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Archive for the ‘Guadalupe-Lamar corridor’ Category

Project Connect study: Ridership potential, capacity advantages push light rail into lead

31 January 2020

Chart shows 2040 forecast ridership for both surface (top bar) and grade-separated (lower bar) options of BRT (left end of each bar) and LRT (right end of each bar). In both cases, LRT ridership substantially exceeds that of BRT. That disparity, plus capacity limitations of BRT, seem to tip scales toward LRT. Graphic: Project Connect (click to enlarge).

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In what appears to be a dramatic turn in the saga of Austin’s Project Connect planning process, Austin civic leaders, Capital Metro’s Board, and the team of Project Connect (Capital Metro’s major transit investment planning program) appear to have embraced a planning scenario backing light rail transit (LRT) for both the Orange Line (North Lamar-Guadalupe-South Congress) and Blue Line (downtown-East Riverside-ABIA).

Consensus for this option seemed to emerge during and after a joint Austin City Council/Capital Metro Board work session on 14 January. According to a report in the Austin American Statesman of that date, while LRT would cost more to build than a bus rapid transit (BRT) alternative, “a Cap Metro analysis found the [BRT] system would reach its capacity in 2040.”

In comparison, rail would offer much more potential for passenger growth. Maximum capacity for ridership on a bus rapid transit system would be reached less than a decade from when the system is completed — a fact that doomed it as an option.

Bus rapid transit “does not work … and the analysis shows that now,” Council Member Jimmy Flannigan said. “It doesn’t have the capacity we need.”

Advocates for an LRT starter line serving the Orange Line corridor have long predicted the enormous ridership potential of this route, and Project Connect’s ridership forecasts, based on the Federal Transit Administration (FTA) STOPS model integrated with a locally developed model used by the Capital Area Metropolitan Planning Organization (CAMPO), bear out these community predictions. According to Project Connect’s working forecasts in their operations & maintenance documentation, LRT ridership is projected at unusually high levels for a single new starter line.

• For the year 2028, typical weekday ridership is projected at more than 54,200 for a 50% grade separated (elevated or subway) option, and over 47,200 for a 90% surface option.

• For the year 2040, typical ridership is projected at more than 73,500 for a 50% grade separated option, and over 61,600 for a 90% surface option.

The significance of these Orange Line ridership projections for a single starter line can be assessed by placing them in perspective with ridership experienced by the original single lines of other relatively new major rail rapid transit (RRT, “heavy rail”) and LRT projects, for which data has been readily available. (Weekday ridership data from National Transit Database and American Public Transportation Association.)

• Light rail lines — Los Angeles (1993) 36,600; Denver (1996) 13,500; St. Louis (2005) 40,900; Dallas (1998) 36,700; Salt Lake City (2002) 31,400; Minneapolis (2005) 25,700; Houston (2005) 36,700

• Rail rapid transit (“heavy rail”) lines — Philadelphia-Lindenwold (2019) 38,900; Miami (2019) 59,000; Baltimore 38,400.

For a single-line new-start project, projected 2040 ridership for Orange Line LRT alternative seems to exceed that of even several heavy metro lines, such as this one in Baltimore. Photo: Doug Grotjahn.

It can be seen that the Orange Line projected ridership, if achieved, would fall in the range of some of the highest-ridership new single lines, both LRT and RRT, in the USA, and possibly could count as the highest achieved by any new LRT project in this country.

As Project Connect’s planning proceeds further, attention is focusing on critical details, including fine-tuning and finalizing capital cost estimates that would impact a major municipal bond election proposed for this coming November. Current estimates for the complete Capital Metro service area system, including numerous additional corridors with lighter BRT operations, regional rail services, and other essential transit services as well as the LRT lines, range between $3.8 and $9.4 billion, depending on options such as percentage of surface alignment vs. proposed elevated or subway segments.

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Posted in Austin light rail issues, Austin urban rail issues, Guadalupe-Lamar corridor, Project Connect Orange Line LRT planning, Project Connect urban rail plan, Urban rail ridership issues | Tagged austin light rail, austin orange line, austin urban rail, light rail transit, Project Connect | Leave a Comment »

Project Connect’s Orange Line operating cost assumptions seem to fail plausibility test

3 December 2019

Cover of Project Connect’s O&M cost methodology and assumptions report. Screen capture by ARN.

This analysis has been adapted and revised from comments originally posted to the #ATXTransit listserv by Lyndon Henry, a technical consultant to the Light Rail Now Project and contributing editor to Austin Rail Now (ARN).

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For approximately the past year, Capital Metro’s planning program, Project Connect, has been analyzing two travel corridors for major high-capacity rapid transit investment – the Orange Line (basically following the North Lamar-Guadalupe-South Congress corridor) and the Blue Line (roughly following the Red River-San Jacinto/Trinity corridor through downtown and then the Riverside corridor out to ABIA). A federally required Alternatives Analysis has been undertaken by a consulting team led by AECOM to recommend a modal system choice between light rail transit (LRT) and bus rapid transit (BRT), as well as other features and service characteristics such as vehicle types, station locations, alignments, and the capital costs and operating and maintenance (O&M) costs of each alternative.

Recently the agency released as public information selected details, including methodological procedures and cost assumptions. These have prompted scrutiny by community professionals and activists, particularly in regard to important O&M cost assumptions. In some cases these assumptions have been called into question.

For example, a 13 November posting by research analyst Julio Gonzalez Altamirano (JGA) on his Informatx.org website presented an extensive critical analysis. This resulted in two major findings:

• Project Connect’s BRT revenue hour cost estimate is lower than the national average by 26%. Project Connect does not explain its rationale for the methodological choices that lead to the lower rate.

• Project Connect’s use of a flat passenger car revenue hour rate to calculate LRT costs obfuscates the economies of scale associated with multi-car LRT trains. This is a change from the approach taken by Project Connect in 2013-2014. The new method makes Blue Line LRT appear more productive and Orange Line LRT less productive than an approach that recognizes the cost advantages of LRT scale (e.g. multi-car trains). Project Connect does not explain the rationale for the methodological switch or why its current approach will generate more accurate estimates.

These findings are broadly in line with the results of ARN’s own research into Project Connect’s O&M cost methodology and resultant assumptions, particularly with respect to the Orange Line surface LRT and BRT alternatives. Our analysis relied primarily on data for appropriate peer systems to Austin, reported in the Federal Transit Administration’s National Transit Database (NTD).

Basically, we find that Project Connect’s cost per vehicle-hour assumptions consistently seem to overestimate LRT costs by more than 51% and underestimate BRT costs by over 26%. The bottom-line result is to skew Project Connect’s O&M cost assumptions as much as 70% in favor of the BRT alternative. This produces a relatively huge disparity in evaluating the alternatives, and challenges plausibility. Details of our analysis, plus conclusions and a recommendation, are presented below.

Methodology

Operational configurations and service cycles affect O&M costs, including costs per vehicle-mile. ARN’s methodology has differed somewhat from JGA’s. Most importantly, from the 2017 NTD (latest currently available), ARN selected seven new-start LRT “peer” systems based on both urban characteristics and surface-running alignment and operational configurations that we judged to more closely match those of Austin and the proposed Orange Line surface LRT: Denver, Houston, Minneapolis, Phoenix, Portland, Sacramento, Salt Lake City. Although some have urban or suburban branches on exclusive alignments, all have significant segments in urban streets.

These seven systems have been selected in part for their urban, extensively on-surface, and in some cases predominantly street-routed character (similar to the alignment proposed for Austin’s Orange Line). Generally comparable urban population and density were also an important factor. As state capitals, Denver, Sacramento, Phoenix, Salt Lake City, and St. Paul (included in the Minneapolis-St. Paul system) also make good peer cities for Austin. Other new-start LRT systems that might have some sections on city streets but operate predominantly over extensive regional lines or grade-separated alignments were not considered as fully comparable cost models.

In contrast to our peer-systems approach, Project Connect states that, via its own methodology, “O&M unit costs for LRT service reflect a weighted national average cost per revenue hour ….” [Orange Line Operating and Maintenance Costs, 30 Oct. 2019] Apparently these costs are based on NTD data.

However, if Project Connect calculated its average from national data of all LRT systems reported in the NTD, this would have included a widely disparate collection of O&M and other data, much of it starkly dissimilar to Austin’s demographics and proposed LRT operational conditions. For example, legacy systems (remnants of historic surface electric railways dating back to the late 19th or early 20th century) such as those in Boston, San Francisco, Newark, and Pittsburgh retain a variety of older operating characteristics (e.g., onboard fare collection by train operators) that drive their vehicle-hour costs significantly higher than the average of modern new-start systems.

Other problems with such an indiscriminate approach include differences in alignment engineering configuration. Accordingly, we assessed some modern new-start LRT systems to be less suitable O&M vehicle-hour cost models for Austin’s proposed street-routed LRT Orange Line, including several we excluded particularly because of their proportionately more extensive subway and elevated segments: Buffalo, Los Angeles, St. Louis, Dallas, Seattle.

Nevertheless, despite what appear to be serious weaknesses with its own methodological assumptions, Project Connect has calculated an O&M cost per vehicle-hour of $284.15 (2017) for its Orange Line LRT surface alternative.

As regards BRT, in our judgement eight of the operational configurations of BRT systems reported in the 2017 NTD seemed to conform to the Orange Line BRT surface operating proposal, and can be assumed to represent peer systems with respect to Austin. These BRT services – operating in Cleveland, Eugene, Ft. Collins, Grand Rapids, Hartford, Kansas City, Los Angeles, and Orlando – thus provide an appropriate basis for comparing and evaluating Project Connect’s Orange Line LRT and BRT scenarios. New York City was excluded because its exceptionally high density, population size, and vast multi-model transit system are far out of proportion to Austin’s conditions. Boston’s disconnected system, partly operating as a trolleybus subway, also seemed inappropriate as a peer system. Likewise the Roaring Fork Transportation Authority’s operation, a basically rural system more closely resembling a regional or intercity motor coach service than an urban transit service, was also excluded. Data for the eight peer systems were used to develop metrics for comparison with Project Connect’s assumed cost inputs.

For 2017 O&M cost per vehicle-hour for Project Connect’s Orange Line BRT surface alternative, Project Connect’s own assumptions (based on information from CMTA and NTD) amount to an effective estimate of $119.10, as JGA has converted from Project Connect’s 2028 estimates.

To calculate current national averages and metrics for comparison, we’ve totaled current costs and other relevant values for the target LRT and BRT peer groups from National Transit Database (NTD) profile data, then calculated averages from those totals. All costs discussed are presented in 2017 dollars.

Results

►LRT: Average actual 2017 O&M cost per vehicle-hour for the seven peer LRT systems is $187.52, 34.0% lower than Project Connect’s assumed cost of $284.15 for the Orange Line surface LRT option.

►BRT: Average actual 2017 O&M cost per vehicle hour for the eight peer BRT systems is $162.23, 36.2% higher than Project Connect’s assumed cost estimate of $119.10 for the Orange Line surface BRT option.

LRT vehicle-costs/hour are typically higher than for buses mainly because LRT cars are larger and stations are also usually larger, creating higher maintenance costs. (These characteristics generally stem from LRT’s higher capacity and propensity to attract greater passenger volumes.) The ratio of actual NTD-reported peer-system LRT to BRT costs is 1.16. However, Project Connect’s cost assumptions amount to an LRT:BRT ratio of 2.39 – in other words, approximately twice the cost ratio in actual operating experience. The disparity between Project Connect’s estimates and costs experienced in actual operations is illustrated in the graph below.

Graphic illustration of disparity between Project Connect’s O&M unit-cost estimates and actual reality of costs experienced by actual operations of comparable peer LRT and BRT systems. Graph: ARN. (Click to enlarge.)

Conclusions and recommendation

Project Connect’s assumption for cost per vehicle-hour appears to substantially underestimate BRT and overestimate LRT – and this has dramatic consequences for the agency’s overall cost model results, seemingly skewing the evaluatory process and calling into question the plausibility and validity of the agency’s O&M cost analysis. The table below, presenting Project Connect’s comprehensive O&M cost calculations for the Orange Line alternatives, illustrates how the differential in O&M cost-per-vehicle-hour estimates translate into enormous differences of tens of millions of dollars in annual O&M cost assumptions.

Table of O&M cost calculations from Project Connect’s report. Screen capture by ARN. (Click to enlarge.)

We would strongly recommend that these assumptions and the overall O&M analysis of these alternatives be reviewed and revised – particularly by basing cost estimates on appropriate peer systems relevant to the LRT and BRT alternatives proposed by Project Connect for the Orange Line.

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Posted in Austin bus rapid transit, Austin light rail issues, Austin transportation planning, Austin urban rail issues, Capital Metro Orange Line, Design and cost issues, Guadalupe-Lamar corridor, Light rail transit (LRT), Light rail vs. bus rapid transit, Project Connect alternatives analysis, Project Connect methodology issues, Project Connect urban rail plan, Urban Rail | Tagged austin light rail, austin urban rail, bus rapid transit, light rail transit, o&m cost, operating cost, Project Connect, urban rail | 1 Comment »

Blue Line Should Branch from Orange Line Urban Rail — Nix the Redundant Infrastructure!

15 August 2019

Map shows ARN’s alternative proposed urban rail configuration in Core Area connecting Orange Line (Tech Ridge to Slaughter Lane) with Blue Line (UT campus through Core Area and East Riverside to ABIA). Both lines would share First St. (Drake) Bridge over river, thus eliminating need for an expensive redundant Blue Line bridge. Blue Line would branch from Orange Line at Dean Keaton and at W. 4th St. to serve east side of Core Area and provide link to airport. Map: ARN.
(Click image to enlarge)

By Austin Rail Now

Commentary slightly adapted from one-page handout originally produced by ARN and distributed to participants in Project Connect’s Blue Line Workshop at ACC Highland, 31 July 2019.

► Orange Line as primary corridor — Urban rail installation in the Orange Line alignment (N. Lamar-Guadalupe-Lamar-South Congress/NL-G-SC) must be prioritized. Positioned as Austin’s major central local corridor, between I-35 to the east and Loop 1 (MoPac) to the west, the Orange Line corridor is the center city’s 3rd-heaviest north-south travel corridor (after I-35 and MoPac). The City of Austin has repeatedly emphasized that this is the primary local traffic corridor in central-city Austin, with exceptionally heavy traffic at maximum capacity for over the past 2 decades. North Lamar alone is ranked by Texas Transportation Institute as one of the most congested arterials in Texas. With Austin’s highest total employment density on Guadalupe-Lamar, an urban rail line there alone could serve 31% of all Austin jobs. It would also serve the highest-density residential concentrations in the city — including the West Campus, ranking the 3rd-highest in residential neighborhood density among major Texas cities.
https://austinrailnow.com/2014/10/13/latest-tti-data-confirm-guadalupe-lamar-is-central-local-arterial-corridor-with-heaviest-travel/
http://centralaustincdc.org/transportation/austin_urban_rail.htm
https://austinrailnow.com/2019/07/29/future-proof-austins-mobility-with-urban-rail-not-infrastructure-for-techno-fantasies/

► Light rail transit (LRT) — For over 30 years, urban rail in the NL-G-SC (currently designated Orange Line) alignment has been regarded as the key central spine for an eventual citywide and regional urban rail network using well-proven, widely deployed, effective, affordable light rail transit (LRT) technology. Particularly with little to no need for major civil works, the Orange Line is ideal for a surface-installed LRT starter line.

Since initially selected as Capital Metro’s Locally Preferred Alternative in 1989, LRT has remained Austin’s premier major high-capacity transit vision. LRT has demonstrated numerous key advantages over bus rapid transit (BRT). And unlike many “gadget” alternatives, LRT is well-proven in service, a readily available technology, and non-proprietary. (In contrast, “autonomous BRT” has been neither deployed commercially nor even tested.) Compared with buses, LRT systems provide higher capacity and are faster, more user-friendly and more comfortable to access and ride. On average, ridership on new LRT systems is 127% higher than on BRT. LRT is also more cost-effective – average operating cost of new LRT systems is 10% lower than for BRT.
http://www.lightrailnow.org/industry_issues.htm#ridership
http://www.lightrailnow.org/industry_issues.htm#mode-preference
http://www.vtpi.org/bus_rail.pdf • APTA/National Transit Database

► Alternate Blue Line — Simply trying to resurrect the failed 2014 Highland-Riverside plan is not a prudent option. The Blue Line makes the most sense if it shares segments of the Orange Line, branching from it to serve the eastside of the Core Area and UT, and the East Riverside corridor (and ultimately ABIA). Running westward from ABIA on East Riverside, the Blue Line in this proposal would join the Orange Line south of the S.1st St. (Drake) Bridge. Sharing trackage across the bridge, it would proceed northward to Republic Square, where it would turn east to the San Jacinto/Trinity arterial pair, then turn northward and proceed to serve the Medical District and the UT East Campus. At Dean Keaton, the alignment would then turn west and travel on Dean Keaton toward Guadalupe St. to rejoin the Orange Line, proceeding northward from there. Access to-from ACC Highland could be made available via transfer with Red Line trains (with improved frequency) or various bus alternatives (from UT campus or Crestview).

► Eliminate redundant infrastructure — Major advantages of this alternative include more efficient operation, better passenger interconnection between Blue and Orange Lines, and very significant cost savings through eliminating redundancy: the proposed bridge over the Colorado, approximately three miles of line infrastructure paralleling the Orange Line, and five stations.

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Posted in Alternative Urban Rail Plan, Austin light rail issues, Austin transportation planning, Austin urban rail issues, Guadalupe-Lamar corridor, Light rail vs. bus rapid transit, Project Connect planning issues, Project Connect urban rail plan, Urban Rail | Tagged alternative plan, austin light rail, austin transportation planning, austin urban rail, bus rapid transit, capital metro, light rail transit, Project Connect, urban rail | Leave a Comment »

“Future-Proof” Austin’s Mobility With Urban Rail — Not Infrastructure for Techno-Fantasies

29 July 2019

Orange Line (north-south route indicated within black outline) shown within Project Connect’s map of proposed regional system. Excerpted and edited by ARN.

By Austin Rail Now

Commentary originally produced by ARN and distributed (as one-page handout) to participants in Project Connect’s Orange Line Workshop at Austin Central Library, 17 July 2019.

♦ Light rail transit (LRT) — This well-proven, widely deployed, effective, affordable urban rail alternative has been proposed for the Orange Line (N. Lamar-Guadalupe-S. Congress) corridor for 30 years. Since selected as Capital Metro’s Locally Preferred Alternative in 1989, LRT has remained Austin’s premier major high-capacity transit vision. In early 2018, Project Connect 2’s proposal for LRT in the Orange Line corridor received widespread community acclaim. However, the proposal was subsequently quashed by Capital Metro, which proceeded to restart the Project Connect process.

As noted below, LRT has demonstrated numerous key advantages over bus rapid transit (BRT). And unlike many “gadget” alternatives, LRT is well-proven in public service, a readily available technology, and non-proprietary. (In contrast, “autonomous BRT” has been neither deployed commercially nor even tested.)

♦ Ridership — On average, light rail systems have excelled in attracting passengers, especially new riders who have access to a car but choose to ride LRT. Compared with buses, LRT systems are more user-friendly, more comfortable to access and ride, and perceived as safer and more reliable. On average, ridership on new LRT systems is 127% higher than on bus rapid transit (BRT).
http://www.lightrailnow.org/industry_issues.htm#ridership • http://www.lightrailnow.org/industry_issues.htm#mode-preference
APTA/NTD

♦ Affordability — Especially for a city of Austin’s size, light rail has typically provided an affordable capital cost opportunity to install urban rail (costs similar to “real” BRT), with significantly lower operating + maintenance cost per passenger-mile compared to buses. Average operating cost of new LRT systems is 10% lower than for BRT. The lower capital and operational costs of a predominantly surface LRT system make it the ideal affordable mode for future expansion of a rail transit network throughout the Austin metro area.
http://www.vtpi.org/bus_rail.pdf • National Transit Database

Average operational cost of LRT is 10% lower than for BRT. Average costs calculated by ARN from data reported to National Transit Database, 2016.

♦ Environment & energy — Evidence shows LRT systems have the lowest air pollution and noise impacts, preserve neighborhoods and urban quality of life, and reduce energy usage per passenger-mile compared with cars and buses. LRT especially avoids the energy-wasting effects of hysteresis and asbestos pollution of rubber-tire transport.
http://www.lightrailnow.org/industry_issues.htm#environmental-impacts • http://onlinepubs.trb.org/onlinepubs/circulars/ec145.pdf

♦ Urban benefits — In contrast to bus operations (including BRT), light rail systems have demonstrated a consistent, significant, superlative propensity to attract adjacent development and economic growth, and help shape and guide a changing urban landscape.
http://www.lightrailnow.org/industry_issues.htm#urban • http://onlinepubs.trb.org/onlinepubs/Conferences/2019/LRT/LyndonHenry.pdf

♦ Capacity — Compared to both buses and “gadget” modes, LRT has far higher capacity in normal service scenarios and greater capability to accommodate future demand.
https://www.thoughtco.com/passenger-capacity-of-transit-2798765

♦ Guadalupe-Lamar (G-L) corridor — Positioned as Austin’s major central local corridor, between I-35 to the east and Loop 1 (MoPac) to the west, G-L has repeatedly been regarded as ideal for an LRT surface starter line (with no need for major civil works) to create the key central spine for an eventually citywide and regional urban rail network. It’s the center city’s 3rd-heaviest north-south corridor. The City of Austin (COA) has repeatedly emphasized that G-L is the primary local traffic corridor in central-city Austin, with exceptionally heavy traffic at maximum capacity for over the past 2 decades. Texas Transportation Institute ranks North Lamar as one of the most congested arterials in Texas. Urban rail is essential to maintaining mobility in this crucial corridor.
https://austinrailnow.com/2014/10/13/latest-tti-data-confirm-guadalupe-lamar-is-central-local-arterial-corridor-with-heaviest-travel/

♦ Employment & population density — With Austin’s highest total employment density on Guadalupe-Lamar, an urban rail line could serve 31% of all Austin jobs. An urban rail line in this corridor would serve the highest-density residential concentrations in the city — including the West Campus, ranking as the 3rd-highest in residential neighborhood density among major Texas cities.
http://centralaustincdc.org/transportation/austin_urban_rail.htm

Posted in Austin light rail issues, Austin transportation planning, Austin urban rail issues, Guadalupe-Lamar corridor, Light rail vs. bus rapid transit, Project Connect urban rail plan, Urban Rail | Tagged austin urban rail, Autonomous Rapid Transit, capital metro, Lamar-Guadalupe, light rail transit, LRT, Project Connect, urban rail | 2 Comments »

Why light rail transit is crucial for the Orange Line corridor

28 June 2019

A logical and affordable first step to actually implement a bona fide “high-capacity transit” system in the Orange Line corridor would be a 6.2-mile LRT starter line from US183 to downtown. Map: David Dobbs.

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Commentary by David Dobbs

This commentary has been adapted, edited, and slightly expanded from original comments submitted to the Federal Transit Administration in response to Early Scoping for Project Connect’s Orange Line “high capacity” corridor (North Lamar-Guadalupe-downtown). David Dobbs is Executive Director of the Texas Association for Public Transportation and publisher of LightRailNow.org.

Austin, Texas is a line village whose principle population centers are caught between two major north-south freeways that are rapidly approaching maximum capacity and cannot be meaningfully expanded. The Texas Transportation Institute (TTI) states that failure to adequately address Austin’s future mobility in the IH-35 corridor will essentially shut down economic growth by 2035. [1] This approximately 21-mile-long, one-to-three-mile-wide ribbon of urban population has only one continuous north-south travel corridor that can provide sufficient mobility for future residents – and then only if a well-designed electric urban light rail transit (LRT) line is constructed as a surrogate/alternate to IH-35 from Parmer Lane to Slaughter Lane, primarily routed via North Lamar, Guadalupe, and South Congress

This concept – basically, an elaboration of the Orange Line sketched in Project Connect’s Long-Term Vision Plan – is summarized in the linked 5-doc_Dobbs_Objective-2030-Basic-Concept page (PDF). Constructed as surface-running LRT (e.g. Phoenix, Houston, etc.), revenue service could begin in 2030. With a 17 mph average speed, a cross-platform transfer point with the Red Line at the Crestview Station, and major park & ride facilities at each end, such a line could plausibly carry as many as 100,000 daily rider-trips by 2035. Running through the densest sectors of the city, it would serve as a template for dense, mixed-use transit-oriented development (TOD), while at the same time providing excellent access to outlying areas sans the use of automobiles. We estimate the cost of this 21-mile Orange Line at approximately $2 billion in 2019 dollars, a fraction of the cost of expanding IH-35 (see map below).

LRT in Orange Line corridor could link Tech Ridge on the north end to Southpark Meadows on the south. Map: David Dobbs.

As the Objective 2030 Basic Concept page also suggests, a first step toward this 21-mile central route could be a much shorter initial starter line (at substantially more modest cost). Illustrated in red on the map (and in the map excerpt included at the top of this post) is a 6.2-mile Minimum Operable Segment running from the North Lamar Transit Center (at US183) on the north end, south via N. Lamar and Guadalupe (and Lavaca) to a south terminus at W. 4th St. downtown.

The Austin community has spent more than $30 million in planning money over the last 40 years trying to get this essential transportation element built here in the Texas capital – see, for example, FTA’s summary of the 2000 LRT plan. [2] Unfortunately, with mobility worsening and the pace of critical urban decisions speeding up, time is running out. We simply cannot wait for some hypothetical new technology to be developed and become available at some undetermined date in the future. Light rail is the proven alternative world-wide.

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References

[1] Mobility Investment Priorities Project Long-Term Central Texas IH 35 Improvement Scenarios August 2013 pp 58-61
http://tti.tamu.edu/documents/TTI-2013-18.pdf

[2[ FTA New Starts/Small Starts Austin, Texas/Light Rail Corridors (November 1999-& 2000)
https://austinrailnow.files.wordpress.com/2014/05/fta_austin-texas-cmta-light-rail-corridors-new-starts-nov-1999_.pdf

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Posted in Alternative Urban Rail Plan, Austin urban rail issues, Dave Dobbs's postings, Guadalupe-Lamar corridor, Guadalupe-Lamar MOS proposal, Light rail transit (LRT) | Tagged austin light rail, austin transportation planning, austin urban rail, federal transit administration, Lamar-Guadalupe, light rail transit, Project Connect | Leave a Comment »

Let’s Put Austin’s Urban Rail Planning Back on Track

29 November 2018

Light rail starter line using N. Lamar-Guadalupe corridor from Tech Ridge to downtown was key element of Project Connect comprehensive regional plan presented in February 2018. Despite a three-year data-driven process with community participation, it was subsquently overruled and aborted by Capital Metro officials – setting back planning process another two years.

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This post publishes the text of a handout distributed to a “Community Conversation” meeting sponsored by Project Connect in Council District 5 on 17 November 2018.

No more backsliding – Finalize a plan!

Last February (2018), Capital Metro’s Project Connect planning program, with public input, was finally nearing the end of a two-year process to devise a regional public transport proposal with urban rail and other “high-capacity” transit. On the table was a widely acclaimed, tentative plan for a viable, attractive public transport system, centered on a north-south light rail line from Tech Ridge to Slaughter Lane to link the city’s heaviest local travel corridors and provide a spine for ultimate rail extensions to other sections of the city. It was conceivable that details could be finalized to place a starter line on the November ballot for bond funding.

But that wouldn’t happen. Just over a month later, CapMetro’s new incoming CEO, with the blessing of the board, discarded the plan and reset the whole process back to zero – thus adding another two years to the seemingly endless effort to forge a transit remedy to Austin’s worsening mobility crisis.

While this destructive action was unprecedented and outrageous, for Austin it nevertheless fit a pattern of transit system plans aborted, botched, or abandoned by top leaders of CapMetro and the city’s political power elite, persisting over the past three decades. That’s a graveyard of at least six – count ‘em, 6 – urban rail planning efforts, totaling tens of millions of dollars, that have died because of official disinterest or misleadership, prolonging Austin’s mobility crisis pain and misery by 30 years. This delay needs to end – Austin needs to finalize and implement an urban rail system ASAP!

Real-world light rail, not science fiction dreams

In official studies from 1989 to 2018, light rail transit (LRT) has repeatedly been validated as Austin’s best choice for an attractive, cost-effective high-capacity transit system and the centerpiece of a regional system.

In recent decades, at least 19 North American cities have opened brand-new, affordable light rail systems that have typically excelled in attracting passengers, provided essential capacity and cost-effectiveness, and stimulated economic development that has more than repaid the public investment. Yet Austin’s official planning has recently been re-focused on visions of a totally untested, speculative technology (a “Smart Mobility roadmap” and ”Autonomous Rapid Transit”) – i.e., substituting science fiction for realistic, workable planning.

This seems basically a cover for dumping bona fide rapid transit and embracing a rebranded buses-only operation – bus rapid transit (BRT) – contradicting not only the recently aborted Project Connect process, but at least three official comparative studies over the past 28 years that have selected LRT as superior to BRT, particularly in key features such as capacity, ridership, cost, and economic development impacts. Disappeared from planning now are critical goals such as creating livable, transit-friendly, pedestrian-friendly streets and neighborhoods, and shaping public transit to guide growth and create economic investment.

Plans for urban rail should be fast-tracked

Austinites have long been suffering the pain of this region’s prolonged and worsening mobility crisis. We need real-world, proven, effective solutions now – not speculative visions of the possibilities of high-tech toys and autonomous vehicles. For sure, while prudently assessing new technology, we must not let our city be turned into a “Smart Mobility” Petri dish in lieu of installing a well-proven mass transit system such as LRT.

Austin’s mobility planning needs to be re-focused on developing an extensive, attractive, affordable, accessible, cost-effective public transport system with urban rail that can enhance livability, reduce total mobility cost, help guide growth, and encourage economic development that can recoup the public investment. To make up for time lost through delays and top-level debacles, rail planning should be fast-tracked, particularly by reinstating the results and community-participated planning decisions already achieved.

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Posted in Austin light rail issues, Austin transportation planning, Austin urban rail issues, Guadalupe-Lamar corridor, Project Connect planning issues, Project Connect urban rail plan | Tagged austin light rail, austin transportation planning, austin urban rail, capital metro, Project Connect | 1 Comment »

Capital Metro strikes three blows against Lamar-Guadalupe light rail

31 May 2018

Graphic: Grace in the city

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In a post this past February 28th, we reported on a surprising development coming from Capital Metro’s Project Connect planning process – the “conceptual” proposal of a 21-mile predominantly linear north-south light rail transit (LRT) corridor, running from Tech Ridge in North Austin, through the central heart of the city, to Slaughter Lane, near the Southpark Meadows area, in South Austin. The proposal particularly extolled the merits of a 12-mile-long segment, through the Lamar-Guadalupe corridor, from Tech Ridge to downtown.

After over four decades of indecision, missteps, and delay, it seemed like the transit agency (and city leadership) might, amazingly, have turned a corner. Could this actually mean that, at long last, Capital Metro and Austin’s top leadership were prepared to move ahead with a plausible, workable light rail plan – implementing a long-awaited leap forward in urban mobility – for the city’s most important central corridor?

Unfortunately, no. Slightly over a month later, Capital Metro reversed itself, withdrew the LRT proposal, and reverted to the familiar decades-long pattern of indecision, confusion, dithering, and delay that has gripped Austin like a curse.

Instead of an actual, specific project for a new light rail system, with a starter line from Tech Ridge to Republic Square downtown, the proposal had dissolved into the clouds, becoming just another line on a map of “perhaps something, some day”. To explain the retreat, planning was now described as “mode agnostic” – in other words, reverting back to a kind of official daydreaming, without any modes (the things that people would actually ride) identified to define a real-world project.

Almost exactly a month later, Capital Metro’s board made another fateful decision. Whereas mode-specific recommendations from the Project Connect study were scheduled for June, the board delayed that back to late in the fall (or perhaps winter) – far too late to put any kind of actual, mode-specific project (such as the previous LRT proposal) on the November ballot for possible voter approval of bond funding. (At best, this would now delay voter approval of any hypothetical project until the 2020 election cycle.)

A third blow against LRT in the Lamar-Guadalupe corridor was struck on May 8th, when the Capital Area Mobility Planning Organization (CAMPO) approved a Capital Metro-sponsored plan (originally submitted Jan. 19th) to overhaul the N. Lamar Blvd.-Airport Blvd.-MetroRail intersection (adjacent to the Crestview MetroRail station) with a design – exclusively focused on accommodating and facilitating motor vehicle traffic, rather than public transport – that would impose enormous obstacles to LRT on North Lamar. Currently, community activists and urban rail advocates are endeavoring to prompt a redesign of this project.

For decade after decade, the Austin community has agonized, writhed, and wailed over its steadily mounting mobility crisis. Hundreds of miles of lanes and roads have been built and rebuilt, and even more vigorous roadbuilding is currently underway. Yet the mobility crisis continues to worsen – for many motorists, driving around the urban area increasingly feels like trying to swim through solidifying mud. Or, alternatively, slogging through a battlefield ….

Repeatedly, the need for light rail has been affirmed. (See «Long saga of Guadalupe-Lamar light rail planning told in maps».) As we pointed out in a March 2015 post, “For two and a half decades, local officials and planners have explained why urban rail — affordable light rail transit (LRT), in Austin’s case — has been an absolutely essential component of the metro area’s mobility future.” («Austin’s urban transport planning seems struck by catastrophic case of amnesia and confusion».)

Capital Metro designated LRT in the Lamar-Guadalupe corridor as the region’s Locally Preferred Alternative in 1989. In 2000, Capital Metro hastily placed LRT on the ballot – but, in a poorly organized election campaign, it was defeated in the overall service area by a tiny margin (although it was approved by Austin voters). In 2014, another LRT plan was presented to Austin voters under the slogan “Rail or Fail” – but, proposed for the ridiculously weak Highland-Riverside corridor, the plan was resoundingly rejected. (See «Austin: Flawed urban rail plan defeated — Campaign for Guadalupe-Lamar light rail moves ahead».)

Time and time again, Austin has demonstrated that it’s the national poster child for chronically muddled urban mobility planning. In a January 2015 post, we warned that “Austin – supposedly the most ‘progressive’ city in the ‘reddest’ rightwing state of Texas – has a distinctive (read: notorious) reputation for dithering, dallying, and derailing in its public transport planning ….” («Strong community support for Guadalupe-Lamar light rail continues — but officials seem oblivious».) As our previously-cited March 2015 post went on to observe: “The devastating befuddlement of Austin’s official-level urban transportation planning … has been nothing short of jaw-dropping.”

Will Austin, and Capital Metro, ever manage to break out of this pattern of failure? Does hope still spring eternal?

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Posted in Austin light rail issues, Austin transportation planning, Capital Metro policy and planning, Guadalupe-Lamar corridor, Light rail transit (LRT), Urban Rail | Tagged austin light rail, austin transportation planning, campo, Lamar-Guadalupe, light rail transit, Project Connect, urban rail | 1 Comment »

North Lamar-Guadalupe-South Congress light rail plan seems back on the table

28 February 2018

Project Connect’s latest draft system plan envisions multiple bus and rail routes, including the long, linear north-south light rail line (shown in purple north of the river and lavender to the south) stretching from Tech Ridge to Slaughter. Map: Project Connect.

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The stream of Twitter posts on Feb. 12th from Steven Knapp, attending a meeting of the Multimodal Community Advisory Committee (MCAC), came like a bombshell – forwarding snapshots of an apparent conceptual proposal, by Capital Metro’s Project Connect planning body, for a light rail line not merely in the Guadalupe-Lamar corridor, but stretching all the way from Tech Ridge in North Austin, southward down North Lamar, and Guadalupe, through the Core Area, and on down South Congress to the Southpark Meadows area in far South Austin.

The route, originally proposed by local transportation activist Dave Dobbs in 2014, incorporates sections initially proposed by transportation planner and local activist Lyndon Henry in 1989, plus the portion of Capital Metro’s 2000 plan taking light rail transit (LRT) from the Crestview area (N. Lamar/Airport Blvd.) as far south as the Ben White freeway. Dave’s extensions north to Tech Ridge and south to Southpark Meadows have created a highly plausible north-south linear alignment, offering a central alternative to both I-35 and the MoPac (Loop 1) freeway, that has caught the public’s imagination and attention.

Initial phase of LRT project would run from Tech Ridge to downtown at Republic Square, mainly following the North Lamar-Guadalupe travel/development corridor. Map: Project Connect.

While Capital Metro insists that the idea at this stage is just “a draft for internal review”, LRT in the city’s most important central corridor – North Lamar-Guadalupe – plus South Austin’s most venerable central corridor – South Congress Avenue – does seem to be garnering particularly serious interest. According to Project Connect’s Feb. 12th MCAC presentation,

The North Lamar/Guadalupe Corridor has been one of the most critical transportation arteries in Austin for over a century. Phase 2 of Project Connect considered the 12 miles of the corridor stretching from Tech Ridge in North Austin to Republic Square in Downtown. The corridor connects many of Austin’s most important destinations, including Downtown, the State Capitol, University of Texas, and several major state agency offices between 38th and Crestview.

A graphic emphasizes this corridor’s potential even more:

Table shows demographic and other data bolstering potential of LRT in Guadalupe-Lamar corridor. Graphic: Project Connect.

It should be noted that these improved prospects for Guadalupe-Lamar LRT come into ascendancy just as the alternative scheme for an I-35 “Super BRT” – buses running in future toll lanes in the Interstate highway – have been placed “on hold”. (See «Why TxDOT-Capital Metro “BRT” plan for I-35 is a massive boondoggle».) Reportedly, toll-based highways are being rejected by top Texas officials, particularly in light of prohibitions by Texas voters against using relatively new road revenue streams to finance them.

Yet even if LRT is suddenly, truly on the official table, moving forward with an an actual project is not without challenges. First, Project Connect’s planning methodology is still encumbered with unfortunate flaws, a few of them somewhat similar to several within the 2013 planning process. These include dubious and implausibly rigid “corridor” criteria, as well as questionable evaluation criteria. (See «The fraudulent “study” behind the misguided Highland-Riverside urban rail plan».)

But by far the biggest challenge will be how to pay for such an ambitious plan, especially in view of the Trump administration’s evidently skeptical and parsimonious attitude toward public transport funding. But there’s a saying worth keeping in mind: “Who wills the end, wills the means.” Austin could, like Houston, rely on local bonds to fund its own LRT starter line project – if it’s designed (and kept) sufficiently modest and affordable. And some level of federal funding is not necessarily totally out of the question.

In any case, Project Connect appears at least to have taken an official step toward putting LRT back on a sound path for planning and, hopefully, implementation. And that may signal real progress. ■

Posted in Alternative Urban Rail Plan, Austin light rail issues, Austin urban rail issues, Guadalupe-Lamar corridor, Light rail transit (LRT) | Tagged austin light rail, austin transportation planning, austin urban rail, Lamar-Guadalupe, urban rail | 3 Comments »

Urban Rail on Guadalupe-Lamar, Not I-35 “BRT”

31 July 2017

Map from Austin Rail Now/Our Rail leaflet distributed at July 26th “Traffic Jam” shows 21-mile light rail transit line proposed as a “high-capacity transit” alternative to the “BRT” line in I-35 advocated by TxDOT and other road proponents.

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As our April 30th article «Reorganized Project Connect 2.0 opens up, reaches out» explained, Project Connect – the major planning effort -sponsored by Capital Metro, has been re-evaluating Austin-area corridors as possible candidates for rail and other forms of “high-capacity transit”. In recent months, the Texas Department of Transportation (seeking funding participation for its planned overhaul of Interstate Highway 35 through Austin) has been prodding the transit agency to allocate funding for a so-called “bus rapid transit” (BRT) service to be installed in the proposed reconstructed highway. This has become one of the de facto “high-capacity transit” alternatives competing with urban rail in the Guadalupe-Lamar corridor for major local funding.

On July 26th, Project Connect, Capital Metro, and several other collaborating agencies sponsored a “Traffic Jam” community meeting, with invited panelists, to discuss possible options in the planning process. The following article is adapted from a leaflet published and distributed by Austin Rail Now, together with the Our Rail political action committee, at the “Traffic Jam” meeting, focusing on a proposed central 21-mile light rail transit (LRT) project, paralleling I-35 and Loop 1 (“MoPac”, Austin’s other north-south freeway), as an alternative to the I-35 “BRT” proposal.

Why not a true mobility option?

• Alternative to I-35 and Loop 1 — A 21-mile urban rail line, running from Tech Ridge in the north to Southpark Meadows in the south, following the Loop 275 (North Lamar to South Congress) corridor, could provide alternative traffic relief to Austin’s major north-south freeways (I-35 and Loop1/MoPac).

Map at left illustrates the major neighborhoods and activity centers that would be served. Such a route could plausibly have a potential of attracting ridership of 100,000 a day.

• Better option than I-35 “BRT” — Urban rail is a far better public transit option than a dubious, seriously handicapped “bus rapid transit” (BRT) line in I-35. Urban rail lines have demonstrated significantly greater potential to attract riders, guide adjacent development, improve commercial taxbase, and stimulate economic activity. It’s unlikely that buses running in an I-35 HOV toll lane would yield any of these benefits.

• Affordable — Light rail transit (LRT), predominantly surface-routed, can most easily and affordably be installed to serve people where they live, work, and need to go. Decades of experience in other major U.S. cities demonstrates that light rail is substantially less costly to operate per passenger-mile than buses, and tends to create high-value taxbase around stops. This can significantly enhance public revenue for better city services, while at the same time helping stabilize or even lower property taxes.

• Guadalupe-Lamar starter line — Guadalupe-Lamar (G-L) is the center city’s 3rd-heaviest north-south corridor. In addition to major activity centers, the corridor serves a variety of dense, established neighborhoods, including the West Campus with the 3rd-highest population density in Texas. With Austin’s highest total employment density on Guadalupe-Lamar, an urban rail line could serve 31% of all Austin jobs.

An initial 6 or 7 mile LRT starter line from U.S. 183 or Crestview to downtown could serve as the initial spine of an eventual metrowide system, with branches north and south, northwest, northeast, east, southeast, west, and southwest.

• BRT Reality Check — So-called “BRT” operations in other cities like Minneapolis and Cleveland typically fail to meet the ridership and urban benefit claims of their promoters. Minneapolis’s Orange Line, an upgrade of the city’s heaviest bus transit corridor in I-35W, with just 14,000 daily ridership on 25 routes after 45 years’ worth of facility investment, is no model for Austin. (In contrast, Minneapolis’s 2 LRT lines attract ridership of 68,000.) Cleveland’s Health Line carries ridership of 16,000 in the city’s historically busiest local corridor. Running both in reserved lanes and in mixed traffic, this line is more akin to Austin’s MetroRapid bus services than a “BRT” operation in I-35.

• Community benefits — Compared with buses, LRT systems are more user-friendly, more comfortable to access and ride, and more reliable. G-L LRT would provide higher passenger capacity than the proposed I-35 “BRT”, while being more energy efficient, encouraging denser development and safer, more livable urban environments, and emitting less greenhouse gases.

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Posted in Austin bus rapid transit, Austin light rail issues, Austin urban rail issues, Guadalupe-Lamar corridor | Tagged austin light rail, austin urban rail, bus rapid transit, cleveland health line, Lamar-Guadalupe, minneapolis, reserved lanes, urban rail | 3 Comments »

The case for urban rail on Guadalupe-Lamar

30 May 2017

Top: Map of Guadalupe-Lamar light rail starter line minimal operable segment (MOS), proposed in 2016. (Map: CACDC.) Bottom: Salt Lake City light rail line at downtown station could resemble system proposed for Austin. (Photo: L. Henry.)

♦

by Lyndon Henry

This post has been adapted from comments distributed to members of the Multimodal Community Advisory Committee (MCAC) at its meeting of 26 April 2017. Lyndon Henry is a technical consultant to the Light Rail Now Project and a contributing editor to the Austin Rail Now website.

Why light rail transit (LRT)?

► Ridership — On average, light rail systems have excelled in attracting passengers, especially new riders who have access to a car but choose to ride LRT. Compared with buses, LRT systems are more user-friendly, more comfortable to access and ride, and perceived as safer and more reliable.
http://www.lightrailnow.org/industry_issues.htm#ridership
http://www.lightrailnow.org/industry_issues.htm#mode-preference

► Affordable — Especially for cities of Austin’s size, light rail has typically demonstrated an affordable capital cost and the lowest operating + maintenance cost per passenger-mile of typical urban transit modes.
http://www.vtpi.org/bus_rail.pdf

► Environment & energy — Evidence shows light rail systems have the lowest air pollution and noise impacts, preserve neighborhoods and urban quality of life, and reduce energy usage per passenger-mile compared with cars and buses.
http://www.lightrailnow.org/industry_issues.htm#environmental-impacts
http://onlinepubs.trb.org/onlinepubs/circulars/ec145.pdf

► Urban benefits — In contrast to bus operations, light rail systems have demonstrated a consistent, significant propensity to attract adjacent development, stimulate economic prosperity, and help shape and guide a changing urban landscape.
http://www.lightrailnow.org/industry_issues.htm#urban

► Capacity — Compared to both buses and “gadget” modes like gondolas, LRT has far higher capacity in normal service scenarios and greater capability to accommodate future demand. Unlike many “gadget” alternatives, LRT is well-proven in public service, a readily available technology, and non-proprietary.
https://www.thoughtco.com/passenger-capacity-of-transit-2798765

► Expandable — The lower capital cost of a predominantly surface LRT system makes it the ideal affordable mode for future expansion of a rail transit network throughout the Austin metro area.

Why the Guadalupe-Lamar corridor?

► Travel density — Guadalupe-Lamar (G-L) is center city’s 3rd-heaviest north-south corridor. The City of Austin (COA) has repeatedly emphasized that G-L is the primary local traffic corridor in central-city Austin, with exceptionally heavy traffic at maximum capacity for over the past 2 decades. Texas Transportation Institute ranks North Lamar as one of the most congested arterials in Texas. Urban rail is essential to maintaining mobility in this crucial corridor. It’s the most logical location for an urban rail starter line.
https://austinrailnow.com/2014/10/13/latest-tti-data-confirm-guadalupe-lamar-is-central-local-arterial-corridor-with-heaviest-travel/

► Employment & population density — With Austin’s highest total employment density on Guadalupe-Lamar, an urban rail line could serve 31% of all Austin jobs. Since, this corridor also has Austin’s highest population density, an urban rail line would serve the highest-density residential concentrations in the city – including the West Campus, ranking as the 3rd-highest neighborhood in residential density among major Texas cities.
http://centralaustincdc.org/transportation/austin_urban_rail.htm

► Future expansion — As Austin’s primary central arterial access corridor, Guadalupe-Lamar is ideally positioned to become the spine and anchor for future expansion of LRT into an eventual citywide system.

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Posted in Austin light rail issues, Austin urban rail issues, Guadalupe-Lamar corridor, Lyndon Henry's postings | Tagged austin light rail, austin urban rail, Lamar-Guadalupe | 2 Comments »

Reorganized Project Connect 2.0 opens up, reaches out

30 April 2017

Guadalupe-Lamar corridor places at top of Project Connect’s table of corridor rankings shown in slide at April 26th MCAC meeting. Photo: L. Henry. (Click to enlarge.)

♦

Has Austin’s public transportation planning and decisionmaking establishment turned a new leaf?

That’s yet to be fully determined. But … if Project Connect – the Capital Metro-sponsored major planning effort in charge of evaluating possible rail and other forms of “high-capacity transit” – offers any indication … there may be signs of a changed focus.

The original Project Connect earned intense distrust from Austin’s most ardent transit advocates because of its role leading the 2013-2014 High-Capacity Transit study that produced the disastrously flawed $600 million Highland-Riverside urban rail proposal (defeated by voters in November 2014). In contrast, the current planning agency (“Project Connect 2.0”) appears to have actually undergone a makeover in some important respects.

• Personnel — A totally new planning team, with completely different personnel from the original Project Connect.

• Consultants — A new consultant team led by AECOM.

• Methodology — A focus on actual travel corridors rather than the original Project Connect study’s method of slicing up central Austin into districts and sectors and mislabeling them “corridors” and “subcorridors” … plus analytics that seem more accurate in evaluating and prioritizing corridors for a comprehensive plan.

• Public involvement — What seems to be a much more sincere effort than in the past to solicit and engage actual involvement by key members of the community in the nuts and bolts of the planning process.

Included in this outreach have been strong advocates of urban rail for the Guadalupe-Lamar corridor. Invited to an April 17th consultory meeting, representatives of the Texas Association for Public Transportation (TAPT, sponsor of the Light Rail Now Project and this website) and the Central Austin Community Development Corporation (CACDC) were presented an overview of Project Connect’s planning process and its current status, which appeared to represent a new direction in goals and methodology and a somewhat new approach to public involvement.

Currently Project Connect is completing what it designates as Phase 1 of its overall analysis – concentrating mainly on evaluating and selecting corridors as candidates for possible “high-capacity transit”. Phase 2, according to the agency, about to begin, will focus on selecting modes (i.e., types of “vehicle” systems), identifying funding mechanisms, determining “the best set of solutions”, and recommending Locally Preferred Alternatives (LPAs).

At the April 17th meeting, the attendees were told that the Guadalupe-Lamar corridor was ranking quite high in the evaluation. They were encouraged to attend a public meeting of the Multimodal Community Advisory Committee (MCAC), set for April 26th, where the major results of Phase 1 would be presented.

And indeed, at the April 26th MCAC meeting, Project Connect team members, via a slide presentation led by the project’s Director of Long Range Planning Javier Argüello, revealed the study’s conclusion: Guadalupe-Lamar had emerged as the study’s top-ranked corridor. (At top of this post, see closeup of slide of ranking table.)

Project Connect’s table of corridor rankings shown in slide at April 26th MCAC meeting. Photo: L. Henry. (Click to enlarge.)

From here, according to the study timetable, the focus will narrow on possible modes (rail modes, buses, others) and comparative costs. Obviously, there’s no guarantee that light rail transit (LRT) on Guadalupe-Lamar – the center of substantial community interest for decades – will make the final cut.

Unfortunately, it’s possible that an evaluation could be impaired or skewed by false assumptions. For example: Buses in dedicated lanes may rate as a “high-capacity” mode, but they have not shown that they can attract passengers to utilize that capacity at a rate or level comparable to LRT. Also, LRT has shown a much higher propensity to attract adjacent development – particularly transit-oriented development, or TOD – than “high-capacity” bus services such as MetroRapid. And there are other significant performance and operational issues to consider.*

*See:
• New light rail projects in study beat BRT
• LRT or BRT? It depends on the potential of the corridor

Nevertheless, despite an array of critical differences, study methodologies and planning models frequently treat rail and bus modes as if they’re totally interchangeable in key features such as attracting ridership, accommodating future ridership growth, and stimulating economic development.

So will an adequate, fair, accurate comparison be conducted? Are local public transport planners actually starting to move in a new direction? The jury’s still out. But Austin’s staunchest transit advocates are watching … and hoping.

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Posted in Austin transportation planning, Guadalupe-Lamar corridor, Project Connect methodology issues, Project Connect planning issues | Tagged austin light rail, austin transportation planning, austin urban rail, Lamar-Guadalupe, light rail transit, Project Connect | 2 Comments »

Transit planning cabal-style

28 February 2017

Graphic: Marvel Database.

♦

In recent weeks, within Austin’s transit advocacy community, rumors have been circulating of some kind of “package” of major transit projects possibly being compiled, perhaps for the November 2018 election cycle. While details are murky – concocted behind the veil of a resuscitated Project Connect and the tightly shuttered enclaves of the high-level leadership consortium of Capital Metro, City of Austin, plus some Travis County and state officials – it is whispered that such a plan might include a “Guadalupe-Lamar project” as well as an expansion of the MetroRail regional railway, a highway-routed bus “rapid transit” (BRT) line, and other possible projects.

A “Guadalupe-Lamar project” sounds great – a starter light rail transit (LRT) line in the Guadalupe-Lamar (G-L) corridor would represent the crucial linchpin of an eventual LRT (urban rail) network for the entire metro area. But there’s no guarantee that LRT is the “project” behind the dark curtain. Whatever concrete details of these wisps of plans may exist seem to be closely guarded secrets. For the G-L corridor, officials, planners, and their consultants may be envisioning urban rail, or they might just as plausibly be concocting more investment in the pathetic MetroRapid faux-“BRT” operation … or a cable-gondola line … or some other scheme.

The problem is that this top-level methodology of secrecy is now the routine modus operandi of most of Austin’s major public transport planning. And this, in an era of so-called “transparency”.

In fact, a lot of this methodology comes close to the definition of a cabal: “the contrived schemes of a group of persons secretly united in a plot ….” While it doesn’t have the cohesiveness of a bona fide cabal – and it certainly isn’t motivated by evil intent – today’s transport planning process nevertheless feels enough like a behind-the-scenes cabal to merit this unfortunate comparison. (And that’s why we’ve dubbed it “cabal-style”.)

Local planning wasn’t always this Machiavellian. Back in the early days of the Austin Transportation Study (predecessor of CAMPO) and Capital Metro, particularly in the 1970s and 1980s, planning was upfront; plans were on the table for public review, discussion, and debate. Community activists were intimately involved in the planning process; public participation was vigorous and vibrant. Meetings of advisory bodies such as Capital Metro’s Citizens Advisory Committee and Transitway Corridor Analysis Project Advisory Committee were frequent and well-attended, often by participants in the dozens. Plan proposals were not only clearly on view, but were shaped and fine-tuned by direct community input.

That process has, in recent years, been squelched. Interactive public meetings have been replaced by “open houses” and “workshops” where actual full discussion among all participants is excluded. Austin Rail Now has analyzed and criticized this deleterious process in considerable detail – see the numerous articles collected in the category Public involvement process.

Bona fide, free-speaking, freely attended, full public meetings are a critical component of democratic process. That’s how ideas are raised, shaped, tweaked, finalized – via discussion within groups of participants with a diversity of expertise, backgrounds, viewpoints, insights.

You can be sure that these occult, mysterious transit plans we’ve been referring to have been hatched by vigorous interactive meetings … not of the public, but of a relatively tiny, cabal-like huddle of officials, planners, and consultants sheltered from public view and involvement. A carefully assembled community body like the Multimodal Community Advisory Committee is allowed an occasional glimpse of what’s already been decided elsewhere … and then, only every few months or so. Back in the days of the directly involved and intensely active public advisory committees, meetings were held several times a month (especially in the final stages of formulating plans).

Even through this dark, distorted process, perhaps acceptable plans will emerge that will be embraced by the Austin community. But don’t hold your breath. The absence of direct, intimate, ongoing, adequately engaged, fully democratic public participation seriously increases the risk of flawed outcomes and political problems.
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Posted in Austin light rail issues, Austin transportation planning, Austin urban rail issues, Capital Metro policy and planning, Guadalupe-Lamar corridor, Light rail transit (LRT), Project Connect planning issues, Public involvement process | Tagged austin light rail, austin transportation planning, austin urban rail, Lamar-Guadalupe, Project Connect, public involvement, urban rail | Leave a Comment »

Guadalupe-Lamar urban rail needs to be included in Austin’s “mobility” bond package

27 July 2016

Ann Kitchen chairs City of Austin Mobility Committee meeting of June 14th. Photo: Sceenshot from ATXN video.

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By Lyndon Henry

The following comments were made during Citizen Communications to a public meeting of the City of Austin’s Mobility Committee on 14 June 2016. Lyndon Henry is a transportsation planning consultant, a former board member of Capital Metro, a technical consultant to the Light Rail Now Project, and a contributing editor to this website.

I urge you to include a measure for urban rail in the proposed $720 million “mobility” bond package now under consideration. I support the proposal for an affordable 5.3-mile light rail Minimum Operable Segment on North Lamar and Guadalupe from Crestview to downtown.

Currently 83% of the proposed $720 million package is devoted to road projects. Surely some of these road projects could be replaced with the $260 million to $400 million that would facilitate an urban rail project.

5.3-mile Minimum Operable Segment light rail line proposed by CACDC. Graphic: Screenshot from CACDC map.

Proposed 5.3-mile light rail transit starter line Minimum Operable Segment in Guadaluoe-Lamar corridor. Graphic: CACDC.

It’s absurd that the $720 million bond package you’re considering could be labeled a “mobility” package despite NO major initiative for transit, let alone urban rail, which has been studied and affirmed as a necessity for decades. This bond proposal stands in contradiction to the decades of official “green” rhetoric and policy initiatives such as Envision Central Texas and Imagine Austin that have verbally embraced public transportation and “high-capacity transit” as key “alternative mobility” measures necessary to “keep Austin moving”.

This road-focused $720 million package tries to address congestion by increasing “throughput” of vehicles. Unfortunately, experience and evidence suggest that this is a losing approach — trying to tweak more capacity to squeeze through more cars typically just induces more traffic. Furthermore, this influx of ever-growing vehicle traffic imposes more stress on congested areas such as Austin’s core.

Lyndon Henry presenting comments to City of Austin Mobility Committee on June 14th. Photo: Screenshot from ATXN video.

In contrast, this light rail plan (and future expansions throughout Austin) removes traffic from roadways by attracting motorists to the transit service, adding the equivalent of four lanes of extra peak capacity to this corridor. Can the same be said for the current $720 million road-focused bond plan?

I suggest that urban rail — providing highly attractive rail transit service on its own dedicated tracks — makes far more sense as a solution for alleviating mobility congestion, than simply trying to squeeze more traffic onto the city’s crowded streets, roads, and parking spaces.

I’ve heard the argument that urban rail is “not ready” to be offered as a bond measure. Yet polls and other evidence indicate resounding support for public transit and urban rail, and the Austin community has gone through years of repeated outreach exercises familiarizing them with the technology and the issues. The public seems more ready than ever to support rail; it’s Austin’s civic leadership that seems to have cold feet.

Finally, whatever bond package you choose, I urge you to unbundle the roads bonds from the small proportion of bicycle and pedestrian bonds. This would allow the community at least to consider these alternative mobility elements separately. ■

[

NOTE: As of this posting, the Mobility Committee and City Council have approved the $720 million roads-dominated bond measure, without provision for transit, as a bundled package.

Posted in Austin light rail issues, Austin transportation planning, Ballot measure campaign and issues, Guadalupe-Lamar corridor, Guadalupe-Lamar MOS proposal, Lyndon Henry's postings, Urban Rail | Tagged austin light rail, austin urban rail, Lamar-Guadalupe, light rail transit, rail ballot measure | Leave a Comment »

Grassroots effort proposes small light rail starter project for an authentic “mobility bond” measure

11 June 2016

5.3-mile Minimum Operable Segment light rail line proposed by CACDC. Graphic: Screenshot from CACDC map.

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An Austin “mobility” bond package without a single major transit project? That’s the current plan from the office of Austin Mayor Steve Adler – a $720 million bond bundle overwhelmingly (about 83%) concentrated on roadway projects, with a smattering of “alternative mobility” pedestrian and bicycle projects, and virtually no significant public transport improvements.

The current official bond package stands in stark contradiction to the decades of official “green” rhetoric verbally embracing public transportation and “high-capacity transit” as key components of the “alternative mobility” measures necessary to “keep Austin moving” – rhetoric also enshrined in major policy initiatives of recent decades such as Envision Central Texas and Imagine Austin. The “mobility” bond package also comes in contrast to a recent resurgence of competent studies and reports suggesting that continuing to emphasize further roadway development – because of effects such as encouraging suburban sprawl, creating further dependency on private car travel, and inducing even more traffic – is a losing game.

An affordable light rail starter line

In response, an outcry has arisen throughout the Austin community, calling for some major public transport elements to be included in the “mobility” bond measure. By far the most substantial alternative approach to the official roadwork-heavy bond offering is a proposal crafted by Scott Morris and Andrew Clements of the Central Austin Community Development Corporation (CACDC), a small nonprofit organization. Supported by a group of other community leaders, the proposal suggests that a light rail transit (LRT) Minimum Operable Segment (MOS) would be feasible, stretching 5.3 miles from Crestview (North Lamar at Airport Blvd.) south to Republic Square (West 4th St.) in downtown Austin (see maps above and further below). CACDC estimates daily ridership of 37,400 for the MOS.

The MOS is actually a subset of previous plans for the Guadalupe-Lamar (G-L) corridor, such as Capital Metro’s 1994 plan, the agency’s 2000 plan, a 2013 proposal from Texas Association for Public Transportation (TAPT), an earlier, more extensive CACDC plan for the G-L corridor, and the 2014 “Plan B” proposal from Austin Rail Now (ARN).

In addition to previous design work by Capital Metro consultants from 1994, 2000, and the early 2000s, ARN has also suggested another design option for inserting LRT infrastructure into the corridor. See: «San Francisco’s N-Judah Muni Metro line shows design option for light rail in Austin’s Guadalupe-Lamar corridor».

Cross-sectional diagram of major arterials in corridor, showing center LRT reservation, traffic lanes, sidwalks, and side-mounted TES poles for suspending the OCS. Graphic: ARN.

Cross-sectional view of a possible design for LRT in the Guadalupe-Lamar corridor. Graphic: ARN.

CACDC’s capital investment cost estimate for the proposed MOS – $397.5 million – is based on an average of costs from 15 rail projects (LRT plus one diesel-powered light railway), as compiled by the Federal Transit Administration (FTA) and reviewed and analyzed by Andrew Clements. This renders an average of $68.3 million per mile (2016 dollars). Especially in light of past studies of LRT in the G-L corridor, as well as recent projects nationwide, the methodology certainly provides a competent and plausible basis for a “system-level” order-of-magnitude estimate suitable for presentation to voters and justification for further, more detailed planning.

CACDC is proposing that its year-2016 cost estimate ($397.5 million) be offered to voters in full as a ballot measure this coming November. CACDC believes the MOS project could be implemented via local funding and without assistance from the Federal Transit Administration (FTA).

A more methodologically conservative estimate of investment cost for the same proposed MOS by the Light Rail Now Project of Texas Association for Public Transportation (TAPT) accepts CACDC’s cost estimate but adds a higher allowance for contingency. As explained by Lyndon Henry, a transportation planning consultant and technical consultant to the Light Rail Now Project (and also a contributing editor to this website), there is a substantial component of “unknown” in most major rail transit projects. Therefore, best standard practice for capital investment cost estimates is to apply a contingency allowance (for surface LRT projects) averaging at least 25-30% of the total of all other costs – in effect, as a kind of “insurance”. Curiously, a cost estimate of “about $465 Million” reported in a May 12th KEYE-TV News segment covering the CACDC proposal, including an interview with Clements, appeared to incorporate such a contingency, amounting to about 28% added to the cost-per-mile average that Clements found from his analysis of FTA project data.

However, the actual project funding intended in a bond measure must also allow for the effects of inflation as the project proceeds. Thus standard practice is to escalate the given current-year investment cost estimate into YOE (year of expenditure) dollars. Otherwise project proponents, designers, and managers will either (a) be caught short or (b) need to go to voters again for enough money (or scrummage for some other source) to actually complete the project. The TAPT estimate assumes a 2.5% adjustment rate over a project span of four years.

In TAPT’s assessment, seeking FTA assistance (and thus collaboration and oversight) is important, particularly since TxDOT lacks a strong rail oversight program. The dangers of disdaining federal collaboration already became clear in some of the most serious missteps of Capital Metro’s MetroRail implementation, resulting in a significantly delayed opening, jeopardizing public support, and leading to expensive operational constraints and unexpected requirements, continuing to this day. FTA participation would also imply 50-50 sharing of the capital investment cost, significantly alleviating the funding burden borne by Austin taxpayers. Also, a design concept to implement a cross-platform transfer between LRT and MetroRail (under the aegis of the Federal Railroad Administration, or FRA) would invoke FRA involvement.

Based on all these factors, the TAPT capital investment cost estimate, with 28% contingency and YOE escalation at 2.5% per annum, totals about $520 million for this 5.3-mile MOS starter line. In TAPT’s FTA-funded scenario, a mobility bond measure of $260 million would be sufficient to provide a local 50% match for funding the project.

Wider-view map showing 5.3-mile LRT MOS route strategically serving busy local Guadalupe-Lamar corridor between Loop 1 (MoPac) and I-35. Graphic: ARN.

Wider-view map, in context of central-city Austin, showing 5.3-mile LRT MOS route strategically serving busy local Guadalupe-Lamar corridor between Loop 1 (MoPac) and I-35. Graphic: ARN.

Significant benefits

Assuming a 14-mph average speed for the 5.3-mile starter line, Henry calculates a 23-minute Crestview-to-Republic Square running time. This compares with 26-28 minutes by Capital Metro’s MetroRapid Route 801 “rapid transit” bus service. (And while MetroRapid buses often skip some stops because no passengers are waiting there, LRT trains make every stop and actually board passengers at each station because of the greater attractiveness of rail service.)

That differential may seem small, but, compared with buses, LRT brings additional advantages. Passengers have a greater sense of service reliability and safety, and greater orientation to where routes go and where stations are located. There’s a much greater sense of permanence. LRT railcars are more spacious, easier to board and deboard, and more comfortable to ride. Attributes like these combine to attract substantially higher ridership.

Based on past ridership estimates for this corridor, including a 2000 New Starts profile study approved by the Federal Transit Administration (FTA), Henry estimates a daily ridership of 30,000 for this MOS (within two years of opening). From the new rider data in the FTA study, Henry extrapolates that approximately 13,800 of these rider-trips would be new to transit in the corridor. By assuming that all these new rider-trips would otherwise be made by motor vehicle, this means that about 12,600 daily vehicle trips would be eliminated from these arterials (in addition to those already diverted to public transit). During peak travel periods, nearly 5,000 private vehicle trips would be eliminated, as former motorists would be attracted to the proposed new light rail service.

This also implies the elimination of approximately 1,300 peak vehicle trips per hour in the corridor — roughly equivalent to two arterial lanes of capacity. In other words, this LRT starter line would add the equivalent of two lanes of extra peak capacity to this corridor in each direction. As Henry pointed out in an E-mail memo to City Councilmembers (emphasis added),

The road-focused $720 million “mobility” bond package currently under consideration tries to address congestion and safety by increasing “throughput” of vehicles. Unfortunately, experience and a vast body of evidence suggest that this is a losing approach — trying to tweak more capacity to squeeze more traffic typically merely induces more traffic. Furthermore, this influx of ever-growing vehicle traffic simply imposes more stress on congested areas such as Austin’s core.

In contrast, our LRT proposal (and future expansions of LRT throughout Austin) removes traffic from roadways by attracting both drivers and passengers to the transit service

I would suggest that our approach — providing highly attractive rail transit service on its own dedicated tracks — makes far more sense and is far more sustainable as a long-term solution for alleviating mobility congestion, than those elements in the current official proposal that simply attempt to squeeze more traffic onto the city’s crowded streets, roads, and parking spaces.

Proposed citywide urban rail system. Map: Andrew Mayer.

Proposed MOS LRT starter line could serve as anchoring backbone for expansion into LRT network throughout metro area. Map: Andrew Mayer.

And those capacity projections are merely predicated on the initial base estimate of 30,000 daily ridership. The actual potential capacity of the line’s infrastructure, with additional railcars and minor upgrades (e.g., increased power supply), could be raised to 9,000 peak-period rider-trips per hour, corresponding to daily ridership of about 90,000. That’s ultimately equivalent to approximately ten freeway lanes (five per direction).

These capacity benefits are joined by an array of other benefits with LRT, such as:

• Reduction in unit cost of public transport operations compared with bus-only services

• Safer, more accessible neighborhoods

• Reductions in greenhouse gas emissions and other motor vehicle pollutants

• Reduction in demand for parking spaces in areas served by LRT

• Safer, more reliable, lower-cost mobility for the public

• More accessible and more affordable public transportation to reinforce affordable housing policies

An authentic mobility bond measure

Over the past several decades, Austin has acquired notoriety for endless agonizing, hesitation, confusion, and indecision over urban rail. Dozens of “studies, re-studies, and re-studies of the re-studies” (in the words of Lyndon Henry) have been executed for LRT in the Guadalupe-Lamar corridor, with no outcome other than further indecision. Now, in the face of excruciating congestion, and a mounting toll of bloody and fatal accidents, the prospect of a “mobility” bond package is on the table. CACDC’s proposal for a 5.3-mile Minimum Operable Segment (MOS) provides an opening path toward some truly realistic solutions.

A powerful case can be made that a substantial bond commitment for LRT in the Guadalupe-Lamar corridor can be inserted into the $720 million official “mobility package”. This can be accomplished by reducing some of the proposed roadway expenditures and substituting rail bonding.

The City Council has before it at least two alternative urban rail bond options, either of which can make urban rail actually happen. Each of these represents an alternative way of funding the same basic project:

• CACDC bond proposal — $397.5 million: this would provide (in our assessment) about three-fourths funding (and potential local match, with FTA assistance) of the proposed MOS starter line

• TAPT bond proposal — $260 million: this would provide 50% local match for the MOS starter line with 50% FTA assistance

Currently, $720 million is on the table — it’s now a question of “what’s in the package for that amount of money?” Ensuring that urban rail is included would bring authenticity of bona fide “mobility” to such a mobility bond package. ■

Posted in Austin 2016 urban rail bond campaign, Austin light rail issues, Austin urban rail issues, Ballot measure campaign and issues, Guadalupe-Lamar corridor, Guadalupe-Lamar MOS proposal | Tagged austin light rail, austin urban rail, Lamar-Guadalupe, minimum operable system, rail ballot measure | Leave a Comment »

Support grows to include urban rail in November “mobility” bond package

28 May 2016

J.D. Gins, member of Urban Transportation Commission, at May 10th meeting, argues for recommendation to Austin City Council to include rail transit in November bond package. ARN screenshot from COA video.

♦

On May 7th, Austin voters resoundingly defeated Proposition 1, an effort by “gig” taxi firms Uber and Lyft to exempt themselves from several regulatory measures applying to other taxi services operating in Austin. In response, Uber and Lyft have both suspended their operations in Austin.

An interesting result is that interest has surged in the possibility of an urban rail alternative – mainly focused on an electric light rail transit (LRT) starter line for the Guadalupe-Lamar corridor – being added to a proposed package of “mobility” bond measures this coming November. In a May 12th news segment, for example, KXAN-TV News reporter Chris Sadeghi noted that “As Uber and Lyft leave the conversation on mobility options in Austin, it could provide urban rail the opportunity to re-enter it.”

At its regular meeting of May 10th, the City of Austin’s Urban Transportation Commission (UTC) unanimously passed a resolution presented by board member J.D. Gins (see photo at top of this post) recommending that “the City Council consider rail options including, but not limited to, a minimum operating segment as part of the 2016 bond proposal.” Reporting on this development, KXAN reporter Sadeghi interviewed UTC member Mario Champion. As Sadeghi related, “Because there have been studies and plans already conducted into the feasibility and design of rail projects, Champion said the commission is hopeful the process to getting an election item on the November ballot can move quickly.”

“We could dust off those plans and learn from the community what was good about them and what was not good about them” Champion told the reporter.

Resolution passed by Urban Transportation Commission recommends City Council consider including rail transit in November bond package. Screenshot by ARN from COA PDF. (Click to enlarge.)

Also covering the UTC recommendation for putting rail on the ballot, KEYE-TV News reporter Melanie Torre interviewed Andrew Clements with the Central Austin Community Development Corporation (CACDC). “Clements has been pushing for an urban light rail for years, but where the rail goes is critical to its success” reported Torre. Clements and the CACDC had played a key role in providing information on urban LRT for UTC members.

“All along North Lamar and Guadalupe there’s already density that would support light rail” Clements told Torre, adding “We’ve known since probably the 1970s that’s the best place to put light urban rail first.” Torre explained that “Years down the road, rail construction could expand north toward Rundberg Lane, east down Riverside Drive and south down Pleasant Valley Road.”

According to the KEYE report, CACDC is proposing a first segment that would “span from Crestview Station to Republic Square Park in downtown” at an estimated cost of about $465 million (2016 dollars). (The CACDC route replicates nearly 80% of the “Plan B” proposal described in an October 2014 ARN posting.)

“Even though it’s expensive, the most efficient way is what we need to start dedicating our public right-of-ways to …” Clements insisted. It should be noted, however, that this is a bargain price for such a mobility investment, which could potentially remove as many as 2,700 motor vehicles each peak hour from major arteries in the Guadalupe-Lamar corridor.

The $465 million investment cost also appears eminently affordable, if 50% Federal Transit Administration funding is assumed. Converting CACDC’s 2016 estimate to Year of Expenditure (YOE) dollars would imply a total project investment of $514 million over four years, and a local 50% match of $257 million – a budgetary allotment for Austin commensurate with other major capital investments in recent years.

A May 16th Austin Monitor article by Caleb Pritchard focused on the UTC vote and also put the urban rail possibility in the context of greater emphasis on alternative mobility opportunities, including expanded bicycle and pedestrian facilities. Pritchard notes that a funding package that would include the 2014 Bicycle Master Plan “as well as the construction of high-priority sidewalks around schools and transit stops” was already on the table in the amount of $411 million.

Miller Nuttle, representing Bike Austin, told the Monitor reporter: “I think rail should be a critical part of solving Austin’s long-term transportation crisis. I also think biking and walking are critical, too, and that’s something we can do now given that the plans have been thoroughly publicly vetted. All they need in order to be actualized is capital funding.”

Pritchard also quoted Clements in regard to the merits of CACDC’s $465 million proposal. “Of all the things that are being considered, I think light urban rail will have the most impact on mobility…” Clements stated. “I strongly support the bike master plan and the sidewalk plan, but I think that, at best, those are going to have single-digit impacts on ride-share mode splits. And I believe light urban rail will have the biggest bang for the buck.”

On May 17th, the City’s Zoning and Platting Commission included the UTC’s resolution “calling for funding the bicycle master plan, high priority sidewalks, and corridor plans that increase opportunities for high capacity transit, including the consideration of rail” in citing their basis to approve a resolution “calling on the city council to put a transportation bond proposal on the upcoming November ballot ….” according to a report from Fox 7 TV News.

Dick Kallerman, a longtime leader of the Travis County Sierra Club’s involvement in transportation issues, interviewed by Fox 7 News, suggested that “a better outreach campaign” might help convince more of the public to “get on board” with public transportation .

“If people start thinking in turns of urban, urban living, mass transit it part of it …” said Kallerman. ” If you get in a car it’s a contradiction, if you think you are an urbanite living in a city and you get in a car, it means you really don’t know what urban living is all about.” ■

Proposed LRT alignment in narrow segment of Guadalupe between 29th-38th St. Graphic: Andrew Mayer. (Click to enlarge.)

One possible design for inserting light rail line into Guadalupe St. between W. 29th-W. 38th St. Graphic: Andrew Mayer. (Click to enlarge.)

Posted in Austin light rail issues, Austin urban rail issues, Ballot measure campaign and issues, City of Austin issues, Guadalupe-Lamar corridor, Light rail transit (LRT) | Tagged austin light rail, austin urban rail, Lamar-Guadalupe, light rail transit, rail ballot measure, rail vote campaign, urban rail | Leave a Comment »

Capital Metro: Let’s have 2 1/2 more years of analysis paralysis

27 February 2016

Title slide of Capital Metro’s CCCTA presentation to Austin City Council Mobility Committee on Feb. 3rd. Screen capture: ARN.

♦

After months of preparation, organizing, bidding, and selection, with lots of fanfare Capital Metro at last launched its $3 million, 30-month (2.5-years) Central Corridor Comprehensive Transit Analysis (CCCTA) study. In a Jan. 25th news release, Capital Metro announced that its board of directors had selected engineering firm AECOM as the lead consultant to conduct the Central Corridor analysis.

To the uninitiated, inexperienced, and uninformed, this latest study might seem some kind of step forward for Austin’s transit development. After all, its elements include impressive-sounding goals like “An in-depth study of a variety of transportation modes and their potential for creating improved transit options within the corridor”, “A multimodal transportation plan that improves the feasibility of transit in the Central Corridor while effectively maximizing connections with regional routes in surrounding communities”, and “A realistic cost analysis for building, operating and maintaining the proposed sustainable and connected transit system”.

Capital Metro's planning chief Todd Hemingson explains CCCTA study to Austin Mobility Committee on Feb. 3rd. Photo: ARN screenshot from official video.

Capital Metro’s planning chief Todd Hemingson explains CCCTA study to Austin City Council Mobility Committee on Feb. 3rd. Photo: ARN screenshot from official video.

Analysis Paralysis gold medal

But, among grassroots public transportation advocates in Austin, it’s hard to find a transit supporter who’s enthusiastic about this study. The reason: All of these issues have already been exhaustively studied, and plans prepared and re-prepared, over and over and over and over again, for more than two decades. For Austin transit supporters, we’ve “been there, done that” — multiple times. It’s just one more repetitive “re-study of the re-studies of the re-studies ….”

To get a breathtaking idea of the time, resources, energy, and money Austin has sunk into planning for “high-capacity” public transport, just check out our February 2015 chronicle of studies and re-studies of light rail transit (LRT) in the Guadalupe-Lamar corridor: «Long saga of Guadalupe-Lamar light rail planning told in maps». This central travel corridor’s high level of traffic, population and employment density, and crucial position accessing and connecting vital activity centers (like UT, the Capitol Complex, and downtown) with key established neighborhoods and extended commercial activity along the route have made it the focus of planning for rail transit for over three decades.

In terms of public transit, Austin clearly is a top contender for the Analysis Paralysis gold medal. And Capital Metro’s latest CCCTA study, as it’s currently designed, surely represents Exhibit A toward this dubious award. The confusion, misdirection, conflicting intentions, and lack of purpose underlying this “paralysis” were discussed in our March 2015 article «Austin’s urban transport planning seems struck by catastrophic case of amnesia and confusion».

Meanwhile, as meaningful public transport planning continues to languish, the Austin metro area is experiencing a veritable blitz of intensive highway development and construction, including at least three new tollways, massive projects on I-35, and assorted projects throughout the urban area. As the saying goes, “Roads get built, transit gets studied“.

Project Connect back from the dead?

But confusion and a continuation of “analysis paralysis” aren’t the only problems with the CCCTA study. As currently configured, the study seems little more than a rehash of Project Connect’s ill-fated “High-Capacity Transit Study” which elicited such intense community outrage beginning in 2013, the precursor to its ultimate resounding rejection by voters in November 2014. Indeed, the CCCTA project seems the first major effort to resuscitate Project Connect since its 2014 debacle.

Among the worst weaknesses of the Project Connect disinterment is the revival of the seriously flawed methodology of the earlier “analysis”. This includes ignoring actual, existing travel corridors — such as the pre-eminent Guadalupe-Lamar corridor — and instead mislabeling huge chunks and sectors of the city as “corridors”. (The methodology further subdivided the “Central Corridor” into “subcorridor” mini-sectors.) Thus, according to Capital Metro, per the CCCTA study, “The Central Corridor is defined as an area bordered on the south by Ben White (US-290), on the east by the Capital Metro’s Red Line, on the north by RM 2222/Koenig Lane, and on the west by MoPac Expressway, and includes downtown Austin.”

Not only is that vast glob of central Austin not a corridor, but (as in the 2013 activity) this approach slices and truncates actual travel corridors, particularly Guadalupe-Lamar, rather than analyzing them in terms of their suitability and potential for actually solving mobility problems with public transport (particularly urban rail). We analyzed the problems with this in our November 2013 article «Project Connect’s “corridor” study — without corridors!»

Infographic shows how Project Connect’s methodology segmented Guadalupe-Corridor into nonsensical pieces, and summarizes numerous other major problems. (Click to enlarge.)

Methodology of Project Connect study in 2013 labeled huge chunk of central city as a “corridor”, but severed actual intact travel corridors into meaningless pieces. Graphic: ARN. (Click to enlarge.)

Community skepticism about Capital Metro’s “corridor” methodology in the CCCTA study was illustrated as early as last September by Jace Deloney, a co-founder of the influential AURA group (involved with urban and transportation issues) and former chairman of the City’s Urban Transportation Commission and Capital Metro’s Customer Satisfaction Advisory Committee:

It’s very important that we advocate against using the previous subcorridor definitions for any future high capacity transit planning project. In my opinion, these subcorridor definitions were deliberately designed to end up with a Red River alignment recommendation.

Re-direct the CCCTA study!

Besides the exhaustive “saga” of studies of the Guadalupe-Lamar corridor detailed in the ARN article cited and linked above, Austin Rail Now and other community stakeholders have presented LRT alternative alignment and design proposals that provide more than enough basis for quickly reaching a decision for an urban rail starter line. The most recent proposals are described in several ARN articles:

• Plan for galvanizing Austin’s public transport development: Light rail starter line in Guadalupe-Lamar (June 2015)

• Another major Austin community recommendation for light rail transit in Guadalupe-Lamar (November 2015)

• Another possible design for light rail in Guadalupe-Lamar corridor (January 2016)

So far, in the absence of any sense of direction toward a major urban rail investment, Austin’s top political and civic leadership is vulnerable to pressure by highway interests (such as TxDOT) for municipal general obligation bond funding for a heavy local investment in a massive I-35 overhaul and other huge highway projects. To this, a major rail transit starter line investment might be counter-proposed as a far more effective and desirable alternative for city bond funding.

It would definitely seem time to end Austin’s decades of “analysis paralysis” and move forward quickly toward finalizing an urban rail plan for public approval — a strategy that could be expedited by re-directing Capital Metro’s CCCTA study. There is certainly sufficient planning and design preparatory work already in place to provide the voting public a basis on which to make a decision for the Guadalupe-Lamar corridor. The AECOM consultant team (widely respected in the public transportation industry, with experience with LRT in Portland, Minneapolis, and elsewhere) could simply update and tweak the major engineering studies that have already been done (e.g., those in 1993 and 2000) for the Guadalupe-Lamar corridor.

Proposed 6.8-mile "Plan B" light rail transit line in Guadalupe-Lamar corridor would have 17 stations and connect the North Lamar Transit Center at U.S> 183 with Crestview, the Triangle, UT and the West Campus, the Capitol Complex, the CBD, and the Seaholm-Amtrak area. It's projected to serve 3 times the ridership of the Prop. 1 Highland-Riverside rail line at slightly over half the capital cost.

Austin Rail Now proposal is one of several possible configurations already suggested for light rail starter line in Guadalupe-Lamar corridor. Graphic: ARN.

This would likely require a major intervention by Austin City Council members to request Capital Metro to negotiate with its consultant team for a modification of the CCCTA work plan — eliminating the proposed 30-month “slow track” study, and re-directing the project into planning, design, and engineering of LRT for the Guadalupe-Lamar corridor as suggested above. This would have the aim of placing a measure on the ballot for bond funding (to be kept in escrow till further planning and Preliminary Engineering/Environmental Impact Study tasks are completed). Adequate cost estimates are already on hand for such a ballot measure.

According to Surinder Marwah, the former Capital Metro Senior Planner who secured federal funding for the MetroRapid bus project, this can be “a reasonable plan if the elected officials, business leaders and major stakeholders can come to an agreement” for the general Guadalupe-Lamar alignment corridor. “AECOM can update the preliminary cost estimates quickly and perform fatal flaw analysis for the alignment corridor within few months — by mid-late August to get this into [a] November ballot measure.”

Capital Metro’s currently contrived CCCTA study seems little more than a “holding pattern” reflecting the indecisiveness and lack of will of key public officials in regard to public transport policy. Re-directing this study as proposed above would at long last move Austin’s rail public transport development into a widely supported action phase and head it expeditiously toward the mobility quantum leap Austinites have so long been denied. ■

Posted in Alternative Urban Rail Plan, Austin light rail issues, Austin transportation planning, Capital Metro policy and planning, Guadalupe-Lamar corridor, Project Connect methodology issues, Urban Rail | Tagged alternative plan, austin light rail, austin urban rail, capital metro, Lamar-Guadalupe, light rail transit, Project Connect, rail ballot measure, urban rail | Leave a Comment »

Another possible design for light rail in Guadalupe-Lamar corridor

30 January 2016

Guadalupe St., near W. 28th St. Graphic: Google Street View.

♦

As Austin Rail Now has repeatedly pointed out, there are various ways that a starter light rail transit (LRT) line could be fitted workably into the Guadalupe-Lamar corridor. In our December 2014 article «San Francisco’s N-Judah Muni Metro line shows design option for light rail in Austin’s Guadalupe-Lamar corridor» we suggested a design alternative with the objective of inserting dedicated LRT lanes while minimizing disruption and cost and maintaining four traffic flow lanes. In this, we showed how a San Francisco LRT design could serve as a model for installing a dedicated LRT alignment in the relatively narrow 80-foot width of the Guadalupe-Lamar corridor (see illustrations below).

San Francisco’s N-Judah LRT line could serve as design model for Austin’s Guadalupe-Lamar corridor. Photo (copyright) Eric Haas.

ARN’s proposed design shows how LRT, plus 4 traffic lanes and pedestrian/bicycle facilities, could be fitted into relatively narrow Guadalupe-Lamar corridor. Graphic: ARN. (Click to enlarge.)

This past December, another design proposal was made public by Austin community urban activist and Guadalupe-Lamar rail transit supporter Andrew Mayer. Compared to Austin Rail Now’s relatively minimalist approach, Andrew’s design is considerably more ambitious — with undoubtedly more urban impact and capital expense — but it embodies good ideas and hints at the kind of range of optional approaches available to ensure that LRT will work in this key central corridor.

As Andrew explains, “For those who are interested in urban rail along Guadalupe and Lamar … I made a bunch of detailed cross-sections with streetmix several months ago.’ These are posted on the Imgur online image sharing community and image host site: http://imgur.com/a/gsa2n. In this post, we’ll illustrate Andrew’s proposal with sample graphics selected excerpted from his presentation. (Occasional stations are selected to illustrate typical proposed station design.)

Complete Streets approach

While almost any design proposing insertion of dedicated lanes for LRT into this corridor would represent to some extent a Complete Streets approach, Andrew’s proposal seems to be a particularly large-scale and aggressive implementation. As he elaborates,

I feel like these designs are relatively ambitious (2 transit lanes, 4 auto lanes, 2 separated bike lanes, 2 12 ft sidewalks along most of its length), but revamp Guadalupe and Lamar into more complete streets, while seeing if I could retain the existing number of auto lanes. Some of these ideas I came up with way back in 2009 (i.e. the split direction of traffic along west campus, the wide boulevard between 38th and 51st st), some are more recent.

Regardless how much you agree or disagree with these designs, I hope this contributes to the discussion of rail on Guadalupe/Lamar, as I feel like detailed discussion of street design is warranted if there is going to be a push to get [Guadalupe/Lamar/Congress] urban rail on the ballot as soon as possible.

Illustrating this approach is Andrew’s proposal for making the Drag more hospitable to LRT, pedestrian, and bicycle traffic by moving southbound traffic off of Guadalupe and onto either Nueces or “possibly” San Antonio St. (see map below). Andrew notes that “Relatively slow traffic (25 mph) due to traffic calming measures … makes street pedestrian friendly despite higher traffic volumes.”

Map snippet shows Guadalupe St. at right (east), with University of Texas campus bordering on east side; San Antonio and Nueces St. in West Campus neighborhood (west of Guadalupe). Andrew Mayer’s design proposes moving southbound traffic from the Drag onto either Nueces or San Antonio. Graphic: Google Maps. (Click to enlarge.)

Proposed southbound traffic moved from Guadalupe to Nueces St. Graphic: Andrew Mayer. (Click to enlarge.)

The Drag (West Campus)

As illustrated below, Andrew’s proposal for the main Drag segment (bordering the West Campus neighborhood) seems to envision dedicated LRT lanes occupying the west side of the street (former southbound lanes, with traffic now moved to either Nueces or San Antonio St.). Traffic lanes are narrowed to 10-ft width. Andrew comments: “Bike lane stays pretty much the same, but the parking lane and current southbound lanes are used for transit lanes. Northbound lanes are pushed slightly westward to allow for a separated bike lane and wider sidewalk.”

Proposed LRT alignment along Drag. Graphic: Andrew Mayer. (Click to enlarge.)

In this proposal, space for station platforms appears to be appropriated from pedestrian/bike space. It’s not explicit in Andrew’s design, but station platforms would likely be staggered across intersections (a common space-conserving technique in LRT design). Andrew also suggests that “platform” space might be allocated to use as a turning lane for motor vehicles (although this could conflict with the need for a station platform at that same point). Another option, deployed in Houston Metro’s MetroRail LRT design, is to allow a turn lane to share the LRT track (with traffic signal control coordinated with train movements — discussed briefly in our article «Houston’s MetroRail shows the way — How to fit urban rail into Austin’s Guadalupe and Lamar»).

Andrew comments that “In this design, there are two platforms and both open on the right side of the vehicle.” Andrew also suggests the possibility that “the idea was that some buses would also use the transit lanes (i.e. 803, 3, other bus lines that feed onto Guadalupe) and thus the right-hand platforms would be compatible with buses that only have doors on the right-hand side.” However, while sharing of lanes between buses and LRT is entirely possible and done in some situations, sharing where there is high-frequency service by both modes is not advisable. (Our own design proposed center-street running with allocation of at least a single curbside lane on each side for local bus access.)

Proposed 24th St. station (southbound direction). Graphic: Andrew Mayer. (Click to enlarge.)

Proposed LRT alignment on Drag at 24th St., with possible turning lane. Graphic: Andrew Mayer.(Click to enlarge.)

Between 24th and 29th St. (Andrew calls this the North Drag), Guadalupe narrows somewhat, constricting the space for LRT as well as pedestrian and bike facilities (see streetview at top of post, and aerial view, below). Andrew’s solution is to rely on the fact that southbound traffic has been re-routed to other streets; he also narrows the sidewalks and assumes that the bicycle route can be re-routed through this section to an available parallel street (Hemphill Park).

Aerial view of most constricted section of Guadalupe-Lamar corridor, between 24th-29th St. Graphic: Google Earth. (Click to enlarge.)

Proposed LRT alignment in narrow segment of Drag between 24th-29th St. Graphic: Andrew Mayer. (Click to enlarge.)

Central Guadalupe segment

To insert the LRT alignment in the relatively narrow segment of Guadalupe between 29th and 38th St., Andrew’s option seems to eliminate a traffic lane, although he assumes a turning lane in some cases. (With ROW assumed at 100 feet or more, Andrew’s plan would seem to require additional property acquisition in this section.)

Proposed LRT alignment in narrow segment of Guadalupe between 29th-38th St. Graphic: Andrew Mayer. (Click to enlarge.)

Proposed 34th St. station (platform for southbound direction shown). Graphic: Andrew Mayer. (Click to enlarge.)

At West 38th St. (shown in a Google Street View below), Andrew apparently proposes a short subway section, commenting “The transit lanes plunge beneath the street in a shallow cut-and-cover tunnel (basically an underpass) so there can be turning lanes for NB auto traffic without expanding the road’s ROW [right-of-way]….” Technically, this is possible — but quite an expensive feature, particularly since a station for this important east-west arterial would certainly be justified (and a subway station would add a considerable capital expense).

Street view of Guadalupe at 38th St. intersection. Graphic: Google Street View. (Click to enlarge.)

Our own design (which avoids any heavy civil works) assumes that LRT, like MetroRapid buses and ordinary traffic, would simply continue to operate through the W. 38th St. intersection at-grade, following the current surface street profile. Nevertheless, Andrew’s tunnel proposal indicates that there are indeed other options in the planning toolbox that could be considered to address engineering, political, or other concerns.

North of W. 38th St., for about eight blocks (to W. 45th St.) this section of Guadalupe is bordered on the east by leafy established neighborhoods such as Hancock and Hyde Park, and on the west by the publicly owned State of Texas property of the Department of Mental Health and Mental Retardation (MHMR, including the Austin State Hospital). Andrew proposes that a narrow strip of this public property be allocated for widening of the Guadalupe ROW, thus facilitating an LRT alignment: “Between 38th and 45th St, about 15 feet of feet from the [public property] is acquired to expand the ROW to 120 feet, allowing for an 2 bike lanes, 2 transit lanes, 4 auto lanes, and a parking lane or left turn lane, and 2 10 ft sidewalks.” Andrew suggests such a transfer of state land to the city would be plausible and workable “because the existing space is basically used for fields, some interior roads, and power lines, all of which can be moved/replaced relatively easily.”

Aerial view of section of Guadalupe St. between 28th-45th St., showing MHMR bordering on west and established residential neighborhood on east side. Graphic: Google Earth. (Click to enlarge.)

Proposed LRT alignment in segment of Guadalupe between 38th-45th St. Graphic: Andrew Mayer. (Click to enlarge.)

Use of this property in this manner as part of an LRT alignment has been proposed in various studies and propositions over the past 25 years. The day is surely coming when the State will seek to divest itself of this property, perhaps to private interests, so if an easement for ROW expansion is to be procured, official planning and action would seem urgent. Yet no public body, particularly neither Capital Metro nor the City of Austin, has taken a single official step toward this goal in all the years the idea has been on the table.

In the section north of W. 45th St. West Guadalupe St. branches off Guadalupe to connect with N. Lamar Blvd., forming the Triangle area (see map below). West Guadalupe provides a wider ROW here, and is followed by the LRT route, as shown in Andrew’s design, also below. Andrew comments that “Like in the 38th-45th portion, state land would be acquired (basically fields) to expand the roadway. In this case, the northbound auto and bike lanes would be just east of the existing oak trees next to Guadalupe.”

Map snippet shows West Guadalupe St. joining North Lamar at triangular land section now known as “the Triangle”. Graphic: Google Maps. (Click to enlarge.)

Proposed LRT alignment past Triangle, with station. Graphic: Andrew Mayer. (Click to enlarge.)

North Lamar segment

Having transitioned to North Lamar, the alignment with Andrew’s proposed design would seem to require acquisition of more ROW to accommodate a cross-section width of 115 feet for pedestrian and bike facilities, landscaping, and buffer zones (see typical cross-section, below).

As Andrew subsequently explains,

The expanded roadway would work by turning the parking spaces in front of businesses into larger sidewalks and bike lanes. Parking lanes would be put in between the auto lanes and bike lanes where possible to allow for some parking capacity. I HIGHLY recommend doing a study of the traffic going to businesses along this section of N Lamar. How many customers can access the business by foot/bike/transit? For those who have to drive, is there enough parking on the street or behind the business?

Andrew notes that “Interestingly, this section of Lamar Blvd is one of the study areas for CodeNEXT [current process revising Austin’s land-use regulations], so perhaps there is data available there.”

Andrew’s wide streetscape design (which undoubtedly would require extensive and costly adjacent property acquisition) contrasts with our own narrower design proposal which assumed insertion of LRT within existing public ROW (except at intersections with stations, where modest widening would occur). There’s no question that widening North Lamar with amenities such as Andrew has suggested would create a significantly enhanced environment for the public. The issue here is whether it should be included in the initial starter line design, or proposed as a later major upgrade to the corridor.

Proposed typical LRT alignment in North Lamar. Graphic: Andrew Mayer. (Click to enlarge.)

For a station at the intersection of North Lamar with the major east-west arterial Koenig Lane (shown below), Andrew remarks that “Large parking lots in the shopping center, unused TxDOT land (that was going to be used for freeway along [Koenig] Ln), and fields along the DPS building could all be acquired to make a full-sized boulevard next to [Koenig] Ln.”

Proposed Koenig Lane station (platform for northbound direction shown). Graphic: Andrew Mayer. (Click to enlarge.)

Andrew’s designs terminate at Crestview — a major and rather complex nexus, with the heavily used Airport Blvd. intersecting and the MetroRail Red Line rail transit route crossing North Lamar, parallel to Airport (see aerial view, below). Maintaining a 115-ft ROW assumption, Andrew provides a surface LRT design, shown further below; although an interchange station would be essential here, none is presented. Calling his surface design “Alternative 1”, Andrew explains that “Transit lanes stay at grade, there are only 2 instead of 3 NB auto lanes, and the sidewalks are only 12 ft wide each.”

Aerial view of complex intersection of North Lamar with Airport Blvd. and Red Line alignment. Graphic: Google Earth. (Click to enlarge.)

Proposed typical LRT alignment at Crestview. Graphic: Andrew Mayer. (Click to enlarge.)

Andrew also proposes an “Alternative 2” in which “Transit lanes and the station go into a cut-and-cover tunnel beneath the auto lanes.” He acknowledges that such a subway would be “More expensive and complex to construct, but retains the same number of NB auto lanes and allows for wider sidewalks and more parking.” Andrew indicates a preference for his first alternative, keeping LRT on the surface.

Austin Rail Now believes that an initial surface starter LRT line could safely and efficiently operate through the Crestview intersection as it basically exists. Ultimately, however, some method of grade separation at this complicated intersection may be prudent. We believe this should involve either tunneling or elevating (or both) the motor vehicle traffic — leaving the surface to transit, pedestrians, and bicycles. Not only is this approach more compatible with a livable, walkable environment, but it also recognizes that there is many times greater funding available, from all sources, for roadways, while transit is strapped for resources.

Summing up

Considering both our own design proposal and Andrew Mayer’s more ambitious approach, our thoughts return to the controversy over Project Connect’s ill-fated urban rail planning process and proposal that emerged through the fall of 2013 and eventually crashed and burned in the November 2014 vote — in particular, the expressions of skepticism, utter hopelessness, deficit of vision, and outright hostile resistance voiced by several members of the Central Corridor Advisory Group (CCAG) and Austin City Council in their efforts to disparage and dismiss the possibility of installing LRT in the Guadalupe-Lamar corridor. Fortunately, that nonsense (whether based on misunderstanding, ignorance, or cynical political sniping) has mostly evaporated.

Between the two designs now already on the table, it’s possible to see that in reality a broad range of alternatives and design options is available to make this happen. It’s neither impossible nor astronomically expensive. We believe our “minimalist” design is the most immediately affordable, workable, and attractive to voters and the public at large — but that’s just our assessment; we strongly believe all options are worth considering.

It’s time to end Austin’s long saga of indecision, conflict, bumbling, bungling, and diddling. Guadalupe-Lamar is truly the city’s strongest “central corridor”, by far the most logical backbone for a light rail transit starter line. The major task at hand is mustering the community and political will to bring an LRT project here to fruition. ■

Posted in Alternative Urban Rail Plan, Austin light rail issues, Austin urban rail issues, Design and cost issues, Guadalupe-Lamar corridor, Light rail transit (LRT) | Tagged austin light rail, austin urban rail, Lamar-Guadalupe, light rail transit, LRT, reserved lanes, urban rail, Urban rail transit | 1 Comment »

Another major Austin community recommendation for light rail transit in Guadalupe-Lamar

12 November 2015

Light rail transit alignment following North Lamar Blvd., Guadalupe St., Riverside Dr., and Pleasant Valley Rd. as proposed by MobilityATX.

♦

The prospect of a light rail transit (LRT) starter line project in the Guadalupe-Lamar corridor has received another huge boost in a recommendation from MobilityATX, an eminent Austin-focused civic organization that describes itself as “a community-engagement initiative sponsored by both public and private community partners that invites the public to create and shape public policy solutions to Austin’s transportation woes.” The recommendation for Guadalupe-Lamar light rail is included as one of ten “Popular Ideas” resulting from a community input process in the spring and summer of 2015, elaborated in a Mobility ATX Findings Report produced by Glasshouse Policy “in conjunction with community partners and stakeholders …” and packed with supportive factual documentation. The report was originally released in mid-October.

As the report relates, “Part of the MobilityCity umbrella initiative, MobilityATX is a privately-funded online and in-person platform for all Austinites to explore discrete topics that impact Austin mobility.” And regarding the background of the report: “Lasting from April to July, MobilityATX curated a conversation by inviting the public, Austin community leaders, regional transportation brands, mobility influencers and regional employers to join this effort to turn citizen-sourced priorities into effective policy solutions.”

The report’s proposed LRT alignment, shown in its map at the top of this post (see above), includes the Guadalupe-Lamar segment (which we’ve consistently advocated as the most feasible LRT starter line), then crosses Lady Bird Lake (the Colorado River) to include a possible line branching into southeast Austin. The proposed route follows North Lamar Blvd. and Guadalupe St. (and presumably the Guadalupe-Lavaca street pair downtown), then crosses the river via a bridge that appears to be roughly located parallel to either the South First St. (Drake) Bridge, or the Congress Avenue Bridge — or possibly it involves an adaptation of either bridge to include lanes for LRT (as we’ve also proposed).

Heading southeast, the proposed route appears to follow Riverside Drive, then turns southward to follow Pleasant Valley Road and then other unspecified alignments south of Ben White Blvd. (State Highway 71). Population density levels shown on the route map indicate that areas of high density are connected by the alignment.

In presenting the proposal, the report notes that

Despite two major defeats for light rail in recent history, it’s clear that there is sustained community interest in exploring and developing an expansive light rail system in Austin. According to the 2015 Zandan Poll of Austin-area residents, 63% of respondents would favor seeing an increase in taxes to construct an above ground rail system. In addition, Austin’s commuter rail line, the MetroRail Red Line, has seen dramatic increases in ridership. …
…
We must get cracking on planning a light-rail line that will serve the greatest number of riders on day one, and going forward. We can’t give up on light rail just because the city floated a bad plan and voters shot that bad plan down. Bus Rapid Transit is not a substitute.

(Emphasis added in above quotations. Original quote implied that MetroRail began operation in 2008; in actuality, MetroRail opened in spring of 2010.)

Supported by a consortium of leading civic “partners”, including the Downtown Austin Alliance, the Greater Austin Chamber of Commerce, Capital Metro (the region’s transit authority), RECA (the Real Estate Council of Austin), Leadership Austin, the Central Texas Regional Mobility Authority, the Austin Monitor (online news media), and a variety of mainly tech-involved businesses and other organizations, MobilityATX clearly represents much of the top civic leadership of the city. (See complete list of partners in the graphic below, from the Findings Report).

Mobility ATX/Glasshouse Policy partners. Graphic: MobilityATX Findings Report.

In his Foreword to the report, City of Austin Mayor Steve Adler emphasized:

As Austin rapidly evolves, we must continually innovate new approaches to engage Austinites in the discussions that shape City policy. Given the participation in the MobilityATX initiative, it’s clear Austinites are anxious to contribute their ideas for transforming mobility, and how it impacts our commutes, our economy, and our lives.
…
The final Glasshouse Policy report on this process provides me, my colleagues on the Austin City Council, private employers, public agencies, and all Austinites, with a new community perspective from which to approach our shared mobility challenge. We need to add this perspective to those gathered from other community engagement efforts to
ensure that we hear from all Austinites in every district as we plan for our mobility future. I’d also like to thank the array of public and private stakeholders for their vision and support of this effort, including business, government, and civic leaders like RideScout CEO Joseph Kopser, Dewitt Peart of the Downtown Austin Alliance, and Capital Metro CEO Linda Watson.

Each of you who took part in MobilityATX confirmed that all Austinites have something to say and deserve a forum in which to say it. I look forward to working with the MobilityATX partners to ensure Austin leads the global conversation on what constitutes a smarter, more connected city, and continues to reflect the innovators and entrepreneurs that call Austin home.

Mobility ATX’s LRT recommendation notes that

After the defeat of Proposition 1 in November, there has been no significant movement to develop a new light rail plan for Austin. In order to build new light rail in Austin, bond funding would have to be secured for a new plan. There is no official public effort underway to develop a new light rail plan.

Austinites are anticipating that city and regional transportation authorities will develop a new plan for a light rail system, a process that should include sustained and inclusive community input in the planning and development of that system. Beyond all other data collected, the expectation of inclusion is most critical to understanding Austin’s evolving mobility constituency.

And it concludes with what seems a call for action (emphasis added):

Contact your Council Member. Like the Bicycle Master Plan, building a light rail line requires a bond election. In order for a bond to appear on the ballot, City Council must vote to put that bond proposal up to popular vote. Once City Council does that, a simple majority in a popular election is required to pass the bond proposal.

The MobilityATX Findings Report has been received enthusiastically by proponents of Guadalupe-Lamar light rail, including Texas Association for Public Transportation, Austin Rail Now, and the Central Austin Community Development Corporation (CACDC), which have long advocated for such a project. A report on KEYE-TV News included a graphic (see below) with an excerpt from a CACDC statement that commented, in part, “The community will support a new light rail plan that reaches the most people possible, and this is a very encouraging step forward.”

CACDC statement applauding Mobility ATX report, as shown on KEYE-TV News. Screenshot: ATXRail.

Hopefully, the MobilityATX report’s recommendation will add significant momentum to the ongoing campaign for an initial LRT starter line project in the crucial Guadalupe-Lamar travel corridor. ■

Posted in Alternative Urban Rail Plan, Austin light rail issues, Austin urban rail issues, Community endorsements, Guadalupe-Lamar corridor | Tagged alternative plan, austin light rail, austin urban rail, Lamar-Guadalupe | 1 Comment »

Dedicated transit lanes on Austin’s Drag must be designed for light rail

29 September 2015

Busy section of Austin’s Drag, Guadalupe St. at W. 24th St. Official city planning by CTR has proposed curbside transit lanes, with buses running on outside lanes as seen in this photo. (Screenshot from Google Streetview.)

♦

By Lyndon Henry

The following commentary has been adapted and expanded from remarks posted to an online Austin rail discussion. Lyndon Henry is a transportation planning consultant, a technical consultant to the Light Rail Now Project, an online columnist for Railway Age magazine, and a contributing editor to Austin Rail Now. He is also a member of the Light Rail Technical Forum and Streetcar Subcommittee of the American Public Transportation Association (APTA). His comments highlight the vision of Austin Rail Now and other transit advocates that light rail is justified in, and needs to be planned for, a number of the Austin area’s major travel corridors.

As most Austinites are undoubtedly aware, the Drag is that section of Guadalupe St. stretching between (approximately) West MLK Jr. Blvd. and W. 27th St. Straddled by the University of Texas campus on its east side and the high-density West Campus neighborhood on its west side, the Drag is perhaps the single most important segment of the Guadalupe-Lamar corridor. See: «Long saga of Guadalupe-Lamar light rail planning told in maps» and «Dobbs: Density, travel corridor density, and implications for Guadalupe-Lamar urban rail».

Map shows the Drag area (Guadalupe St., running north-south in center). UT campus lies on the east, West Campus neighborhood on the west. (Screenshot from Google Maps.)

Now, driven partly by their fixation to substitute buses for rail as “rapid transit”, and partly by pressure from some community groups and activists, local civic leaders and official planners are floating plans for dedicated transit (read “bus”) lanes on the Drag. (Official planning defines “the Drag” as continuing north to W. 29th St.)

Last month (August 2015), AURA (originally Austinites for Urban Rail Action), a grouping of mostly Millennial-aged urban planning enthusiasts, posted a proposal for major improvements on the Drag, one of which suggested: “Extend transit priority lanes from Downtown to the Drag”.

At peak periods, transit moves roughly half of the people passing through the corridor. This is to be expected in a central location like the Drag, as transit is by far the most efficient way to move people in a city.

Given the anticipated growth of the city, increasing the throughput of people in the corridor is of paramount importance. The city should plan ahead for increased frequency of existing bus routes, and continue to examine the viability of Guadalupe as a future corridor for rail service. Buses should not have their effectiveness limited by less efficient forms of mobility. Two lanes of Guadalupe should be dedicated solely to transit.

Back in May, per its contract with the City of Austin (COA), UT’s Center for Transportation Research (CTR) produced for city staff a memo of its findings with respect to installing dedicated lanes on the Drag. As summarized by AURA’s John Laycock, the report “modeled three scenarios: Scenario 0) the baseline scenario, Scenario 1) a transit lane in each direction on Guadalupe, and Scenario 2) diverting the buses completely off of Guadalupe onto San Antonio.” Laycock reports that the city subsequently requested CTR to model an additional case, involving one transit lane northbound on Guadalupe and another southbound on Nueces/San Antonio. Results from that additional modeling effort apparently have not yet been released publicly.

Diagram from CTR report for curbside dedicated lanes on the Drag. (Screenshot from CTR memo.)

The proposal for dedicated transit lanes on the Drag may seem fairly benign, helpful to public transport and innocuous to the prospects for light rail (LRT). However, installing reserved transit lanes without broader planning for rail can raise some quite serious problems. Depending on their design and implementation, transit lanes could significantly improve or seriously impede the prospects for light rail transit (LRT) — by far, the most feasible and affordable rail option — in the Guadalupe-Lamar corridor. (See «Plan for galvanizing Austin’s public transport development: Light rail starter line in Guadalupe-Lamar».)

First, I’ll note that implementing a high-quality bus service as a precursor to rail can be an effective way of building ridership and preparing the public for the coming rail upgrade. Likewise, establishing reserved transit lanes that can be dedicated to rail can also be helpful. However, both infrastructure and configuration of dedicated transit lanes, done improperly, can create problems.

• Infrastructure — Proponents of dedicated transit lanes have argued that all that’s needed is to paint some stripes on the street. And certainly, in the scheme of transit capital projects, just “painting” markings on pavement is relatively cheap. But there’s almost always more involved. The Guadalupe-Lavaca transit lanes, for example, included repaving, plus bus stop relocation and upgrading. Parking meters were removed. And the project has resulted in effectively eliminating the possibility of dedicated LRT tracks on those sides of these streets (bus traffic too heavy).

Buses use curbside reserved lanes on one-way Lavaca St. downtown. Curbside lanes on the Drag would be similar, but on two-way street. Photo: L. Henry.

In previous discussions I’ve suggested that LRT dedicated lanes would need to be relocated on the opposite side of each street. Total cost of the downtown bus lane project was about $370,000 — not a billion-dollar investment, but enough of an investment certainly to give pause to totally redoing this project, or making substantial modifications to it (although modification to add LRT would definitely be a highly worthwhile investment).

We also don’t know what COA and Capital Metro have in mind for the Drag project. Some community transit activists might be thinking very minimalist, but what are official planners thinking?

• Configuration — The precise alignment on the transit lanes also needs serious consideration with respect to the needs of LRT (and evidence suggests that a substantial portion of the Austin community would like to see LRT as a project on the planning table now). Curbside lanes — as assumed in the CTR design, described above — are used by several major LRT systems (Portland, Houston, Dallas, and Denver come immediately to mind), but this configuration can often encounter serious problems, mainly with motor vehicle right-turns and especially pedestrian traffic (including where the right turns are made). Another problem for the Drag is the number of driveway cuts and the issue of access to businesses along this commercial alignment.

Denver: Passengers waiting to board LRT train running in curbside lane on Stout St. Photo: Peter Ehrlich.

To be sure, a number of different LRT alignment and configuration options are possible. My preferred alignment concept for the Drag has been to keep both LRT tracks on Guadalupe, in the center (with stations also in the center), and the outside (curb) lanes continued for mixed motor vehicle traffic, including buses. The main reason for this configuration is that buses need access to right-side loading at stops, and I envisioned that local routes like #1 would need to be continued. Of course, bus routes could be moved further west, probably to San Antonio-Nueces, but keeping them on Guadalupe would facilitate relatively easy transfers to and from LRT and bus.

Ideally, the main Drag segment in this heavy-pedestrian/heavy-transit traffic area should be converted to a pedestrian-transit mall, with general motor vehicle traffic prohibited (except perhaps in the case of service vehicles for adjacent businesses). However, a design with reserved transit lanes plus a single mixed-traffic lane in each direction would appear to be possible.

To sum up: While dedicated transit lanes, with very minimal investment, could possibly be helpful as a preparation for LRT, I’d recommend huge caution and vigilance as this notion moves forward. Keeping particularly in mind the considerations I’ve raised above.

In this regard, it’s important to realize that a major chunk of Austin’s civic leadership, and planning establishment, still regard MetroRapid as the city’s “rapid transit system”. Likewise, the fantasy persists that Austin could “become the best bus system we can be” without a rail system. (Cities with the “best bus systems” also seem to happen to have excellent rail systems too.) Reserved transit lanes on the Drag could advance the case for LRT, but only if they’re properly configured, designed, and planned in the context of an ultimate LRT outcome. ■

Posted in Austin light rail issues, Austin urban rail issues, Guadalupe-Lamar corridor, Lyndon Henry's postings, Transit priority lanes | Tagged austin light rail, austin urban rail, dedicated transit lane, Lamar-Guadalupe, reserved lanes | Leave a Comment »

Plan for galvanizing Austin’s public transport development: Light rail starter line in Guadalupe-Lamar

30 June 2015

LEFT: Map of proposed 6.8-mile light rail route in Guadalupe-Lamar corridor. (Map: ARN.) RIGHT: San Francisco light rail train in dedicated lanes in Judah St., similar to Guadalupe-Lamar corridor. (Photo: Eric Haas.) (Click to enlarge.)

♦

Austin’s transportation planning could be seen as “a tale of two systems“. On one hand, here in the 21st century — amidst crises over the climbing cost of energy, increasing road congestion by private vehicles, and global climate change impacted by greenhouse gas emissions — local planners and leaders are expanding highways like it’s 1955. In all directions, nowadays it’s mostly tollways, with new ones under development or planned in southwestern Travis County; across the river, double-decked over Loop 1 (MoPac); from East Austin to ABIA; and through the heart of the city with new toll lanes on I-35. Austinites who’re already paying taxes to fund roads now get to pay out-of-pocket tolls to use the new ones — a kind of Double Whammy.

So what about public transportation? Basically, since last year’s “Rail to Nowhere” Highland-Riverside proposal crashed and burned, public transportation planning has been going in circles — a circular maze, to be exact.

In other words, roads burgeon while transit diddles.

Meanwhile the solution continues to stare the Austin community in the face. As we noted in our March 29th article «Austin’s urban transport planning seems struck by catastrophic case of amnesia and confusion», “For two and a half decades, local officials and planners have explained why urban rail — affordable light rail transit (LRT), in Austin’s case — has been an absolutely essential component of the metro area’s mobility future.” We went on to elaborate that

…the fundamental case for LRT in Austin has been grounded in truth — the higher capacity, greater ridership attraction, cost-effectiveness, environmental benefits, unsurpassed magnetism to transit-oriented development and economic development, and other advantages of light rail are indeed essential for the future of this community. Mobility cannot be sustained of a continuing expansion of rivers of highways and tollways and a steadily rising flood of personal motor vehicles. Urban rail continues to be key to providing truly attractive public transit alternative, and shifting at least significant segments of the Austin metro to a sustainable alternative mobility lifestyle.

Austin Rail Now has underscored the case — and extensive evidence — in an array of solidly documented articles, including:

• Long saga of Guadalupe-Lamar light rail planning told in maps

• Latest TTI data confirm — Guadalupe-Lamar is central local arterial corridor with heaviest travel

• Dobbs: Density, travel corridor density, and implications for Guadalupe-Lamar urban rail

• West Campus is where the students are!

• Guadalupe-Lamar is highest-density corridor in Austin — according to Project Connect’s own data!

• Guadalupe-Lamar urban rail line would serve 31% of all Austin jobs

• Demographic maps show Lamar-Guadalupe trumps Mueller route for Urban Rail

• Dobbs: “Why are we squandering our best asset?”

• How urban rail can be installed in the Guadalupe-Lamar corridor

• Strong community support for Guadalupe-Lamar light rail continues — but officials seem oblivious

• Poll: Austinites want surface rail!

• Community endorsements

• Why the MetroRapid bus project currently is NOT an obstacle to urban rail in Guadalupe-Lamar

• Contradicting local official claims, FTA says it “would consider request” for urban rail on North Lamar

So where and how could LRT be installed in the Guadalupe-Lamar corridor? Austin Rail Now has provided conceptual details for a workable, affordable, attractive, cost-effective plan in a series of thoroughly researched articles:

• What and where — Our article «A “Plan B” proposal for a Guadalupe-Lamar alternative urban rail starter line» proposed a 6.8-mile LRT starter line from the North Austin Transit Center down North Lamar and then Guadalupe and Lavaca to downtown, with a westward spur to the Seaholm-Amtrak Station area. Total cost was estimated at less than $600 million (2014 dollars), and daily ridership was estimated at 30,000 to 40,000.

Map of proposed 6.8-mile LRT starter line in Guadalupe-Lamar corridor, with connection to Seaholm-Amtrak Station site. (Map: ARN. Click to enlarge.)

• How — Our article «San Francisco’s N-Judah Muni Metro line shows design option for light rail in Austin’s Guadalupe-Lamar corridor» explains how two dedicated LRT tracks could be installed in the Guadalupe-Lamar corridor in a design that maintains four traffic lanes (two per direction) and facilities for pedestrians and cyclists.

Cross-section of proposed LRT dedicated lanes in Guadalupe-Lamar, including 4 traffic lanes and pedestrian-bicycle facilities. (ARN. Click to enlarge.)

• How soon — Our article «How soon to get Austin’s urban rail on track after Nov. 4th?» explains policy steps that the new City Council could implement to re-focus planning on a viable Guadalupe-Lamar LRT starter line and a local funding mechanism. Our subsequent, more detailed article «Possible timeline for installing light rail transit in Guadalupe-Lamar corridor» lays out a plausible itemized timeline that brings an LRT plan for Guadalupe-Lamar from the start of system-level planning to opening of operations in less than seven years.

Conceptual timeline for proposed LRT starter line project, with assumed starting point in fall of 2015. (ARN. Click to enlarge.)

Until this city has a signature rail system, beginning with a starter line in the right corridor to serve as a spine and anchor for a citywide and regionwide network, Austinites will continue to face one highway ripoff after another — burdened with steadily rising costs for more roads and shackled to dependency on increasingly expensive private vehicles in worsening traffic congestion.

We’ve proposed a plan that can work and initiate a realistic path forward for solving Austin’s mobility crisis. Will Austin decide to proceed on that path, or continue to circle around in the maze of indecision and procrastination? ■

Posted in Austin light rail issues, Austin urban rail issues, Guadalupe-Lamar corridor | Tagged alternative plan, austin urban rail, Lamar-Guadalupe, light rail transit, urban rail | 3 Comments »

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Archive for the ‘Guadalupe-Lamar corridor’ Category

This analysis has been adapted and revised from comments originally posted to the #ATXTransit listserv by Lyndon Henry, a technical consultant to the Light Rail Now Project and contributing editor to Austin Rail Now (ARN).

Methodology

Results

Conclusions and recommendation

Commentary slightly adapted from one-page handout originally produced by ARN and distributed to participants in Project Connect’s Blue Line Workshop at ACC Highland, 31 July 2019.

Commentary originally produced by ARN and distributed (as one-page handout) to participants in Project Connect’s Orange Line Workshop at Austin Central Library, 17 July 2019.

References

This post publishes the text of a handout distributed to a “Community Conversation” meeting sponsored by Project Connect in Council District 5 on 17 November 2018.

No more backsliding – Finalize a plan!

Real-world light rail, not science fiction dreams

Plans for urban rail should be fast-tracked

Why not a true mobility option?

This post has been adapted from comments distributed to members of the Multimodal Community Advisory Committee (MCAC) at its meeting of 26 April 2017. Lyndon Henry is a technical consultant to the Light Rail Now Project and a contributing editor to the Austin Rail Now website.

Why light rail transit (LRT)?

Why the Guadalupe-Lamar corridor?

*See: • New light rail projects in study beat BRT • LRT or BRT? It depends on the potential of the corridor

NOTE: As of this posting, the Mobility Committee and City Council have approved the $720 million roads-dominated bond measure, without provision for transit, as a bundled package.

An affordable light rail starter line

Significant benefits

An authentic mobility bond measure

Analysis Paralysis gold medal

Project Connect back from the dead?

Re-direct the CCCTA study!

Complete Streets approach

The Drag (West Campus)

Central Guadalupe segment

North Lamar segment

Summing up

What We’re Seeking

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*See:
• New light rail projects in study beat BRT
• LRT or BRT? It depends on the potential of the corridor