Portland's "peak" is from 10 a.m. to 7 p.m. During those hours, each of the streetcar routes operates 15 minute headways, meaning that if you are in Downtown or the Peal District (where the routes overlap), you only have to wait a maximum of 8 minutes.

 

How many people are trying to get from OTR to Fountain Square at 3 pm?

 

Probably not many office workers, but that's not the only demographic being served.

^ I know that when I've been on the Portland streetcars they are pretty busy throughout the afternoons.

Because of work rules you can't just have peak headways for a handful of hours. The better frequency is created by adding a third car.  No one is going to come in for a 2 hour lunch shift then leave.

I assume the schedule is flexible enough to change based on the way things go? The data should speak for itself and after a while the city should be able to analyze the data to determine if changes should be made.

^ One thing: [correct] with counters at every door, they can get boardings and de-boardings stop-by-stop during the entirety of a run. I imagine they might have the ability to watch this in real-time, following the streetcar along its path and watching passengers get on and off.

FYI, just got this response from the mayor:

 

Thank you for your email. I appreciate you sharing your thoughts and concerns with me. To address your concerns, no proposals, including my own, have recommended a reduction in frequency at this time.

Because of work rules you can't just have peak headways for a handful of hours. The better frequency is created by adding a third car.  No one is going to come in for a 2 hour lunch shift then leave.

 

They have peak headways during rush hour on Metro buses and some express routes only run for an hour or two each morning/evening... so, why couldn't they have "peak" service for the Streetcar as well? I'm not sure it'll be necessary, but I sure hope work rules wouldn't preclude it from being an option on the table, if the data shows it'd be helpful.

I would think that peak frequency could be accomplished by overlapping shifts. It's not like you would just have someone come into work for 4 hours if the rush period lasted four hours. You would just have a morning shift and an evening shift overlap by 4 hours.

I would think that peak frequency could be accomplished by overlapping shifts. It's not like you would just have someone come into work for 4 hours if the rush period lasted four hours. You would just have a morning shift and an evening shift overlap by 4 hours.

That setup works if the peak hours are in the middle of the day. But if peak hours are actually at rush hour (7-9am, 5-7pm), then it doesn't work... but rush hour (or any other pattern) ought to still be feasible. As I said, Metro already has routes that only run during the mornings and evenings.

But peak hours for the streetcar should not have two separate periods for morning and evening rush. On other streetcar systems, the peak is actually mid-day with office workers taking the streetcar out for lunch. I think the Portland Streetcar's director mentioned that highest ridership is 11am-3pm.

^Well then it certainly is simple! You just run two shifts with enough overlap to meet the lunch hour demand.

But peak hours for the streetcar should not have two separate periods for morning and evening rush. On other streetcar systems, the peak is actually mid-day with office workers taking the streetcar out for lunch. I think the Portland Streetcar's director mentioned that highest ridership is 11am-3pm.

 

Travis is right

A reporter doing a story on public transportation asked me if I had any idea how much had been spent on parking structures downtown in the past decade. Anyone have any clue?

Spitballing. So since 2005. Downtown = CBD...River to Central Pkwy and Eggleston to Central Ave.

 

-All Banks garages except NURFC, PBS and GABP.

-Transit Center.

-All QCS. 303 and GAT.

-84.51

-Tower Place Mall conversion.

 

Beyond:

-Casino

-WashPa

-Gateway

-Mercer

 

 

 

 

 

^Don't forget about Fountain Square.  That's not a new garage, but it was $42M spent to renovate an existing garage and event space, just shy of 10 years ago.

What about the one at 4th and Main? Isn't that fairly new.

 

When was the one at Sycamore and Reading built?

Streetcar, developers win big

 

With the backing of Mayor John Cranley, Council tripled the amount that downtown and OTR developers likely will kick in to the streetcar’s operations fund on Tuesday. It also increased the number of years that developers can receive property tax abatements.

 

This is big news.

Sounds like a really good deal to me. The nexus is there. No longer are the abatements the only incentive to invest in OTR - the streetcar is as well. As a result, the abatement incentive should be reduced to have that money help support the other incentive - the operations of a transit amenity. I see this as a win-win.

Can the streetcar be used on the Oasis line?

Can the streetcar be used on the Oasis line?

 

No.

Glad to see Valarie McCall, Cleveland Mayor Frank Jackson's Chief of Government & International Affairs, also the American Public Transportation Association's board chairperson, touring the Cincinnati Streetcar last week. Hopefully she'll be inspired by what she sees and wants to replicate the vision in Cleveland...

 

Dwight A Ferrell ‏@DwightAFerrell  Dec 11

@FTA Carolyn Flowers, Marisol Simon and @APTA_info Chair Valarie McCall touring

@Cincy_Streetcar

@cincinnatimetro pic.twitter.com/s9Hj2iYoZQ

Yet another business cites the streetcar as a reason for moving downtown:

 

"Now we're down near the streetcar project and where things are. It certainly helped with recruiting," LeBret said. "The streetcar gives us access to REDI Cincinnati and the Chamber and things going on downtown. We're not a retail business, but we still want to have that access and be able to go downtown or the ballparks."

 

http://www.bizjournals.com/cincinnati/news/2015/12/16/exclusive-startup-leaves-incubator-for-otr.html

From GAT:

Get ready for major streetcar budget drama...Cranley decided to squander the surplus on a massive expansion of police and fire that he hopes will ensure his reelection. 

http://www.cincinnati.com/story/news/2015/12/17/budget-deficit/77415166/

Is Cincinnati worse at getting grants than other cities or are they about par? Looks like a lot of the budget problems are stemming from missed grants.

It seems like we are pretty good at winning grants when we actually have people working to make that happen. I have heard that we would have very good chance at getting a federal grant to pay for most of the cost of going Uptown if we actually put together a plan to get Uptown (and didn't have a mayor with a track record of breaking contracts).

No streetcar drama. It's obviously all being spent on public safety. If it wasn't for the massive development surrounding the streetcar driving revenues we would be able to afford all the new cops & firefighters at all.

No streetcar drama. It's obviously all being spent on public safety. If it wasn't for the massive development surrounding the streetcar driving revenues we would be able to afford all the new cops & firefighters at all.

 

I'm skeptical of claims that the streetcar has boosted city revenue significantly already. I know it will, and already has started to but I would like to see a quantifiable number. Gross property taxes are static, so we could invest trillions in increased property values and wouldn't see a nickel of additional revenue to the city. Pretty much the only significant source of revenue the city could see from the streetcar is income taxes from those who live along the line or those who work along the line and live outside of the city. And both of these would have to be people who otherwise wouldn't have lived in the city or had a job in the city. I haven't seen any figures for this. I know it's hard to quantify, but I don't think the streetcar has provided enormous revenue for the city yet.

 

GE's new office will count toward it, but the streetcar obviously wasn't the only factor in their decision, so I don't know if you can claim those income taxes next year wouldn't have existed without the streetcar. But then how do you account for the streetcar being a factor in a decision and not the main factor? IDK. This is all wishy washy maths.

It will be impossible to determine an exact number and say "the streetcar has caused $X worth of investment in the city".

 

That would be like trying to determine the financial impact of a good school district on the homes within that district. Some people are willing to pay a premium for a home in a "good" school district where they will send their kids. For other people living nearby, the school district may have played no role. But since everyone's property value is impacted by their neighbor's property value, there is no question that the good school district has a positive impact on all of the homes there. It's just not possible to pin down an exact number.

 

For some people, they would live in OTR or the CBD whether the streetcar was built or not. For other people, it was a major factor. So overall it raises everyone's property values, whether they personally care about it or not.

^Well, I think you have to account for the ripple effect of construction dollars spent in the city center.  Those checks to workers, some of the materials, etc. definitely have an affect on the bottom line during the "short term" and then you add up all the other details you have mentioned.

 

I agree that the other details will come more as time passes, little by little.

 

In the meantime, what was Cranley thinking, if he was such a fiscal conservative, about all these extra hires to run into a deficit.  Wouldn't they have the details to know these figures before they did all of this?

 

I think I read on the business courier that the streetcar deficit figures the Enquirer is tracking are more or less all degrees of what happens if projections don't reach this amount, is that correct?

Portland has completed an extensive study which concludes that its streetcars is responsible for 35% of commercial development and 41% of the residential development along its streetcar line.

 

 

Portland has completed an extensive study which concludes that its streetcars is responsible for 35% of commercial development and 41% of the residential development along its streetcar line.

 

I would love to check out the study and see what their assumptions were based on. Do you by chance have a link? I'm not surprised that this is the number.

You can be as skeptical as you want. I for one moved to OTR from Mason in 2010 because we had voted on it and we're moving ahead and I didn't want to be the last guy in trying to buy a $500k condo...and look what's happened. Meanwhile, for the proposed budget as a whole, Marc Raab's comment on the Enquirer article sums it up.

In the meantime, what was Cranley thinking, if he was such a fiscal conservative, about all these extra hires to run into a deficit.  Wouldn't they have the details to know these figures before they did all of this?

 

The same way he is not accounting for the streetcar ops.  However, the streetcar ops will get 1000% of the blame/attention while only constituting a fraction of the effect.  Wouldn't it be nice to have a mayor who realized that this makes us the envy of peer cities and promoted it accordingly?

Portland has completed an extensive study which concludes that its streetcars is responsible for 35% of commercial development and 41% of the residential development along its streetcar line.

 

I would love to check out the study and see what their assumptions were based on. Do you by chance have a link? I'm not surprised that this is the number.

 

Ryan, here's the study: http://www.portlandstreetcar.org/pdf/DevelopmentStudy.pdf  Something to keep in mind. Portland thinks its streetcar is responsible for 35-41% of the development along the line. I think it would be a higher percentage in Cincinnati. That's because Portland has so many things going for it, starting with its natural location, a well-developed regional transit system that crosses the streetcar loop in several places, and high supportl for public transportation, and so on. Along the streetcar route the influences are mainly 3CDC and the streetcar-- they're things that have moved the needle along the streetcar line. But from here forward, I think the streetcar will be more influential in downtown development, especially if we extend the tracks north on Walnut and Main.

 

And here's a chart that illustrates some of the data: http://www.portlandstreetcar.org/pdf/2015DevelopmentReport.pdf

 

Note how the Portland Streetcar developed in phases around the Willamette River. I look at this map and see -- conceptually -- streetcars linking Cincinnati with Covington and Newport together with the extension to Uptown.

No streetcar drama. It's obviously all being spent on public safety. If it wasn't for the massive development surrounding the streetcar driving revenues we would be able to afford all the new cops & firefighters at all.

 

I'm skeptical of claims that the streetcar has boosted city revenue significantly already. I know it will, and already has started to but I would like to see a quantifiable number. Gross property taxes are static, so we could invest trillions in increased property values and wouldn't see a nickel of additional revenue to the city. Pretty much the only significant source of revenue the city could see from the streetcar is income taxes from those who live along the line or those who work along the line and live outside of the city. And both of these would have to be people who otherwise wouldn't have lived in the city or had a job in the city. I haven't seen any figures for this. I know it's hard to quantify, but I don't think the streetcar has provided enormous revenue for the city yet.

 

GE's new office will count toward it, but the streetcar obviously wasn't the only factor in their decision, so I don't know if you can claim those income taxes next year wouldn't have existed without the streetcar. But then how do you account for the streetcar being a factor in a decision and not the main factor? IDK. This is all wishy washy maths.

 

City of Cincinnati 2015 income tax receipts for zip code 45202 are up $11,827,383.82 compared to 2011.

The GE income tax is being returned to GE.  Employees will have the tax withheld from their paychecks, then the City of Cincinnati will cut GE a check. GE essentially gets 2%~ of the salaries it pays back.  Also, GE will pay zero property tax for 15 years. 

 

No streetcar drama. It's obviously all being spent on public safety. If it wasn't for the massive development surrounding the streetcar driving revenues we would be able to afford all the new cops & firefighters at all.

 

 

 

I'm skeptical of claims that the streetcar has boosted city revenue significantly already. I know it will, and already has started to but I would like to see a quantifiable number. Gross property taxes are static, so we could invest trillions in increased property values and wouldn't see a nickel of additional revenue to the city. Pretty much the only significant source of revenue the city could see from the streetcar is income taxes from those who live along the line or those who work along the line and live outside of the city. And both of these would have to be people who otherwise wouldn't have lived in the city or had a job in the city. I haven't seen any figures for this. I know it's hard to quantify, but I don't think the streetcar has provided enormous revenue for the city yet.

 

GE's new office will count toward it, but the streetcar obviously wasn't the only factor in their decision, so I don't know if you can claim those income taxes next year wouldn't have existed without the streetcar. But then how do you account for the streetcar being a factor in a decision and not the main factor? IDK. This is all wishy washy maths.

 

City of Cincinnati 2015 income tax receipts for zip code 45202 are up $11,827,383.82 compared to 2011.

 

I'd put that out there

What's going on, if anything, with the idea that was discussed on this thread maybe 2 yrs ago, of creating a special taxing district for properties in close proximity to the route?

What's going on, if anything, with the idea that was discussed on this thread maybe 2 yrs ago, of creating a special taxing district for properties in close proximity to the route?

 

That option is only available for property taxes and is politically difficult due to the existing DCI assessment. The new 15% VTICA should general a sizable amount for the project but will take a few years to ramp up.

 

KC was able to do a 1% sales tax that runs a surplus.

No streetcar drama. It's obviously all being spent on public safety. If it wasn't for the massive development surrounding the streetcar driving revenues we would be able to afford all the new cops & firefighters at all.

 

I'm skeptical of claims that the streetcar has boosted city revenue significantly already. I know it will, and already has started to but I would like to see a quantifiable number. Gross property taxes are static, so we could invest trillions in increased property values and wouldn't see a nickel of additional revenue to the city. Pretty much the only significant source of revenue the city could see from the streetcar is income taxes from those who live along the line or those who work along the line and live outside of the city. And both of these would have to be people who otherwise wouldn't have lived in the city or had a job in the city. I haven't seen any figures for this. I know it's hard to quantify, but I don't think the streetcar has provided enormous revenue for the city yet.

 

GE's new office will count toward it, but the streetcar obviously wasn't the only factor in their decision, so I don't know if you can claim those income taxes next year wouldn't have existed without the streetcar. But then how do you account for the streetcar being a factor in a decision and not the main factor? IDK. This is all wishy washy maths.

 

City of Cincinnati 2015 income tax receipts for zip code 45202 are up $11,827,383.82 compared to 2011.

 

Do you have a source for the inevitable "Link?" question that comes up when you try to prove a streetcar opponent wrong?

What's going on, if anything, with the idea that was discussed on this thread maybe 2 yrs ago, of creating a special taxing district for properties in close proximity to the route?

 

That option is only available for property taxes and is politically difficult due to the existing DCI assessment. The new 15% VTICA should general a sizable amount for the project but will take a few years to ramp up.

 

KC was able to do a 1% sales tax that runs a surplus.

What's going on, if anything, with the idea that was discussed on this thread maybe 2 yrs ago, of creating a special taxing district for properties in close proximity to the route?

 

That option is only available for property taxes and is politically difficult due to the existing DCI assessment. The new 15% VTICA should general a sizable amount for the project but will take a few years to ramp up.

 

KC was able to do a 1% sales tax that runs a surplus.

 

When GE inevitably gets a property tax abatement for their new building, are they going to be paying into the VTICA?

The GE income tax is being returned to GE.  Employees will have the tax withheld from their paychecks, then the City of Cincinnati will cut GE a check. GE essentially gets 2%~ of the salaries it pays back.  Also, GE will pay zero property tax for 15 years.

 

I believe GE receives 85% of the income taxes back for 15 years. That translates to the city seeing about $350,000/year in income tax revenue from the deal instead of $2,331,000.

I read an article awhile back, when all this GE talk about Import - Export Bank was going on, about how GE is a master at paying pretty much 0% taxes to the government after all is said and done, but all legally of course.

The GE income tax is being returned to GE.  Employees will have the tax withheld from their paychecks, then the City of Cincinnati will cut GE a check. GE essentially gets 2%~ of the salaries it pays back.  Also, GE will pay zero property tax for 15 years.

 

I believe GE receives 85% of the income taxes back for 15 years. That translates to the city seeing about $350,000/year in income tax revenue from the deal instead of $2,331,000.

 

Still a great deal for the city, in my opinion.  Even if that tax revenue was $0, you end up with a nice new building at the Banks and hundreds of workers frequenting lunch spots nearby.  These are also employees that either relocated and otherwise wouldn't live here or were already living in the region but have found new employment.  I know that tax abatements are not always popular on this board, and I get the rationale for that, but I still think this scenario in particular was a huge win for Cincinnati.

Considering we built them a parking garage, streetcar, abated their property taxes, and the state gave them a sweet deal, it just seems like we could have gotten a little more income tax revenue from it. I would rather get $0 and have them there, but it's just unfortunate the city can't get a better deal. I'm not sure they could have. It's just unfortunate.

It's corporate welfare for the only company that has been listed on the Dow Jones for its entire 100+ year history.  People who spent their careers at GE and benefited from company stock actually benefited from all of the local, state, and federal tax breaks GE has negotiated over the past 50+ years.

Considering we built them a parking garage, streetcar, abated their property taxes, and the state gave them a sweet deal, it just seems like we could have gotten a little more income tax revenue from it. I would rather get $0 and have them there, but it's just unfortunate the city can't get a better deal. I'm not sure they could have. It's just unfortunate.

 

Agreed.  But it's not like we built the parking garage and streetcar at the request of GE.  GE is just the first company who happened to recognize a good situation.  We had to raise the development out of the floodplain anyway, or just be happy with the whole thing being a parking lot or park that can flood without taking major damage.

It's corporate welfare for the only company that has been listed on the Dow Jones for its entire 100+ year history.  People who spent their careers at GE and benefited from company stock actually benefited from all of the local, state, and federal tax breaks GE has negotiated over the past 50+ years.

 

It's not fair, but I'm not interested in fair.  The unfortunate reality is that this is how things currently work.  The alternative is that this HQ goes to somewhere else, like North Carolina or Texas.  I'll take a nice new building and employment for hundreds of people.  Jobs drive everything, so whatever it takes to attract more jobs to the region (not the shell game that takes place between NKY and Cincy) is fine by me.

^^I agree completely. Just pointing out that they would have already gotten a sweetheart deal without the income tax returns. It's just unfortunate we can't see a bigger impact than we will from such a big development. It's still huge, and I'm not suggesting we could have done better. Just that we should be able to do better.