urbanMSP

I hope that map isn't a final design, since it looks kinda rough. Pretty great seeing all of those routes on the official metro map, though!

I was just looking at the map again. The Rush Line is incorrect. It should connect to the Green Line around Regions. I think this map makes it clear that the Gold Line should have the loop in downtown St Paul.

I’m a little confused by the presentation and suggestion to include aBRT in Metro. Would they be assigned colors or not?

I hope that map isn't a final design, since it looks kinda rough. Pretty great seeing all of those routes on the official metro map, though!

I was just looking at the map again. The Rush Line is incorrect. It should connect to the Green Line around Regions. I think this map makes it clear that the Gold Line should have the loop in downtown St Paul.

I’m a little confused by the presentation and suggestion to include aBRT in Metro. Would they be assigned colors or not?

aBRT will be branded METRO, but will retain the letters for the naming scheme.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Colors are LRT or hBRT, letters are aBRT, right?

Colors are LRT or hBRT, letters are aBRT, right?

Correct, but one system branded METRO because they provide the same type of service.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

On the Uber/Lyft discussion; both major ridesharing companies continue to massively subsidize their fares with investment capital. Uber's growth decreased and its losses increased in Q2 and Q3 of this year, and it's trying to expand into other businesses while its flagship ridesharing service continues to hemorrhage money. Maybe next year's IPO will go swimmingly, the economy continues to grow, and the company will keep on rolling. But maybe things go south in one or more ways. Ridesharing is still extremely vulnerable.

I think governments are also waking up to some of the negative externalities of Uber/Lyft, with congestion being perhaps the most politically influential one in the short term, but the increased VMT and emissions are also significant. One thing that Minnesota should consider doing is taxing shared rides at a rate sufficient to bring Metro Transit fares back to $2.00.

...
There are some folks who are just anti-transit ideological zealots, but apart from them, Metro should absolutely view each Uber as a service failure. (Or sometimes a land use failure, but I digress.) The remedies for this are obvious, and supported by the fact that ridership is growing for the few corridors where we invest in a consistently high level of service and routes that are reliable, direct, and simple. The issue is that running buses and trains at high frequency costs money, and building transitways to ensure fast, on-time operation costs even more money.

The other issue is that Metro Transit does not control the streets. Minneapolis wants more transit but, as of now, has refused to do anything that substantially improves transit reliability. The Hennepin-Lyndale "bottleneck" project--nothing. Hennepin DT rebuild--nothing. 4th St. DT rebuild--nothing.

I responded to a tweet from Lisa Bender about transit a few months ago and the response I got was basically "something is coming". But continuing to build transit out of key corridors is building away the potential to give transit a time advantage through congested corridors (and failing to build an equitable or low carbon transportation system). It's easy to expect someone else to fix your problem, but it's clear that dumping more buses with scarce drivers into DT Minneapolis is not in Metro Transit's interest until the City steps up to change how it plays the road reconstruction game.

Would these European/Asian-style train cars make it to SWLRT or the Blue Line Extension? Or are those cars already chosen?

[Edit: oh, wait, or is this passenger rail, not LRT?]

https://usa.streetsblog.org/2018/11/23/ ... rain-cars/

As I understand it, this is passenger rail, specifically on tracks shared with freight trains. So this should open up the possibility of the Northern Lights Express or that service to Eau Claire that occasionally gets mentioned to use trainsets like this, which would make them cheaper both to build and to operate. Cheap enough to actually get funded? No idea.

Is there any information on the affect of nicerides, lime bikes, or lime/bird scooters on local bus-route usage? I know people using Lyft/Uber in affecting ridership, I’d be curious if these other methods affect it as well, especially in the warmer months. I may be alone in this, but I know that my local bus-route usage drops a lot when nicerides are available.

As I understand it, this is passenger rail, specifically on tracks shared with freight trains. So this should open up the possibility of the Northern Lights Express or that service to Eau Claire that occasionally gets mentioned to use trainsets like this, which would make them cheaper both to build and to operate. Cheap enough to actually get funded? No idea.

According to the West Central Wisconsin Rail Coalition, the group trying to establish privately funded and operated passenger rail to Eau Claire, Union Pacific (the owner of the tracks) is requiring that the passenger trains be the average bulky American locomotives instead of lighter weight locomotives or self-propelled units. Why this requirement I don't know.

Why this requirement I don't know.

The freight railroads are half the reason for the old requirement in the first place. They don't want the liability on their hands, even if these trains are built to be better.

The other half is just anti-transit lawmakers making it difficult to buy train sets under the guise of safety.

Is there a way to remove the liability from the freight railroads? Would that even be a good idea?

Is there a way to remove the liability from the freight railroads? Would that even be a good idea?

You mean other than nationalizing them?

Is there a way to remove the liability from the freight railroads? Would that even be a good idea?

Wasn't that proposed in the state legislature as part of the Green Line and Blue Line extensions?

It sounds like a good idea except in the event a freight railroad caused an accident and they're clearly at fault.

While on the subject of changes in regulation in terms of weight requirements, is there any additional regulations that artificially increase the weight of freight locomotives/cars as well?

The Transportation Committee will be reviewing a bus fleet plan at their meeting on Monday. From what I know, an RFP for buses was put out in the summer but no contract has been awarded. The new fleet plan seems to focus on electric buses, hopefully leading to a complete electrification of the fleet.

Metro Transit is considering the following procurements from 2019 to 2022.

- 19 40-foot electric buses with options for an additional 46 buses.
- 30 60-foot electric buses with options for an additional 22 buses.
- 62 60-foot diesel buses with options for an additional 22 buses.

- In 2019, the C Line articulateds (6 electric, 8 diesel) and 20 standard diesel buses will arrive.
- Orange line will be operated by diesel articulateds (10 buses)
- The B and D lines will be split between electric (10 for B, 13 for D) and diesel (10 for B, 13 for D) articulated buses.
- The E Line would be served by 15 articulated electrics.
- The regular fleet would receive 25 new diesel articulateds and 65 new electric standards from 2020 to 2022.

- The electric fleet evaluation will help determine the propulsion for 51 articulated and 119 standard buses that will be needed in 2023 and 2024.

https://metrocouncil.org/Council-Meetin ... -Plan.aspx

Aw, I was hoping they'd get at least some electrics for the Orange Line. Also, 'diesel' means 'hybrid' here, right? Those have been in use for years now, I can't think of any reason not to at least get those.

I wonder how electric buses would perform on freeway routes. Los Angeles is ordering articulated electric buses for their Orange and Silver BRT lines.

True, uncongested freeway driving (no regenerative braking) is about the worst-case scenario for EV range.

Here's an article on the BYD electric buses Los Angeles already has:

https://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la- ... story.html