Dunno know about the stop at Corry. It would be forty or so feet underground and very expensive.

 

Without this stop, I'd be worried about Clifton Heights being underserved.  It's a dense neighborhood where parking is difficult and lots of people are inclined to use transit.

 

In fact, if this stop has to be underground anyways I would move it further south towards Jefferson & Calhoun intersection or on Vine in between Calhoun & McMillan.

 

 

Pretty sure that OKI only does these surveys because either ODOT or the Feds require them as a condition of getting funds. Also pretty sure there is no interest in higher-level public transportation at OKI.

 

which is completely baffling. I work for the MPO in Hampton Roads and we have significant work tasks surrounding public transit and active trans. This is where the Feds are pushing. They should be doing that stuff too. If you want to see if they are really gonna do any real public trans work, check out their annual Unified Planning Work Program (UPWP), which is a required doc by the Feds - it spells out all the work the MPO will be doing over the next FY.

^OKI is not obligated to do anything that makes sense.

 

"Sometimes I think the purpose of OKI is to keep consultants in business." - an OKI employee  :-o

I ran the Mt. Auburn tunnel concept through my spreadsheet thingy…

 

I plotted out John and Jules' concept of a streetcar extension north along Main and Walnut streets, crossing Liberty (with a stop) and entering a Mt. Auburn tunnel at the foot of the hill in the vicinity of Mulberry.  The tunnel daylights for a Christ Hospital stop (probably involving some kind of plaza/elevator infrastructure to access the hospital itself) and re-enters the tunnel.  The tunnel comes up for good in the vicinity of Jefferson and Corry.  I don’t have a clear concept of how this would happen, but on my map I added a stop here (differing from John's map,) to put a stop closer to Clifton Heights.  The route continues on Jefferson and MLK with stops at University Ave., the University/Children's/VA Hospital Campus, and at Reading Rd. where Uptown Consortium is assembling properties for a research/biotech hub.  My assumption is for dedicated transit lanes in this corridor.  At the MLK interchange itself, the tracks would make a left hand turn and follow the highway north, mostly using the existing rail right of way west of the highway (the PRR/CL&N ROW- thanks jjakucyk[/member] .)  It would mostly have dedicated right of way through this corridor, but some building demo/rearrangement of streets may be required to make that happen.  I envision a stop at Blair Ct. in Avondale, with a new bridge extending over I-71 to connect directly to Walnut Hills High School, and also some Transit Oriented Development along the tracks & highway in this corridor.  The final stop (for now) would be at Xavier University by the University Station development, serving Norwood and Evanston. 

 

As far as route times go, a word of caution. The most important variable in these calculations is miles per hour speed averages.  These I estimated doing some cursory internet research on bus and streetcar averages, and should be considered wild guesses at best (not very scientific for being the most important variable.)  That being said,  I came up with about a 24 minute travel time end to end from the Great American Ballpark to Xavier. With five vehicles running, I came up the minimum obtainable headway of a vehicle coming by every 10 minutes.

 

 

 

A few things confuse my about this route.  I'm not sure why it would travel a section up along the Interstate.  Anything traveling along Interstates would be higher speed light rail which things like streetcars can feed.  Things like street cars shouldn't be traveling along an Interstate canyon.  I agree with getting to Xavier, but not going up a section of Interstate.  Then there is the opportunity to have the zoo along the route which it misses.  It comes very close, but just misses it.  That is a missed opportunity.   

This is a plan for a light rail line. Useful transit has to value someone's time and to do that it must maintain a higher average speed when traveling over longer distances. This gets the streetcar/light rail vehicle (the same CAF Urbos 3 trains we've already bought) out of mixed traffic ASAP by going though the tunnel. After that, route design is a trade off of planning worthwhile stops and still connecting things with a straight non-winding route. As the zoo is not "on the way" but instead would require a detour that would probably travel through slower mixed traffic streets slowing down overall times I don't think it makes sense to go there. Also the zoo is not the high value destination it appears to be because it's not going to drive high ridership on cold January days like today and that's the case for 4 winter months out of the year as well. That being said if it was "on the way" then by all means put a stop there.

 

My thinking is this would have to have dedicated lanes on Jefferson and MLK even. The average speed must be kept high to still be useful traveling in between neighborhoods, not just within them. (Within a neighborhood, like the downtown streetcar, a different set of principles apply, you're trying to provide "access" with a high frequency circulator.)

 

Maintaining a higher speed is critical if we ever go "beyond Xavier" as well (along Wasson Way or up I-71) so we simply can't have large portions of the line be slower moving mixed traffic streetcar.

That ROW between MLK to Xavier already exists as the former CL&E double-track line that was abandoned in 1968.  It was the route that the metro moves plan was going to use. 

^ CL&N

I combined the previous concept with my Northside light rail map. Looks like Liberty St. would be a major transfer point between the two lines.  Also moved the theoretically underground UC Corry St. station to Calhoun:

 

This is a plan for a light rail line. Useful transit has to value someone's time and to do that it must maintain a higher average speed when traveling over longer distances. This gets the streetcar/light rail vehicle (the same CAF Urbos 3 trains we've already bought) out of mixed traffic ASAP by going though the tunnel. After that, route design is a trade off of planning worthwhile stops and still connecting things with a straight non-winding route. As the zoo is not "on the way" but instead would require a detour that would probably travel through slower mixed traffic streets slowing down overall times I don't think it makes sense to go there. Also the zoo is not the high value destination it appears to be because it's not going to drive high ridership on cold January days like today and that's the case for 4 winter months out of the year as well. That being said if it was "on the way" then by all means put a stop there.

 

My thinking is this would have to have dedicated lanes on Jefferson and MLK even. The average speed must be kept high to still be useful traveling in between neighborhoods, not just within them. (Within a neighborhood, like the downtown streetcar, a different set of principles apply, you're trying to provide "access" with a high frequency circulator.)

 

Maintaining a higher speed is critical if we ever go "beyond Xavier" as well (along Wasson Way or up I-71) so we simply can't have large portions of the line be slower moving mixed traffic streetcar.

 

I'm guessing part of the MLK alignment is on a bridge

^having trouble conceptualizing that. Is that because of the sudden dip in elevation?

^having trouble conceptualizing that. Is that because of the sudden dip in elevation?

 

Yes, and it may need to be elevated much of the entire length from Vine to Reading on account of the induced traffic from the new interchange. One traffic engineer told me MLK is almost certain to seize up, especially in bad weather, when that interchange opens.

I chatted several years ago with someone who worked on OKI's light rail study in the late 90s.  He said they wanted to bridge Eden Ave. and then do underpasses at Highland, Burnett, Harvey, and Reading.  With an underpass at Reading they could then get down to the grade of the old railroad ROW a little easier.  There's really a possibility to do an almost completely grade-separated route between the north portal of the tunnel all the way to Reading with the only really big project being an underpass at the messy Jefferson/Vine/MLK intersection.  The line could travel in the grassy strip between Jefferson and UC's sports bubble and Turner Hall, then run on the north side of MLK where there are no buildings obstructing its construction other than perhaps the Piedmont Apts between Eden and Highland, which I think I heard are going to be redeveloped anyway. 

^But people often walk past bus lines to get to streetcar or subway lines in those cities that have large rail networks.  They walk past the bus lines because they don't know that they exist and if they do because they don't know where they go.  In Boston people often ride the T into Downtown Boston and then back out on another branch rather than ride any number of very frequent crosstown bus routes. 

 

Though IMO a lot of that has to do with the slow speed of the routes.  Particularly in a smaller city like Boston with an overpowered train system (by American standards the coverage is probablt the best I've seen) its probably faster to go downtown then transfer than it is to take the crosstown route in a lot of cases.

 

Chicago people do the same, though the size of the city makes it very hard to do in a lot of cases.  I'm kind of wondering if google maps has changed this dynamic too because google will tell you the most efficient route to take...

The Boston T is pretty hit-or-miss, with the best sections of the lines being in the famous parts of the city.  The core of the system is the green line (converted streetcars) and the north section of the red line (Harvard, Alewife).  The orange and blue lines are almost completely useless from a TOD standpoint (station locations are in odd locations like railroad gulches and underneath I-93, not beneath main streets) and the south half of the red line is just about as bad as the orange line so far as unwalkable station locations. 

 

The new streetcar systems have generally been pretty successful because the station locations are *right in* the business districts, not in some railroad gulch 1,500 feet away like so many new light rail systems.  Every station on the new Cincinnati streetcar line will be a "good" station.  The whole problem with light rail and rapid transit systems is that often half (or eve more than half) of the stations on a line compromise their location in order to build the line out further -- often to another set of mediocre station locations. 

The Boston T is pretty hit-or-miss, with the best sections of the lines being in the famous parts of the city.  The core of the system is the green line (converted streetcars) and the north section of the red line (Harvard, Alewife).  The orange and blue lines are almost completely useless from a TOD standpoint (station locations are in odd locations like railroad gulches and underneath I-93, not beneath main streets) and the south half of the red line is just about as bad as the orange line so far as unwalkable station locations. 

 

The new streetcar systems have generally been pretty successful because the station locations are *right in* the business districts, not in some railroad gulch 1,500 feet away like so many new light rail systems.  Every station on the new Cincinnati streetcar line will be a "good" station.  The whole problem with light rail and rapid transit systems is that often half (or eve more than half) of the stations on a line compromise their location in order to build the line out further -- often to another set of mediocre station locations. 

 

Describes St. Louis's Metrolink to a T where its always a 10-15 min walk to where you are going.

I chatted several years ago with someone who worked on OKI's light rail study in the late 90s.  He said they wanted to bridge Eden Ave. and then do underpasses at Highland, Burnett, Harvey, and Reading.  With an underpass at Reading they could then get down to the grade of the old railroad ROW a little easier.  There's really a possibility to do an almost completely grade-separated route between the north portal of the tunnel all the way to Reading with the only really big project being an underpass at the messy Jefferson/Vine/MLK intersection.  The line could travel in the grassy strip between Jefferson and UC's sports bubble and Turner Hall, then run on the north side of MLK where there are no buildings obstructing its construction other than perhaps the Piedmont Apts between Eden and Highland, which I think I heard are going to be redeveloped anyway.

 

This concerns me- it seems like we have a window of opportunity to secure a right of way to the north of MLK Drive but it may be closing quickly with the planned developments for that area.  Has anyone talked to the Uptown Consortium about this possibility?

The Boston T is pretty hit-or-miss, with the best sections of the lines being in the famous parts of the city.  The core of the system is the green line (converted streetcars) and the north section of the red line (Harvard, Alewife).  The orange and blue lines are almost completely useless from a TOD standpoint (station locations are in odd locations like railroad gulches and underneath I-93, not beneath main streets) and the south half of the red line is just about as bad as the orange line so far as unwalkable station locations. 

 

The new streetcar systems have generally been pretty successful because the station locations are *right in* the business districts, not in some railroad gulch 1,500 feet away like so many new light rail systems.  Every station on the new Cincinnati streetcar line will be a "good" station.  The whole problem with light rail and rapid transit systems is that often half (or eve more than half) of the stations on a line compromise their location in order to build the line out further -- often to another set of mediocre station locations. 

 

I disagree.  The Blue line serves the Aquarium and busy/lively wharf area.  The Blue Line also goes directly to Revere Beach.  The south Orange Line directly serves Chinatown and there are some significant TOD locations near it.  While I think Boston made a mistake in tearing down the old Orange Line el down Washington Street, since the el cut through the heart of central Boston (and the relocated Orange Line is off to the side, duplicating the Green Line's Heath branch) I still find it useful.

 

My biggest beef with the T is that the Green Line is just too congested and slow.  Too many busy routes funnel into a single set of tracks.  This may be the oldest section of subway in America, but it's past time to upgrade.

I chatted several years ago with someone who worked on OKI's light rail study in the late 90s.  He said they wanted to bridge Eden Ave. and then do underpasses at Highland, Burnett, Harvey, and Reading.  With an underpass at Reading they could then get down to the grade of the old railroad ROW a little easier.  There's really a possibility to do an almost completely grade-separated route between the north portal of the tunnel all the way to Reading with the only really big project being an underpass at the messy Jefferson/Vine/MLK intersection.  The line could travel in the grassy strip between Jefferson and UC's sports bubble and Turner Hall, then run on the north side of MLK where there are no buildings obstructing its construction other than perhaps the Piedmont Apts between Eden and Highland, which I think I heard are going to be redeveloped anyway.

 

This concerns me- it seems like we have a window of opportunity to secure a right of way to the north of MLK Drive but it may be closing quickly with the planned developments for that area.  Has anyone talked to the Uptown Consortium about this possibility?

 

I would hope that the Uptown Consortium gets involved with this in a big way as the future of the Uptown area would benefit.  I think that the Uptown Consortium also needs to put pressure on city council since the mayor is non-rail and if they can get the ear of enough of them, things can get done.  A group like the Uptown Consortium should be able to get their attention.  Securing right of way should not be a huge task.   

The Uptown Consortium isn't even thinking about transit in any meaningful way right now. They are completely focused on the MLK interchange.

 

 

 

I would hope that the Uptown Consortium gets involved with this in a big way as the future of the Uptown area would benefit.  I think that the Uptown Consortium also needs to put pressure on city council since the mayor is non-rail and if they can get the ear of enough of them, things can get done.  A group like the Uptown Consortium should be able to get their attention.  Securing right of way should not be a huge task.   

 

The best solution would be to do a significant rebuild of Jefferson and MLK which integrates light rail (possibly in the median) rather than threading a transit line where it can fit currently.  It would be a lot more expensive but could create a much more attractive streetscape.  Jefferson Ave. looks a lot better these days after the landscaped median was added back around 2012, but I'm sure there is a way to do rail in a landscaped reservation there that wouldn't significantly impede vehicles. 

 

Same thing with MLK -- I remember when it was a regular 4-lane street up until the rebuild, which I think was in or around 1997.  That's when the narrow median with the interstate highway-type lights was added between Vine and Eden.  It's not hard to picture a much more attractive streetscape where a transit line surfaces from a short tunnel under the big MLK/Jefferson/Vine intersection into a median in the center of MLK on the downslope and then immediately bridges Eden Ave. on a nice bridge with a fairly long span that enables good visibility at the intersection for drivers.  This bridge could be a mini-landmark for the neighborhood, and a station would possibly be located on it not unlike a lot of the new light rail stations in Los Angeles. 

 

 

The Boston T is pretty hit-or-miss, with the best sections of the lines being in the famous parts of the city.  The core of the system is the green line (converted streetcars) and the north section of the red line (Harvard, Alewife).  The orange and blue lines are almost completely useless from a TOD standpoint (station locations are in odd locations like railroad gulches and underneath I-93, not beneath main streets) and the south half of the red line is just about as bad as the orange line so far as unwalkable station locations. 

 

The new streetcar systems have generally been pretty successful because the station locations are *right in* the business districts, not in some railroad gulch 1,500 feet away like so many new light rail systems.  Every station on the new Cincinnati streetcar line will be a "good" station.  The whole problem with light rail and rapid transit systems is that often half (or eve more than half) of the stations on a line compromise their location in order to build the line out further -- often to another set of mediocre station locations. 

 

I disagree.  The Blue line serves the Aquarium and busy/lively wharf area.  The Blue Line also goes directly to Revere Beach.  The south Orange Line directly serves Chinatown and there are some significant TOD locations near it.  While I think Boston made a mistake in tearing down the old Orange Line el down Washington Street, since the el cut through the heart of central Boston (and the relocated Orange Line is off to the side, duplicating the Green Line's Heath branch) I still find it useful.

 

My biggest beef with the T is that the Green Line is just too congested and slow.  Too many busy routes funnel into a single set of tracks.  This may be the oldest section of subway in America, but it's past time to upgrade.

 

I remember a pretty significant number of Orange Line stations having absolutely nothing around them...that was in 2002 so maybe things have changed.  That line of course was built on (and under) a strip of land that had been demolished for an expressway that ended up getting cancelled.  But north of downtown, the orange line was again mediocre, from what I remember.  One of the stations was literally in line and directly underneath an elevated section of I-93 in an industrial wasteland.  I don't think I ever got off the train at the Aquarium station so I don't know what was up there.  But past Logan, the blue line didn't travel into neighborhood business districts from what I remember.  It was sort of like an interurban or commuter line past that point, no doubt built in place of some wimpy industrial line that had no business back in the early 1900s. 

 

Compare all of those to the Red Line Alewife extension that opened around 1983...really one of the most incredible transit projects nobody talks about.  That was a hugely expensive project that dug deep bored tunnels from the previous terminus at Harvard to Davis and Porter squares, then to the big park & ride at Alewife.  It put the stations right in the ideal locations -- right beneath those squares, which are each pretty similar to Oakley Square or Lookout Square in Cincinnati.  Ridership on that part of the Red Line is huge, and the rebuilt Harvard station is a really interesting and attractive design. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Boston T is pretty hit-or-miss, with the best sections of the lines being in the famous parts of the city.  The core of the system is the green line (converted streetcars) and the north section of the red line (Harvard, Alewife).  The orange and blue lines are almost completely useless from a TOD standpoint (station locations are in odd locations like railroad gulches and underneath I-93, not beneath main streets) and the south half of the red line is just about as bad as the orange line so far as unwalkable station locations. 

 

The new streetcar systems have generally been pretty successful because the station locations are *right in* the business districts, not in some railroad gulch 1,500 feet away like so many new light rail systems.  Every station on the new Cincinnati streetcar line will be a "good" station.  The whole problem with light rail and rapid transit systems is that often half (or eve more than half) of the stations on a line compromise their location in order to build the line out further -- often to another set of mediocre station locations. 

 

I disagree.  The Blue line serves the Aquarium and busy/lively wharf area.  The Blue Line also goes directly to Revere Beach.  The south Orange Line directly serves Chinatown and there are some significant TOD locations near it.  While I think Boston made a mistake in tearing down the old Orange Line el down Washington Street, since the el cut through the heart of central Boston (and the relocated Orange Line is off to the side, duplicating the Green Line's Heath branch) I still find it useful.

 

My biggest beef with the T is that the Green Line is just too congested and slow.  Too many busy routes funnel into a single set of tracks.  This may be the oldest section of subway in America, but it's past time to upgrade.

 

I remember a pretty significant number of Orange Line stations having absolutely nothing around them...that was in 2002 so maybe things have changed.  That line of course was built on (and under) a strip of land that had been demolished for an expressway that ended up getting cancelled.  But north of downtown, the orange line was again mediocre, from what I remember.  One of the stations was literally in line and directly underneath an elevated section of I-93 in an industrial wasteland.  I don't think I ever got off the train at the Aquarium station so I don't know what was up there.  But past Logan, the blue line didn't travel into neighborhood business districts from what I remember.  It was sort of like an interurban or commuter line past that point, no doubt built in place of some wimpy industrial line that had no business back in the early 1900s. 

 

Compare all of those to the Red Line Alewife extension that opened around 1983...really one of the most incredible transit projects nobody talks about.  That was a hugely expensive project that dug deep bored tunnels from the previous terminus at Harvard to Davis and Porter squares, then to the big park & ride at Alewife.  It put the stations right in the ideal locations -- right beneath those squares, which are each pretty similar to Oakley Square or Lookout Square in Cincinnati.  Ridership on that part of the Red Line is huge, and the rebuilt Harvard station is a really interesting and attractive design. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The resemblance between porter square especially and the east side squares of Cincinnati is uncanny, I remember getting out of the subway there and thinking that this is what Cincinnati would be like if it had subway service... (along with the extra dense TOD that also came along with it).

The thing that's so amazing about all of this is that Murray Seasongood, the man who killed Cincinnati's half-completed subway project upon his election to the Mayor's seat in 1926, AND John Cranley, who almost succeeded in killing Cincinnati's under-construction streetcar project, each attended Harvard.  On top of that Cincinnati's subway was designed to Boston's red line specs.  So these guys absolutely, positively knew the benefits of high quality public transportation, yet willfully acted against it. 

The Boston T is pretty hit-or-miss, with the best sections of the lines being in the famous parts of the city.  The core of the system is the green line (converted streetcars) and the north section of the red line (Harvard, Alewife).  The orange and blue lines are almost completely useless from a TOD standpoint (station locations are in odd locations like railroad gulches and underneath I-93, not beneath main streets) and the south half of the red line is just about as bad as the orange line so far as unwalkable station locations. 

 

The new streetcar systems have generally been pretty successful because the station locations are *right in* the business districts, not in some railroad gulch 1,500 feet away like so many new light rail systems.  Every station on the new Cincinnati streetcar line will be a "good" station.  The whole problem with light rail and rapid transit systems is that often half (or eve more than half) of the stations on a line compromise their location in order to build the line out further -- often to another set of mediocre station locations. 

 

I disagree.  The Blue line serves the Aquarium and busy/lively wharf area.  The Blue Line also goes directly to Revere Beach.  The south Orange Line directly serves Chinatown and there are some significant TOD locations near it.  While I think Boston made a mistake in tearing down the old Orange Line el down Washington Street, since the el cut through the heart of central Boston (and the relocated Orange Line is off to the side, duplicating the Green Line's Heath branch) I still find it useful.

 

My biggest beef with the T is that the Green Line is just too congested and slow.  Too many busy routes funnel into a single set of tracks.  This may be the oldest section of subway in America, but it's past time to upgrade.

 

I remember a pretty significant number of Orange Line stations having absolutely nothing around them...that was in 2002 so maybe things have changed.  That line of course was built on (and under) a strip of land that had been demolished for an expressway that ended up getting cancelled.  But north of downtown, the orange line was again mediocre, from what I remember.  One of the stations was literally in line and directly underneath an elevated section of I-93 in an industrial wasteland.  I don't think I ever got off the train at the Aquarium station so I don't know what was up there.  But past Logan, the blue line didn't travel into neighborhood business districts from what I remember.  It was sort of like an interurban or commuter line past that point, no doubt built in place of some wimpy industrial line that had no business back in the early 1900s. 

 

Compare all of those to the Red Line Alewife extension that opened around 1983...really one of the most incredible transit projects nobody talks about.  That was a hugely expensive project that dug deep bored tunnels from the previous terminus at Harvard to Davis and Porter squares, then to the big park & ride at Alewife.  It put the stations right in the ideal locations -- right beneath those squares, which are each pretty similar to Oakley Square or Lookout Square in Cincinnati.  Ridership on that part of the Red Line is huge, and the rebuilt Harvard station is a really interesting and attractive design. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The resemblance between porter square especially and the east side squares of Cincinnati is uncanny, I remember getting out of the subway there and thinking that this is what Cincinnati would be like if it had subway service... (along with the extra dense TOD that also came along with it).

 

Wow. I wasn't aware that this was a more recent extension. The way they integrated the Red Line and the Fitchburg Line together is flawless.

Yeah, there is that rapid transit/commuter connection there, then the underground rapid transit/electric bus connection at Harvard.  It appeared that those buses ran with overhead electric for their entire routes in order to operate in the relatively short but very convenient bus tunnel in Harvard Square.  The storage yards for the red line used to be in Harvard Square and after the extension the maintenance and storage all moved south of Dorchester, on part of the line that didn't exist when the original subway opened.  Harvard University took over the land where the yard had been and built a few buildings on it.   

 

What's amazing is how busy the Harvard station is, when Harvard's total enrollment is a fraction of many state universities around the country.  I think their total undergrad/grad enrollment is around 12,000 whereas UC's Clifton campus is at least double that and OSU is at least 3X as large.  At the same time, Harvard had basically zero parking garages from what I remember. 

 

Boston's Red Line -- the rapid transit line after which Cincinnati's Rapid Transit Loop was modeled, recently announced that daily weekday ridership has reached 280,000. 

http://www.bostonglobe.com/metro/2016/01/25/state-red-line-crowded-late-need-repair/8MPiHXV8BwhMXpULICneCL/story.html?s_campaign=email_BG_TodaysHeadline&s_campaign=

 

Today the Red Line has roughly twice as many route miles as the 16-mile Rapid Transit Loop and the stations were expanded to handle 6 cars instead of the original 4.  In order to expand Cincinnati's stations, the Brighton station would have had to close (or be one of those odd stations where passengers in two cars can't get off the train -- that situation actually exists on some New York City commuter routes).

 

But given those statistics, I think it's safe to say that the 16-mile, 16 station Rapid Transit Loop would have been carrying at least 100,000 riders per day in a healthy circa-2016 Cincinnati, or more than Metro's current daily bus ridership. 

 

 

 

Guess what I just learned:

 

http://www.cincymuseum.org/programs/heritage

 

2016 Subway Tours

 

Tours of the Cincinnati subway tunnel are no longer permitted by the City of Cincinnati due to a risk assessment performed in the spring of 2015. Please take advantage of one of our other fantastic tour experiences we have planned for 2016.

 

This is something that city should be working hard to PROMOTE not bury.  I don't know the reason or rationale behind this study, but I smell a Rat I mean a Cranley.

Eh. The city has almost no incentive to bring tour groups down there or allow tour groups down there. It's a liability to the city. I wish they didn't stop the tours, but I'm actually a little surprised they let them do it in the first place.

Guess what I just learned:

 

http://www.cincymuseum.org/programs/heritage

 

2016 Subway Tours

 

Tours of the Cincinnati subway tunnel are no longer permitted by the City of Cincinnati due to a risk assessment performed in the spring of 2015. Please take advantage of one of our other fantastic tour experiences we have planned for 2016.

 

This is something that city should be working hard to PROMOTE not bury.  I don't know the reason or rationale behind this study, but I smell a Rat I mean a Cranley.

 

While I wouldn't put it past Cranley to do something like that... those tunnels are seriously under maintenanced and now house a large amount of electrical and hydro infrastructure. There may be some credence in that risk assessment.

At the same time there should be some serious effort to make this a tourist attraction!  Other cities would kill to have an asset they can sell to tourists like this!

 

Look at how successful the Seattle underground is for instance.

At the same time there should be some serious effort to make this a tourist attraction!  Other cities would kill to have an asset they can sell to tourists like this!

 

Look at how successful the Seattle underground is for instance.

 

There are plenty of underground tours in Cincinnati that go into crypts and lagering cellars already. I agree it would be cool to open up the subway tunnels to regular tours, but it doesn't seem worth the risk to the city to allow dozens of people down there every weekend.

 

It's not going to provide a noticeable boost in tourism to Cincinnati by opening the tunnels. First of all: they are much more of a local interest. Second: The tunnels themselves don't look that interesting. As a local I'm dying to go down there, but I wouldn't travel to Cincinnati to see those tunnels. They are nothing like the MTA City Hall Station. It's not like they are elaborate stations like DC but abandoned. They would mostly get locals to come down and some tourists who were already going to Cincinnati.

The city invested heavily in the past few years to do tunnel roof replacements along Central Parkway, notably due to leaks, but I'm not aware of other serious structural issues.

At the same time there should be some serious effort to make this a tourist attraction!  Other cities would kill to have an asset they can sell to tourists like this!

 

Look at how successful the Seattle underground is for instance.

 

There are plenty of underground tours in Cincinnati that go into crypts and lagering cellars already. I agree it would be cool to open up the subway tunnels to regular tours, but it doesn't seem worth the risk to the city to allow dozens of people down there every weekend.

 

It's not going to provide a noticeable boost in tourism to Cincinnati by opening the tunnels. First of all: they are much more of a local interest. Second: The tunnels themselves don't look that interesting. As a local I'm dying to go down there, but I wouldn't travel to Cincinnati to see those tunnels. They are nothing like the MTA City Hall Station. It's not like they are elaborate stations like DC but abandoned. They would mostly get locals to come down and some tourists who were already going to Cincinnati.

 

Frankly the Seattle underground doesn't look that interesting either, (the lagering tunnels are still cooler) but it generates for Seattle both positive buzz making the city more visable and I'm sure generates a lot of revenue for that region.  If your city wants to be taken seriously as a place people want to visit you need to have a lot of stuff available for people to check out.  The more cool things you have like converted churches into breweries, historic neighborhoods like OTR and East Walnut hills, lagering tunnels the more likely people are going to want to take the time/money/effort to visit your city.  Cincinnati should have way more heritage tourism than it should given what it has, but its done not enough to exploit what it has.

 

The Seattle underground is a local interest thing, but if you notice its also captured national interest.  People like unique things, Cincinnati has an abundance of unique things that it likes to bury or take out of sight >:(

 

Case in point from a national perspective (and yes it gets facts wrong about the subway): http://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/cincinnati-built-a-subway-system-100-years-ago-but-never-used-it

^Part of the problem with subway tours is that the guides inevitably get the facts wrong, often way wrong. 

 

I made it on one of the city tours. We entered the Race Street Station, which is awesome. The stairs have no handrails. The platforms have no handrails. There is water and debris on the floor. Everything is dark. While on the tour, I was thinking, "What if someone falls off this stair and gets hurt?" Nevertheless, people loved it. When the tour guide said "The tunnel goes on for another two miles, but we are going to turn around here," people were disappointed.

 

One guy said that commercial caves like Mammoth Cave attracts people like crazy. All we need is some lights and safety improvements and we would have an instant attraction. Well, I guess it would take more than that, but you get the idea.

^Part of the problem with subway tours is that the guides inevitably get the facts wrong, often way wrong. 

 

You should be a tour guide Jake ;)

Lots of people asking for rail on the OKI 2040 survey results http://2040.oki.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/03/full_document.pdf

From the front page of The Daily Beast today:

 

http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2016/04/10/could-trains-ever-run-on-cincinnati-s-secret-subway.html

 

Very cool, jmecklenborg[/member]

^Great work by Jake, as usual, who is THE Cincy subway historian.

WVXU is doing either a half hour or an hour on the subway today at 1pm or 1:30.  I was a little confused by the email they sent me but I do know that Dan Hurley and I will be in-studio guests at 1:30. 

I got caught on a phone call. How'd it go?

Here is the podcast:

 

http://wvxu.org/post/history-and-future-cincinnatis-abandoned-subway-tunnels

 

It's only 25 minutes long so there wasn't time to get in-depth.  The first caller was a prank caller.  That call was sometime between minutes 10 and 20. 

 

Travis and I are going to do a longer urbancincy podcast sometime this month so we'll be able to get deeper into the subject. 

 

I thoroughly enjoyed that- nice job to you and Dan! I enjoy Hurley's brute honesty. The point he made about Cincinnati being psychologically small resonated with me, as I've had similar thoughts in the past. I think the subway/rapid transit loop would have grown our regional psychology a bit.

Here is the podcast:

 

http://wvxu.org/post/history-and-future-cincinnatis-abandoned-subway-tunnels

 

It's only 25 minutes long so there wasn't time to get in-depth.  The first caller was a prank caller. 

 

 

Which forum member do you think it was?

I listened to the podcast last night, good job Jake.  The other guy was insightful as well and I like how he talked about capitalizing on light rail, etc.

 

Haha and your answer to the troll guy was hilarious.  He was saying, "I love all the murals in the tunnels", and then you said "Oh you mean all the graffiti" or something similar.  And then he just started laughing like "See I gotchya!" then just hung up.  Hilarious.

John Schneider just linked to this very good article about how rail in Denver has developed over the last half century:

http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2016/05/what-works-denver-rail-system-growth-213905?paginate=false

 

This part makes me think of Cincinnati's West End and how CMHA has talked about tearing down the Stanley Rowe towers:

One of the best examples of this is the area around the 10th and Osage Station just south of the city center. The Denver Housing Authority wanted to replace the South Lincoln Homes, a distressed, low-slung 270-unit public housing project on 15 acres with mixed-income housing. The two key criteria critical to attracting middle- and market-rate tenants, DHA Director Ismael Guerrero says, were proximity to downtown and a light rail station, but they also wanted to ensure nobody was unwillingly displaced.

 

“This is a close-knit community and a lot of history, where people live for generations and have family close by,” Guerrero notes. “Residents told us they wanted to make sure that we weren’t just replacing housing but improving the quality of life.”

 

The result is Mariposa, a 900-unit development of energy-efficient three- to nine-story buildings with shops and office spaces mixed into a network of parks, bike paths and community gardens, some of them on land transferred by RTD to the city.

^The thing about redeveloping any of the housing projects in the West End is that there is no political will or funding for replacing the sheer numbers of units there. The projects do serve a function in providing housing that is desperately needed and the capital investment has already been made in them. There is also the concern about uprooting a community that was already traumatized once when the original neighborhood was torn down for I-75 and Queensgate. I'm not saying it will never happen but it would require an incredibly deft hand, compassion, and loads of cash.

Not sure where to put this (moderators, feel free to move to another thread if there's a more appropriate thread)... but it looks like a lot of work is being done on the train tracks down by the Gest and Linn intersection. They have scaffolding up all along the tracks.

 

Does anybody know what work is being done?

 

A rail group I belong to for Cincinnati is wondering as well. They cleaned up the lots and added fairly expensive scaffolding. This could be indicative of more extensive structural work - but you can't do much lifting of structural steel on scaffolds. And it's not needing painting...

Airport rail offers great opportunity

 

 

Today, going from downtown to Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky Airport via the Brent Spence Bridge often can be the most frustrating part of the trip. This irritation level will increase greatly from traffic-backups and long delays once construction begins on the bridge replacement and tolls are applied.

 

Read more:

http://www.bizjournals.com/cincinnati/news/2016/07/14/airport-rail-offers-great-opportunity.html