BeyondDC won’t opine about this one for personal reasons, but take a look at the plan to remake Route 50 in Fairfax into an urban boulevard.
May 9th, 2008 | Permalink | |
Tags: urbandesign
Yes, this is supposed to be Fairfax
Spandex not required
 DC’s bike-sharing system will be identical to Barcelona’s (pictured). |
BeyondDC is based in Ballston. When we want to go anywhere else on the Orange Line in Arlington we’re faced with a dilemma. It’s a little far to walk, but not always worth taking the Metro, especially on the weekend when trains are less frequent. There are surface buses we can hop, but they’re also less frequent on the weekend. For the most part we only use them if one happens to pass by while we’re walking. Driving would be ridiculous, even if we had a car.
The answer to our problem, of course, is a bicycle. Bikes may not guide land use or create TODs the way trains do, but once urbanity is in place they’re an essential piece of the transportation network - the best way by far to make medium-length trips.
With scores of healthy urban neighborhoods in need of connections, an expanding trail infrastructure, a fresh accolade as a top biking destination, and with America’s first bike-sharing programs primed to launch in Washington and Arlington, our region is on the cusp of a major revolution in biking-as-transportation.
To celebrate, and to provide an opportunity for first-timers to get in on the action, local governments and bike proponents around the region are hosting a score of Bike To Work Day events on Friday, May 16. If you register by May 9 you get access to more than the free breakfast and entertainment promised to all stoppers-by.
This is a good chance to send the message to political leaders that biking can be a serious mode of travel for large numbers of people. If you’re able, we encourage you to take part.
May 7th, 2008 | Permalink | |
Tags: transportation, events
No ostrich leadership for America
I’m a non-partisan and have been on the fence over all three candidates. This is the first time that one candidate has clearly distinguished themselves in a way that would sway my vote. It’s not just about a gas tax holiday. It’s about voting for someone [who] isn’t simply trying to buy votes by promising candy to a baby before dinner.
- Richard Wilson, Santa Barbara, CA,
in a comment at GasTaxScam.com.
A lot of candidates run on outsider “change the system” platforms, and most of the time they don’t really mean it. Barack Obama, however, in refusing to pander to emotion on the gas tax issue, is proving first hand that as president he will favor policies actually intended to produce results, rather than those that will maintain the status quo.
Make no mistake, the gas tax holiday favored by Hillary Clinton and John McCain is a bad deal for American voters. Most would only save $30-40 over the course of the entire summer, and according to the American Road & Transportation Builders Association it would come at a cost of $9 Billion in lost revenues, and 300,000 transportation-related jobs put at risk. Never mind that encouraging more driving is the last thing we should be doing right now, the gas tax holiday is an awful idea on its face. The economy is headed to recession and two of the three major candidates for president want to enact a policy that could eliminate 300,000 jobs for no measurable gain? Are they kidding? In what universe is that good leadership?
If you think America deserves more than head-in-the-sand leadership, sign the petition at GasTaxScam.com and join the chorus of voters demanding real solutions to our country’s woes.
May 6th, 2008 | Permalink | |
Tags: government
Purple curiosity
Three potential Purple Line alignments. Click to enlarge.
In 1986 CSX railroad stopped running trains on the Georgetown Branch right-of-way, a rail line between Georgetown, Bethesda and Silver Spring. In 1988 the State of Maryland bought the land specifically to be used for a transit line, and allowed locals to use it as a recreational trail in the interim period. Planning has been under way ever since, and as of 2008 funding is beginning to come together for what will be called the Purple Line.
Of course, it’s never that easy. The route bisects the Columbia Country Club, which though it operated successfully for 76 years with coal freight trains running on the Georgetown Branch, is heavily opposed to electric passenger trains using it. Likewise, the Town of Chevy Chase, a wealthy subdivision-sized municipality south of downtown Bethesda, opposes the route, ostensibly because the town wants to protect the recreational trail that has become very popular.
The Town and Country Club favor an alternate alignment called the Jones Bridge Road route. The alternate (shown in orange on the map below) would, according to opponents of the main alignment (in purple), save the Country Club and the recreational trail by following a route on surface streets further to the north. Never mind that the route isn’t as direct and that surface streets are slower for transit than a dedicated right-of-way, and never mind that the Town and Country Club are in favor of the route re-joining the trail once it gets a mile or so east of their boundaries.
BeyondDC was discussing the matter with some friends a few days ago when the subject of the Ride-On came up. Ride-On, Montgomery County’s bus provider, runs a route between Silver Spring and Friendship Heights that cuts along Leland Street, south of all the proposed Purple Line alignments. With that existing bus route in mind, we sketched out a third alignment (in teal below) following Leland Street and East-West Highway. It avoids the trail altogether. Then we stepped back, looked at what we’d done, and began to wonder why the Town and the Country Club haven’t thought of the same thing. If the point is to save the trail, then the Leland Street route we show does so much more effectively than the Jones Bridge Road route favored by the Town and Country Club.
For the record, BeyondDC still thinks the Georgetown Branch alignment is the best one for the Purple Line, as anyone primarily concerned with transit access will probably agree. But we can’t help but wonder what the Town and the Country Club think of our Leland Street alignment. They say they want to save the trail, and this route saves it better than the Jones Bridge Road route. Surely they would favor this alignment, right?
Or is it all just about their own back yards?
Three potential Purple Line alignments. Click to enlarge.
May 5th, 2008 | Permalink | |
Tags: transportation, government
Tysons Metro… approved?
 The proposed platform at Wiehle Avenue. |
The Washington Post is reporting that the FTA has reversed its earlier decision and is now set to approve funding for the Tysons Corner Metro extension. FTA boss Mary Peters is supposedly on a conference call with Virginia Governor Kaine and other officials right now, literally as BeyondDC types this post, to give them the good news.
More info as the story develops.
The big question now, assuming the Post’s info is accurate, is whether a neutered NVTA poses a major problem for the local portion of funding. We’re not sure it does. Last BeyondDC knew, the State funding match is coming from tolls on the airport access road, and the County match from a real estate tax on businesses in the corridor. But given this project’s history, we’re still holding our breath until we can get confirmation.
- - - -
Update 1:10 p.m. - Amy Gardner of the Washington Post just finished a very informative online question/answer session about the project. The most important of several revelations: What was approved today was NOT a full construction grant, but $150 million for final design. That’s still a big deal, though. The total amount spent on the Silver line so far is about $140 million, so this will more than double the money invested. We can’t think of a better illustration of support.
Update 1:50 p.m. - The Post has put online an updated article pulling together much of the information available so far. One tidbit: Approval is coming with strings. VA and WMATA have to find a way to guarantee adequate maintenance investment in the Metro system.
Update 2:50 p.m. - It’s a big day for Mary Peters. In addition to the news about the Silver line, she’s launched a new official USDOT blog, Welcome to the Fast Lane. Never mind the highway bias in the name, two of the first five posts regard Tysons Metro. One is a lovefest guest post by VA Governor Kaine extolling Ms. Peters’ virtues. The other, written by Peters herself, links to all sorts of handy information, including FTA’s official statements on the issue, as well as FTA’s letter to Kaine and a matrix outlining what’s changed about the project since January.
All this begs the question: Is Mary Peters a villain or a hero? |
All this begs the question: Is Mary Peters a villain or a hero? We know she’s an ideological Bush appointee and Highway Administration alum who comes from Phoenix, the most suburban and auto-oriented major city in America. We know she thinks the Federal government should hand over infrastructure-building to private firms, and we suspect her earlier opposition to the Silver line was part of a scheme to turn the project over to private investors… But Kaine can’t stop praising her, and according to the first Post article we posted this morning, “Officials with knowledge of the federal decision said Peters was behind the reversal despite objections from the FTA staff.” In other words, Peters saved the Silver line from the FTA.
What gives? We know the world isn’t supposed to be black and white, but there’s got to be more to this story. Why did the villain turn hero?
April 30th, 2008 | Permalink | |
Tags: transportation, government
We know; preaching to the choir
The American Public Transportation Association is a neat resource. Their statistics page is one of the best single clearinghouses for transit ridership data in North America. They also have a handy illustration of why transportation is so important to environmentalism. Being a transit advocacy agency, APTA focuses on carbon emissions reductions that can be had by commuting via transit in place of driving, but it doesn’t take much mental extrapolation to imagine what additional gains could be had by living in a walkable neighborhood.
A couple of their graphics:
Thanks to CommuterPageBlog for the heads up.
April 23rd, 2008 | Permalink | |
Tags: transportation, environment
A big week for Metro
Within the last week Metrorail has recorded its third and fourth highest ridership days in the history of the system. Although it was sporting events, cherry blossoms and the Pope’s visit that tipped things over the edge, the real story is simply that more people than ever are using transit for their day to day needs. Go Metro!
April 18th, 2008 | Permalink | |
Tags: transportation
BRT on the cheap… and that’s OK
 A shoulder bus lane in Minneapolis |
Now this is the kind of Bus Rapid Transit system we can wholeheartedly support.
WMATA chairman Chris Zimmerman’s proposal to allow buses to use roadway shoulders as exclusive lanes during periods of heavy traffic is absolutely inspired. It could markedly improve bus service on 100 miles of our region’s largest roads, it costs virtually nothing since it uses infrastructure already in place, and it’s not being billed as anything it can’t be (like the equivalent of rail). It is, in short, an easy thing we can do to make sure buses don’t have to sit with cars in traffic jams.
Ron Kirby, director of transportation at MWCOG (and a guy with whom BeyondDC usually agrees), doesn’t think the idea is worthwhile because the benefits would be relatively modest. He says not all shoulders are wide or strong enough, and even those that are would generally only be safe for marginally higher speeds than clogged traffic.
But see, the fact that this is a marginal benefit is kind of the point. Zimmerman isn’t trying to reinvent the wheel, he’s just trying to do what he can to make what we’ve got better, for virtually no cost. This is one of a multitude of little things that we can do to make transit service just a little bit better. And why shouldn’t we? A slight benefit is better than no benefit, and if you manage to string together a bunch of slight benefits, pretty soon you’re making a major difference. This sort of thinking is exactly the reason WMATA brought CEO John Catoe to Washington from Los Angeles. Under his stewardship LA made a lot of improvements like this to its bus system, and they increased efficiency by a pretty whopping 25%.
BeyondDC has long maintained that BRT can be a valuable way to “do buses right”, as long as it’s not used as an excuse to stop building rail. This proposal gets it exactly right.
April 17th, 2008 | Permalink | |
Tags: transportation
Parking Prudence and a Pandering Populist
In his book The High Cost of Free Parking author Donald Shoup persuasively argues that no parking is really free, that the hidden costs of “free” parking outweigh the benefits, and that our cities would be better off if the enormous veiled subsidies propping up ostensibly free parking were eliminated, or funneled towards more productive goals. The DC Council must be familiar with the work, or at least the concept, because they are considering a $25 / month tax on every free commuter parking space in the city. Parking at residences, transit stations and shops would be unaffected, as would for-pay parking, but any employer currently subsidizing its employees’ driving habits with a free space would face new charges. Even if the initiative fails to discourage many drivers, at least someone other than taxpayers will be footing part of the bill for “free” parking.
Councilmen Jim Graham and Phil Mendelson, co-sponsors of the bill, should be commended for showing the sort of progressive leadership our cities need if they are to climb out of the automobile-induced funk in which they’ve been stuck for 50 years, and which has resulted in our country being at the mercy of foreign oil exporters. Graham and Mendelson’s prudence is particularly glaring when compared to the populist pandering of presidential hopeful John McCain, whose plan to suspend the federal gas tax would have the primary effect of encouraging consumption. The feels-good-but-ultimately-counterproductive plan would make all our oil and transportation problems worse. It would be a step backward at exactly the time we should be sprinting forward. It’s the latest indication that McCain isn’t the logical, independent thinker he purports to be, and that no matter his foreign policy pedigree, he has little idea how to run a country.
By the way: Cutting the gas tax would take money directly out of the federal transportation budget, forcing cuts to funding for new projects. Considering McCain’s anti-rail record, it’s not hard to guess where those cuts would be made if he’s elected. Anything but a moderate when it comes to transportation, McCain considers rail “pork” and says he will not negotiate over his desire to shut down Amtrak. Transit advocates are calling him worse than Bush.
April 16th, 2008 | Permalink | |
Tags: transportation, government, people
Jane Jacobs lived here
 First walk-up on the left was hers |
When Jane Jacobs wrote her seminal work on walkable urbanism, The Death and Life of Great American Cities, she lived on an upper floor of a humble walk-up in New York’s Greenwich Village neighborhood. BeyondDC happened to be in that part of Manhattan last December, so we took the opportunity to make a quick pilgrimage. The spot is, after all, just a little bit holy.
The handful of photos we snapped are available to view.
