Stadium LRT Station, Ped Bridge & Plaza (MSFA block)

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RailBaronYarr
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Re: Minnesota Multi Purpose Stadium

Postby RailBaronYarr » August 26th, 2014, 1:57 pm

*commences beating of dead horse*

Step 1) Flip-flop 4th and the LRT so trains/cars never have to stop for each other at that intersection (assumes Chicago is closed on game/event days).
Step 2) Add a second LRT platform (center island style, please!) on the north side of the new stadium, making the entire area between platform and stadium pedestrian-only with trees (for attractiveness) and queuing space (for people).
Step 3) There is no step 3!

*horse sufficiently beaten*
Would this work with the tunnel to the new stadium requiring access on 4th?

HiawathaGuy
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Re: Minnesota Multi Purpose Stadium

Postby HiawathaGuy » August 26th, 2014, 2:11 pm

Would this work with the tunnel to the new stadium requiring access on 4th?
What tunnel? Or did you mean to say "Would this work with a tunnel to the new stadium..."?

Also, the land north of the Stadium is not owned by the Metropolitan Sports Facilities Commission or Metropolitan Council. It is owned by the Wilfs. I cannot envision a reason as to why they'd be expressively interested in selling that property. I love the idea of a new center-platform station, trust me, but I just don't see that as reality.

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Re: Minnesota Multi Purpose Stadium

Postby RailBaronYarr » August 26th, 2014, 2:20 pm

Would this work with the tunnel to the new stadium requiring access on 4th?
What tunnel? Or did you mean to say "Would this work with a tunnel to the new stadium..."?

This one. I guess you could call it a below-grade access portal or whatever. It was one of the sticking points I (and I'm sure others) had in the stadium design against 4th as it ensures 4th drops down, making area re-development and freeway capping more of a challenge.

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Re: Downtown East / Vikings Stadium LRT Station

Postby mattaudio » August 26th, 2014, 2:31 pm

Not the skyway I'm talking about.

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mister.shoes
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Re: Minnesota Multi Purpose Stadium

Postby mister.shoes » August 26th, 2014, 2:43 pm

Would this work with the tunnel to the new stadium requiring access on 4th?
Also, the land north of the Stadium is not owned by the Metropolitan Sports Facilities Commission or Metropolitan Council. It is owned by the Wilfs. I cannot envision a reason as to why they'd be expressively interested in selling that property. I love the idea of a new center-platform station, trust me, but I just don't see that as reality.
In my dream/horse-beaten scenario, 4th and the LRT trade places altogether, requiring no land to be purchased from the Wilfs. Both 3rd and 4th currently have \ \ \ \ \ stripes painted over a solid 15' to 20' of pavement, leading me to believe that the new ROW could be significantly narrower than it currently is, giving more space between the theoretical new LRT platform and the stadium.
Would this work with the tunnel to the new stadium requiring access on 4th?
What tunnel? Or did you mean to say "Would this work with a tunnel to the new stadium..."?
This one. I guess you could call it a below-grade access portal or whatever. It was one of the sticking points I (and I'm sure others) had in the stadium design against 4th as it ensures 4th drops down, making area re-development and freeway capping more of a challenge.
How about leaving the LRT in place and moving 4th to the other side of it using the parking lots and connect it 3rd st as it goes under the LRT tracks? The parking lots are owned by the Wilfs so I guess they would have to be on board - maybe could have negotiated some like this in the beginning.
Orbi's idea would obviously require land coming from the Wilfs, but would also work perfectly well with that tunnel/portal access. As mentioned above (and visible in RBY's linked image), 3rd has a lot of pavement currently striped for no use. Lanes would have to be narrowed to fit 2 each for 3rd and 4th underneath the current LRT bridge, but whatevs. We be dreamin' right now.
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HiawathaGuy
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Re: Downtown East / Vikings Stadium LRT Station

Postby HiawathaGuy » August 26th, 2014, 4:07 pm

I just a did a quick hack job of a google map in photoshop, laying a center platform station in the 4th Street ROW.
I think it could be feasible, if 4th didn't need to still work through there.
https://i.imgur.com/N1dwf4O.jpg

It's too bad a shallow tunnel couldn't be used for 4th, allowing it to emerge at a lower grade, toward the tunnel (stadium access point) on the NE corner of the new stadium. This would allow for a "plaza" over 4th and no traffic turning at Norm McGrew Place. But the connectivity of Chicago would be difficult.

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Re: Downtown East / Vikings Stadium LRT Station

Postby Archiapolis » August 27th, 2014, 12:11 pm

Here is a presentation about a pedestrian bridge proposed to be added the Downtown East light rail station:

http://metrocouncil.org/Council-Meeting ... adium.aspx

I am fine with this, assuming they don't go the Bloomington route and close off an at-grade pedestrian crossing. I would imagine they will consider restricting crossing the tracks at grade during events, though. They do point out they plan to run some extra service during games, meaning a train passing every 2 minutes vs. every 5 minutes during the previous Vikings Season.
"Provide control of 4th St. at-grade crossing"

Unless this means that there will be fencing or barriers that restrict grade crossing this is going to be an $8M failure.

Have the people proposing this EVER exited an event space? I'm a Gopher football season ticket holder (insert joke here) and I'd describe the exiting as a free-for-all that is only somewhat managed by traffic cops. Gopher football has roughly 40k people and the adjacent streets have NOT had a train crossing and car traffic is at the mercy of the exiting throngs/ability of the police to limit crossing by pedestrians. Vikings capacity is nearer to 100k.

I'd say that the above scenario pretty much describes every event exiting - complete chaos which may or may not have traffic cops who have varying degrees of control over pedestrians and traffic. Now, throw in trains crossing every 2 minutes and double the capacity.

Unless there are physical barriers that FORCE people to use this staircase to another staircase it is going to fail. If the football-game-going populace has a choice between mounting a giant staircase only to descend another one or crossing a street and giving the finger to trains and cars, guess which one they will choose.

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Re: Downtown East / Vikings Stadium LRT Station

Postby HiawathaGuy » August 27th, 2014, 1:38 pm

Unless there are physical barriers that FORCE people to use this staircase to another staircase it is going to fail. If the football-game-going populace has a choice between mounting a giant staircase only to descend another one or crossing a street and giving the finger to trains and cars, guess which one they will choose.
My guess will be that they'll use some sort of stanchion or baracades, like is done at Target Field Station on game days. There are always plenty of security & police to manage those crowds. I'm not worried about that at all. The City has been very forthright about their expectations that Met Council and MSFA plan for the crowds accordingly with regard to this station. So I'm actually glad to see this proposal and information 2 years ahead of the stadium opening.

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Re: Minnesota Multi Purpose Stadium

Postby Nathaniel » August 27th, 2014, 4:36 pm

http://www.startribune.com/blogs/272734301.html

Here comes the pedestrian bridge!
Anyone know where this came from? Like, who's idea was it? It's not in any planning document. Sort of jumped from out of the blue. Thoughts on the bridge?

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Re: Minnesota Multi Purpose Stadium

Postby Wedgeguy » August 27th, 2014, 5:00 pm

http://www.startribune.com/blogs/272734301.html

Here comes the pedestrian bridge!
Anyone know where this came from? Like, who's idea was it? It's not in any planning document. Sort of jumped from out of the blue. Thoughts on the bridge?
I think that they came to the realization that you can't keep trains running on schedule and have people trying to beat the trains to get across the track.

In other words. Theory says one thing, but the reality of the real world says you can't make it safe. Trains every 2-3 minutes and you think a mass exodus from the stadium are going to care whether the train gets to move or they get into their cars before gridlock.

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Re: Downtown East / Vikings Stadium LRT Station

Postby Nathaniel » August 27th, 2014, 10:36 pm

Here's a crazy thought:

What if we just accepted gridlock? I have a feeling that, in doing so, people would just opt to go another way. Whether that be a walk through a future park, or around north and back over, etc. I mean, it's 10 days a year. It seems excessive to build this at about $20k a game, for something that'll be used sparingly. I have to imagine that there is a more reasonable solution.

I guess, my frustration isn't so much the bridge. But, more so - how did we get to a situation where it's easier and quicker to spend a lot of money on a pedestrian bridge for a football stadium, yet we struggle so dearly to find transit / transportation monies for other more "everyday" endeavors?

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Re: Downtown East / Vikings Stadium LRT Station

Postby froggie » August 28th, 2014, 5:50 am

how did we get to a situation to spend a lot of money for a football stadium,
FTFY.

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Re: Downtown East / Vikings Stadium LRT Station

Postby mattaudio » August 28th, 2014, 7:47 am

Still no answers on why the skyway between the DTE and MSFC ramps no longer shows up on plans, and why we aren't reviving that plan to allow for non-conflict circulation between stadium and westbound platform since it would be significantly cheaper (and usable for more than a dozen days a year) compared to this bridge.

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Re: Downtown East / Vikings Stadium LRT Station

Postby mister.shoes » August 28th, 2014, 8:15 am

Purely a guess, but maybe it doesn't show up because it won't be super useful? The skyway from the stadium to the ramp is for climate-controlled VIP access, meaning the unwashed masses trying to get to the WB LRT platform [likely?] won't be able to use it—completely defeating the purpose of a connector over 4th.
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Re: Downtown East / Vikings Stadium LRT Station

Postby mattaudio » August 28th, 2014, 8:23 am

But the recent renderings show no skyway to the DTE ramp across 4th Street, despite that ramp being purchased to meet the required 2000 space climate-controlled skyway/tunnel requirement in the stadium legislation. And the other skyways along the north side of 4th Street, then crossing 4th into the stadium, surely won't be VIP only.

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Re: Downtown East / Vikings Stadium LRT Station

Postby twincitizen » August 28th, 2014, 8:25 am

Here's a crazy thought:

What if we just accepted gridlock? I have a feeling that, in doing so, people would just opt to go another way. Whether that be a walk through a future park, or around north and back over, etc. I mean, it's 10 days a year. It seems excessive to build this at about $20k a game, for something that'll be used sparingly. I have to imagine that there is a more reasonable solution.

I guess, my frustration isn't so much the bridge. But, more so - how did we get to a situation where it's easier and quicker to spend a lot of money on a pedestrian bridge for a football stadium, yet we struggle so dearly to find transit / transportation monies for other more "everyday" endeavors?
All of this. It is insane to spend this kind of money for 10 days a year. Especially when most of them are Sunday afternoons, and none are during a weekday rush hour. From my understanding the purpose of this is so pedestrians aren't clogging up the tracks, and trains are able to move through the intersection every 2 minutes post-game. What if, instead, we just didn't care if the trains run a little late on less than 10 Sunday afternoons? Use uniformed human beings to keep other human beings out of the intersection, and let the trains go every few minutes. The trains will get back on schedule after a few hours following the game. Again, it's Sunday afternoon.

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Re: Downtown East / Vikings Stadium LRT Station

Postby mattaudio » August 28th, 2014, 8:39 am

Yeah and leaving a prosportgame is really like herding cattle... the masses will go in the direction of least resistance. This whole thing is a waste, unless it's part of some spectacular park building on that half block DTE ramp triangle which could be a better terminating vista for the yard than the stadium. But I'm sure that won't happen.

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mister.shoes
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Re: Downtown East / Vikings Stadium LRT Station

Postby mister.shoes » August 28th, 2014, 8:39 am

But the recent renderings show no skyway to the DTE ramp across 4th Street, despite that ramp being purchased to meet the required 2000 space climate-controlled skyway/tunnel requirement in the stadium legislation. And the other skyways along the north side of 4th Street, then crossing 4th into the stadium, surely won't be VIP only.
I would be absolutely willing to bet that on game days, this skyway is 100% VIP-only:
Image

That's the skyway that meets the climate-controlled requirement, as I understand it. I haven't seen anything that indicates any additional skyways on the north side of the stadium.

And even if it isn't VIP-only, there's no way that a single skyway could handle the number of people trying to get to the WB LRT platform. That's why this stairway is so wide. A massive crush of people are not going to fit into that little straw, especially if they have to go through the ramp and over to a second skyway, then down an elevator/escalator to the LRT. Masses of people mass their way out the front door.
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mister.shoes
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Re: Downtown East / Vikings Stadium LRT Station

Postby mister.shoes » August 28th, 2014, 8:41 am

This whole thing is a waste
QFT.
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Nathan
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Re: Downtown East / Vikings Stadium LRT Station

Postby Nathan » August 28th, 2014, 8:44 am

so I'm just thinking and I don't know a whole lot, but this is going to become a very busy station right? thearea is going to be filled up with lots of residentialand hotels and some office, plus a park, and people are going to want to check out the new stadium for pictures and such, plus be a main transfer point for the blue and green lines, isn't it good to get a lot of people off the ground out of the crossings? in a subway system you change sides at a different grade, they don't let you run across. it just seems equally expensive to move the station and change the road structure ( as some have mentioned) as to make an above grade crossing. the kinds of people crossing here are not all going to be lrt experienced and if small intersections cause skateboard accidents I'd rather not experiment with lots of people here.


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