How’s this for a visible sign of our impending streetcar overlords?

Another view, in context.

The sign is on South Capitol Street, where streetcar tracks from Firth Sterling Avenue curve to head south towards Bolling Air Force Base and the DDOT streetcar commissioning track.

Back in 2011 I speculated we would soon have signs like this in DC. I haven’t noticed any on H Street, although it’s possible I’ve just missed them.

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.

Charlotte streetcar construction. Photo by Reconnecting America on flickr.

President Obama yesterday nominated Charlotte Mayor Anthony Foxx as the next Secretary of Transportation. If Foxx’s experience in Charlotte is any indication, he’ll make a strong choice.

During his nomination press conference, Foxx said “cities have had no better friend” than the US Department of Transportation under outgoing Secretary Ray LaHood, and that if confirmed he would hope to “uphold the standards” LaHood set. That’s great news.

The fact that Foxx comes from a major central city is also a huge benefit. It means he understands urban needs, which aren’t just highways.

Charlotte may not be New York, but it’s made great strides in the right direction. The city’s first rail line opened a few years ago, and a streetcar line is under construction now. Charlotte also gained bronze-level status as a bike friendly community in 2008, and launched bikesharing in 2012.

Foxx has been a strong advocate for urban rail, especially streetcars. He knows transportation and land use are tied at the hip, and has fought repeated attacks on Charlotte’s streetcar by former Mayor and current North Carolina Governor Pat McCrory.

He’s also worked as an attorney for bus manufacturer DesignLine.

Foxx also knows that state Departments of Transportation can sometimes be part of the problem. At the federal level, it’s common for USDOT to delegate responsibilities and funding to state DOTs, under the assumption the states have a better understanding of local needs. But state DOTs aren’t any more local than any huge centralized government. And since they usually focus on highways, the result is that federal dollars mostly go to highways as well.

Since Foxx fought with the state over Charlotte’s streetcar, he knows that funneling everything through state DOTs means states hold the cards. He knows that can hurt cities.

Finally, Foxx hired Arlington, VA’s former county manager, Ron Carlee, to run Charlotte’s city government. Foxx would have heard about Arlington’s reputation for progressive transportation planning during the hiring process, and presumably counted it in Carlee’s favor.

Of course, no one can really predict what kind of Secretary Foxx will be. When progressive champion Ray LaHood was first tapped for the job, the blogosphere worried his history as a Republican from rural Illinois meant he’d be a status quo highway builder.

But we do know that Foxx has made a priority of building transit in his home city, and has had to fight to make it happen.

 Cross-posted at Greater Greater Washington.
 
 
 

Construction of DC’s H Street streetcar is proceeding apace, but the street infrastructure isn’t the only thing going on. The rail vehicles themselves are also actively under construction. DDOT already has 3 streetcars, but more are needed to provide enough service.

This is one of the new vehicles, under construction at manufacturer Oregon Iron Works. Delivery should come later this year.

DC’s newest streetcar vehicle, under construction.

Tysons grid of streets, no. 2.

Maryland and Virginia will both enact major new transportation funding bills this year. Neither bill says exactly which projects will be funded, but here are the top 10 projects in Maryland and Virginia that most deserve to get some of the funds.

Number 1: 8-car Metro trains. Metrorail is near capacity, especially in Virginia. More Metro railcars would mean more 8-car trains on the Orange, Blue, and Silver Lines.

Number 2: Tysons grid of streets. Tysons Corner has more office space than downtown Baltimore and Richmond put together. Converting it to a functional urban place is a huge priority.

Number 3: Purple Line. Bethesda, Silver Spring, Langley Park, College Park, New Carrollton. That’s a serious string of transit-friendly pearls. The Purple Line will be one of America’s best light rail lines on the day it opens.

Number 4: Baltimore Red Line. Baltimore has a subway line and a light rail line, but they don’t work together very well as a system. The Red Line will greatly improve the reach of Baltimore’s rail system.

Number 5: Silver Line Phase 2. The Silver Line extension from Reston to Dulles Airport and Loudoun County is one of the few projects that was earmarked in Virginia’s bill, to the tune of $300 million.

Number 6: Arlington streetcars. The Columbia Pike and Crystal City streetcars both have funding plans already, but could potentially be accelerated.

Number 7: Route 7 transit. Leesburg Pike is the next Rosslyn-Ballston corridor waiting to happen. Virginia is just beginning to study either a light rail or BRT line along it.

Corridor Cities Transitway, no. 8.

Number 6: Corridor Cities Transitway. Gaithersburg has been waiting decades for a quality transit line to build around. BRT will finally connect the many new urbanist communities there, which are internally walkable but rely on cars for long-range connections.

Number 9: MARC enhancements. MARC is a decent commuter rail, but it could be so much more. Some day it could be more like New York’s Metro North or Philadelphia’s SEPTA regional rail, with hourly trains all day long, even on weekends.

Number 10: Alexandria BRT network. This will make nearly all of Alexandria accessible via high quality transit.

Honorable Mentions: Montgomery BRT network, Potomac Yard Metro station, Virginia Beach light rail, Southern Maryland light rail, VRE platform extensions.

 Cross-posted at Greater Greater Washington.
 
 
 

Cool transit find of the week: This Capital Transit Company ticket from exactly 76 years ago, featuring robins and cherry blossoms.

For those keeping score at home, in 1937 it cost $1.25 for a week’s worth of unlimited streetcar and bus rides. Adjusted for inflation, that’s about $20. For comparison, WMATA weekly passes today go for $16 for a bus-only pass, and a little under $60 for a rail pass.

1937 Capital Transit ticket. Photo by u/stampepk on reddit.

 Cross-posted at Greater Greater Washington.
 
 
 

The best curbside bus stop in the region opened yesterday, at Columbia Pike and Walter Reed Drive in Arlington. The “super stop” has an expanded shelter area, a platform strip, maps, and an electronic real-time information screen. It’s the first of 24 planned super stops on Columbia Pike. When Arlington’s planned streetcar opens, the super stops will become rail stations, and off-board fare payment will be added.

Here are some quick photos.

Denver is in the midst of a huge regional rail expansion. That’s great, but like in many cities (including DC, historically), the urban bus system has been largely ignored amidst all the hubbub over rail.

I got my planning degree at the University of Colorado, and after discussing Denver’s bus system with some friends recently, decided to produce this map. It shows the city’s high-frequency bus routes along with its existing and future rail lines.

Although the geography is obviously different, in many ways this map is a sequel to my DC 15-minute bus map from last August. I applied a lot of the lessons learned during that exercise to this Denver map. Compared to the DC version this map shows more information, presented more cleanly.

Read more at DenverUrbanism.com.

Denver rail and frequent bus map, including future lines. Click map for full size version.
Other sizes via flickr.

K Street Transitway. Image by DDOT.

DDOT is studying whether or not to extend the H Street streetcar onto K Street in downtown DC. As part of the study, they will rethink whether or not the long-planned K Street Transitway makes sense.

DC’s citywide streetcar plan shows a line connecting H Street with downtown and Georgetown, roughly along the same route as the K Street Circulator bus. With H Street less than a year from opening, it’s now time to start working on the next project.

On Wednesday evening last week, DDOT kicked off its new Union Station to Georgetown Transit Alternatives Analysis. It will consider extending the streetcar versus using other modes such as BRT. It will also look at whether to pursue the transitway or some other alternative.

In order to gain federal approval, and possibly get funding, DC has to study all the options. Streetcars will be strongly considered since existing streetcar plans are the impetus for the study, but rail is not a foregone conclusion.

The study will also look at K Street itself. For years DDOT has proposed rebuilding K Street to include a physically separated transitway down its center. The transitway hasn’t been built yet because there’s never been funding. It’s at least a $140 million project, not counting any of the tracks or electric power systems necessary for streetcars.

The transitway is still an option, but as part of the Alternatives Analysis DDOT will also look at other possibilities, such as curbside transit lanes, mixed traffic, and maybe even using other streets for more transit trips.

The analysis will also consider how to connect Georgetown. Traditional options will focus on Pennsylvania Avenue, M Street, and K Street underneath the Whitehurst Freeway, but a more radical idea might be to convert the Whitehurst itself to a more multimodal, complete street.

If you have any ideas you think DDOT should consider, you can contact them via the project webpage.

Image from the American Public Transportation Association.

Streetcars and buses have different strengths and weaknesses, and are better at accomplishing different goals. Flexibility is often touted as a major strength of buses. Although buses are legitimately more nimble in some ways, when it comes to flexibility of capacity it’s streetcars that have the edge.

It’s true that buses have tremendous routing flexibility. Since buses can operate on any normal traffic lane, routes can be reconfigured on a whim and individual buses are free to move around obstacles. These are real benefits, and sometimes they determine that a route should use buses.

At the same time, streetcars are customizable for high-capacity service in ways that aren’t available for buses.

Streetcars can be longer

In simplest terms, streetcars can be longer than buses. Since streetcars run on tracks there is no danger of jackknifing. Likewise, since streetcars are powered by overhead wire there’s not a single engine distributing power. Thus there’s no physical limit to their length.

For example, streetcar manufacturer CAF offers its Urbos model in options ranging from 60 feet long up to 141 feet long. Bombardier’s similar Flexity model comes in any length from 69 feet up to 148 feet.

Portland’s famous streetcar is a relatively diminutive 65 feet long, but longer vehicles are beginning to show up in North America. Cincinnati is using a 77 foot long Urbos for its future line, and the first 78 foot long Siemens S70s have already been delivered to Atlanta. In Toronto, 99 foot long Flexities will soon ply the continent’s largest streetcar network.

99′ long Toronto streetcar. Image by Bombardier.

And that’s just single streetcar vehicles. Streetcars can also be coupled into trains of multiple cars, so transit agencies that have shorter vehicles can still get the benefits of extra length without needing new railcars.

Agencies that want to run longer trains do have to provide longer stations, but since streetcar stations are typically simple, that’s relatively easy to accomplish.

Ultimately the limiting factor on streetcar length is the size of city blocks. Streetcars can’t typically be longer than one city block, lest they block traffic on perpendicular streets. But city blocks are usually hundreds of feet long, so streetcars can still be much longer than buses.

Streetcars can have diverse interiors

Even compared to buses of exactly the same length, streetcars can support a higher passenger capacity. Since gliding along rails is so much more smooth than rumbling along asphalt, and since there’s no need for huge wheel wells, it’s more practical for streetcars to have a lot of open space that maximizes standing capacity.

Interior of one of DC’s streetcars.

The 3 streetcars that DC has in storage use this strategy. They’re 65 feet long, but they have much more capacity than a 60 foot long articulated bus because of the open floor plan. The trade off, of course, is that they have fewer seats, but only streetcars practically offer the choice.

What kind of flexibility is more important?

Faced with the choice of operational flexibility or capacity flexibility, which one rules?

Obviously it depends on the needs of the corridor and the goals of the transit line. Sometimes buses are the correct answer, and other times it’s streetcars.

Sometimes it might make sense to use both on the same corridor. For example, streetcars capable of providing very high capacity might serve most passengers along a line, while buses capable of skipping around traffic might serve longer express trips on the same road.

There are 157 WMATA bus routes in the District of Columbia alone, with hundreds more WMATA and non-WMATA routes around the region. The majority of them are probably better served with buses, but some of them are undoubtedly better fits for streetcars.

The key for decision makers is to embrace the differences inherent to each mode, and decide accordingly.

 Cross-posted at Greater Greater Washington.