Eigth and State

^---- Regardless of what the planning commission says, the impression that I get is that young professionals want private parking spaces. Look at ads for apartments in the city and see how many of them advertise off-street parking. Sure, it's possible to live without a car, especially in areas with transit. Furthermore, cars can be rented for trips. But how many young professionals WANT to live without a car? If the streetcar brings all the development that the proponents call for, then expect it to bring a lot of cars as well. That's not necessarily bad, but I don't think it's what the proponents had in mind.

Just saw this in another thread. We have a "young professional" looking for a place in or near downtown Cleveland who wants either a modern apartment or an old apartment rehabbed to modern standards with "Granite, Stainless, and Hardwood." He is willing to pay $1200 per month. He works at a hospital. This is just what we need in Over-the-Rhine, right? YP's with lots of money to fill some of those rehabs or new construction. The streetcar will take him to his job at University Hospital. Here's the problem: "I have a car, but I want the walkable atmosphere." An urban area will tolerate some cars, but cars in any number will make the area unwalkable. Where are you going to park them all?

Here's what they were thinking in 1930: Little did they know that we wouldn't get a building taller than the Carew Tower for 80 years, and then we would be discussing ground elevations, flagpoles, and view angles to prove which building is actually higher. The tallest in that mural is TWICE as tall as Carew!

^---- A plan without a source of funding is just a dream. Sure, the 1948 plan had a lot of propaganda in it, but some of the concepts in the 1948 plan actually got built.

"It was advertised that buses would use the expressways instead and that service would be better..." The Metropolitan Master Plan of 1948 suggested loading and unloading lanes alongside the expressways. Buses wouldn't have to leave the highway, and passengers would walk in from surrounding neighborhoods. Since a lot of the traffic exists on the local roads at suburban interchanges, this really wasn't a bad concept. Of course, by the time the interstates were built, this concept had faded away. Today, the buses lumber along Reading Road, Montgomery Road, Colerain Avenue, Hamilton Avenue, etc, stopping every block or two, while cars zip down the freeway without stopping. No wonder people drive!

Ugh, who wants to walk under that ugly highway infrastructure to get to downtown? Plus, it's still pretty far from downtown, especially from the concentraion of business at the 6th and Vine area. Pedestrians are very sensitive to distance. TANK buses quit using Dixie Terminal in favor of 6th Street just to save their users 2 blocks.

There's a story that Henry Ford imagined that his cars would be used in rural areas, since urban areas already had rail transportation. What actually happened is that most cars ended up in cities. Incidently, Henry Ford also owned a railroad, the Detroit, Toledo, and Ironton, which was renowned for its high degree of maintenance.

I got a phone call the other day: "Hello, this is _______ from _______. We are a public opionion survey company and we would like to ask your opinion. We are not selling anything. This survey will take 20 minutes. Do you have time? "20 minutes! Gee, that could take awhile. Ok, go ahead. "Do you or anyone in your family work for a newspaper, TV, or radio station?" "No." "Do you write a blog, or participate in internet discussion forums?" "Yes." (Sounding surprised) "Is that a yes? You said that you do write a blog or participate in internet discussion forums?" "Yes, I do." "This is the end of the survey. Thank You for your time." (hangs up.)

The best shelter is one that is integrated with the adjacent buildings. An example is the Chichita building downtown that has a covered bus stop incorporated into it.

^---Siemens claims that their vehicle can run without wires on stored power from regenerative brakes. They didn't say for how far. They also didn't say how they are storing power. Batteries are one way to do it, but they add a lot of weight. But they clearly say that their vehicle can store power from regenerative brakes without a wire. Historically, there have been electric streetcars that were powered by batteries under the seats and charged at night. There have also been gravity railroads that were powered by the load rolling downhill; empty cars were hauled uphill by full cars running downhill. This only works when the load is moving in only one direction, such a between a mine and a market. If the streetcar up Vine Street is built, some form of energy counterbalance should be considered. Regenerative brakes that send the energy back to the wire might be the simplest. If the Siemens vehicle really could run on wires on the uphill track of Vine Street only, it could potentially save a lot of catenary.

Here's a website that provides technical specs for the streetcar vehicles used in Portland and Seattle. http://www.inekon-trams.com/superior_low-floor_tram_tech_specs.html

According to the Siemans website, they now have an electric tram vehicle with regenerative brakes that can run without overhead wires. http://www.mobility.siemens.com/mobility/en/pub/urban_mobility/rail_solutions/tram.htm#content-zone So much for all those ugly overhead wire issues! I don't know how this works. I doubt that any vehicle can run an entire route continuously only on stored electric energy. But this technology allows only part of a route to be electrified. In Cincinnati, if the uphill vine street portion was electrified, the vehicle may be able to regenerate enough electricity on the downhill portions to power the rest of the route.

With a little work, we should be able to get the shaft locations pinpointed to within about 20 feet based on records and maps. Then, we can check those locations, assuming that we can get to them because they may be on private property, and see if there is anything there.

Well, he's writing a book, you know, and I want to buy it!

Jake - put me on the list for your book. On another note, if anyone is interested in searching for any evidence of the shafts of the Deer Creek tunnel, please let me know. That is, if Jake hasn't already found them.

"Everybody realizes a continuation of Race/Elm to McMicken, then northwest at least to Mohawk is the next step." I don't get it. I thought the city was already set on a route up Vine Street to Uptown. Are we talking about the same thing?

^--- All of the downtown traffic signals are coordinated and timed for continuous progression at 25 mph in both directions. This is only possible because of the square grid. You can see this for yourself by driving at 25 mph and watching all the lights turn greet ahead of you. However, if you try to circle around the block, you will get all red. Of course, if traffic is really heavy, the system breaks down. Anyway, the signals are ALREADY timed for continuous progression for all vehicles. Farther north, I'm not sure if Liberty Street is connected to the system. I always seem to get a lot of red on Liberty.

"No letters from uptown or OTR." I have a comment on that story. Some years ago, the Hamilton County Park District held a series of election campaigns disguised as public information meetings. There were about 12 meetings scattered all over Hamilton County, plus one special meeting for elected officials. One in Farifax drew about 30 people. One in Whitewater Township drew 50. One in Anderson Township drew 30. The one in Bond Hill drew 1. The involvement in the suburban communities was invariably strong, but the involvement in urban communities was almost non-existant. You can draw your own conclusion as to why, but the fact is that the urban communities had the lowest participation rates by far.

"The first people to think up this streetcar idea envisioned it running the whole length of Elm. It is the longest street and the idea was to get to the hard to reach northern parts of OTR that are in the worst shape, expecially the market. It made lots of sense, and switching over to Walnut and Main also makes sense for the CBD part. It only got complicated when the uptown link was determined to be Vine, which I still don't like because of it's unpleasantness. Face it Vine Street hill is ugly and not a good way to have a visitor enter the city." The original OTR loop was a workable plan. When the uptown extension was added, it became unworkable. Vine Street hill is ugly? It's no worse than I-75 at Hopple, I-71 at Taft, I-471 at Pendelton, I-71 at Reading, or a number of other gateways. Plus, I thought the idea of the streetcar was to make it better! The reality is that Vine Street is one of the very few possible routes up the hill. If you want to drop the uptown extension, then the routing will be another discussion entirely.

"For those who are worried about 90° turns, this is Maxmonument in Munich. The streetcars basically do a 90° S-turn twice in a row." Not to be picky, but those turns in Munich, judging from your picture, are more like 120 degrees. A 90 degree turn in OTR will be much harder.

"They're too far along with the underground mapping and the lane assignments to make any major changes now." Any work done so far is a sunk cost. It should have no bearing on selection of alternatives. I wasn't aware there was any underground mapping being done. Could you share with me who is performing the underground mapping?

I want to be a renderer. :-)

"Double-tracking CP also gives you the perfect potential tie in between the Streetcar system and the old subway line." One of the former subway plans had ramps from the subway to grade on Central Parkway. The ramps would take an entire city block in length and make for some awkward traffic patterns. Look at the remaining streetcar ramps at the west end of the Western Hills Viaduct for an example of what they might look like.

^I don't doubt that the value falls of quickly lateral to the line. But it also falls off transverse to the line from activity points. A streetcar rail in the ground that is 10 minutes from U.C. is worth more than a streetcar rail in the ground that is 14 minutes from U.C.

"But even if you drove a straight line from A to B, it would still be blown out of the water by LRT, which I hope we get someday." Do you have a proposed route for LRT? Does it go anywhere near U.C.?