KJP

Why does the development of park-n-ride lots depend on a healthy downtown? What if land surrounding all rail stations was used in an equally potent manner as transit-trip generators? And yes, when you have to drive to a rapid station to take the train to the Van Aken District, people are going to drive the entire way. Consider this paragraph from my article "Cleveland TOD initiative on track" -- Consider that, within a quarter-mile “walkshed” of bus routes offering daytime departures every 15 minutes or better and within a half-mile walkshed of rail stations, only 17 percent of land in those areas is used for buildings; 25 percent is used for parking, according to a new report by the Cuyahoga County Planning Commission. And buildings — especially when designed with mixed uses and placed next to sidewalks — generate walking and transit use, Hewitt said. Another 45 percent of land is devoted to greenspace and 12 percent of land use near transit stops was identified as roads. More than twice of the land surrounding a high-frequency transit service stop is devoted to cars than it is for buildings that are the biggest generator of transit trips. Until that number is reversed (heck, even equalized would make a big difference), few people with choices will choose transit in Cleveland. BTW, there's other, more disturbing numbers in that TOD article.

Spent a little more time adding and correcting stuff on that map. It's been fun and sad researching this. So much rail infrastructure lost to the tyranny and isolationism of the almighty car.

Akron Metro RTA owns a rail corridor that connects downtown Akron to near Kent. Their ownership ends at the county line, and the county line is just west of the city of Kent. And east of there, the right of way is owned by Portage County. And the track is still active from the county line east to Ravenna.

Was looking at historic satellite images before writing my article about the demo and was surprised to see there was a half-dozen buildings on site, although some were connected and appeared as a single building.

Wife and son are in Ukraine visiting family. They can't get home soon enough -- for multiple reasons.

Wednesday evening. End of the last day of the crane.

No, actually I'm not. Just referring to the new developments across Lorain which really aren't next to Grove Court but close enough to create more critical mass. They are new developments. There is activity. There is hope and light in the city... 🙂

Some street-level views.... https://www.linkedin.com/posts/jayemery2_cle-cleveland-downtowncleveland-activity-7210030523606343681-49ly?utm_source=share&utm_medium=member_desktop A sample:

Last SCOOP until Monday: Ohio Lt. Gov. Jon Husted allegedly led the charge with now-indicted FirstEnergy execs to pass legislation that was the result of the largest corruption scheme in state history... New texts allegedly show Ohio Lt. Gov. Jon Husted leading FirstEnergy's push for House Bill 6 https://www.news5cleveland.com/news/politics/ohio-politics/new-texts-allegedly-show-ohio-lt-gov-jon-husted-leading-firstenergys-push-for-house-bill-6

You live longer and healthier in walkable neighborhoods... Why southern Europeans will soon be the longest-lived people in the world Diet and exercise, but also urban design and social life https://www.economist.com/europe/2024/06/20/why-southern-europeans-will-soon-be-the-longest-lived-people-in-the-world

Some corrections and comments.... Dayton is the sixth-most populous city in Ohio but the fourth-most populous metro area. It's actually the Genesee & Wyoming and if memory serves, its routing is only 8 miles shorter than the Dayton routing which is engineered for higher speeds. The G&W in the vicinity of Loveland would have to be completely realigned to offer higher speeds. Plus Since Dayton-Cincinnati has two high-quality main lines, you have the opportunity for consolidating through-freight traffic on one of the lines and dedicating the other for fast passenger trains, at least during daylight hours. If it were me, I would make the CSX routing via Hamilton as my passenger line, but that might require some trackwork in Hamilton and, perhaps someday, a passenger flyover of NS trains using the New Castle District line. Historically, the railroads came up with some pretty bad station locations like Cincinnati Union Terminal or Buffalo Central Terminal. But it worked for them operationally. BTW Cincinnati Union Terminal saw 216 trains a day at its peak. High-speed rail would do well for Ohio's largest cities. But conventional-speed rail would do well for Ohio's small towns as well. Combined with a well-designed system of feeder buses, many Ohio small towns that have become isolated since bus deregulation could become well-connected again for people of all incomes and ages. Here's a couple of maps I made 15 years ago...

Grove Court isn't so lonely anymore. It's got a couple of large, million-dollar townhomes on one side of it and Waterford Bluffs on the other. And then across Lorain...

A few examples of taking the city back from the car (partially or completely)...

Since NEOtrans was down all day, I spent a few hours showing current, former and even some planned rail rights of way in the Cleveland - Akron - Canton corridor. You can zoom in to see pretty much where everything was in detail. Please don't change anything unless you ask me first. Still working on the stations and a few other pieces parts.... https://www.google.com/maps/d/edit?mid=1TbmCnHUDYPVqkUL12LLwYWjyvC1LHCA&usp=drive_link You can see additional details in these old digitized maps here: https://www.arcgis.com/apps/View/index.html?appid=ddb0ee6134d64de4adaaa3660308abfd

Like Republican passenger rail champion H. Cooper Snyder from Hillsboro to said in the 1980s, providing passenger rail will not only help the 3Cs but also the 3Ps -- Piqua, Painesville and Pickerington. He said that when a reporter asked him if Hillsboro isn't getting train service, why does he support it?

Developing park-n-ride lots makes the stops useful again and for a new paradigm. Converting park-n-ride lots into transit villages creates new transit destinations, etc. Perhaps you have a different vision of what developing a park-n-ride lot means than I do. To me, some of these lots are big enough that they can become new communities that are comparable to the Market District, Little Italy, Shaker Square, Van Aken District, Gold Coast, Downtown Rocky River, etc. I wrote a NEOtrans article last August "Lots of opportunity" about how much land is involved and how many housing units and neighborhood-scale retail square footage could be added by developing these unused spaces that may otherwise never be used again. If developed with transit-supportive housing levels (30 units per acre) and a typical amount of neighborhood retail for that housing, it would add tens of thousands of housing units and hundreds of thousands of square feet of retail space. Then we do a Toronto and start marketing ourselves to immigrants and refugees around the world with business incubators/advisory clinics at each station and promote ourselves as a climate-friendly place to live.

No offense, because you're not the first one to say it, but this is one of the least defensible things anyone could say. Do you realize how many successful initiatives (high-ridership rail lines, busy roads, popular new restaurant concepts, embraced technologies, etc etc) were provided where none had ever existed before? These things aren't the result of natural phenomena or karma. There are the result of human creativity and willpower that sometimes eludes us and other times successfully is amassed and when it does you get new stuff you get to enjoy.

Huge! Hope it gets built.

It's sad what we've become. I sure hope GCRTA gets more aggressive in seeking the redevelopment of its park-n-ride lots to justify this massive investment in new trains. Development doesn't just happen. It has to be clearly defined and encouraged.

I like when someone challenges the advocacy. It gives us a chance to address the concerns. First, none of the metro areas along 3C are shrinking in population. And it's a travel corridor that ranks in the nation's top-20 in total travel between city pairs. It was ranked 10th a couple decades ago, according to USDOT, but since then it isn't growing as fast as others. So, since private capital follows public capital, states and regions that have provided quality rail infrastructure and quality services on it have seen private investment and business activity around rail stations and in rail travel corridors increase at rates above, often far above, the initial public investment. Recent studies have projected the same would happen here in Ohio. https://www.allaboardohio.org/_files/ugd/903aba_8754327435ed4c79bc94da63faae6a5a.pdf

That was theme for Stephen King's short story “The Lonesome Death of Jordy Verrill” in the movie Creepshow. https://www.appalachiabare.com/when-stephen-king-turned-into-a-plant-the-old-villain-kudzu/

Unfortunately daily ridership has only been 4,000 since it opened in April. It was designed before the pandemic to, among other things, serve downtown commuting which of course has taken a hit with remote working.

The headline is a bit confusing vs the content of the article.... Company hired to stabilize Realty Building: Youngstown City Council https://www.wkbn.com/home/company-hired-to-stabilize-realty-building-youngstown-city-council/

There were once four rail lines between Cleveland and Akron and three rail lines between Akron and Canton. There is no way to easily get a train from Cleveland to Akron anymore (the larger two cities) but there are still two routes remaining to get from Akron to Canton. Each one of these railroad lines had their imperfections but ironically if we had stitched together their best parts we would have had a terrific rail quarter linking Cleveland, Akron and Canton. I'll put together some google maps to show you where the rail lines are in were. Most of the old Northern Ohio interurban rail service in the CAC corridor ran on streetcar tracks in the city centers but had fast, dedicated rights of way in the countryside allowing regular 80 mph speeds. The most notable piece of this became Route 8 north of Route 303 to northfield. It was called the Crittenden Cutoff and replaced side-of-the-road operation along Old Route 8 There was a pretty high-end study about developing Cleveland-Akron-Canton commuter rail service done in the mid-1990s. I have a hard copy of it but we didn't do digital copies of studies back then. Unfortunately the rail line from Akron to Hudson has faded away since then. I do have a digital version of the Ohio Hub regional rail plan. I'll figure out a way of hosting it somewhere and sharing a link to it.

Nothing new. Like I said, things have quieted down significantly in recent months. Not sure why.