LA Orange Line BRT. Photo by Matt Johnson.

LA’s Orange Line is one of America’s most well-planned and successful BRT routes. It’s real BRT, with a dedicated busway and rail-like amenities. And it has a big problem: Just 8 years after opening, it’s hitting maximum capacity.

At rush hour, the Orange Line runs 60′ articulated buses every 4 minutes. That’s already peak efficiency.

More buses would add more seats, but would also disrupt the traffic signals along the line, slowing buses and causing bunching. Capacity would technically go up, but the line would slow down for everyone, and traffic on surrounding streets could get worse.

Even with a dedicated busway, you just can’t run vehicles more often than about every 4 minutes without a lot of negative effects. Not unless you fully separate every single intersection with elevated flyovers.

At some point, the most effective way to increase capacity is with larger vehicles. That means rail. And at about 30,000 riders per day, LA’s Orange Line is hitting that threshold.

Oh by the way, Arlington’s Columbia Pike corridor is projected to have over 30,000 transit riders by 2030. And it won’t have a dedicated busway.

When the Washington Monument topped out at 555 feet tall in 1884, it became the world’s tallest structure. Our champion status lasted only 5 years, until the Eiffel Tower put it to shame in 1889.

This vintage 1884 diagram shows the tallest buildings at that time, with Washington occupying the top.

From Cram’s Unrivaled Family Atlas of the World, Chicago IL. Lithograph color print.

There was good news and bad news for Maryland transit yesterday.

The bad news was Maryland’s decision to cut bus service on the ICC. The good news was that the Purple Line, Corridor Cities Transitway, and Baltimore Red Line are all advancing, and that MARC’s Penn Line will start running on the weekend.

Overall, that’s a huge net gain for transit in Maryland.

The new BRT and light rail lines are still years away, but weekend MARC service could start as soon as this winter. The MARC news alone is a bigger win for transit than the ICC buses are a loss.

Not that there’s actually any trade here. MARC isn’t expanding service because ICC buses are going away. The two are unrelated. Just that, as a transit user, if I were given the choice between those two things, I’d definitely pick weekend MARC.

And although Maryland is deservedly criticized for the ICC, it’s also worth noting that the ICC is in the past, and the state’s current plans are extremely progressive.

Most of the new state’s new transportation money is going to transit instead of roads, and most of the road projects are relatively reasonable. There are plenty of proposed interchange improvements and widenings, but there’s no sprawl-inducing, traffic-generating outer beltway.

The ICC.

Maryland may eliminate 3 of the 5 bus routes on the Intercounty Connector. The move is a classic bait and switch from highway builders: Get political buy-in with the promise of a multimodal road, then cut the multimodal aspects at the first opportunity.

The Maryland Transit Administration operates 5 bus routes on the ICC. They’re proposing to eliminate routes 202, 203, and 205. Only the 201 and 204 would remain, running from Gaithersburg to BWI and Frederick to College Park.

When planning the ICC, Maryland promised it would include good transit service and a high quality bike trail. They cut much of the trail in 2004. The bus service was never very good either, so it never got many riders. Now the state is citing that as a reason to cut it significantly.

Of course, cars aren’t held to the same standard.

There also aren’t many drivers on the ICC. Around 21,000 cars per day use the road. The state says that meets projections, but the projections seem to change. At one point they were as high as 71,000.

But is anyone proposing the state shut the road? Nope. Instead, the strategy is to try and boost car use.

Lawmakers hoped to induce more traffic with lower tolls last year, although that proposal was never accepted. This year the state raised the speed limit to make driving more attractive.

When it comes to bikes and transit, it’s cut and run at the first hint of a problem. For cars, it’s roll out the red carpet and hope for more traffic.

This isn’t the first time this has happened. When Virginia’s I-95 HOT lanes were first proposed, the firm hoping to expand the highway called its proposal “BRT/HOT lanes,” but of course nothing resembling actual BRT was ever built.

Transportation advocates should remember this the next time someone proposes a “multimodal” highway. Odds are they won’t deliver.

 Cross-posted at Greater Greater Washington.
 
 
 

The first of 70 new Amtrak locomotives rolled off the assembly line yesterday. They will fully replace all the locomotives on Amtrak’s non-Acela Northeast Regional trains, and can reach a top speed of about 125 miles per hour. Expect to start seeing them in service between DC and Boston this autumn.

Amtrak’s new “ACS-64″ locomotive. Photo from Amtrak.

WMATA has settled on a brand for its upcoming Crystal City Potomac Yard BRT line. It will be called Metro Way, and it will feature a flashy new blue paint scheme.

Metro Way. Image from WMATA.

The BRT line will run from Pentagon City through Crystal City and then into Alexandria. It will have dedicated lanes, with large rail-like stations, and will run every 6 minutes during rush hour, and every 12-15 at other times.

In a few years it will be upgraded to streetcar. But in the mean time, it’s the DC region’s first bona fide BRT.

WMATA selected the Metro Way brand and livery following a survey this past March that considered several options. The blue livery, although clearly unique, reflects Metro’s use of blue for its MetroExtra express buses.

 Cross-posted at Greater Greater Washington.
 
 
 

DC’s 1941 master plan is available through the Library of Congress. Published just months before Pearl Harbor, the plan is a fascinating look at the future pre-war planners envisioned.

The National Mall extends eastward to the bank of the Anacostia and dominates the plan. “Semi-public buildings,” parking garages, and much more highway-like Constitution and Independence Avenues line the new Mall. On the other hand, Southwest retains its historic street grid, and isn’t cut off by I-395.

What else jumps out?

Image by National Capital Park and Planning Commission.

 Cross-posted at Greater Greater Washington.
 
 
 

The Yangtze River valley between Shanghai and Nanjing is one of China’s densest and most heavily populated regions. It’s also one of its most agriculturally rich. Just like in America, sprawl claims much of the land between cities in the megapolis, but unlike America, the sprawl is happening in a way that preserves much of the land as functioning farms.

This aerial shows how walking along one of those streets, one might never know the neighborhood is primarily farmland.

More pictures.

From google maps.

A proposed skyscraper in Tysons Corner will be 435 feet tall, making it the tallest in the DC region, and first to breach the 400 foot threshold. The building is proposed as part of the SAIC redevelopment, adjacent to the Silver Line’s Greensboro Metro station.

SAIC Westpark. Image by FXFOWLE, published online by The Tysons Corner.

Traditionally, the tallest skyscrapers in the region have been in Rosslyn. But Rosslyn is in the flight path to National Airport, so buildings there can’t rise higher than 400 feet. A bevy of development projects in Rosslyn, Alexandria, Tysons, and North Bethesda are in the 300-400 foot range, but this is the first serious proposal to crack 400 feet.

Outside the DC region, Maryland’s tallest building is 528 feet, and Virginia’s is 508 feet. Richmond’s is 449 feet.

 Cross-posted at Greater Greater Washington.
 
 
 

Walkable City describes the benefits of urbanism, and proscribes how to make good urbanism happen. It’s a worthy read, for both newbies and hardened Jane Jacobs veterans.

I don’t read many mass market city planning books anymore, because so many of them say the same things. But when I heard one of the authors of Suburban Nation had his own book, I had to give it a shot. Suburban Nation is still the most eminently readable and easy to understand discussion of 20th Century suburbs, and why urban neighborhoods are better.

In some ways, Walkable City is like all those other books. It says mixed use and transit are good, wide highways and blank walls are bad. Most of us in the city planning world already know these things.

But Walkable City is worth reading, because Speck gathers a mountain of data supporting most of the arguments in contemporary urbanism, and then presents it in a convincing, methodological, and easy to read way. If you already know the basics, Walkable City is the most complete reference available.

And it does have new arguments. For example, Speck’s discussion of walkable architecture is intriguing, and explains in detail why it isn’t the ornament of historic buildings that makes them superior to most contemporary ones, but that they have layers of interesting things to look at, from different scales, and that walkers can interact with them in ways other than staring at a wall (even a decorated one).

Maybe I just like the book because I’m in it. Much to my surprise. I was reading it one day on the Metro and then, unexpectedly, on page 58, saw my own name, quoted regarded LEED architecture.

But perhaps the best thing I can say about Walkable City is this: After reading the first couple of chapters in a cafe, I went home, got a pen, and started over. Now my copy is covered with notes and squiggles from front to back.