biker16

^ Funny you don't like that, but you probably love this: Yep, Toronto's streetcars carry as many riders as the our entire transit system. They quote 1 million riders per year, when there are already 20 bus and rail line in Cleveland caring more than a Million riders annually. Are our standards so low that we would spend up to 100 million dollars per kilometer (more expensive than rail) to build this thing, that deliver less economic development opportunities than if the money were spent on something else. BTW the London sky lift, cost 60 million pounds or 96.6 million dollars for a one kilometer 2 station system.

For one of my urban design project I put a dog park at Huron and Ontario across from Gund Arena.

Imagine these tower dotting the landscape from Ohio city to Edgewater park

The problem is NEW always attracts attention, the prospect of the 100 -120 million needed to replace the rail fleet so that we will still have Rail transit in Cleveland in 20 years never will attract more attention than NEW Vaporware at this point. Realistically I expect that it would take $220-300 million to buy new trains, upgrade the Redline to lower maintenance costs, by replacing the now 58 year old outdated and expensive Cantenary system, that become more and more fragile as it ages (line breaks, service interruptions), Plus Money needed to modify Redline stations to Use a Low floor LRT vehicle, and potentially money to modernize the 90 year old maze of tracks underneath Tower City,and potential replace the expensive to maintain Hi and Low Platform Station with an single low platform station. The fact is the cost to run our rail system is higher than it has to be, If RTA doesn't begin to deal with the legacy costs of the sytem it will eat RTA's budget alive.

everything sounds awesome until someone needs to pay for it.

Taxes can be punitive, look at tariffs, sin taxes on tobacco, and liquor. You could say that traffic cameras and parking fees are a from of tax. lets not forget the supreme count upholding the individual mandate as a punitive tax. So yes Ken you can use a parking tax as a punitive tax and feel good about it,too :-D

there won't be a direct connection to Route 10 They need to designate it so it will qualify for State + federal repair funding which BTW still has a substantial local match.

using big words as a substitute for wisdom. the term used in urban planning is Agglomerate. your statement that "there is no such thing as a “dense and walkable city” in the USA. Is myopic and infers a something that it doesn't. you too quick to write off, areas because of current condition with the hope that a change can bring about an improvement that will not happen, or that would happen anyway without that change. you present things as facts which are not facts. books for you to read. Walkable City: How Downtown Can Save America, One Step at a Tim Suburban Nation: The Rise of Sprawl and the Decline of the American Dream Any wannabe urban planner must own this book. The Death and Life of Great American Cities Paperback by Jane Jacobs To understand how the urban renwals efforts of the 50s and the 60s created the forgotten Triangle. read this. Derelict Paradise: Homelessness and Urban Development in Cleveland, Ohio

Tailgating is still a big tradition at Browns games, which pretty much precludes transit usage. They'd do better if the rapid had a park and ride lot on the East Side, in an area perceived as safe. Incorrect on point 1. point 2: which lots Are "perceived" as unsafe?

So if that money goes to a new interchange west of Avon, where they will build new housing development, new Sprawl-Marts and Targets, and more industrial parks, taking more people and jobs from Cleveland, you will call that a win for the city? Avon will grow regaurless if the Opportunity cooridor is built or not, the question is there is not proof this will create the 500 jobs they Hope it will. the Type of development Cleveland needs is based around transit. building a road like this will do nothing to address the reasons Cleveland's population has fallen, people don't want to live here. I fail to see how making it easier to live outside the city addresses this issue.

again you speak and I wonder where you get this information from, because it is 100% wrong.

thanks jerry where are the bylaws on RTA's' new website? so it would make sense that if we had a mayor like Cincinnati's mayor and a more progressive county executive we would see, a more progressive RTA.

this project is expected to receive funding from Turnpike bonds.

follow this logic the board is appointed by the county and the mayor of Cleveland. 4 appointees of the Cuyahoga County Mayors and City Managers Association Gary A. Norton Jr., Mayor, City of East Cleveland Bill Cervenik Mayor, City of Euclid Mark J. Elliott, Mayor, City of Brook Park Vice-President: Dennis M. Clough, Mayor, City of Westlake 3 members Appointed by the Mayor of Cleveland Valarie J. McCall, Chief of Government & International Affairs, City of Cleveland President: George F. Dixon III, Restaurateur Leo Serrano, Executive Director, Office of Institutional Advancement, Cleveland Metropolitan School District 3 members Are appointed by the County 2 are city of Cleveland Residents. Nick "Sonny" Nardi, Veteran labor leader Karen Gabriel Moss, Cleveland immigration attorney Cleveland Resident Jesse O. Anderson President, Disabled Rights Task Force Inc Cleveland Resident To change RTA you need to change the Mayor of cleveland

CTEs Analysis of the Opportunity Corridor Brownfields Report view the entire report here. http://opportunitycorridor.files.wordpress.com/2013/09/2013-03-25-opportunity-corridor-brownfields-report-draft-email.pdf that is like 500,000 dollars per job.

Notice the operating costs on the streetcar, how low they are even when compared to buses.

Portland. I think it would be a good Idea to look at transformational investments Portland cost per hour is $197, and fare box Recovery is 49%. inside or outside, they will be scraped, it doesn't matter. More info to come. Scraped? Do you mean scrapped? If so, are you trying to say that the rail system will be scrapped? I think the idea is to replace the rail fleet with perhaps 40-some cars. If so, most of those could fit inside the maintenance building with room to spare for maintenance. And those that can't will be out in revenue service or be on short-term layover/idling. Storing them indoors doesn't save any money, having a right sized maintenance facility would. Excess capacity and expensive infrastructure (stations, rolling stock, flyovers, bridges, maintenance facilities) right sizing would help lower costs. I would like to see the return of the express surcharge for rail transit if ridership continues to increase, this could be used as a down payment on the new rail fleet. Long term the solution is to increase ridership by expanding the system, which spreads the maintenance costs over more riders.

Portland. I think it would be a good Idea to look at transformational investments Portland cost per hour is $197, and fare box Recovery is 49%. inside or outside, they will be scraped, it doesn't matter. More info to come.

You told me it was. operational cost as in moving the trains is average, the maintenance costs both of the rolling stock and the infrastructure is very high, not helped by low ridership. I think that's just due to having an old rolling stock. When your Heavy Rail is pushing 30 years old and parts possibly getting harder to find along with them breaking down due to age, that would definitely cause maintenance cost to skyrocket. Also with how fast train technology had progressed the new trains I believe would be worlds cheaper to maintain than 1980s trains. Exactly, central rail is over sized, for the fleet that is operating today and is expected to operate in the future. moving to Light rail will help. the cost saving from moving the Red, blue and Green lines to the same platfroms in tower city will save a alot of money. Finding ways to move the fleet to a higher voltage standard will help. possibly reducing the number of sub stations, (even a mix of 750VDC green and Blue and 1500VDC on redline will help reduce operating costs. removing some of the flyovers and bridge will also will help. removing some bridges will help.m expanding the system and looking for way to share the overhead costs with Commuter rial or even Amtrak will help. here is a Quick breakdown of RTA Vs tri met look at RTA central rail vs tri met Portland GCRTA

Is that even doable? Maple Heights only joined RTA grudgingly in the beginning. Basically yes they can drop out but it would be worse for Euclid residents to have no transit than RTA. The only advantage to them dropping out is if they could join Laketran or form their own transit agency. As far as the RedLine/Healthline extension study goes, there was surprisingly good turnout at the public meeting in Euclid. Most of the audience seemed fairly ignorant about the issue but there were a few people with interesting ideas too. what needs to happen is the cities that want rail IE streetcar, need to commit to paying the difference In operating cost vs BRT lite. that difference could be between 3-6 million per year this could be generated by TIF, SID, or other types of value capture.

You told me it was. operational cost as in moving the trains is average, the maintenance costs both of the rolling stock and the infrastructure is very high, not helped by low ridership.

No, I wish I did. The only thing I can figure is that some of the work rules at Central Rail (East 55th) contribute to this. For example, a Rapid operator who drives the trains out on the mainline tracks cannot operate trains into the rail yard at Central Rail. Instead, they change operators to a Yard Hostler-type employee who then moves the rail car around the yard, and also into the maintenance facility. But I do not know how many "Yard Hostler" employees there are. Another factor may be that RTA's rail division employees may be paid more than the bus division? I do not know how RTA employee salaries compare with other similarly sized transit systems. But wages and work rules are the first place to look for cost savings since this is the source of most of GCRTA's operating expenses. Another reason why this is the likely cause is because All Aboard Ohio's Cleveland Coordinator asked Joe Calabrese the other day what can be done to reduce the per-hour operating cost of the rail system. Joe's response? "Nothing." That tells me its contractual wage/work rule issue. No shock. Highly restrictive "work rules" designed to maximize headcount (thereby maximizing union membership and dues collection) were a staple of the automotive industry and its primary suppliers until they found themselves faced with foreign competition. It's still an issue with many public sector unions, which is why there's been an effort to rein them in. It isn't labor cost. The operating cost isn't much higher than other systems. Stay tuned.

stay tuned.

I actually suggested running an express line up and down 91 (SOM Center) from county line to county line awhile back. It could link to both Summit and Lake's systems. Where would these riders come from? Where would they go? I understand your concerns, why do we think about transit as only being for commuters? How about the other trips that people take day in and day out? We have to begins to think about linking walkable dense neighborhoods. To areas that these people want or need to go. That may mean linking shaker square and UC to Beachwood place and legacy village. Providing more options to be car free or car lite. To me the natural connection between east gate with it's midrange Shops (target, walmart, and Marcs) and over 1000 residential units to the Beachwood place high end shopping area with over 1000 residential units, and connecting those areas to 10s of thousands of residential units between shaker square and Beachwood place is a good trip generator above simple commuter service. High quality Service out to these traditional retailers, helps address the issue of lack of access to shopping for downtown residents for whom it is very difficult to live without access to car. That is the benefit. But this makes o sense unless the benefit justifies the cost, so how do you reduce the cost of rail? You use mixed-traffic tram technology to cut the cost of rail by up to 70%. This requires replacing the entire light rail fleet with a modern low floor tram. They could run in sets or single, they would be cheaper to maintain, and to extend than the current light rail system. And within the current grade separated ROW they can run at speeds up to 50mph, only 5 mph slower than current fleet. The result is you can extend the green line to Beachwood place for less than $75 million. That would make this extension very cost effective. A future extension to east gate would be more expensive but have dedicated high speed ROW parallel to I271 making travel times between cedar and Mayfield roads roughly 7-10 min time competitive with driving. We need to be more creative, ideas that provide high quality transit at low cost need to be explored. Beware of the false choice.