for ~$7000. in contrast to a conventional 10 bike station that costs $40,000 to own. For Example if Barley House disappears the bike share station would disappear unless another business decides to take over the lease. It would be nice to think the generosity of businesses would never end, but realistically with Zagster there is a high risk that the system will implode once the "newness" wears off and financial realities of business take over.
  20. I think you're pretty spot-on. Whether streetcars are the right transit tool depends on the context. DC's streetcar is probably the most suspect of the modern crop. In a transit-poor city with a densely built, somewhat downtrodden downtown like Cincinnati's, they are a fantastic idea. Most of the critics are unfamiliar and/or unrealistic about the political climates in tier-3 urban America, as well as the urban economic and real estate contexts in those cities. Contexts are likely to shift, too, though -- in fact that's largely the point of streetcar projects. So cities building them should keep an eye to how to keep the infrastructure relevant in the long term. For example, designing lines with the possibility in mind of making the ROW exclusive and carrying longer, heavier vehicles in the future. (One example where I think Cincinnati's streetcar maybe missed this mark is in not planning for one-way to two-way street conversions.) With DC they keep getting hung up on the Starter Segment. Which represents only 2 miles. Of then one city line, which will travel from George town to union station and across the Anacostia river to predominately minority part of DC. Connecting the 6 metro stations to areas of the city without metro service. Unfortunately, that is lost on the few and their lemmings screaming it's too short and too slow, and ignore the facts that dedicated lanes are planned in the follow on segments. The truth is no one knows what these systems will become over the next 30 years.
  21. which completely misses the point of TOD, which is Sad.
  22. They would likely I71 to I490 and then the "new" route 10 directly to University Circle. this cant really be TOD with 800 new parking spaces, can it?
  23. How did the meeting go?
  24. Take note Cleveland they are going to Remove a station and move less than 1/4 miles down the line. I wonder if they will physically remove the station or just remove it from maps and post signs saying that it is no longer in use. Completely removed.