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  #12421  
Old Posted Nov 20, 2019, 7:27 PM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Cirrus View Post
The more interesting question is how much higher RTD's ridership would be if they had built lines with maximizing ridership in mind, rather than with maximizing political coverage.
I'm still content to be the one, if Only The Lonely to respectfully disagree that a better mousetrap existed - except for one missed opportunity.

Most cities put their first light rail line along the busiest bus corridor. In Denver that was East Colfax but almost nobody gave two chits about East Colfax either within the City of Denver or outside the city. Even now with impressive BRT plans, the city has put those plans on the shelf presumably due to lack of funding as well as lack of buy-in from placeholders along the corridor.

I can recall back to when I knew virtually nothing about transit and you would lead others in a discussion about light rail along South Broadway and Speer Blvd to Cherry Creek. That eventually morphed into my Signature Urban Line extended along Leetsdale Drive. That IMO is the one and only missed opportunity. But to the best of my knowledge nobody within the City of Denver even bothered to lobby for this when FasTracks was created?

Aside from (my) Urban Signature Line, Denver - going back to the context of 1999 - didn't (and still doesn't) have any particularly dense corridors ideal for light rail. Even today, all the created density is adjacent to downtown which isn't the normal function for light rail. The one short light rail (extension) that comes to mind as a home run was Seattle's ~3-mile tunnel link between downtown and the University District station.

Even in the context of today, the only additional corridor (after Broadway/Speer/Leetsdale) that would make sense (and previously stated) would be Colorado Blvd. Having traditionally the highest traffic counts, the Colorado Blvd Line would intersect with three existing LRT stations.
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  #12422  
Old Posted Nov 21, 2019, 12:05 AM
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East Colfax BRT is moving into Design/NEPA.

Third Bond Issuance
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  #12423  
Old Posted Nov 21, 2019, 3:16 AM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by TakeFive View Post
National Western Stock Show Station
While having less of a residential component this $1 billion plus development with voter approved funding in place for most of the project, having a rail station in its midst has to qualify as a nice Double.
Less for now...
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  #12424  
Old Posted Nov 21, 2019, 5:10 PM
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B-Cycle is dead.....
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  #12425  
Old Posted Nov 21, 2019, 5:45 PM
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Denver B-cycle to end, city may thin herd of scooter operators as it tightens regulation of “micromobility” services

Quote:
Originally Posted by Denver Post
Denver is pumping the brakes on its pilot program for shared scooters, electric bikes and dockless bicycles, trading the current permitting system in for a competitive bid process that will result in “one or more companies” landing a contract with the city to operate so-called “micromobility” services, according to Denver Public Works.

. . .

The city hasn’t determined how many contracts it will extend to scooter operators, but said it may be less than the existing five companies operating in Denver: Bird, Lime, Lyft, Razor and Spin, which between them operate more than 2,800 scooters.

. . .

Denver also plans to contract with a new docked bike share to replace B-cycle, but it’s anticipated there will be a months-long gap without such an option in the city. Officials expect to have the new contracts in place over the summer of 2020.

The city’s request for proposals, which will outline what Denver is looking for out of its contracted operators, is still being finalized, but will be released at the end of January. Scooter and e-bike companies currently permitted to operate in the city will keep rolling with Denver’s Dockless Mobility Pilot Permit Program until the city’s contracted vendors begin operation.

. . .

One operator that will no longer cruise the streets: Denver B-cycle, owned and operated by the nonprofit Denver Bike Sharing. The first shared riding option of its time in the city, Denver B-cycle will cease spinning its wheels on Jan. 30 after nine years in operation, in part because it has lost business to the more than 2,800 scooters zooming around the city.
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  #12426  
Old Posted Nov 22, 2019, 3:19 AM
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Reduce micro-mibiliy?
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  #12427  
Old Posted Nov 22, 2019, 5:20 AM
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Survey Says:

https://denver.cbslocal.com/2019/11/...-train-a-line/
Quote:
In the district-wide outreach survey – of which 13,000 people completed between Nov. 4-17 – 59% favored a temporary cut to better balance with the number of RTD bus and train operators. RTD said about 63% of its stakeholders also agreed with the service reduction idea.

As far as what that looks like – temporary service cuts for days… months… maybe years? – RTD isn’t sure.
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  #12428  
Old Posted Nov 22, 2019, 8:52 PM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by PLANSIT View Post
East Colfax BRT is moving into Design/NEPA.
Thanks for the update!

RTD crisis: Operator shortage, high fares, lower ridership
NOVEMBER 21, 2019 BY MICHAEL KONOPASEK AND ALEX ROSE - Fox31 Denver
Quote:
“It’s unfortunate that it’s happening at the same time that RTD is trying to expand its service and improve its quality of service,” said University of Denver professor Andrew Goetz.
Who is this Goetz guy?
Quote:
Goetz, an expert on transportation and urban studies, warns riders are most concerned about service reliability while remaining sensitive to what comes out of their wallets
Impressive!
Quote:
Goetz said while working to attract more operators, he would like to see RTD reduce fares to grow ridership. He says that could benefit everyone.

“It really comes down to a concept of elasticity of demand,” he said. “If you lower fares, you may very well get more riders. More riders may actually increase your total revenue for that -- or at least be neutral.”
Clueless.!.!

As PLANSIT has already stated the fare "restructuring" was designed to be net revenue neutral. The most notable increase was to the 'A Line' where ridership has grown in spite of the fare increase.

Then the professor grabs Econ 101 "elasticity of demand" principle which on paper and in a static vacuum makes perfect sense. The only problem is that we don't live in a static vacuum. All manner of things come into play.

Okay, I'm prejudiced but I'll put my ordinary degree with my real world experience and assert that I know a lot more about "ridership" than the Professor with whatever degree paper he has hanging on his wall. As I've suggested elsewhere RTD fares are likely the last thing that comes into play with respect to ridership. Other than walking and biking what other way is cheaper than a bus fare?
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  #12429  
Old Posted Nov 22, 2019, 10:13 PM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by wong21fr View Post
B-Cycle is dead.....
It's fair to say that the "sharing gig economy" is still trying to find it's way. That will also include Uber/Lyft due to a lack of understanding and biased misinformation.

In the last week I happened to pick up a couple of ladies that were dependent on walkers to get around due to disabilities. The 1st was about 40 years old and went from her home to IHOP. The 2nd person was about 20 years old and I got the idea she was going from Dad's house to Mom's. Dad asked me to drive up onto the sidewalk (angled curbs) which I did. When I dropped her off I pulled into the driveway. At first I was surprised that nobody came out to meet her; then I realized that out of pride this sweetheart wanted to show how she could manage by herself. She had a garage opener and all went well.

I also happened to pick up a ~30 year old gal from Mayo Clinic who had her left leg in a cast and needed crutches. Other than struggling to swing her leg into the back seat she was fine. It's always interesting the people that are now able to rely on ride-share. I've given enough rides to "working poor" to understand how some use it to get to/from work, go grocery shopping etc and perhaps on weekends go do something interesting or fun.

I see where Seattle is 'quickly' planning to create a ride-share minimum wage for drivers (actually it gets complicated). At least they are using the same "researchers" that NYC used which is a more workable model for ride-share than what California is doing. Boston wants a ride-share congestion tax/fee.

What's interesting to me is the anti-private sector micromanagement and greed of cities is going to hurt the least among us the most. For so many of the working poor riding a bus is not an option. If ride-share fares go up by 50% or more that's a problem for the poor.

I'm always fascinated by the irony of liberals who love to talk about helping the poor and then turn around and screw them over.

Note: Because the airport is a good place to catch a good trip, many drivers go hang out in the ride-share queue. These drivers are the ones that expect a 'living wage guarantee' for sitting around playing blackjack for a couple of hours waiting for a trip. I have no sympathy; there's plenty of rides out there 'on the street' as they say.
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  #12430  
Old Posted Nov 22, 2019, 11:50 PM
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Credit: RTD
RTD Genereral Manager & CEO Dave Genova Announces Retirement Amid Ongoing Operator Shortage
November 22, 2019
Quote:
DENVER (CBS4) – The Regional Transportation District’s General Manager and CEO Dave Genova is retiring after nearly 26 years at the agency. Genova notified the chair of the RTD Board of Directors of his decision Thursday evening, according to a news release.

“It has been a privilege to serve the Board, our incredible team of employees and our community. I am confident that our very capable leadership team will continue to guide the agency in our mission to serve the traveling public,” said Genova. “It has been an honor to have shared in many industry-leading projects and I am proud of the successes we achieved during my nearly five-year term as General Manager and CEO.”
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  #12431  
Old Posted Dec 2, 2019, 7:24 AM
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Orlando says its downtown Uber and Lyft hubs have worked
NOV 26, 2019 By RYAN GILLESPIE - ORLANDO SENTINEL
Quote:
Designating locations for drivers to pick up downtown Orlando patrons has improved traffic flow at last call and led to roads reopening quicker than before.

The hubs were pitched over the summer as a potential solution to the so-called “push” of pedestrian and vehicle traffic that spills into downtown after bars close at 2 a.m. As thousands of patrons aim to leave simultaneously, cab and ride-share drivers struggled to navigate cluttered and closed streets.
They add that sporting and other events are still problematic. With the AZ Cardinals football stadium, they do have designated ride-sharing areas which works well.

I've wondered about downtown considering specific ride-share zones. Riders don't seem to mind waking to designated areas. Due to the App they can virtually walk up to or spot their car coming which is what they like.

Since I avoid downtown Phoenix and Rush Hour in general I can't speak to having any personal experience.
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  #12432  
Old Posted Dec 3, 2019, 2:44 AM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by TakeFive View Post
Since I avoid downtown Phoenix and Rush Hour in general I can't speak to having any personal experience.

Wait. Do you always avoid downtown Phoenix?
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  #12433  
Old Posted Dec 3, 2019, 3:27 AM
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Originally Posted by seventwenty View Post
Wait. Do you always avoid downtown Phoenix?
In Denver it would be like taking So Broadway and Colfax Ave and I prefer to stay in the SE portion of the city/metro area - only in Phoenix it's the NE area. I enjoy driving after P.M. rush hour since there's less traffic but I have little control over where I end up. During the day I don't mind the downtown neighborhoods but if I end up in downtown I hope for a quick ride outta there or I'll deadhead 15 minutes, usually east of downtown. Longer rides is what I want which is why I focus somewhat on airport trips - which is east of downtown. Is this exciting or what?
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  #12434  
Old Posted Dec 3, 2019, 5:12 AM
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TOD with a sky bridge

Since it's nearby to the Colorado Station, Denver approved an up-zoning request.

https://denverite.com/2019/10/23/dev...versity-hills/
Quote:
Two towers with homes, hotel rooms, office space and a restaurant could supplant a dry cleaner and a vacant liquor store in the University Hills neighborhood.

...their plans include 86 residential units, 120 to 130 hotel rooms, plus office space and a restaurant at Colorado Boulevard and Evans Avenue near the Colorado RTD station. They’d be spread across two buildings, one eight stories tall and the other 12, and connected by an elevated bridge.
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  #12435  
Old Posted Dec 3, 2019, 7:03 PM
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Is all that Bike Infrastructure really necessary?


Photo: Gabrielle Lurie / The Chronicle

Interesting article out of the Bay Area.

In SF, bikes still aren’t a preferred means of travel
Nov. 27, 2019 By Phil Matier - San Francisco Chronicle
Quote:
In yet another effort to get people out of their cars, San Francisco is gearing up to install a record 100 new bikes racks a month in the coming year. How quickly the new racks fill up, however, remains to be seen.
Presumably there's a reason for this?
Quote:
“More bike racks will lead to more people biking,” Wiedenmeier said.

But if recent history is any indication, Weidenmeier’s “if you build it, they will come” thesis may be an iffy bet.
Numbers please.
Quote:
More than 106 miles of bike lanes were installed in the city between 2006 and 2018. And in the past five years, the city has added 2,676 bike racks. But despite the efforts to make pedaling to work faster, easier and safer, bike ridership has remained pretty much static.

According to San Francisco Municipal Transit Agency’s annual count, bike use, as compared to all trips taken in the city, has hovered between a high of 4.4 % in 2014 and a low of 3.1% in 2017.

And it’s not just in San Francisco. “When you focus on commute trips, patterns have been pretty static all around the Bay Area,” Goodwin added.
What do transportation commute surveys show for San Francisco?
Quote:
By comparison, the number of San Franciscans traveling in taxis, motorcycles, Lyfts and Ubers stayed between 61% and 65% — 6 out of 10 trips — according to the SFMTA’s 2018 transit trend report.

Mass transit represented about a third of the trips taken in 2018.
That's more than a head scratcher, especially if you compare it to what the Downtown Denver Partnership surveys indicate. See here.

So if Denver already has over twice as much bike commuter share (at 9%) as San Francisco with the existing infrastructure then why bother to build more? Doesn't it just get in the way of the effort to make downtown more pedestrian friendly?

Okay, not a serious question. My real question is "What is the likely ceiling for bike-share in Denver?"
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  #12436  
Old Posted Dec 4, 2019, 6:00 AM
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Quote:
So if Denver already has over twice as much bike commuter share (at 9%) as San Francisco...
It doesn't. The SF data is for all trips citywide (including buying groceries out in the neighborhoods), while the Denver number is only for commute trips into downtown. Denver's all trips citywide number is somewhere between 1-3%.

Quote:
My real question is "What is the likely ceiling for bike-share in Denver?"
Bikeshare specifically or bike usage in general? Assuming you mean the latter, here are some key facts (from the same link as above:

1. The highest all trips bike mode share city in the US is Davis, CA with about 20%. Davis (and places like Boulder) are small college towns with drastically different commute profiles than a big city like Denver, but they *can* be proxies for what's possible with non-work trips and last-mile type trips. If you assume a good transit network and that a lot of commute trips are bike-to-transit, Davis' 20% is probably the extreme upper limit for most US cities.

2. The highest big US city is Portland with a little over 6%. Portland is marginally better than Denver at both transit and bike stuff, but it's not another universe.

3. The US numbers (including Davis and Portland) have all gone up a lot over the last decade, so while it's hard to imagine Davis-like levels in a big US city, Portland should absolutely not be considered a ceiling.

4. Looking to foreign cities, it's easy to dismiss Amsterdam's 40% as just another universe and completely non-applicable to Denver, but Christchurch's 8% seems pretty within reach (nobody would bat an eye if Portland hit that). And while I can't think of any European city as sprawly as Denver, the 11% that Euro-sprawly Helsinki gets at least tells you that you can get pretty high with post-war non-central city development. Helsinki suburbs like Espo are in the 8% range, and anything you can do there you could also do along Colorado Boulevard (if maybe not Northglenn).

So in my head, something like 10% is a good goal for most big US cities. It's hard but possible.
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Last edited by Cirrus; Dec 4, 2019 at 6:14 AM.
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  #12437  
Old Posted Dec 4, 2019, 8:22 PM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Cirrus View Post
It doesn't. The SF data is for all trips citywide (including buying groceries out in the neighborhoods), while the Denver number is only for commute trips into downtown. Denver's all trips citywide number is somewhere between 1-3%.

Bikeshare specifically or bike usage in general? Assuming you mean the latter, here are some key facts (from the same link as above:
See how useful you are.

Thanks for the correction and putting things into proper context. It would be fun to fast-forward 30 years and see how much has changed.

Certainly I still cherish my time spent on trails, notably the Cherry Creek Trail and High Line Canal Trail. Even Aurora b/c it's (relatively) new has open space corridors built-in for storm drainage that include trails.

General bike usage however will be a much heavier lift. Central Denver with its expected densifying nodes will be more natural areas but even for the city in general its still hard for me to visualize.
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  #12438  
Old Posted Dec 5, 2019, 9:02 PM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Cirrus View Post
Bikeshare specifically or bike usage in general?
I'm not certain but we do have an update.


Credit CBS4 Denver

Redfin Ranks Denver As A Top Bikeable City In America
December 5, 2019 By Ben Warwick - CBS4 Denver
Quote:
DENVER (CBS4) – The bicyclists you see on every Denver street are in on the secret. Our city is one of the most bikeable in the country.

Redfin has ranked Denver as the fourth-best bike-friendly city, behind Minneapolis, Portland, and Chicago. Access to bike lanes, the number of hills, and other factors went into the grading.
Rumor has it that Denver is an ascendant biking city.
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  #12439  
Old Posted Dec 6, 2019, 7:31 PM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Cirrus View Post
1. The highest all trips bike mode share city in the US is Davis, CA with about 20%. Davis (and places like Boulder) are small college towns with drastically different commute profiles than a big city like Denver, but they *can* be proxies for what's possible with non-work trips and last-mile type trips. If you assume a good transit network and that a lot of commute trips are bike-to-transit, Davis' 20% is probably the extreme upper limit for most US cities.

2. The highest big US city is Portland with a little over 6%. Portland is marginally better than Denver at both transit and bike stuff, but it's not another universe.

3. The US numbers (including Davis and Portland) have all gone up a lot over the last decade, so while it's hard to imagine Davis-like levels in a big US city, Portland should absolutely not be considered a ceiling.

4. Looking to foreign cities, it's easy to dismiss Amsterdam's 40% as just another universe and completely non-applicable to Denver, but Christchurch's 8% seems pretty within reach (nobody would bat an eye if Portland hit that). And while I can't think of any European city as sprawly as Denver, the 11% that Euro-sprawly Helsinki gets at least tells you that you can get pretty high with post-war non-central city development. Helsinki suburbs like Espo are in the 8% range, and anything you can do there you could also do along Colorado Boulevard (if maybe not Northglenn).

So in my head, something like 10% is a good goal for most big US cities. It's hard but possible.
It takes me time to dial in for a closer look. Then there's the context (which is everything) and definitions. If I don't understand the context then I don't understand the data. I also found this page.

So mode share is a commuting percentage but does that mean at least once a month or does it mean every day (or most of the time)? Portland varies between 2% and 6.3%. Recent census data from 2016 gives Portland a 3% bike share but appears to include the 'urbanized' area across the river in Vancouver.

I'd also be curious of the density patterns in Portland. Generic density numbers that include bodies of water or large areas of land like DIA in Denver are likely more misleading than helpful.

For those who don't live along bus routes then either biking or ride-share would be more convenient. Between both these modes it enables more people to go car-lite.

Outside of the 'original six' Seattle is the ONE city where transit is a star. Perhaps that's also why their bike-share remains modest.

Consider this: Downtown Seattle has 2.25 times the employment density of Denver. Seattle's transit (all modes) has 1.8 times the ridership of Denver. Denver RTD, on the whole, is doing okay. Portland transit ridership is essentially the same as Denver although Denver is a bit bigger.

See how l like to create context as apposed to raw data?
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  #12440  
Old Posted Dec 6, 2019, 10:53 PM
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Xcel Energy gets onboard the electric transit wagon

A bit nerdy; electric rates and how they're applied have a significant impact on RTD's electric fleet of buses used on the 16th street mall.

Denver RTD leads the pack in bus fleet electrification
DECEMBER 5, 2019 - Mass Transit Mag

Interestingly, the new rate structure is very much like what we do in the desert; only we have 6 months of higher 'summer' rates while Denver gets away with only 4 months.
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