urbanMSP

The draft Transportation Action Plan was released today at http://go.minneapolismn.gov.
The public comment period starts today, and runs though 4/22 online or at one of three open houses, the first of which is Wednesday from 4-6pm at the Central Library.

This is a pretty big deal - it's the transportation counterpart to the 2040 Comp Plan, and covers everything from sidewalk width to transit-only lanes to freight operations.

The "All Ages and Abilities Network" plan for bikes is pretty wild. Virtually every planned bikeway in the city is replanned as a "low-stress bikeway" which seems to be either a protected lane or a bike boulevard.

(Notable that Hennepin north of Lake is one of them.)

Who else had to change their underwear after seeing that Midtown was included as a Transit Priority Project? That project hasn't been spoken about in any official capacity since Metro Transit finished their Alternatives Analysis in 2013-14. It still seems the project does not have a champion at Hennepin County, which is a problem since they own the ROW and control the main source of transit capital funding (sales tax). The City including it on a map won't magically make it happen without the full support of the county. Even if the city was offering to pay the local funding share instead of the county, the county still has to support it.

P.S. Since Metro Transit re-did their website recently, the project documents from the Midtown Corridor page are no longer accessible. But I found the final AA report through Google, so I recommend downloading this if you care about it: https://www.metrotransit.org/Data/Sites ... ow-res.pdf Google "metro transit midtown corridor" to find even more stuff to save for posterity

I don't have a ton of comments, because when I go to make a point, it's mostly already in there.

I'm really curious about the MT Network Next plan now. I hadn't really had much hope that it would entail a wholesale restructuring of bus routes, but if the City coordinated with MT for the transit portion of this plan, and is now suddenly proposing bus lanes on 4th and 5th Aves... sounds like there's something big brewing.

Call me a skeptic, but I have a feeling that we will be spending a whole bunch of study money and time on re-studying those high-capacity transit corridors, instead of building upon the existing alternative analyses and feasibility studies.

Now that the Midtown Greenway corridor project has been dormant for at least 6 years, I won't be surprised if we end up doing the whole thing from the ground up again.

and is now suddenly proposing bus lanes on 4th and 5th Aves...

Of course, it is noted as "Difficulty: High".

Yeah, I'm disappointed by that. It's just political will. Realize for a moment that practically none of the downtown businesspeople are actually constituents that can vote against you, and go for it.

There's pretty broad consensus that Marq2 is over capacity though, right? I think MVTA has already moved some routes to 4th/5th due to the delays on Marq2. Why do we think there will be opposition to putting transit lanes on 4th and 5th Aves? I'm guessing it would be just a single curbside lane on each street, rather than a full-blown Marq2 design. Marq2 isn't going anywhere, it just needs a reliever, especially with the Orange Line coming.

Well, there's one action to put bus lanes on several downtown streets (1st Ave N to 13th Ave S on 6th/7th/8th Sts, 2nd Ave N to Marquette and 2nd on 4th St, and Washington to 10th St on 4th and 5th Aves), which is marked as High Difficulty. I suspect the 6th/7th/8th lanes are what's driving that difficulty level, I agree that 4th//4th/5th shouldn't be too controversial.

Would 4th/5th be useful as relievers for Marq2? They are comparatively far outside the downtown core, and I imagine suburban commuters would feel less comfortable on them since they have fewer businesses/foot traffic/eyes on the street.

It's a good plan, which is what I expected.

- Thrilled to hear about three new bus lanes implemented this year.
- Really positive about the "All Ages and Abilities" network, because it is a useful grid and would cover the entire city.

I was hoping a few parts would be a bit more ambitious.

- Bus lanes are needed especially on 11th/12 (and post Orange Line, on 12th alone) and on Hennepin, yet both routes are only listed in the "Evaluate" action.
- Bollard-protected bike lanes aren't good enough, in my opinion, I was hoping for language that would set curb protection as the minimum standard.
- The plan specifically avoids naming a streetcar for both Nicollet-Central and Midtown. However, I wish it went further in eliminating a streetcar option.

The All Ages and Abilities network also needs more connections out of the city to the south. There's currently one low-stress bikeway (MUP next to Bloomington Ave) and no additions in the plan.