Rail-ready BRT

The Transport Politic follows up today on news of Ottawa, Canada's plan to convert it's bus-only Transitway to light rail. It's worth reading because the Geary BRT project here in SF is using exactly the same "rail-ready" model that Yonah Freemark attributes to Ottawa, a model that may not realize the kind of cost savings its proponents frequently cite.

March of Progress

Check out this historic history of the old Key System



Thanks to 38th Notes!

See, It Doesn't Cost Too Much!

I can always count on The Overhead Wire to link to a news story that pisses me off. I fully recognize that there's a pie-in-the-sky element to my H-Potrero Van Ness subway plan because it is the most expensive option. But it's just damn hard to take such claims of poverty seriously when cases like this are out there.

It's not 'We don't have the money,' it's 'We don't want to spend it on public transit.'

Tampa Gets It

The Tampa Bay Area Regional Transportation Authority has a plan to build a network of hundred of miles of light rail and commuter rail lines.

This is Tampa, Florida.

If they get it, shouldn't we be ashamed that we don't?

A Rail Is Not a Rail Is Not a Rail

In Utah they're planning a streetcar network to feed their light rail system.

SFMTA planners might be forgiven for being confused about the difference between the two systems. Here in San Francisco the mention of "light rail" evokes the N-Judah or the T-Third. We think we have light rail and we think that "light rail" means a rail car that has to straddle the competing restrictions of an underground tunnel and on-street operation.

In my opinion, Utah is doing it right. Build a robust rapid rail system (Utah's TRAX) and then a completely separate feeder system. Tailor each system to fit the role it fills.

San Francisco has done it wrong, we've built a system that switches from unreliable rapid rail downtown to overbuilt local feeder service at its extremities. Because the same equipment must fill two completely different roles, it's encumbered by 'features' that may be advantageous in one mode but reduce efficiency in the other.

Muni recognized the problems of transitioning its LRVs from high-platform underground stations to surface-level boarding and operation in mixed traffic. Their solution was to build every station on the T-Third line with high platforms at a massive expense and to separate train platforms from passengers on the sidewalk by lanes of auto traffic. Neither of these solutions do much to improve the system, and the T-third has had a tepid reception at best.

Given my druthers, San Francisco would have a rapid rail network that was built to be just that, and would serve the parts of town with a demand for a rapid network. Augmenting this network would be another network or feeder lines. Those lines, like the ones proposed for the Beehive State, would be

An electric rail car that can run through a lane of traffic. In many ways it's similar to TRAX, [UTA's assistant general manager Mike] Allegra said, but it's lighter, so laying the tracks doesn't require such fortification. The result is a lower price tag, partly because underground utilities aren't affected.

A car on this network would be

Low to the ground and requires no station platform -Salt Lake Tribune

If you're following along I expect you'd be wondering if I've ever noticed Muni's bus network. Our (arguably unmatched) bus network serves this role for most of the denser parts of the city. Along the Market Street tunnel and BART line, Muni's busiest bus lines filter residents from their homes to the rapid rail stations and back every day, many all day.

But a bus is not a streetcar. The 38-Geary and 14-Mission are frustrated by private auto traffic and long dwell times at stops. Buses can only be so long, so if you need to carry more passengers you need more buses - and more drivers. The diesel and electric trolley buses that run down these lines endure a beating from uneven streets and must be replaced much more frequently that a typical streetcar. The bumpy, jerky, slow and unpredictable service these workhorses provide is a turn-off for a large chunk of people who would otherwise ride them.

Running buses on these routes costs Muni in maintenance and operating costs in addition to the opportunity cost of potential riders (many of whom drive instead, competing for space and compounding the problem).

Don't get me wrong, buses fit an important niche in a transit network. Buses can reach into low-density neighborhoods and run less-frequent local service cheaper than a streetcar, especially in hillier parts of San Francisco. But where buses are run like streetcars, they fail to perform as well.

Furthermore, the lack of differentiation between a rapid network, feeder network and local network leads good people to make generalizations about transit service that I fear hurt its image, reduce expectations and ratchet down service in the end. Gripes about slow bus lines could be more easily rebutted if we all understood that bus lines were slower, more infrequent, and more local whereas grade-separated rail lines are fast, frequent, but require a longer walk or connecting ride.

It's a sad state of affairs when Muni can't get funds to expand service or make capital improvements because the average San Franciscan doesn't trust Muni with the money. That's a death spiral. Poor service begets lower budgets beget service cuts. Do not pass Go, do not collect $200.

We need leaders to imagine and realize a future for Muni, like they have in Utah. And if our leaders won't do it then we need to do it ourselves.

Tear Down This Wall

In a thinly-veiled attempt to make me love it, the Transbay Blog has a great article on how to get rid of the Central Skyway. That makes the Transbay Blog the latest voice calling for San Francisco to finish the good job it started when we knocked down the elevated structure North of Market Street.

I've called for this, and Streetsblog SF reported that the MTA has agreed to consider studying alternatives to the elevated skyway at the urging of superheroesque Tom Radulovich. Well, Transbay blog has an alternative worth considering.

I've got my own fantasy map that I'm working on polishing up, and I'm sure there are smart folks out there with their own great ideas for this miserable waste of space.

This is an issue that's important to me, and I hope it takes off!

Western Neighborhoods Plan

Vancouver's about to launch its "Laneway Housing" pilot project. The project aims to encourage owners of single-family homes in the middle of the city to build small in-law cottages on place of existing garages. Apparently garages in these parts of Vancouver front on back alleys, or lanes, hence the name.

The idea isn't without controversy, but the goal is to expand the diversity of housing stock in the city by building small, more affordable units. This would also densify the neighborhoods, meaning more people could live closer to work, grocery stores, etc.

A couple problems with the Canadian plan stuck out to me, including the ability for property owners to keep up to three parking spaces. That would allow the new residents to clog local streets with more cars, rather than increasing the walkability of the neighborhoods.

But the basic idea is good, and worth emulating in the almost-walkable, relatively high-density suburban areas of the Bay Area, including the City and County's own suburbs among the dunes on the West side of town.

Take this random stretch of Judah St. I literally double-clicked at random on MapJack to find this scene. The N-Judah runs in front of these houses night and day, but they all have garages! A decision by the city to allow in-law units in place of those garages would double the density of units in this picture. And all without casting any new shadows or otherwise disrupting the architectural character of the neighborhood.

A zoning change or a streamlined process for building and approving these in-law units would provide financial benefit for those homeowners on this robust segment of rail infrastructure who don't drive much, or might be willing to give up a parking space for some extra rental income.

Our city leaders tell us every chance they get that we need to find a way to fit more housing into SF. Their solution for the last three decades has been to put that in the "Eastern Neighborhoods." These neighborhoods - SoMa, the Mission, Potrero Hill and also Bayview - are being made to bear this load because there are pockets of industrial land that are going out of use for various reasons, but also because it's politically possible to do so; residents of those neighborhoods don't have ebough of voice in city government to stop it.

For reasons worth exploring (but not now) the homeowners West of Twin Peaks have made a political third rail out of any new, dense housing on their avenues. But that's not good for the city. It will cost a lot of money, out of public and private coffers, to put 10,000 units of housing on the East side of town.

Most of the new housing will be on the formerly industrial land, which often lacks sidewalks, adequate street lighting, traffic signals, sewers, even properly paved roads. And once those units are built the residents will have to squeeze onto those bus lines that survived the TEP axe.

On the West side of town, however, four of Muni Metro's light rail lines already run through some of the lowest-density residential areas of SF. Almost every unit within a couple blocks of the K-Ingleside, L-Taraval, M-Oceanview and N-Judah has a garage. If it were easier (or even possible) to convert those garages into small apartments, this area of town could absorb 10,000 or so of them over the next 20 years with much less pain. And these new units would be truly Transit-oriented development.

Outside of SF, East Bay and Peninsula counties could use rezoning strategies like this to densify corridors along new light rail or BRT lines. Using tax revenue capture programs, they might even choose to fund the capital costs of those lines by encouraging this "laneway housing."

Every city and region has their own needs, but a properly-tailored plan for this kind of infill housing can steer development away from the exurbs and into existing neighborhoods, without many of the external costs that come when big development corporations raze and rebuild sections of the neighborhood fabric.

Houston to SF: Light-Rail-Ready BRT Ain't Worth It

By 2012, only nine years after voters narrowly approved the plan, Houston will have gone from one Main Street light rail line to a network of six rail lines. This is Texas, people. Here in nominally transit-friendly San Francisco, it has been 20 years since the passage of Prop B (by a much wider margin, i might add) called for "fixed guideway capital improvements in the Bayshore, Geary and North Beach corridors," and we are still years away from breaking ground on the Central Subway.

Of special interest, given the specific language of Prop B calling for "fixed guideway" (rail) improvements along the Geary corridor, is the decision by the Houston Metropolitan Transit Authority to build light rail, rather than BRT. It seems that back when Houstonian, Republican House Majority Leader and die-hard rail foe Tom Delay has a finger on the purse strings, he cut any funding for light rail expansion. This led the city to consider BRT on some of the lines instead of rail.

In 2007, after Mr. Delay’s dramatic fall from power and the takeover of Congress by more transit-friendly Democrats, Metro reversed its decision, deciding finally that building light rail from the start would make the most sense. -The Transport Politic

I'll resist the urge so many transit advocates feel to point out that the SFCTA does not consider things like "sense" when planning projects. But the fact remains, a city in Texas is planning to seriously expand its transit infrastructure in a cost-effective and permanent way, while San Francisco wastes money and time on a half-step (at best). What's wrong with this picture?

OMG Transit Porn!

Say hello to Miss January 2009: Bombardier’s new PRIMOVE Catenary-Free Technology. Look! Her induction coils are showing!

This innovation uses the magnetic field of an underground power line to send power to an electric streetcar. Seriously, wireless streetcars! Maybe this is destined to fit a rare niche in places where overhead wires can't be excused, but even if so it means more places where good rail transit can be added. Which is great.

Streesblog SF wonders if we'll ever see new technology like this with a Muni worm on the side, but I'm optimistic. If for no other reason, our Breda cars won't last forever and something will have to replace them. Assuming no change in the status quo, however, whatever that is will very likely have most of the same drawbacks as the current rolling stock. The JKLMN (Jack Lemmon?) lines all run through the Market Street Tunnel, which has high boarding platforms, and then later on surface streets with curb-height stops. That means Muni needs cars that can do that screechy stair-lowering thing to run on thos lines. That's custom, and custom is expensive.

The T-Third, however, will eventually run through its own tunnel below 4th and Stockton Streets. It could have been built to run modern low-floor trains, but instead it was built with high platforms on the street. I (and people who are smarter and cooler than I) think this was a mistake, but what's done is done.

But I'm a dreamer, and I think we will lay down new rail someday. When we do, I hope all technology options are considered. There's a benefit of flexibility to having all of your LRVs be able to run on any of your track, but there can be costs for that flexibility. On the other hand, it might make sense to build new rail lines down Geary, Van Ness, 19th Ave or what have you with technology that makes sense for those lines, even if it can never run through the Market Street Tunnel. With the growing transit advocacy community here in the Bay Area, I think there's a good chance that might just happen.

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