urbanMSP

I've never been a fan of 2-way bikeways, and having it be a mixed-use trail doesn't make it better. Should be a bikeway on each side of the road with a separate sidewalk.

The 10U branch from Central & 53rd to Northtown has a frequency of every 20-40 minutes give or take, and to/from Northtown where there's two branches of the 10 going there the frequency is every 10-15 minutes give or take. Was this similar or different pre-COVID? If aBRT service were to be trunc...

I expect to see these kind of tactics from the airlines, like in the Northwest days when they were very protective of their MSP hub. But from a public transit agency? This is such a waste and to do this during the times we're in is absolutely careless. I would be very interested in knowing the conve...

I drove over to Chanhassen to see progress on the Highway 101 reconstruction. The new trail bridge for the Minnesota River Bluffs LRT Regional Trail is complete, and from what I read on the Three Rivers Park website the trail is now reopen between 101 and Pioneer Trail after being closed since 2014 ...

MVTA is launching a couple new local routes in Burnsville, Apple Valley, and Eagan. Route 442 is being extended to the Mall of America and will basically be a duplicate of the Red Line. The new services begin tomorrow. Seems like a very expensive way of sticking it to Metro Transit and the Met Counc...

The photo of Opus Station appears to actually be the Golden Triangle Station.

I forgot who I asked, but during a Zoom meeting about planning for the next aBRT routes I asked why the Nicollet and Central lines aren't combined and they said it's because the route would be too long and lead to reliability issues.

Anyone else find the location of City West Station odd? I biked over there yesterday and the only people I can see benefiting from this are park & riders and workers at Optum who can use the train for their commute (which is probably a small number of the overall workforce). I realize it's too ...

Anyone else find the location of City West Station odd? I biked over there yesterday and the only people I can see benefiting from this are park & riders and workers at Optum who can use the train for their commute (which is probably a small number of the overall workforce). I realize it's too l...

When the opt-outs pull stunts like this it makes me more supportive of consolidating all the transit operations in the region to Metro Transit. The problem is that Metro Transit isn't particularly great at serving the outer suburbs with local service. The turf wars are dumb, and most of the opt-out...

Some construction updates based on what I've seen recently: -the foundations for the following stations can be seen: Golden Triangle, Opus, Shady Oak, and Hopkins -lot of electrical and utility lines can be seen where the EP Town Center and 21st Street stations will be -the new freight rail alignmen...

My suggestions for improved local service in Bloomington to make the Orange Line have a better chance to succeed: -extend the 4L south from 82nd Street to South Bloomington Transit Center via Lyndale -extend the 4P south from 82nd Street to Normandale College via Penn, the 94th/James industrial area...

So the 535 stops literally two houses down from me, while the nearest Orange Line station is more than a mile away, a lot farther than you'd want to think about walking twice a day. As you all know I don't ride the bus and I don't go downtown, but for those in the neighborhood that do I'd imagine i...

When the opt-outs pull stunts like this it makes me more supportive of consolidating all the transit operations in the region to Metro Transit.

And then there's 63rd/Zane, which still baffles me. Though I don't live in the area the current bus route serves so perhaps I'm underestimating its potential.

https://www.startribune.com/pedestrian-fatally-struck-while-crossing-highway-in-coon-rapids/573064482/ If I have the location right, this is where University and Highway 47 split near Northtown Mall. Looking at the location on Street View, I see a desire path cutting through tall grass from Target/S...

"Small but loud and well-connected group of opponents" is the definition of handwaving away the opposition. You know who has a good read on the size of the opposition? The elected officials making these compromises. Handwaving away opposition is ignoring it. We know there's opposition, an...

I can't speak for Philly and San Francisco, but regarding Boston's Green Line it doesn't help that four branches merge together, the tunnel section among other infrastructure is ancient (oldest subway tunnel in the US), no level-boarding platforms, and their trams are severely limited in terms of ca...

Off topic, but I wonder if Siemens is developing or has developed a S70 model that can operate off-wire via batteries. I think it should be looked at for Riverview in which trains operate via overhead wires where they're already installed on the Blue and Green Line, and off-wire along West 7th. Less...

I refuse to call it a streetcar because of the simple fact that only a short segment of the overall route is proposed to be mixed-traffic while the rest is dedicated ROW. Riverview is, and always will be (assuming it's built in the proposed form) a streetcar-light rail hybrid, and trying to use a di...