Also, in the early days of aviation no one knew what to expect in the future. The Cincinnati Metropolitan Master Plan of 1948 recommended 9 (!) airports to serve Cincinnati. All of them would have been smaller to serve smaller aircraft.

 

    It was assumed that aircraft ownership by private individuals would be widespread, like automobile ownership. Of course, we know that in addition to military and commercial cargo, most aircraft use is commercial passenger travel rather than private. Only a minority of people own their own planes.

 

    Numerous small airfields have disappeared. One of them became Northgate Mall.

 

    Today, CVG takes most of the big commercial flights, Lunken takes corporate jets and smaller commercial flights, and Blue Ash takes private owners. Lunken had every advantage in historical head starts; American Airlines was born at Lunken, and Lindburgh landed there. Lunken just didn't have room to expand and was subject to flooding.

 

    In the long run, I would count on airline traffic to do nothing but decline. Peak oil is real, and while there are so many unknowns, I can't imagine anything that will keep the airline industry alive. At least cars, rail vehicles, and ships can run on other sources of energy, such as electric batteries, electric wires, or coal. The only hope for airlines is to run on petroleum derived from coal, which will be necessarily more expensive than straight coal.

 

    CVG doesn't get enough traffic now to justify a rail connection to downtown. How would it ever justify one in the future? Also, one could argue that a connection to downtown would only shift business to downtown away from the airport area. Kentucky isn't likely to approve of that.

 

     

I'm starting to think we need to cut back on airports and have feeder rail lines from cities running into them. If the future is rail, that means we won't need as much air service.

 

Agreed... In the long term, assuming Union Terminal becomes a regional high-speed rail hub and a light rail line gets built between CVG and downtown Cincinnati, Cincinnati is fortunate in that it wouldn't take much to run a light rail shuttle train between CUT and CVG. Regional trains to Union Terminal could serve as feeders to long-distance flights to/from CVG, with a fairly short train ride connecting the two facilities, possibly even with through ticketing and baggage handling. This type of arrangement could put Cincinnati at a competitive advantage over other cities in the region.

 

While I think rail would eliminate the need for most regional puddle-jumper flights, long-distance flight isn't going away and I think CVG should still aggressively pursue those flights. It also wouldn't hurt if they got another airline to set up a hub operation there (Jet Blue?), instead of putting all their eggs in Delta's basket.

I *do* wonder how the 3-C will affect both CVG and DAY.  Why would we need 2 airports within 75 miles of each other if we could just choose the best price by rail?  Especially when high-speed rail comes into play.

^

It might make things more competetive, but I dont see this unless there is a good connection between the airport and the high-speed rail line.  The win-win is that air travel could become quite cheap from the metro area due to competing airports. 

 

 

 

  A rail connection to CVG is unlikely. The current passenger traffic doesn't support it, and air traffic is likely to decline from here. Plus, CVG would likely make more money on parking revenue anyway.

 

    Ironically, the airport train is the closest thing to rail transit that we have.

What airport train is that?

 

 

I think the two airports situation is another sign of this becoming a major metro area.  Examples would be the DC/Baltimore area with three airports, and LA, with four (LAX, Ontario, Burbank, and that airport in Orange County).  Cin-Day would be more like Washington/Baltimore, but without the major long distance airport in Dulles. CVG is Washington National + international flights while Dayton = Baltimore-Washington

If one wanted to select a local airport that could be connected to 3-C rail it would be Middletown since its so close to one of the 3-C ROWs.  Middletown could be upgraded to provide limited regional passenter air service, similar to Gary's airport up in Chicago.

 

 

The current passenger traffic doesn't support it...

 

The whole idea is to generate new passenger traffic by positioning Cincinnati to be a more convenient air-rail hub than other comparable cities in the region. Let's say some guy in Indiana wants to fly to London, and has to travel to either O'Hare or CVG via high-speed rail to do it. CVG should be doing everything in its power to make sure it's the more appealing option.

 

What airport train is that?

 

 

It's a people-mover that connects the Delta terminal to Concourses A and B. It runs on a concrete guideway and is pulled by a system of cables. Basically a horizontal elevator.

Ok, its like what they have  at DFW and Atlanta.

I was thinking they could do something like that with suburban high-speed rail stations to connect them to edge-city developement.

 

CVG doesn't get enough traffic now to justify a rail connection to downtown

 

If this were true, I'd doubt that we'd have the Airport Shuttle service that we do ... not to mention the amout of cabbies on 75 between 275 and Downtown.

 

http://www.tankbus.org/LinkClick.aspx?fileticket=Ml2je6HX92g%3d&tabid=72

 

  Given that we already have a highway, bus service to the airport is much less expensive than a new rail alignment between downtown and the airport.

 

 

Busses?  Ride Busses?  The streetcar proponents will tell you that no one will ride busses!!

Yes, but would they ride a train to Westchester, Middletown, or Dayton?

Given that we already have a highway, bus service to the airport is much less expensive than a new rail alignment between downtown and the airport.

 

A light rail line to CVG is already part of the OKI Regional Plan, and the Brent Spence reconstruction will preserve a light rail right-of-way through the cut-in-the-hill. There's a reason cities build rail lines to airports: Because it works and it makes the city more attractive as a travel destination. Two of NYC's three major airports have rail connections; LaGuardia has bus service but no rail. Guess which airports are easiest to get to, even if the physical distance is greater?

 

A few cities with airport-rail connections:

 

Cleveland - RTA Red Line

Portland, OR - MAX Light Rail

Chicago O'Hare - CTA Blue Line

Chicago Midway - CTA Orange Line

JFK - MTA subway and Long Island Rail Road (via AirTrain connection)

Newark - NJ Transit Commuter Rail (via AirTrain monorail)

Philadelphia - SEPTA Commuter Rail

Washington National - Metro subway

Boston Logan - MBTA Blue Line

Washington Dulles - Metro subway (under construction)

Denver - RTD Light Rail (proposed)

 

I'm probably missing a few more, and those are just American cities. (In developed countries overseas, building a rail line to the airport is simply a given and not even a matter of debate.) Point is, every single one of those airports likely had bus service before they built the rail link, but they knew the rail link was crucial for making the airport competitive.

 

Busses?  Ride Busses?  The streetcar proponents will tell you that no one will ride busses!!

 

Maybe we keep saying it because it's true. Hell, I'm the biggest mass transit advocate you'll find, but I'll go several blocks out of my way to take the train instead of a bus. I can't even remember the last time I rode a bus in NYC.

Have you been to CVG lately?

There's already TANK's 2X to the airport, which leaves about once per hour.  Problem is, it runs to I think 4th & Main downtown, meaning unless you live downtown it's inconvenient. If you live somewhere else in NK, you've got to come to downtown Cincinnati, then back across the river on another TANK bus. If you live somewhere in Cincinnati, you've got to transfer.  It easily turns into a bus trip of close to 2 hours because the 2X only runs once an hour, meaning you're going to have to hang around that street corner for a half hour or so on the way to and on the way back. 

 

Metromoves would have built 4 light rail lines in Hamilton county that would have transfered downtown to a frequent train to Florence and the airport.  It would have crushed the 2X's ridership.       

 

   

Atlanta's massive airport also has rail connection via MARTA which is currently being expanded with an additional southern line from my understanding.

Got news for you, LGA is the preferred airport to fly to NYC.  Certainly it is much easier to get to than JFK.  It's 20 minutes by cab from Midtown most times of the day.

 

Have you been to CVG lately?

 

Yes.

 

Got news for you, LGA is the preferred airport to fly to NYC.  Certainly it is much easier to get to than JFK.  It's 20 minutes by cab from Midtown most times of the day.

 

Not everybody lives in Midtown, and not everybody can afford a $26 cab ride. Maybe it's popular for business travelers who can get their cab fare expensed, but most people I know find it a royal pain in the ass to get to. LGA is actually my closest airport as the crow flies, but I find it much easier to take NJT to Newark or LIRR to JFK than to deal with the M60 bus crawling along 125th Street at a snail's pace.

 

Even so, there's a long-term plan to extend the JFK AirTrain to LaGuardia, and/or the N subway line from Astoria.

^ I'd think that $26 is a pretty conservative cost.

$26 base fare, plus $4.50 toll (if you use the Midtown tunnel or the Triboro) and tip.

^ I'd think that $26 is a pretty conservative cost.

 

I'll pay $1.75 to take an express bus from CVG than a $26 cab ride anyday.  (It's about the same cab fare from CVG to Downtown as it is from LGA to Midtown.)

When I fly to CVG, I rent a car. But if Cincinnati had a decent rail transit system with direct service to the airport, I'd be much less inclined to do so.

Well, I assume that you rent a car to get around quickly AFTER you arrive in the city.  I, however, see no need to burn $26.  I can take the 2X TANK from CVG to 4th + Main, walk 2 blocks, and get to virtually any neighborhood in the city.  Total cost of the 2X to Downtown and one fare plus one transfer:  $4. 

 

Some people still underestimate the Metro bus system, I believe.

 

Now, if you're going to Cincinnati on business, I can understand.  Otherwise, I'm not sympathetic.

Nobody is talking about burning $26 to get from CVG to downtown Cincinnati. That figure is from Midtown NYC to LaGuardia, and is used to compare ease of access to airports with rail transit vs. those without. If I had to choose between the $1.75 bus fare and $26 cab fare, then of course I'd take the bus (unless my employer or a client was picking up the tab).

 

But the bus only runs once an hour (Just miss it? then you get to hang around the airport for another 55 minutes), and hauling luggage onto a train is much easier than onto a bus. If I were staying at a hotel in downtown Cincinnati and if I didn't have plans to venture very far beyond downtown during my stay, then the 2X would make sense. But when I visit Cincy, I'm usually not staying downtown, and I'd rather spend my time visiting friends and family than waiting at bus stops or having to travel all the way downtown to make a transfer.

 

My point is that, for me anyway, rail transit to the airport is usually the make-or-break factor in deciding whether I need to rent a car or not. If I fly to Chicago, I don't rent a car because I can easily take the train to/from either airport, as well as get around within the city. Same with Washington, Boston, or Atlanta. Denver has light rail, but it doesn't go to the airport yet, so I still end up renting a car when I fly there.

 

Why would Chicago go through considerable expense to build the Blue Line to O'Hare and the Orange Line to Midway if existing bus service to the airports was sufficient?

>and not everybody can afford a $26 cab ride.

 

I've taken the bus from LaGuardia variously to whatever the nearby subway line is or the M125(?) across to my friend's apartment who lives in Harlem, which is faster than the subway. 

 

>ome people still underestimate the Metro bus system, I believe.

 

Here's the problem -- this bus does not run late on Sunday nights, and also if you wish to connect directly after work (I work downtown) you have to bring your luggage to work. When I lived in Boston that was no big deal.  But in Cincinnati people think you've come from Mars. 

^Oh, believe me.  I've had to take my luggage to class before.  Reminded me of the kids in high school with backpacks on wheels. :)

 

Points taken though, jmecklenborg and Living in Gin.  The 2X suits me well right now, although I acknowledge how the wait sucks.  Perhaps if I made (more) money, my opinion would be different.  However, I'm definitely not arguing that the 2X is suffcient such that rail is not necessary.  I do worry about the cost of a light rail spur to the airport in the future though, as there is little else to anchor such a line along the way.

>and not everybody can afford a $26 cab ride.

 

I've taken the bus from LaGuardia variously to whatever the nearby subway line is or the M125(?) across to my friend's apartment who lives in Harlem, which is faster than the subway.

 

It's quicker to take the bus from LaGuardia to Harlem and hop on either the 4/5/6 or 1/2/3 depending on if you need the east or west side of Manhattan.  This is still faster than taking the train from JFK to Manhattan which takes well over an hour and some sheer luck just to pull it off.

Meanwhile, back on I-75, The Dayton Daily News Op-Ed page waxes eloquent on the signifigance of outlet malls.  They make a good point that that old mega-mall proposal might have fared better nowaways:

 

Shopping Outlet a good use of I-75 Cooridor

 

 

Given that we already have a highway, bus service to the airport is much less expensive than a new rail alignment between downtown and the airport.

 

A light rail line to CVG is already part of the OKI Regional Plan, and the Brent Spence reconstruction will preserve a light rail right-of-way through the cut-in-the-hill. There's a reason cities build rail lines to airports: Because it works and it makes the city more attractive as a travel destination. Two of NYC's three major airports have rail connections; LaGuardia has bus service but no rail. Guess which airports are easiest to get to, even if the physical distance is greater?

 

A few cities with airport-rail connections:

 

Cleveland - RTA Red Line

Portland, OR - MAX Light Rail

Chicago O'Hare - CTA Blue Line

Chicago Midway - CTA Orange Line

JFK - MTA subway and Long Island Rail Road (via AirTrain connection)

Newark - NJ Transit Commuter Rail (via AirTrain monorail)

Philadelphia - SEPTA Commuter Rail

Washington National - Metro subway

Boston Logan - MBTA Blue Line

Washington Dulles - Metro subway (under construction)

Denver - RTD Light Rail (proposed)

 

I'm probably missing a few more, and those are just American cities. (In developed countries overseas, building a rail line to the airport is simply a given and not even a matter of debate.) Point is, every single one of those airports likely had bus service before they built the rail link, but they knew the rail link was crucial for making the airport competitive.

 

Busses? Ride Busses? The streetcar proponents will tell you that no one will ride busses!!

 

Maybe we keep saying it because it's true. Hell, I'm the biggest mass transit advocate you'll find, but I'll go several blocks out of my way to take the train instead of a bus. I can't even remember the last time I rode a bus in NYC.

 

Current construction of the 'Silver Line' is only to Reston, VA.  There still aren't enough funds to build out to Dulles yet. So it's more 'proposed' than 'under construction' at this point. Just FYI.

They might have been able to built out to Dulles in one phase if they had chosen to build it as light rail instead of metro.  This is the problem with heavy rail -- it starts getting really uneconomical out in thinly populated suburbs and for distant airport runs like this one. 

That and the expense of running the system through Tyson's Corner, which has a lot of secret gov't infrastructure that has to be dealt with.

Lets try to keep this discussion on topic before it veers too far off.

It's relevant because there's no 50 mile heavy rail line anywhere in the world.  New York's A train is probably the longest, at around 35 miles.  Most are 20 miles or shorter. 

 

Light rail for such routes is in trouble because the FTA is not allowing light rail lines to parallel active freight lines without some ridiculous spacing between them, something like 25 feet.  This makes commuter rail for such trips more viable in terms of ROW acquisition alone, since the city approaches will be tough to do as light rail without elevated or tunneling. 

 

 

Back on topic:  Connect the dots:

 

 

 

 

 

….and it doesn’t even include Union Centre.

 

 

^ The above 'vision' was actually created and published a couple of years ago.

 

What's interesting to me is how they just arbitrarily penciled in the 'yellow' commercial zone some 3 mile on either side of I-75.  Now, I have seen more detail plans of this that actually have a more refined commercial zone as you drill down to more detail levels, but the fact remains that someone came in and said ' hey, let's take all the land 3 miles on either side of I-75 and make it all commercial.  Now you local planners get to work making that a reality".

 

I live in that area, and I and a lot of the people who live near me do not agree with this vision.  We stoop up repeatedly at county planning meetings and protested it.  We wrote letters, had conversations, pushed back on the plan (on the local level).  In the end, we were told "So what! We don't care! This is the plan the county commissioners want and this is what's going to happen."

 

So, in a sense, this is very heavy-handed top-down planning at the expense of the people living there. A lot of that yellow commercial space on either side of I-75 is currently zoned agriculture/residential.  People bought houses with that zoning in mind.  Now the local governments are going to just change it as they see fit, regardless of what the neighbors think.  They are developing tools to do this - local port authorities to aid in acquisition, 'Overlay" zoning to aid in the rezoning effort, new road infrastructure to push the development onto people when the road expansions are not really needed for the existing traffic flow.

 

 

^

Yes, this was from a .ppt by the Butler & Warren County port authorities.  I didn't know the date on it.  But I thought it was interesting as an example of the two counties working together on something.

 

 

I'm still doing research on this, but I can tell you that the idea of commercial/industrial along I-75 goes pretty far back.  I'll be posting more on this over time as I need to get some sources via Ohiolink.

 

What you are describing re the county comission calls to mind the I-675 story from 1970s Dayton, local power structure forcing their agenda.

 

The Liberty twp interchange opens next week. 8 months ahead of schedule.

The Liberty twp interchange opens next week. 8 months ahead of schedule.

 

I drove from 75 N to Veterans Highway W last weekend and it seemed like it was about finished.  New traffic signals were blinking and ready to go.

Glad it's ahead of schedule, but still see no point to this intersection as there is one at Cin-Day and 129 less than half a mile away that is constructed for extremely high traffic volumes.

This new interchange is to relieve the traffic congestion at the Tylersville Rd exit, which is 1 mile south of this new interchange.  The Tylersville rd can back up well onto (northbound) I-75 during the evening rush hour.

 

The goal is to have a full-interchange at sR129.  However, that appears to not be possible.  So they took a parrallel road (Hamilton-Mason, now being renamed 'Liberty Way') that is about 400' south of 129 and made it the full interchange, leaving sr129 alone.  This new intechange creates a direct connection to Cox Road to the east of I-75. 

 

The new full interchange also fit nicely into the planned Liberty Town Center which was to sit adjacent to I-75 (on the west side, where the water tower is), between sr129 and the newly renamed Liberty way.  This interchange would feed traffic right into that development.  However, that development has fallen through for now.

 

Make no mistake, although the proposed Liberty Town Center would have benefitted from this interchange, the real purpose behind the interchange is access to land East of I-75.  The existing golf course is now prime commercial land.  And linking the interchange to Cox rd ties directly into the commercial/retail district of Cox/Tylersville Rd.  And it provided easy access for the upscale residential developments just outside these commercial/retail districts.

 

The county really wants to develop all land along Cox rd. to be commercial/retail.  And it want to extend cox rd further north to end right into the new outlet mall.

 

 

I have nothing substantive to add here, but wanted to mention that last night I was on a flight that followed the southwest Ohio-born map/geography nerd's dream route right past Cincinnati and Dayton. And even knowing what I know about the region, I was quite surprised at how connected Cincinnati and Dayton look from 30,000 feet at night. Wish I'd had my good camera accessible to try to get a picture.

^ from what i saw on the today show this morning, it looks like toledo has more worries with the latter!  :police:

 

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/33270591/ns/us_news-crime_and_courts/

 

 

I was going to talk about the throwing stones in glass houses but that's just a given ;).

This new interchange is to relieve the traffic congestion at the Tylersville Rd exit, which is 1 mile south of this new interchange. The Tylersville rd can back up well onto (northbound) I-75 during the evening rush hour.

 

I had thought this interchange was built specifically for economical purposes, but I could be mistaken. 

I find it funny that they look at the success of Union Center(first new interchange in SW Ohio in 30 years) and think they can duplicated everywhere.  Eg.... Liberty interchange and now the Austin Rd interchange. And i've heard talks of another one north of JESUS.

I had thought this interchange was built specifically for economical purposes, but I could be mistaken.

 

I think economic development was the real reason it was built.  But the local polititions point out that it should relieve some of the Tylersville Rd traffic, so they claim that as a "reason".  In reality, you are right.  The "traffic" angle is just a cover.

 

I read an article about the new interchange opening ahead of schedule some 2 weeks ago, and they specifically mentioned the traffic angle.