JeTDoG

Well, I'm not sure if THEY can... but WE certainly will: http://www.riderta.com/casino

As one of the people responsible for the distribution of this kind of information, and a lifelong transit user myself, I'm with you there, and I (we) do appreciate your desire to use RTA services with out-of-towners. Unfortunately, our closure schedule a) isn't always ours (see earlier comment about ODOT), and b) can be extremely fluid based on availability of materials, capital funds, and good weather (NONE of which are a given in this climate, and I mean that in EVERY sense of the word). I have a real thing against distributing information early only to have to publicize it again when things majorly change. It's difficult enough getting people to listen once, never mind multiple times (how many people actually READ the story corrections in the PD?). All that being said, we're working on it, and we're trying to get better at it, in every way possible. I'd like to think we've made some progress. It's a top-to-bottom cooperation process, and your input into how we can make that process smoother is valuable and appreciated. BTW, if you're coming from the East side, park at Windermere and show your friends the HealthLine and everything happening along Euclid Ave. I think they'll appreciate it. :-D

Clvlndr, I can't speak for ODOT (the decision-maker insofar as the Saturday shutdown is concerned), but I can say that, were I responsible for a project such as this, I'd likely build in a little "pad time" with weekend work to ensure that if anything Saturday didn't go as planned, I could use Sunday to complete work and/or back things out/revert to prior conditions in time for morning rush hour on Monday. Most projects of this caliber tend to do "heavy lifting" on Saturdays.

Where was this shot at and will this actually be a presence in the skyline or is the elevation to low to stand out? It's a presence in the skyline from the west side, a little bit on the south side, but you can't see the building from the east side. I think this shot was taken from the shoreline at Edgewater Park. And that sure is a lot of ore at the C&P Dock on Whiskey Island! Times must be getting better in the steel industry. I disagree. I see this building every morning on my way in along the East Shoreway. It will look even more impressive once it has a skin on it.

Keith, have you tried http://m.riderta.com/, the mobile-optimized site? It's a bit more user-friendly to mobile phones, and distilled down to only the information an active rider would need (schedules, fares, alerts).

And, as indicated on that same page, "Construction is dependent upon funding." When the capital funds are there, and in the context of all other capital needs of the Authority, this project will proceed.

From our Director of Revenue: "We were going to replace the machine with a new one and saw that the flooring was being replaced last week. As soon as the floor is installed we will replace the machine." Our apologies for not posting an advisory to this effect; I think the hope was that the replacement would be done quickly enough to avoid any inconvenience.

It's nice to know we're worth their time to parody. You know what they say, there's no such thing as bad publicity. And 327, many of our core routes run 24/7, so yes, riding for 14 hours straight is possible. Not encouraged, but possible.

Okay, this is where I weigh in and mention that old phrase comparing opinions to posterior orifices. Just sayin'... admittedly, I'm biased.

I can't necessarily speak to any other part of it, but the plan has always been for the new headhouse to replace the existing headhouse (what there is of it) on the west side of Lee. The artists' rendering you've referenced is the view from the northeast, looking southwest. As far as federal funding is concerned, yes, just about every infrastructure investment has some federal funding component.

What is the significance of 'Westin 15' and 'Westin 16' slides? Are these just for ideas of what a facade on this property could look like? Yes, note the captions of "Metal Mesh System Examples" and "Lighting Examples", respectively, on those slides. These were concepts of what could be done, based on what's been done (or proposed) elsewhere. Personally, I like the "colorwash" presented on Slide 16. It fits with what's been done on the Tower City spire and City Hall's lakeside face in the past, and offers a branding opportunity that's not obnoxious.

Apparently, my Google-fu is weak this morning. Now that I've seen this: http://blog.cleveland.com/architecture/2010/11/marriott_courtyard_hotel_desig.html all is much clearer.

MuRrAy, if you're referring to the section titled "Cornell/Euclid Hotel", it DOES seem to show that the area in question at least minimally fronts onto Mayfield; it may be nothing more than a driveway, but it's there. I'm also curious about a couple of things: what the distinction is between the blue-green area and the striped-out red area in that image? the image seems to show that the Charter One/Starbucks building is in the area for the hotel -- I hope they're planning on replacing/re-siting those properties

Not meaning to split hairs on this, since I think it's a great project, but to say that Mayor Norton is building, or even planning, it is a misrepresentation: http://www.cleveland.com/business/index.ssf/2011/09/university_circle_reaches_into.html

Hallelujah to that! We're making positive progress, Red Line is now single-tracking between W 25 and W 98/West Blvd.

Glad to hear things went as smoothly as they did, given the circumstances. FYI, we've restored power through Tower City, so shuttles will run between W 25 and W 98/West Blvd. Further updates as we get them...

FYI, there are some overhead lines down at W 38 that are leading to shuttle buses replacing rail between W 117 and E 34 -- yes, that means no service into Tower City from the East Side, and no Red Line from West Side. Shuttle buses are running, but obviously our capacity is reduced in this situation. Please plan accordingly, and we'll keep you informed through all available channels.

My pleasure, it's why I hang out here :-). I got an official reply from Google: It is called Transit Layer. The Transit Layer is a part of Google Transit. Google Transit has the goal to provide full schedule information and routing, the objective of the Transit Layer is to overlay lines visually on Google Maps. It is based off the shapes provided in the GTFS feed. Think of a virtual metro map on top of Google Maps. At this point in time we are taking launch requests very slowly at the moment. We will remember your request and come back to you as soon as we can. Regards, The Google Transit Team

Most likely a deadhead from the Hayden garage, where those vehicles are stored, to the starting point at Public Square. Deadheads can take a variety of routes to reach their destinations, many of which don't even come close to revenue service routes, depending on circumstances. This is quite ordinary.

Thanks for the additional detail, Scav. I took a little closer look at things, both in San Francisco and in Paris, and I see what you mean about the route highlighting. The GTFS spec does offer the ability to include a file called shapes.txt that is a referenced set of geolocations for route traces, and that, combined with the route_color field in routes.txt, appears to be what's used to make this happen. It seems that San Fran's bus lines all use the default light blue color, as they do not specify a route color in their routes.txt file, while the BART rail lines DO specify route colors. Cleveland currently includes a shapes.txt file in the feed that is supplied to Google, so it looks like we're giving them everything we need to. I've put the ask in to Google to see if there's anything we're missing, or if perhaps this route display is a limited-release feature only implemented for certain cities. Much as we'd all like Cleveland to be a top-tier testbed for Google, I suspect Paris and San Francisco might yield them more useful results, simply on volume alone (though I think they underestimate the enthusiasm of certain Clevelanders!). I have noticed that this feature isn't present in all other cities, so Cleveland definitely isn't the only city that's missing it. Buffalo, my old stomping grounds, doesn't have the feature at all, and Boston seems to have it only for rail, as does Sacramento, CA (a system with a comparable level of service miles to Cleveland). So, this may be more "cutting edge" of a feature than we all realize, useful though it may be. I'll keep you all apprised of anything additional I find out from Google. In the meantime, if any of you would like to get a look at the raw data we supply to Google, the latest data set is always available at http://www.riderta.com/gtfs/latest/google_transit.zip and a list of other available feeds can be found at http://code.google.com/p/googletransitdatafeed/wiki/PublicFeeds. There's currently no "license" associated with OUR feed, but if you're going to use our data to build something, please don't infringe on RTA's trademarks, or represent anything you do as being an official or endorsed RTA product, and please respect the license agreements presented by other agencies if you use their data.

Last night, we were still running shuttle buses between Tower City and W 25 as part of the Cuyahoga Viaduct maintenance project. Transit Police presence was an integral part of maintaining crowd control and providing customer assistance in transitioning to and from the shuttle buses and the Rapid, and they were on site at both ends (Tower City, as well).

Scav: I can try to address some of the Google Transit related aspects of your question more specifically, since I'm RTA's web manager and I am directly responsible for the post-processing of the files we send to Google. In order to do this, I'd like to get some more information from you. Do you have specific examples of what you're seeing in San Fran's information display that you might like to see incorporated here in Cleveland? Specifically, is there a particular stop that would provide a good representative example of your desires? The Bay Area is a very diverse, distributed system, with service provided by no fewer than four distinct agencies (BART, SFMTA, AC Transit, and CalTrain), and I just want to be sure I'm looking at the right source data/engaging with the right contacts out there to try to research this. I can't make any promises, but I concur with Jerry that we're always looking at ways we can improve our communication.

@StrapHanger, your suggestion is absolutely reasonable, and on that matter, I am 100% in agreement. I'm certain we will strive to do a better job coordinating service changes and and print material production in the future -- it's a common-sense approach that ensures the most efficient use of what resources we have. On a semi-related note, something we have started doing lately to try to keep our print materials relevant for a longer period of time, while driving people to our electronic resources, is postings signs that provide general frequency & span-of-service information, with QR codes offering links to the detailed schedules. You can find examples of this at many of our Park-N-Ride lots, and on the Rapid. Let us know what you think! Further implementations of QR codes will be forthcoming, and if anyone has an innovative use they can suggest, I'm all ears!

@jam40jeff, I think you hit the nail on the head, as it's a simple Javascript function that triggers the alert box, so a pop-up blocker might interfere with that. Insofar as not considering the map to be printed material, well, it is. There's still a number of folks, believe it or not, who don't use computers as their primary information source, and the Authority can't just abandon them in a shift to all-digital (or even primarily digital) production. ". People on this site draw lines on maps, with labels, all the time" is a spurious, apples-to-oranges argument. I don't believe I've ever seen anyone on here draw a system map, with all of its included information, in a format that is also easily, usably printable. Regarding the statement, "It's not common for an organization's website to state that google's information is more current than its own."; first off, that's not what was said, because we're actually looking at OUTPUTS, not INPUTS. They're all based on the same input information, one (the printed/PDF product) just lags the other (Google). Secondly, while it may not be common for an organization to STATE such, I think the actual occurrence of such a circumstance might be more common than you think. In that respect, I'll take the side of honesty, clarity, and forthrightness in ensuring that people understand that a document primarily intended for print output might not reflect a reality that changes more quickly than the print product can.

Actually, the website doesn't "refuse to give one". That disclaimer was placed in there to point out the fact that printed materials of any kind typically change more slowly than pure data-based planning services such as Google Maps. Did you click "OK" in the alert box that resulted? Doing so will provide you with the most currently available system map. Clicking "Cancel" will, understandably, cancel your request and NOT return the map, because that's what you've told the server to do. Please report any difficulties with accessing this information to [email protected], and it they will be addressed.