Red Line (Cedar Avenue BRT)

[twincitizen]

^You should suggest that $5 card idea to Metro Transit. It makes a lot of sense.

Apple Valley wants to buy up 13 acres of vacant, tax-forfeited land located a half-mile from AVTS.
http://finance-commerce.com/2013/05/app ... mpty-land/

Red Line opens in one month + one day!

[Mdcastle]

So am I not a decent human being because I don't have a GO-TO card? I ride light rail once or twice a year (so I can get free parking when I fly to Chicago, so I don't see the point in having a card.

As for Cedar, I was and still am against taking away safety shoulders for other purposes or using less than 12 foot lanes. I hate what they've done to the southbound I-35W bridge over the Minnesota, if you sneeze you're liable to scrape against the side of the bridge (Although it's still nothing compared to driving on the Goethals Bridge in rush hour traffic...)

[mplsjaromir]

So am I not a decent human being because I don't have a GO-TO card? I ride light rail once or twice a year (so I can get free parking when I fly to Chicago, so I don't see the point in having a card.

As for Cedar, I was and still am against taking away safety shoulders for other purposes or using less than 12 foot lanes. I hate what they've done to the southbound I-35W bridge over the Minnesota, if you sneeze you're liable to scrape against the side of the bridge (Although it's still nothing compared to driving on the Goethals Bridge in rush hour traffic...)

Off board payment and Proof of Purchase is unique to LRT. Obviously you have never ridden a city bus.

[Tcmetro]

The MVTA bus schedules for the Red Line service change have been posted on the MVTA website:

- 420 now has a simplified routing using 145th and 147th Sts. between Rosemount and Apple Valley
- 437 has a couple more runs and doesn't serve MOA anymore.
- 438 has an extended span (8 am to 7 pm) and has a routing change to serve the Thomas Center strip mall
- 440 now runs every 60 minutes, weekdays and weekends, and now serves Palomino Hills and 140th St. Peak direction service is every 30 minutes, and features a non stop service between Cedar Grove and the VA Hospital.
- 442 has been shortened to Apple Valley to Burnsville Center. Midday service has been reduced to 60 minutes.
- 444 has some minor time changes.
- 445 has a small routing change (no longer serving Rahn Rd), and minor time changes.
- 464 has a new express branch that operates non-stop from Downtown Minneapolis to Savage Park and Ride
- 475 has a few more midday runs (every 2 hours), and also a special event service to concerts at the Minnesota Zoo.
- 477 no longer serves Cedar Grove.
- Minor changes to 421, 460, 465, 470, 472, 476, 478, 480

- There isn't a Red Line schedule posted, but I believe the hours are appx. 5 am - 12 am, 15 min peak and midday, 30 min evenings and weekends.

http://www.mvta.com/uploads/420_31.pdf
http://www.mvta.com/uploads/437-445_22.pdf
http://www.mvta.com/uploads/438-440_final_proof.pdf
http://www.mvta.com/uploads/442_28.pdf
http://www.mvta.com/uploads/444_31.pdf
http://www.mvta.com/uploads/464_16.pdf
http://www.mvta.com/uploads/465_27.pdf
http://www.mvta.com/uploads/470_31.pdf
http://www.mvta.com/uploads/472_30.pdf
http://www.mvta.com/uploads/475_11.pdf
http://www.mvta.com/uploads/476_17.pdf
http://www.mvta.com/uploads/477_20.pdf
http://www.mvta.com/uploads/478-479_26.pdf

[MSPtoMKE]

- There isn't a Red Line schedule posted, but I believe the hours are appx. 5 am - 12 am, 15 min peak and midday, 30 min evenings and weekends.

I hope not. According to this brochure, "Buses operate every 15 minutes from 5 a.m. to 11 p.m. on weekdays and from 7:30 a.m. to 11 p.m. on weekends."

http://www.mvta.com/uploads/metro_redli ... _final.pdf

[Mdcastle]

Well, 1987 was the last time I rode a city bus, and that was because I had no other choice to get to school with my father out of town. So I guess I wouldn't know about modern payments. I don't ride LRT much, not because I don't like it but because I go to downtown about once a year when my company makes me for a conference, and I just hop on I-35W and drive from central Bloomington to the convention center, it seems simpler than driving over to light rail and then parking and then walking a number of blocks from rail to the convention center. So as little as I use LRT I can't see having to buy a card I would then lose rather than just buying a regular ticket.

[Tcmetro]

Here is the Red Line schedule. 15 min peak and midday, 30 evenings and weekends. At least the span of service is decent.

http://metrotransit.org/Data/Sites/1/me ... edline.pdf

[MSPtoMKE]

That is disappointing, the marketing materials seem to imply a longer span of 15 minute service. If a route cannot even meet the rather lax requirements for the hi-frequency network (every 15 minutes until early evening, Mon.-Sat.), I don't see how it can be considered part of the Metro network. To make matters worse, a lot of the connections between the Red and Blue lines at Mall of America seem to be pretty tight, in the 1-2 minute range.

Since this line has so few stops, it seems like mainly this will just force another connection on a large portion of transit riders in the corridor. For local service, only the Red Line and route 444 will cross the Cedar Ave Bridge now. I think the Cedar Ave. corridor has the potential to be a decent transit corridor, but the implementation of the first phase of BRT leaves much to be desired.

[Tcmetro]

It's really annoying that there isn't a comprehensive page on either the MVTA website or the Metro Transit website with good details about the launch and the service changes. AFAIK, there isn't a brochure out, like when other major lines open or restructurings happen.

From the news article on the Metropolitan Council page, it looks like there will be free rides on the Red Line for a week, as well as on the local connecting bus routes; 420, 438, 440, 442, 444, and 445. There will opening day celebrations at Apple Valley, where local officials will be, and at Cedar Grove, where the Minnesota Zoo will be.

http://www.metrocouncil.org/News-Events ... -laun.aspx

[kellonathan]

Not technically related to the Red Line, but I think I just saw a light rail car sitting at Franklin with the LED sign saying "Red Line" with the red square next to it... Maybe they have been secretly planning for an underground LRT under Cedar Ave?? I know... Too much wishful thinking...

[mulad]

Maybe they were advertising the line a bit, I can't say for certain. It's also possible that the display unit simply came pre-programmed with some primary-color lines. Siemens units like these have been sold to a number of transit agencies across the country, so I was thinking they may have included some route names from other regions in the pre-programmed list. Then again, the image gallery on Wikipedia doesn't show a big colored rectangle that our vehicles have on any S70s from other areas.

Anyway, just a reminder that the Red Line is set to start operations this Saturday, June 22nd. Does anyone know if they'll start running right away in the morning? Tcmetro's link says that they'll have an opening celebration at noon.

Hmm, the Red Line website says that they'll only have ticket machines at Apple Valley Transit Station and the Mall of America to begin with. The Mall of America already had TVMs for the Blue Line -- have any new ones been added for the Red Line? TVMs for other stations are "coming soon". The site says buses have Go-To readers at both front and rear doors, while people paying with cash need to enter at the front. I guess that makes me curious how much the on-board fareboxes cost -- both they and the Go-To readers could have been eliminated if TVMs and Go-To pedestals existed at all stops from the beginning... The fareboxes probably aren't super-spendy, though they do have to stand up to the rough ride buses typically experience. In contrast, TVMs are stationary, but more likely to have to deal with variable weather conditions.

It turns out that I have a coworker who lives in Apple Valley within walking/biking distance of AVTS. He's been pretty excited about the Red Line -- I hope it doesn't turn into a big disappointment for him.

[mattaudio]

So the highway capacity improvements funded by transit dollars have been complete for a year, but we can't get TVMs or decent stations installed?

[mulad]

I don't know if the highway construction has been done for very long -- I think there was a major shutdown of MN-77 just a week ago. But yeah, BRT seems to always suffer from half-measures wherever it's implemented in the US. I'm not a connoisseur of the technology, though -- does anyone know of an example where it's been done correctly?

[mattaudio]

I think the MN-77 project was just concrete rehabilitation (although I remember this section being "rehabilitated" less than a decade ago). The major BRT project was expansion of Cedar to include pedestrian amenities such as six travel lanes south to 161st St, bus shoulders, double left turn lanes, extra wide right turn lanes so cars can turn right around buses waiting at stoplights, stoplight removal and frontage road enhancements to reduce local access, and new stoplights from 138th St. to 170th St.

Basically, this was a project that used hundreds of millions in local/state/federal transit dollars to....
A) Reconstruct almost four miles of County Road 23 at much lower cost to Dakota County
B) Widen the highway and implement other "improvements" to traffic flow for people choosing to drive *through* Apple Valley and Lakeville
C) Make Cedar Ave more of a highway and less of a place for people not surrounded by a steel cage on tires (the same folks who would walk up and use the Red Line)
D) Make Cedar Ave less of a place for any sort of development that's not completely auto-oriented (the type of land use that would compliment the Red Line)
E) Build a fancy skyway over Cedar Ave at AVTS and buy some fancy buses
F) Transfer the cost of other walk-up stations to local cities such as Apple Valley paying for 147th St
G) Transfer the cost of connecting off-line stations such as Cedar Grove and Palomino to future phases

But hey, on the bright side, I'm sure it meets some sort of FTA cost effectiveness benchmark!

[mulad]

Here's a video someone shot in late April, including the 3 southern stations (it starts a bit too far south, so you may wish to skip to between about 1:30 and 1:50, when AVTS comes into view):



As depressing as it is that AVTS has a skyway, it's perhaps even more depressing that the 140th Street and 147th Street stations don't have them. This is a seriously wide roadway, and getting across it requires walking a block to the south to make use of the nearest signalized intersection. I suppose the camera exaggerates the problem, but they really should have considered narrower lanes -- maybe that would have made it less expensive to build the bridges across the roadway. Someone is definitely going to get splattered trying to get across at some point, especially considering the high speeds of cars along the route.

[FISHMANPET]

I'd bet the fareboxes are just existing fareboxes that MetroTransit has on hand, once they've got TVMs at all the stations they could take them out of the buses and put them back into regular service.

But who are we kidding none of this makes sense so they'll just do the stupidest thing imaginable.

[stp1980]

I really want this project to be better than it is. After reading the directions on Metro Transit's website on "How to Board" it explains that you need to ask the driver for a transfer to the Blue line. I thought that was the point of calling it a METRO? One ticket, one system, no extra hassle necessary. Did they really overlook this critical detail?

[twincitizen]

Not if you have a GoTo card, which I think will be a fairly high percentage on this line. But yeah, for the sport/event riders who don't buy the 6 hour pass or whatever, this is inconvenient.

If they're just talking about people who pay a cash fare on the bus (in the interim before we have TVMs at every stations), you'd be paying your fare at the front door anyways, so you'd grab your paper transfer right there. You general don't have to actually ask the driver for a transfer...it just pops out of the machine after paying your fare. It is assumed that you will want it when paying cash.

[Tcmetro]

If you pay with cash or a magnetic strip SuperSaver pass (boarding at 140th, 147th, or Cedar Grove) you have to board at the front and put money into the farebox.

If you already have a ticket/transfer, or a pass (GOTO or activated 31 day super saver). you can enter in any door. And if you have cash at MOA or AVTS you can buy your ticket from the vending machine.

[mulad]

I caught a Red Line bus pulling into a high bus platform during route training at the MOA transit station on Monday evening.



I'd never noticed the platform before, so I'm not sure when it appeared. It's on the far side of the transit center, located more in an area where you'd expect buses to drop off rather than pick up, but I suppose everything will get rearranged when the planned improvements to the MOA transit station come around.

I didn't see any TVMs or Go-To pedestals on that platform, though there's a pedestrian crossing at the south end of the LRT platform which would be close enough for people to zip up and down to reach the pedestal and TVM there, I guess. Again, who the hell cares since the bus part of the transit station is going to be reconfigured relatively soon anyway.

I'm not sure if the driver was still just getting used to it, but the bus just crawled into the stop -- I've noticed that same thing with the "Bus 2.0"-wrapped MVTA buses at AVTS before. (Heck, I would have waited for the bus to stop at a better spot for a picture, but it was barely moving.) Hopefully he was just being extra-careful with the shiny new bus... Presumably drivers will get a bit better at it over time, and/or maybe some better guidance technology will come along. I wouldn't be above just sticking some rubber guide wheels onto the frame of the bus at a 90-degree angle so the bus just rolls along the side of the platform -- that's been done for some bus guideway systems around the world. (Yet another example of why rails are nice -- of course, they've been done badly too, but it's less of a problem with new, post-ADA lines).