^ Why isn't the feds matching 90-10 like they do on highway projects?

This brings the funding to about 86 million? Does that sound right?

 

Yes, the Cincinnati Streetcar project has secured $86.5M out of the $128M needed, or 67.5% of the total funding.  There is another round of TRAC funding, TIGER grants, Urban Circulator grants and New/Small Starts all still on the table from my understanding.

Not to be greedy or anything, but if we were to get funding early on that satisfies the remaining amount for phase 1, could we get additional funding that could be applied for phase 2, 3, ...?  I ask because I'm unsure of how the funding applications were set up and if there were any clauses the disqualified Cincinnati if the first phase gets fully funded early.

Not to be greedy or anything, but if we were to get funding early on that satisfies the remaining amount for phase 1, could we get additional funding that could be applied for phase 2, 3, ...? I ask because I'm unsure of how the funding applications were set up and if there were any clauses the disqualified Cincinnati if the first phase gets fully funded early.

We'll be applying later this year to the state and Feds for additional funds to build out the entire Uptown circulator system.

FYI, Michael Earl Patton is trying to be a rail planner on the Beacon site again.

I love how he quotes Central Parkway as a "dream road," and today it's a dead zone operating at about 30% of lane capacity.

This is the same Michael Earl Patton who once claimed that streetcars are unable to turn corners.

A brief article from the enquirer for the funding today.

 

http://news.cincinnati.com/article/20100513/NEWS0108/5140362/+19M+more+for+streetcar

 

They had it on the website for under an hour and now you have to search for it.

 

I can't help but notice that while Cincinnati continued to push hard for their streetcar Columbus city leaders have done next to nothing ever since the streetcar plan was shot down. There are some more bike racks in neighborhoods along High, but virtually nothing on any other major road outside of Downtown (except for where I requested them). There has been some designated motorized two-wheel vehicle parking, but again only in gentrified neighborhoods along High St. There are no designated spots for microcars, but they're spending tens of millions to add lanes on sprawling arterial roads for high-speed traffic even though city council passed a resolution for Complete Streets. It's good to see cities in Ohio that prioritize implementing real alternatives to cars rather than just doing the bare minimum to merely appear progressive. I look forward to riding your streetcar while I stick with DIY transportation here, which I'm happy with rather than wait who knows how much longer for rail. Maybe city leaders here will take note at some point.

 

 

People would have to be stupid to vote to turn down federal money we already have in hand.

 

I take it you haven't been following the 3C rail debate??

I can't help but notice that while Cincinnati continued to push hard for their streetcar Columbus city leaders have done next to nothing ever since the streetcar plan was shot down. There are some more bike racks in neighborhoods along High, but virtually nothing on any other major road outside of Downtown (except for where I requested them). There has been some designated motorized two-wheel vehicle parking, but again only in gentrified neighborhoods along High St. There are no designated spots for microcars, but they're spending tens of millions to add lanes on sprawling arterial roads for high-speed traffic even though city council passed a resolution for Complete Streets. It's good to see cities in Ohio that prioritize implementing real alternatives to cars rather than just doing the bare minimum to merely appear progressive. I look forward to riding your streetcar while I stick with DIY transportation here, which I'm happy with rather than wait who knows how much longer for rail. Maybe city leaders here will take note at some point.

 

 

 

The Columbus Dispatch strikes again!

Coverage of Cincinnati (and Tampa) streetcar projects in a rail industry publication...

 

Streetcar plans advance in Cincinnati, Tampa

 

The Cincinnati City Council, in a 6-2 vote Wednesday, approved a $64 million bond measure to generate local funds for a $128 million streetcar project, following the recommendation made Monday by a finance committee to approve the plan.

For more on this story, visit:

http://www.railwayage.com/breaking-news/cincinnati-city-council-pushes-streetcar-plan-forward.html

 

A final public hearing was scheduled last night on a proposed one-cent sales tax referendum before Hillsborough County (Fla.) commissioners decide whether to advance plans for light rail transit in Tampa. The sales tax, if approved by voters in November, would be used to fund LRT construction.

For more on this story, visit:

Railway Age Breaking News

http://www.railwayage.com/breaking-news/tampa-area-weighs-two-lrt-route-options.html

When streetcar's here, I predict you'll like it

BY LAURE QUINLIVAN • MAY 14, 2010

 

I'm proud of Cincinnati Mayor Mark Mallory and City Manager Milton Dohoney, who made streetcars a priority, and I'm proud of my City Council colleagues who passed streetcar bonds on Wednesday.

 

The enthusiastic support of so many engaged citizens was crucial, and cheers to them as well....

 

http://news.cincinnati.com/article/20100514/EDIT02/5140373/When-streetcar-s-here-I-predict-you-ll-like-it?plckFindCommentKey=CommentKey:a3f20326-6a6d-4c22-930c-9757ea3ffb81

 

 

*Also there is this moronic gem from the comment section.  Is this what the opposition is resorting to now?*

 

"The only people supporting this is the gay and lesbians that want Cincinnati to be more like San Fran, and the friends and families of those that are going to make a hell of a lot of money.

 

With the City Solicitors office having the ethical compass of an Over the Rhine hooker, we can look forward to an ever growing exodus of families out of this area. "

By the way John I emailed Kevin with all the information from January until the present that he needs. 

 

As of this morning, the total tally of negative vs positive streetcar letters for this month are:

17 negative, 2 positive. 

*Also there is this moronic gem from the comment section.  Is this what the opposition is resorting to now?*

 

"The only people supporting this is the gay and lesbians that want Cincinnati to be more like San Fran, and the friends and families of those that are going to make a hell of a lot of money.

 

Wait, this isn't why we are doing this?  I only got on board because I thought I'd be able to eventually go to concerts at the Fillmore Midwest.

Just got a note from someone in Portland who talks to everyone about everything related to streetcar projects all around the country.

 

He thinks Cincinnati is looking really good for Fed funds.

 

*Also there is this moronic gem from the comment section.  Is this what the opposition is resorting to now?*

 

"The only people supporting this is the gay and lesbians that want Cincinnati to be more like San Fran, and the friends and families of those that are going to make a hell of a lot of money... "

 

LOL, what?  Did you guys read the rest of the comments section?  It's hilarious.

 

Example:

"bobbert_dole wrote, replying to Move2Cincy:

 

But it's only for teh gheyz!!!

 

It's a longstanding fact that only homosexuals ride streetcars. That is why I fully support bringing streetcars to Cincinnati."

 

    Well, the streetcar supporters definitely know more about streetcars than the opposition. On the other hand, I don't think the streetcar supporters have any clue about how the rest of the metro area away from the core views the streetcar project.

^I think we know.  We just don't care.  The streetcars will make the core more walkable and attractive as a place to live, and will be funded by the city, not the county.  If the rest of the metro wants light rail or something, no one is stopping them from putting together a plan for that.

 

  They don't want light rail or anything. They think that a streetcar to OTR is a phenominally dumb idea. They think that it really IS their money, since they pay federal taxes, and a lot of them. They think that the urban core is basicly a failed system.

 

  Whether they are right or not is another issue, but that's what they think, and from the material on this forum, my conclusion is that most of the posters on this forum have no idea what the feelings are outside of the core.

 

  "I think we know. We just don't care."

 

    Then why all the griping about Enquirer comments etc?

 

 

Wow. That was a valuable contribution to the UrbanOhio message board. Who knew that suburbanites hate cities and that they feel that any investment is a waste of their money. Wow.

I think the point of arguing is less to convince those arguing and more to show that the pro-streetcar view is more sensible to someone who might not be sure what they think.

 

Of course, you can argue that there are probably slim to none of these people actually reading those comments, and you may be (probably are) right.

I was talking with a German buddy of mine the other day.  I was trying to explain to him the opposition to streetcars in Cincinnati.  His immediate question to me was--with a true WTF in his eyes: "What, are they afraid the city might improve?" 

 

He has lived and traveled across Europe, and he's lived in Boston for several years.  He knows transit and what it does for cities, even though he said, "Public transit in Boston falls short but it's still pretty good." 

 

This guy is a car enthusiast (like many Germans) and relishes the idea of fewer people on the roads (thanks to public transit) when he chooses to drive his car. 

What, are they afraid the city might improve?

 

I think that's exactly it.  They view the situation as a zero-sum game, where if the city improves then their suburban interests will suffer for it.  It's not too surprising either to see how much anti-urban bias there is out there, whether from the county-wide Metro Moves vote or the Enquirer's reporting, because there's frankly a much larger number of people who live in suburban areas.  It's a sad reality, but one we have to deal with.  I'm glad that after Metro Moves got shot down the city retrenched and decided to focus on something that doesn't require the support of every soccer mom in Anderson or Forest Park. 

 

The real challenge is convincing people that investment in projects like this ultimately benefit everyone.  Strong neighborhoods strengthen the city through improved taxes and better utilized services.  For those same reasons, a strong core city leads to a stronger region, and better transit is a way to achieve that.  Trying to reverse the huge anti-urban, pro-suburban bias in planning, development, lending, etc., over the past 60+ years isn't a "war on suburbs", it's a move to end the war on cities.  We need to work to convince people of that so they can support more projects like this, since even if it doesn't benefit them directly, they're helped indirectly.

"What, are they afraid the city might improve?"

 

No, they are afraid that the city will decline further.

 

If the streetcar attracts riders, results in new development, enhances property values, and displaces the underclass, then the streetcar will have been a resounding success.

 

If the streetcar does not attract riders, does not result in new development, requires a steady subsidy to operate, and becomes a moving homeless shelter, then it will have been a dismal failure, and actually CONTRIBUTE to more urban decline.

 

A small minority believes in the second scenario, and is vocal about it. These are the folks that submit comments to the Enquirer. Most people outside of the core don't know much about it and couldn't care less.

 

Then again, most people outside the core have never riden a Metro bus in their entire lives. It really is a different world, with a different culture. They are not stupid, but have a different life experience.

^Here's the difference dude: The majority of the people who support the streetcar project want to improve the City by bringing in new residents in the old urban form, and good public transit is essential to that.  They believe that the urban core is currently undervalued, and that the right investments can add a ton of value for the cost.

 

These people look at other metro areas, like New York, Chicago, San Francisco, or even Charleston and Annapolis and notice that people pay a premium to live in the urban core of those Metro areas.  They look at cities that were much smaller than Cincinnati back in the day like Washington, Atlanta, Seattle, et. cetera, and see the same thing.  They think that Cincinnati can do the same thing.

 

The people making comments on The Enquirer blog are not addressing the project in a manner that is objective.  Folks who refuse to engage an argument on the merits quickly become tiresome.  To the extent they are being ignored or dismissed is not because they have a different opinion, it's because they aren't interested in the project and won't engage the facts.  It's pretty simple.

 

You've made some decent criticisms of the plan, and I tend to agree with you on your preferred route.  Nevertheless, arguments to life experience and thinly veiled genuflections to the transcendence to the holy opinion of the individual is just relativist bullshit and extremely tedious.

 

There's plenty of paths open for political action to oppose this plan.  If you oppose it and your opposition fails because you 1) don't live in the constituency effected; 2) don't bother to support candidates for office who oppose the plan; 3) aren't able to convince a majority of voters or decision-makers to support your position; then you have failed, and you lose.  Whether such a person chooses to view themself as Jeremiah is of course up to them, but that of course lends support to the opinion that they once again aren't willing to face facts.

 

  I don't oppose the streetcar. I am skeptical that it will actually get built, but I don't oppose it. Now that the city has passed a bond issue, I think it has a higher probability of being built, but it still isn't certain.

 

  The city has a lot of other problems besides just transportation, and those problems are deep. There's a reason why the city has lost residents and jobs other than the fact that a lot of families want a house with a yard. In my humble opinion, the city would do well to address some of those other problems first, and then maybe they would have the revenue to build a streetcar without having to depend on outside funding sources.

 

  Borrowing money makes a good business better, but it makes a bad business worse. Which category do you think the City of Cincinnati falls under?

 

 

I think it falls under the category of "city" and not "business."  Contrary to conservative American belief, all currency-using entities are not businesses. People are not businesses. Families are not businesses. Governments are not businesses. They share some characteristics, like various forms of budgeting resources. But they are different animals.

 

A different example, maybe not better but just from a different perspective, is that a city is an organism. In Cincinnati's case, maybe it's a depressed organism. You could assess the symptoms of its depression, and the negative effects in life that the depression causes. You could focus on these and try to improve them. You could try counseling. But perhaps a specific antidepressant would help. Something small, focused. It might not work, but it might. It might cost money, but it's worth a try. It's certainly better than just smiling more, or wearing nicer clothes.

 

The city has a lot of other problems besides just transportation, and those problems are deep. There's a reason why the city has lost residents and jobs other than the fact that a lot of families want a house with a yard. In my humble opinion, the city would do well to address some of those other problems first, and then maybe they would have the revenue to build a streetcar without having to depend on outside funding sources.

 

 

How can we use capital funding to address these other problems?

 

  The city has a lot of other problems besides just transportation, and those problems are deep. There's a reason why the city has lost residents and jobs other than the fact that a lot of families want a house with a yard. In my humble opinion, the city would do well to address some of those other problems first, and then maybe they would have the revenue to build a streetcar without having to depend on outside funding sources.

 

 

What are these "other problems"? What non-transportation capital investment could be made to address these "other problems"? 

 

I find it very interesting when people blame the City of Cincinnati for its population losses, as if the City made individual mistakes that caused this to happen.  I find this hard to do when what has happened in Cincinnati has happened to hundreds of cities across the nation, and all at the same time.  something tells me all these cities didn't individually happen to make the same mistakes all at once.....  :wink:

Yeah, well you hurt yourself at work... HA!

To follow on. I don't really buy the narrative that Cincinnati is at a particularly low point in its history right now. I'd say the last five years have actually been pretty good for the city. In fact if you take out 1989-1994 and 2000-2005 (immediate precipitating causes of the riots followed by the after effects), the city has been holding its own for quite a while and in fact doing better than many cities. The investment is the streetcar is a part of that. It also isn't so big that it has any chance of screwing up the future. Whereas the planning and construction of the interstate highway system and the continued investment in it has degraded life in the city.

^ Excellent!

In the print edition of today's Saturday Enquirer, 36 of it 68 pages have ads for cars, including the 16-page "Cars.com" section, which today has as many pages as the main "A" news section.

 

The Enquirer needs to sell ad space, and I want it to remain viable. And car-advertising is one of the few ad markets where it still dominates. But I wonder if this explains, in part, the Enquirer's editorial opposition to the car-competitive Cincinnati Streetcar.

 

 

Gee, I guess they'll have to go after advertising from businesses along the streetcar route(s).

 

Having worked at a newspaper for many years, the advertisers who pay the bills had no affect on what I or many of my co-workers wrote. But some of my coworkers weren't interested in rocking the boat while others did. I was in the latter category. I didn't even look at the ads in the paper and I never heard from an editor anything like: "better be careful writing that story because they've been a big customer of ours for a long time." In 15 years in working at the newspaper, the only time I got any nudge regarding a story involving an advertiser is when a hospital that was a big advertiser in our paper lost a medical malpractice lawsuit (the hospital lost as well as two doctors). One of our ad salespersons who had that hospital as a client asked me to be careful as he smiled nervously. So I counted how many lines of text I devoted to the quotes from each side -- yet still the hospital thought my article was one-sided (well, they did lose!) but they remained an advertiser in our newspaper.

 

Moreso, journalists are inherently skeptical people. But for every good journalist out there who is committed to the pursuit of truth, I fear there are 3-5 lazy reporters who are nothing more than stenographers. And one or two more are interested more in trying to make a name for themselves and the more "gotcha" articles they write the more they get noticed. So if you want a reporter to believe you, get to know them to find out if you want to work with them, and if you like them personally let them get to know you and trust you.

I do not think the streetcar will be an issue with car adverstising, the amount of cars it will take off the road would be minimual given it s limited scope. I could see light rail being a much bigger threat for the car ads

Yeah, well you hurt yourself at work... HA!

 

I hate you (and miss you) 

  "I think we know. We just don't care."

 

    Then why all the griping about Enquirer comments etc? 

 

I don't think I've mentioned the comments on enquirer.com, but I will say that I do find them annoying and often offensive.  But what I was getting at is that streetcar supporters are going to push ahead with the plan because they feel it is good for their city.  If county residents outside the city like the plan, great.  If they don't, that's fine too.  They're entitled to their opinion, but this is not their decision to make.  Should Mason or West Chester fret over what Cincinnati residents think of their current projects?  No.  They should try to make their own community as good as it can be, which is all that Cincinnati is doing now.

Moreso, journalists are inherently skeptical people. But for every good journalist out there who is committed to the pursuit of truth, I fear there are 3-5 lazy reporters who are nothing more than stenographers. And one or two more are interested more in trying to make a name for themselves and the more "gotcha" articles they write the more they get noticed. So if you want a reporter to believe you, get to know them to find out if you want to work with them, and if you like them personally let them get to know you and trust you.

 

Thanks for your insight, Ken.  Totally agree about the laziness (not that reporters are inherently lazier than other workers- they're just like everyone else).  Also, I do think the narrative form in most news stories require more action (and therefore conflict) than saying, a report from Brookings.

 

The Enquirer is a business that, in my opinion, delivers a crappy product.  i don't really care if they go under or not.

 

I don't really buy the narrative that Cincinnati is at a particularly low point in its history right now. I'd say the last five years have actually been pretty good for the city. In fact if you take out 1989-1994 and 2000-2005 (immediate precipitating causes of the riots followed by the after effects), the city has been holding its own for quite a while and in fact doing better than many cities.

 

Totally agree.  The riots really focused the attention of the City on it's core, and we've seen many positive things come from that.  In a way, because they focused the attention of the City on these discrete and reinforcing projects (3CDC, the Streetcar, Uptown) they (combined with the stadium overruns) really put the City back in the driver's seat of development from the County.  We went from building a Mexican restaurant rather than letting Midland expand and constructing signature "gateways" (of which only two or three were completed) to the energy we have now.

 

So, mostly curious why you said 1989-1994.  I would have put it at 1995-2001.

 

That roughly includes the closing of GM Norwood and the recession of 90-91, which was really rough on industrial Cincinnati (Milacron entered its death spiral then and what was left of the apparel industry pretty much closed up shop then, Kroger and Federated both nearly left town/went bankrupt). 95-01 was a period of weak leadership, though we did build two stadiums and set the stage for the last half of this decade.

 

The Enquirer is a business that, in my opinion, delivers a crappy product. i don't really care if they go under or not.

 

 

Be careful what you ask for. Having a local news publication with experienced journalists who are committed to doing research, analysis and honest-to-goodness reporting is one of the great assets of an open democracy. Many of these Internet-based news, radio and television reporters are nothing more than sounding boards, echo chambers and rip-and-read talking heads. If that is the future of journalism, then I am afraid.

 

OK, rant over. Back to streetcar....

I'm not convinced that the Enquirer is so good about their due diligence and proper reporting.  I was asked for some information about the city's historical streetcar system by one of their writers, and it was obvious he was fishing for anything he could find to show how the overhead wires were ugly and dangerous.  You can see the article and a more detailed version of our correspondence (in the comments) at http://thephonyconey.blogspot.com/2010/04/enquirers-disguised-hit-pieces.html

 

  "Should Mason or West Chester fret over what Cincinnati residents think of their current projects? No."

 

  This is why I think that streetcar supporters do not necessarily understand the culture of Mason and West Chester. This isn't just a city project. If federal funds are being used, it is a federal project, that draws from federal income taxes.

 

  Mason and West Chester folks pay a lot of federal income tax, and they see the streetcar as part of the reason why their taxes are so high.

 

    Do they have a real issue? In the big picture, the streetcar is just a drop in the bucket compared to the federal budget, not to mention the funds that the fed have spent on highways in the Mason and West Chester area. The budgets of various levels of government are so complicated that I don't know if anyone really understands it - but everyone seems to think that they are paying more than their fair share of taxes. So, if Cincinnati gets a big grant from the feds, Mason and West Chester don't sit back and say, "I don't care either way. I don't live in the city;" they say, "Hey, the City just spend $100 million of MY tax money in a failed neighborhood."

 

    Anyway, there is a resentment between the city and the suburbs, and for the most part neither side can really see the other's perspective.

 

 

I see their perspective, it's just wrong. They are better off having their tax money spent in the region, rather than another region. They can dispute that, but they're wrong. They're also wrong about the value of revitalizing OTR and the probability that it will happen. It's not relative: they're wrong.

Eigth & State, the streetcar supporters more than understand the negative suburban perspective because the majority of them are products of that environment. And because of that, they recognize that the suburban middle class, despite more often being college educated, typically have little to no more knowledge about how government actually functions than the poor people in the city that they jeer at.  I heard a lady who I know for a fact owns two homes, is worth several million besides, and has lived in Cincinnati (suburbs) her entire life say  "Actually I like the new stadiums, I just wish we had had a chance to vote on them".  That's the kind of people we're dealing with. 

 

^ I think Jake's right. Township government is all about having no government at all. So the only evidence of activist government the suburban residents see is generally what Cincinnati does or doesn't do. And from that conditioning, they come to believe that Cincinnati decides everything for the region. So that's probably part of their complaint.

 

  Well, the City of Cincinnati does control the Cincinnati Water Works, Metropolitan Sewer District, and big regional events such as Riverfest, Tall Stacks, etc. The City of Cincinnati has a majority control of Queen City Metro buses. The City of Cincinnati has a strong influence on the Cincinnati Public School District, which by the way is not limited to Cincinnati.

 

    The Public Library of Cincinnati and Hamilton County receives funds from suburban tax payers and carries the Cincinnati name.

 

  The Cincinnati Enquirer, Cincinnati Bell, (former) Cincinnati Gas and Electric Company, Greater Cincinnati airport, Cincinnati Reds, Cincinnati Bengals and more are private companies that carry the Cincinnati name.

 

    A lot of suburban residents have Cincinnati mailing addresses.

 

    So, the City of Cincinnati still has a heavy influence on suburban residents outside of the municipal boundaries. Quite frankly, a lot of folks don't understand the municipal boundaries. Back during the 2001 riots, when Mayor Luken called for a curfew, a lot of suburban residents stayed home just because they didn't know any better.

 

    So yes, suburban residents see Cincinnati as calling the shots, whether for good or bad.

And we pay a lot of taxes to the city, and to the county which go to the city.

Eigth & State, the streetcar supporters more than understand the negative suburban perspective because the majority of them are products of that environment. And because of that, they recognize that the suburban middle class, despite more often being college educated, typically have little to no more knowledge about how government actually functions than the poor people in the city that they jeer at. I heard a lady who I know for a fact owns two homes, is worth several million besides, and has lived in Cincinnati (suburbs) her entire life say "Actually I like the new stadiums, I just wish we had had a chance to vote on them". That's the kind of people we're dealing with.

 

 

Hot damn, Jake!

 

This was worded perfectly!

And we pay a lot of taxes to the city, and to the county which go to the city.

 

Who pays a lot of taxes to the city? Suburban residents? Or are you a city resident?

 

If you mean suburban residents, I wasn't aware of that. Can you explain?