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No, I was actually serious about the loop thing. About Armour Yard, though, I would have expected better, to be honest. I thought the people who built MARTA would look to others for storage ideas for their cars, but from what you say, it seems they haven't really tried.
That's why these commuter rail projects are completed in phases. But then again, most P3s have hidden costs that someone is responsible for paying some time after completion (from the Globe and Mail (Toronto)). After reading this, I realized why you would bring up P3s.
As far as I understand the tech, it's possible to give the driver the ability to tell the traffic signals to change in favor of the cars. I think that capability is already in place, just not really used. Someone know if i'm talking out of my butt on this one?
That would certainly be a lot better than having a planned/timed sequence that gets out of wack.
I find it interesting that afer pages and pages of chat, no one mentions that Marta stations need more benches. Sometimes you are waiting on the platforms for a very long time and there is never any place to sit. The stations I use the most or HE Holmes, CNN Dome, Peachtree Center, Five Points. Never any where to sit. I also think some stations should offer wifi, ESPECIALLY Five Points. If we are going to be waiting 20 minutes for a train, at least allow us to connect. I know many want the trains to go more places, but its easy to enhance the stations we already have and make them places we dont mind being at for long periods of time. I am a Marta supporter, been one since I got here, but the lack of benches need to addressed.
I find it interesting that afer pages and pages of chat, no one mentions that Marta stations need more benches. Sometimes you are waiting on the platforms for a very long time and there is never any place to sit. The stations I use the most or HE Holmes, CNN Dome, Peachtree Center, Five Points. Never any where to sit. I also think some stations should offer wifi, ESPECIALLY Five Points. If we are going to be waiting 20 minutes for a train, at least allow us to connect. I know many want the trains to go more places, but its easy to enhance the stations we already have and make them places we dont mind being at for long periods of time. I am a Marta supporter, been one since I got here, but the lack of benches need to addressed.
Oh my, you've touched on two very great points that I always somehow forget to mention! It's almost criminal how few benches there are in the stations. Some people aren't able to stand for up to 20 minutes to wait on a train, and most people (like me) would prefer not to.
On the wifi issue, I do remember a year or two ago where MARTA was beginning to look into adding wifi on the trains. I'm not sure whether or not that included the stations.
Oh my, you've touched on two very great points that I always somehow forget to mention! It's almost criminal how few benches there are in the stations. Some people aren't able to stand for up to 20 minutes to wait on a train, and most people (like me) would prefer not to.
On the wifi issue, I do remember a year or two ago where MARTA was beginning to look into adding wifi on the trains. I'm not sure whether or not that included the stations.
They are looking into WiFi and how to pay for it. I assume stations would be implemented first. As far as benches, adding more would reduce the overall room for riders and create bottlenecks during heavy usage.
I find it interesting that afer pages and pages of chat, no one mentions that Marta stations need more benches. Sometimes you are waiting on the platforms for a very long time and there is never any place to sit. The stations I use the most or HE Holmes, CNN Dome, Peachtree Center, Five Points. Never any where to sit. I also think some stations should offer wifi, ESPECIALLY Five Points. If we are going to be waiting 20 minutes for a train, at least allow us to connect. I know many want the trains to go more places, but its easy to enhance the stations we already have and make them places we dont mind being at for long periods of time. I am a Marta supporter, been one since I got here, but the lack of benches need to addressed.
YES. This. Five Points needs more, and more practical, benches, not those stupid concrete ones. Hard plastic would be just fine.
They are looking into WiFi and how to pay for it. I assume stations would be implemented first. As far as benches, adding more would reduce the overall room for riders and create bottlenecks during heavy usage.
Quote:
Originally Posted by alco89
Oh my, you've touched on two very great points that I always somehow forget to mention! It's almost criminal how few benches there are in the stations. Some people aren't able to stand for up to 20 minutes to wait on a train, and most people (like me) would prefer not to.
On the wifi issue, I do remember a year or two ago where MARTA was beginning to look into adding wifi on the trains. I'm not sure whether or not that included the stations.
Quote:
Originally Posted by BlackPeach2
I find it interesting that afer pages and pages of chat, no one mentions that Marta stations need more benches. Sometimes you are waiting on the platforms for a very long time and there is never any place to sit. The stations I use the most or HE Holmes, CNN Dome, Peachtree Center, Five Points. Never any where to sit. I also think some stations should offer wifi, ESPECIALLY Five Points. If we are going to be waiting 20 minutes for a train, at least allow us to connect. I know many want the trains to go more places, but its easy to enhance the stations we already have and make them places we dont mind being at for long periods of time. I am a Marta supporter, been one since I got here, but the lack of benches need to addressed.
Quote:
Originally Posted by toll_booth
YES. This. Five Points needs more, and more practical, benches, not those stupid concrete ones. Hard plastic would be just fine.
Yeup, WiFi is being studied for train rides (on the trains probably), I assume this'll be extended to the stations. That'll be really nice!
As for the benches, I know there are a few groups doing aesthetic planning for 5-Points and Garnett Stations. Maybe a similar group could do work to make the other stations more comfy?
That could be a part of the TODs that are coming online, use a fraction of the initial money earned to do upgrades to the stations. New paint, escalator/elevator maintenance, new facades, benches, artwork etc.
Anyway! Went to Pheonix for a couple of days of Comicon, and used the Valley Metro Light Rail. I was very impressed by the whole line. Despite its relative simplicity, the line (that is being extended right now) runs very well! The trains were well used, even when most of the Comicon riders had gotten off. There were areas to store bikes, we barely stopped for red-lights at intersections it seemed. The stations were well designed and usually in the middle of the road with cross walks set up for passengers to get across the busy streets.
There were a few Transit Centers set off on their own property with stations that matched the Light Rail's for buses to use. Not BRT, but useful for the long articulated buses and normal city buses none the less. There was artwork, historical posters, water fountains, greenery and canvas for shade, and maybe not enough benches.
Fares were very similar to our Breeze set, nothing too fancy there. Of the two days I used the line, I saw the security guards going around checking everyone's fare (mine too) in a very quick way with handheld boxes like those at Home-Depot. There were even hired surveyors taking ideas and input from riders who volunteered their thoughts. These I liked, and they reminded me of the Ambassadors that are riding the streetcars now (who I would love to see take on similar roles when the system grows a bit).
Overall, I liked it, and though it would be a good model for any LRT that MARTA/Beltline Inc. implemented.
As promised earlier, time to give this a go. This series of plans contains multiple forms of proposed transportation but does not explicitly detail the urban core of LRT/streetcar plans. All maps were created with UMap, which uses OpenStreetMap. Only proposed HRT stations, not existing stations, are given markers, except when they would be situated next to commuter rail stations.
Except for a small portion of the South DeKalb extension of the Blue Line, this is the entirety of my main set of my future + existing HRT proposals. Other than the Top-End Perimeter line, what probably stands out is not what this map has but what it lacks: Nothing to Gwinnett or Clayton, and only a small extension into Cobb. My justification for this is twofold: (1) Commuter rail would, in part, cover those very corridors. (2) HRT is friggin' expensive. So unless it's an urban core expansion, it needs to be compared against other forms of transit which, while they may not carry as many people, typically cost a lot less to build per mile.
Note that (2) implies that the North Fulton and South DeKalb expansions would still be the most justifiable of HRT-as-commuter-lines expansions. This is why I have left them on. Now, South DeKalb deserves an additional mention here, because there already exists a freight rail line that heads out that way. So why still give it an HRT extension? Well, the following map, with proposed commuter rail routes shown as thin blue lines, shows why:
That Stone Mountain-Redan commuter route would fail to serve South DeKalb, which isn't even entirely visible on the map. It would be a very inefficient commute, for instance, to drive from the Wesley Chapel area (near I-20, just east of 285 on the east side) to the nearest commuter rail station. Better to just drive or even take an existing bus route.
Also note that Gwinnett would get a commuter line north of 85 that, with just one transfer, could take passengers to and from Perimeter and Cumberland. This is a major reason I did not follow the old Concept 3 plan of extending the Gold Line one stop into Norcross, because that would require an additional transfer--at an additional cost!
One of the major things I tried to do when creating the routes is maximize service levels while minimizing existing property disruptions. Yes NIMBYs can be a pain in the butt, but as a homeowner myself, if something were to be built near me or especially right on top of me, I'd at least want to know what it is and why, well in advance of final approval (*cough* SunTrust Park). So these are things that have to be considered. So with that in mind, here are a few of the trouble spots that would be encountered and how I think the least bad way to get through them might be.
I struggled with Cumberland more than anywhere else on the entire map. You've got an existing commercial core, a future baseball stadium, an interchange of two major freeways, a major railroad line, low-to-medium density residence, lions, tigers, and bears, oh my! Well, maybe not the lions, tigers, or bears--yet!--but all of this occupies less than seven square miles of land. So how in the world to get the lines in?
The proposed Purple Line coming from Atlanta along the CSX route presented little trouble: Just pick the optimal side of the freight rail tracks and set the line there. But the Top-End Perimeter line was a very different story: How to keep it near 285 for as long as possible, and not disrupt too much ROW, and serve Cumberland, and hopefully get it near enough to future SunTrust Park? After much wrangling, this is what I finally came up with:
That gives two stations in Cumberland--one near the existing bus stations along Cumberland boulevard, which could become the bus bay for this proposed rail station, and one in the heart of Cumberland. It would be within easy walking distance of Cobb Galleria and the Cobb Energy Centre, and as the crow flies, it would be a half-mile walk from the land dedicated to SunTrust Park. Now granted, that would not be a very good level of service to the future ballpark. But as I alluded to earlier, I would rather give excellent service to Cumberland's urban core and mediocre service to SunTrust Park rather than the other way around, for a number of reasons.
Getting down to brass tacks, the line would travel directly on top of Akers Mill Road for about half a mile then curve over Cumberland Mall's parking lot--not the mall itself. Given that the station just southwest of the mall were to go in, I think it's a safe bet that the mall owners would be more than happy to trade a few dozen parking spots at worst for direct connection to MARTA rail.
So what's up with that station in downtown Smyrna? OK, remember the whole minimize-existing-property-disruptions principle? If that station were designed as expansive as Doraville or North Springs, that would completely violate that principle at the southwest Cumberland station. But it is my understanding that there is nothing planned for the large lot bordered by Concord Road, Atlanta Road, and the CSX line that has serious traction for development. So why not put a Lindbergh Center-like station there, which combines mixed-used development with ample parking space? Also, by putting the terminus there, it would have to absorb practically zero commuter traffic from I-75, considerably reducing the parking demand there. That would go to the southwest Cumberland station.
Next up: Perimeter Center.
The obvious candidates for a junction station between the Red Line and the Top-End line are Medical Center and Dunwoody. I feel that Medical Center falls woefully short as a potential junction station for three reasons:
(1) The eastern approach would cause little trouble, but the western approach would require a significant amount of tunneling. There's not a feasible place to bring it back above ground until at least half a mile west of the station as the crow flies. This would cause the construction costs to skyrocket.
(2) The singular reason why Lindbergh Center works well as a transfer station between the northbound Red and Gold Lines is the island platform. Without it, passengers transferring there would have to ascend an escalator or stairs, cross over, and descend the other side. Well guess what. That's exactly what would happen with half the transferring passengers at Medical Center. Oh, and did I mention that Medical Center doesn't have a single escalator anywhere behind the gated area? And building a second platform is out of the question unless you want construction costs to quickly become absurd.
(3) There is a lot of development on Hammond Drive between 400 and the Dunwoody station--enough, in my mind, to potentially justify an additional station there, given the presence of an elevated HRT line.
Now let's talk about the rest of the Purple Line.
I've felt for years that Atlantic Station is more than worthy of its own MARTA station. Imagine how convenient it would be to have this! Note that this configuration would effectively make Arts Center a single-platform transfer station. And Arts Center has an island platform, so it would not suffer from the problem that Medical Center would. Plus the northbound lines already have ghost ramps just inside the tunnel exit designed for a future northwest line, slightly cutting construction costs and greatly reducing travel disruptions on the existing line during construction.
Note the potential station near IKEA, which could have a park-and-ride lot. But remember, all of these are proposals, so perhaps just the Atlantic Station station (haha) might do.
"But toll_booth, wouldn't that make the Purple Line longer to snake that far west?" Yes, it would, by approximately 3 miles longer than going straight up 75. Given all the twisting and turning, that's a good 5 minutes or more lost for people who commute between Cumberland and anywhere south of Brookwood. So here's an alternative map that runs the Purple Line up 75:
Yes, this is considerably shorter. But there's a catch. Remember the NIMBY factor? This would very likely be a major problem for this alignment. We're talking about potential encroachment on or even displacement of wealthy people living in single-family residences--prime risk factors for fierce NIMBY opposition. By contrast, the CSX corridor alternative would mostly run through a considerably poorer part of town where transit would almost certainly be far more embraced. The Vinings station could present a NIMBY issue, but the workaround there could simply be to build a ghost station there, using it as an emergency exit station only for the time being.
Now let's shift our attention to a regional scale. This will address the apparent gaps left in the coverage for Clayton, Gwinnett, and Cobb. It also introduces a new form of transportation to the metro area: Commuter bus.
This system of commuter bus routes would (1) serve a more regional area than local bus routes, (2) have headways comparable to those of HRT--15-20 minutes in the daytime and 20-30 minutes at night, (3) (this is the big one) for the purposes of transfers, work more like HRT lines than local bus routes. This means that free local-bus-to-commuter-bus transfers would become a thing, which implies that local bus routes could have a commuter bus routes serve as one or both termini.
It is important to note that I am intentionally avoiding the term "bus rapid transit," which means separate guideways. With the possible exception of corridors where ROW easily exists to build them, particularly on Cobb Parkway, capital costs would be considerably reduced by having the buses travel on existing roadways, but of course the catch is that the buses' average overall speeds would be lower.
Speaking of Cobb Parkway, I'd like to focus on that route in particular.
"Why is there an indentation just southeast of downtown Marietta? Why not continue the route directly up Cobb Parkway? Because there's already a park-and-ride lot there for CCT. Better to use what's already there whenever possible. Also note that this alignment would go right through Kennesaw State University. Combined with the proposed configuration of the HRT network, this means a KSU student could get to Midtown, Downtown, or most importantly, the airport via a grand total of one transfer, which is huge for students for whom car transportation isn't feasible.
"Are these commuter bus routes an alternative or a replacement of commuter rail routes?" My goal was to design commuter rail primarily for choice riders, to give them an easier way to get into the urban core, and commuter bus as a transit expansion for those who are dependent on transit but live in suburbs where transit is poor or nonexistent. Also, as much as possible, I do not want commuter bus and commuter rail routes to overlap. Here is what the two systems look like together:
Note that per the guidelines above, I removed the commuter bus route on Lawrenceville Highway.
And here is the whole thing all together, with something I have only mentioned in passing...until now!
"What's that pale green perimeter line waaaaay out there? Is that supposed to be an outer bypass of metro Atlanta?" Yes! Because I think it's time we build one. And yes, this is somewhat of a personal shift from my thoughts two years ago. Look, the signs coming into town that describe 285 as the "Atlanta Bypass" are a joke. Considering how vast Metro Atlanta is, no, no it's not. It's one of Atlanta's major thoroughfares, rivaled only by the Downtown Connector and 75 and 85 just north of 285. Note just how far north it has to go: It barely even skirts Forsyth County! Even so, some displacement, particularly near Gainesville, would be inevitable without going straight into the North Georgia mountains, which would increase costs even further.
"How in the world would this be paid for?" Tolls, of course. (Cue all toll booth jokes now. Alright, now let's continue.) The route as drawn is 267 miles in circumference. I don't even wanna think how much this would cost, so it would have to be built in stages. I think they would have to start with the Northern Arc for two reasons: (1) That's probably where the greatest need is, and (2) That's where the greatest sprawl is, so it's a race against the clock to get this portion planned and ROW acquired. Then extend on both sides until it's a complete loop.
"Are those green dots exits?" Not only that: Those 14 exits are the ONLY proposed exits--nearly 20 miles between exists, on average. So service stations would be needed throughout the route, which is standard for rural turnpikes. The key is to keep this outer perimeter from becoming some sort of local highway. It needs to be first and foremost a bypass. Only six of those exits on the entire loop are to anything other than interstate highways (seven, if you count US 23 near Gainesville).
Speaking of which, the final set of points I'd like to make are what I think the order of expansion of HRT are:
(1) The Blue Line. Somebody mentioned in another thread that the South DeKalb expansion projects significantly more additional riders than the North Fulton expansion, despite the fact that the two are roughly the same length. If that's true, then it sounds like a no-brainer to me: Extend the Blue Line first. Also note that there is a shorter extension proposed on the west side, one station beyond the proposed MLK station. Because hey, why not.
(2) The Red Line.
(3) The Purple Line. Yes it might be nicer to have the Top-End Perimeter line in place first, but if you expand in that order, you're going to have a serious problem transferring trains from one line to the next until the entire Top-End Line is completed. Far better, I say, to get the Purple Line in first. Then trains can change lines in Cumberland with no additional track, because that would already be a part of the network.
(4) The Top-End Line, from west to east. Once it joins down at East Lake station, this entire line becomes the Green Line.
Alright! Give the State of Georgia about 50 years and $50 billion or so, and I'll bet you they could get this done!!
I've felt for years that Atlantic Station is more than worthy of its own MARTA station. Imagine how convenient it would be to have this! Note that this configuration would effectively make Arts Center a single-platform transfer station. And Arts Center has an island platform, so it would not suffer from the problem that Medical Center would. Plus the northbound lines already have ghost ramps just inside the tunnel exit designed for a future northwest line, slightly cutting construction costs and greatly reducing travel disruptions on the existing line during construction.
The tunnel stub that currently exists was specifically designed to angle the Northwest Line towards the Peachtree/26th Street intersection. It would be extremely difficult and unfeasible to use it for the line you're proposing given the sharp turn radius and elevation necessary to run the route towards Atlantic Station. It could be used in your alternative route up I-75 with proposed stations at Brookwood and Northside Drive (which are original to the 1971 Referendum Plan).
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