DENVER | Transportation Thread

[EngiNerd]

Originally Posted by Sam Hill

I hate to veer off topic, but I have to chime in here with a rant about the Census Bureau's whole MSA thing.

First of all, SF's MSA is more like 4 million - and I don't even have to look it up because I've seen it a thousand times. And it would HAVE to be much larger, by any fair measure, than San Jose's.

Also, where does SF's MSA end and San Jose's begin? It's one metro. And SF is the heart of it. It's he cultural and financial center - the "downtown" of the Bay Area. If one were to tell someone in San Jose, "I'm from The City," they would know that means SF.

This MSA thing bothers me. Why split up some metro's but not others? Why split up the Bay Area or LA, but keep Seattle and Tacoma together or keep Dallas and Ft Worth together? I don't know who put together that Primary Statistical Area thing, but kudos to them. At least now we have something that keeps everything on the same list and in its proper order. But even that isn't very accurate. Take Denver for instance. You have a MSA that cuts off Boulder when Boulder is clearly part of the same metro area (not to mention the whole Louisville/Lafayette/Superior area), and then you have the CSA that somehow includes Greeley when Greeley is a freaking hour drive (or something like that) past the edge of suburbia. Denver metro's real population is somewhere in between. And I'm sure it's the same for just about every other metro.

Grrrrr!

Anyway...

It's because they split it by county for the CSA, instead of by city or urban area, so there are parts of Weld county that are indeed part of the metro area, but obviously Greeley is not, but since it falls under Weld county it gets included.

Also 100% agree, why Boulder is not included in the MSA never made any sense to me.

[Wizened Variations]

Anyone have thoughts about which alternate extension route RTD might select north of 168th Avenue to Longmont?

[bunt_q]

I wouldn't be surprised if they ultimately stick with the Boulder/diagonal route. Unless Boulder gives up the train entirely, getting to Longmont will still be cheapest that direction.

[Scottk]

Originally Posted by bunt_q

Bob makes an excellent point. Sprawl control and growth control are not the same thing. One is growth management, the other growth control. Boulder tries for growth control - as in, use my planning raygun to keep people out. That is impossible, except at the most local level. If Boulder had embraced the inevitable growth, but done it in anti-sprawl fashion, that would be one fantastic medium-sized city by now.

Remember, if Boulder had kept up its pace of growth from the 70s on, we wouldn't be talking about a little town. We'd be talking about Austin. Only better, because Boulder was decades ahead in terms of progressive thinking. They just went the easy approach (and profitable to existing property owners, whose dumpy 50s ranches are worth 600k now) - the 🞵🞵🞵🞵 Lamm no Olympics approach - and just said no to more people. I'm no Yoda, but I'm pretty sure taking the easy path leads toward the dark side. It WAS the Denver Boulder metro. You hear that less and less now. You hear US36 instead if the Boulder Turnpike. Boulder has been supplanted by...shudder...Aurora.

Boulder could have been a showcase for progressive planning. I don't think there's another city out there in a high growth area that understood the issues like Boulder did and had the appeal that Boulder has. Boulder might possibly be the greatest municipal lost opportunity in the country.

I couldn't agree with you more.

There are sections of Boulder (specifically around pearl street, the river, and the university) that could have been FANTASTIC urban areas. Boulder really had the potential to be an incredible, almost European style city, if it had been developed properly. Boulder has so much potential, but it is extremely underdeveloped.

What would Denver be like if Boulder had encouraged more development? I imagine that downtown denver would not be in as good of a place as it currently is now? Maybe it is a good thing Boulder never fully developed, because it enabled denver to become the center of power?

I also disagree that Superior and Louisville are because of Boulder's "NIMBYism." Suburbs are inevitable, anywhere you go. Some people just like living in the suburbs, and nothing you can say will convince them otherwise. Superior and Louisville are no more Boulder's fault than are Highlands ranch and lakewood Denver's fault.

[SnyderBock]

Originally Posted by Wizened Variations

Anyone have thoughts about which alternate extension route RTD might select north of 168th Avenue to Longmont?

The North corridor route to Longmont, makes more sense. An RTD-CDOT joint funded project to build passenger rail between Denver and Fort Collins, via the North Corridor through Longmont, makes most sense. This is the correct alignment to use.

[Cirrus]

The north route may make more sense if you're primarily interested in getting to downtown Denver, and don't care about getting to Boulder or Broomfield. But is that where most of the commuters from Longmont are going?

I have no idea, but that's a question they'll have to look at. If only half as many people in Longmont commute to Denver than to Boulder/Broomfield, then the potential ridership on the north connection is going to be much lower.

[SnyderBock]

Originally Posted by Cirrus

The north route may make more sense if you're primarily interested in getting to downtown Denver, and don't care about getting to Boulder or Broomfield. But is that where most of the commuters from Longmont are going?

I have no idea, but that's a question they'll have to look at. If only half as many people in Longmont commute to Denver than to Boulder/Broomfield, then the potential ridership on the north connection is going to be much lower.

Do consider, the US-36 BRT will also be extended from Boulder to Longmont, under this scenario. So Fort Collins to Longmont, to Denver, one-seat rides via train. Or at Longmont, to Boulder, Broomfield, Westminster, Denver via BRT.

Also, the NW rail, would likely be extended in phases, as needed, first to Broomfield, second to Louisville and eventually possibly to Boulder (but this could be a 3 phase build out, one phase per decade, not starting until 2015; so we're looking at 2025 to Broomfield, 2035 to Louisville and 2045 to Boulder). That'd be my best guess.

[Wizened Variations]

Originally Posted by Cirrus

The north route may make more sense if you're primarily interested in getting to downtown Denver, and don't care about getting to Boulder or Broomfield. But is that where most of the commuters from Longmont are going?

I have no idea, but that's a question they'll have to look at. If only half as many people in Longmont commute to Denver than to Boulder/Broomfield, then the potential ridership on the north connection is going to be much lower.

Check out

http://www.bouldereconomiccouncil.org/wp...2bouldercommutingpatternsstudyreport.pdf

Per that report, which concerns where Boulder workers live:

34% live in the city of Boulder
69% live in Boulder County
77% live in Boulder or Broomfield Counties
...
...
16% live in Longmont
7% live Broomfield
7% live in Louisville
6.1% live in Lafayette
3.5% live in Erie

Additionally, per the report

8.4% live in Adams county
3.1% live in Larimer county
2.8% live in Denver county (italics added)

2.6% live in Boulder (other)

***************************

I ran Boulder through drcog.org

http://www.drcog.org/workerflows/PDFs/Boulder.PDF?CFID=39776&CFTOKEN=51012147


Place of Residence for Boulder's Workforce

37,760 live in Boulder
11,957 live in unincorporated Boulder
5,516 live outside of Region" (I think they are dealing here with Berthoud, Loveland, and, Ft Collins primarily, based on the other statistics
4,468 live in Lafayette
4,176 live in Westminster
3,804 live in Louisville
3,078 live in Broomfield
2,450 live in Denver
1,755 live in Superior

etc.

Place of Work for Boulder's Residents

37,760 work in Boulder
3,338 work in Denver
2,969 work in Unincorporated Boulder
1,855 work in Longmont
1,588 work in Broomfield

Based upon these stats alone, then

Boulder's commuting concerns should be:

1) Internal to the City of Boulder
2) Internal to the County of Boulder

a) connections to Longmont

3) connections to Broomfield County.
4) connections to southwestern Weld County
5) connections to western Adams County
6) connections to the city of Denver
7) connections to Larimer County,

And in that order.


This, IMO, is the root of at least part of Boulder's frustrations with RTD and Fastracks. Of course, Boulder and Boulder County have their share of property speculators, so where the rail line eventually goes, and, when is also of concern to those with skin in that game.

[Cirrus]

^
That doesn't really tell us what we need to know. We need to know where people in Longmont work, not where people working in Boulder live.

That information is in the DRCOG model that RTD will use to do the modeling in its study, so all is well.

[Wizened Variations]

Originally Posted by Cirrus

^
That doesn't really tell us what we need to know. We need to know where people in Longmont work, not where people working in Boulder live.

That information is in the DRCOG model that RTD will use to do the modeling in its study, so all is well.

One has to look both directions- say Longmont - Boulder to determine the maximum (based on the DRCOG data) number of users in the model. I focused on Boulder.

The Longmont data in the same study (2000 census data)

Place of Residence of Longmont's Workforce

Longmont 17,311
Outside of region 10,158 (Larimer and Weld Counties)
Unincorporated Boulder Cty 2,306
Boulder 1,855
Westminster 656
Lafayette 606
Denver 576
Broomfield 496
Thornton 471
Louisville 413

...
...
...

Total 36,938

******

Place of Work for Longmont's commuting residences

Longmont 17,311
Boulder 8,975
Unincorporated Boulder 2,914
Outside of Region 2,070
(Larimer and Weld County)
Denver 1,219
Louisville 775
Broomfield 754
Lafayette 468
Westminster 327
Unincorporated Adams 264

...
...
...

For workers working in Longmont-

36,938

For workers who reside in Longmont

36,789

For the categories cities- Denver percentages

From Denver to Longmont- 576/36,938 or 1.56%
From Longmont to Denver 1219/37,789 or 3.26%

Carrying down for Boulder from DRCOG

From Denver to Boulder to work 2450/94868 or 2.58% (of Boulder employees)
From Boulder to Denver to work 3338/53828 or 6.20% (of Longmont employees)

Interestingly enough, per DRCOG there are 41,040 more workers working in Boulder than the total number of workers living in Boulder.

**************

Quick data pieces for Broomfield

Total place of residence for Broomfield's workforce 23,351
Total places of residence (major)

Broomfield 3,747
Thornton 1,761
Boulder 1,568
Denver 1,404
Outside of Region 1,386
Unincorporated Boulder 930
Lafayette 850
Louisville 812
Longmont 754

...
...

Place of work for Broomfield residents 20,301

Broomfield 3,747
Denver 3,238
Boulder 3,078
Westminster 1,754
Louisville 869
Unincorporated Adams 802
Arvada 591
Unincorporated Boulder 589
Lakewood 557
Unincorporated Jeffco 540
Thornton 534
Longmont 496
Northglenn 467

...
...

Percentage of Broomfield workers employed in Denver 3,238/20,301 16.1%
Denver workers commuting to Broomfield 1,404/23,351 6.1%

***********

Just a quick look at this data (see the drcog.org/PDFs/ <city>. PDF? seems to suggested that Boulder's primary concern for commuting workers into Boulder would be the rest of Boulder Cty, Longmont, and closely neighboring towns and unincorporated cty land.

Likewise, Broomfield's workforce commutes primarily from immediately neighboring towns, and, about 1/8th of Broomfield residences work in Denver.
Broomfield has a huge set of commuters that travel to Broomfield from the east and west.

Longmont has a huge number of workers that commute from Larimer and to a lesser extent Weld Counties as well as providing a huge number of commuters to work in Boulder, and Uninicorporated Boulder Cty.

In all 3 cities, few of their workforce comes from Denver.

Only in Broomfield, is there a significant percentage 16.1% of working residents that commute to Denver.

*************

I guess little has been done on the north side of the metro area, because commuting patterns are very local, and, Denver is a fairly minor player in their work forces and commuter base.

This has made dealing with this highly localized workforce area difficult from day 1. Problems with BNSF and the economy has just made it that much worse.

I also strongly suspect that vehicle usage on US 36, 120th Avenue, Wadsworth, the Diagonal, etc., are far more complex than this data points to.

[Cirrus]

Place of Work for Longmont's commuting residences
Longmont 17,311
Boulder 8,975
Unincorporated Boulder 2,914
Outside of Region 2,070
(Larimer and Weld County)
Denver 1,219
Louisville 775
Broomfield 754
Lafayette 468
Westminster 327
Unincorporated Adams 264

There you go. There are only 1200 people in Longmont who work in Denver, versus about 9000 who work in Boulder proper and 14000-some in the US-36 corridor overall. Unless those numbers have changed dramatically in the more recent demographic data, that's not enough to justify much spending.

Assuming your numbers are accurate, RTD will only use the north line to reach Longmont if they can do it for next to no cost. If they have to do any track upgrades at all, it's probably not worth it.

[bunt_q]

Originally Posted by Cirrus

Assuming your numbers are accurate, RTD will only use the north line to reach Longmont if they can do it for next to no cost. If they have to do any track upgrades at all, it's probably not worth it.

That's not really true. Because you assume that RTD's goal is transportation related. Their actual goal is to placate a tax base. The reality is that the only transportation alternative that makes sense in the northwest quadrant is some slightly improved bus. Otherwise, the populations and employment are too dispersed to serve effectively; what we're discussing is essentially suburb to suburb transit, which is always problematic. So I would even argue that the current study is less about analyzing transportation alternatives, and more about feeling out the politics, and seeing what the least cost solution is that we can get away with. Because no matter what we choose, it isn't going to make a difference for the transportation. It's about making people feel like it will. Placate the voters. From where RTD sits, it doesn't matter if you succeed, only whether you can claim success.

In a way, I feel like that's what most of our transit investments are anymore. They provide political cover at a reasonable cost to allow us to continue the other investments (roads). We are essentially greenwashing our transportation investments, without actually making much change in how people move. At least that's what I see here. And I'd be willing to bet that you see the same thing around the country. Not everywhere for sure, there are places that are building with an eye toward a car free life. That's not us. The BRT on I 70 is going to be a fine example. We've been talking about the Parsons plan for all of a week, and the articles already have the BRT in the last sentence as an afterthought - the purpose clearly being to say, "see, it's not just a highway widening." Of course, in that case it's the right solution. *If* there is focus on the bus.

[Cirrus]

Well that's depressing. Especially since you could be right.

May as well not bother going into downtown Longmont if that's the case, though. If you just want to be able to claim "we got to Longmont" and don't care about embarrassingly low & money-hemorrhaging ridership, then you may as well just put the last stop somewhere on I-25.

[bcp]

Do entertainment, civic, sport and social trips play into the calcs at all?

[SnyderBock]

Need to use 2010 census data, not 2000.


I think RTD should just make Boulder the hub of a BRT spoke system to Longmont, Broomfield/US36/Denver and eventually other Boulder area communities.

Then RTD can extend the NW rail in phases, as it has money and as population growth makes it more feasible. Possibly even using new ROW separate from the railroad ROW and build it all electrified. Maybe Broomfield/Interlocken is as far as it needs to go.

As for Longmont rail, I think that if/when a Front Range rail line is built, it should just be designed to be compatible with RTD's North, east and Gold commuter rail EMU lines. Then through Denver, it can share RTD's tracks, access DUS, DIA and serve Northern Colorado via the North line. Just extend it to Longmont and Fort Collins as part of a CDOT project, not RTD project (or joint venture). That same CDOT rail plan could look at extending RTD's NW rail from Broomfield or Louisville the rest of the way to Boulder.

[Cirrus]

Originally Posted by bcp

Do entertainment, civic, sport and social trips play into the calcs at all?

Yes, but for a relatively low-frequency and far-flung line like this, they're a minority. And even then, surely there are far more Longmontites (Longmontians? Longmonters?) getting most of their entertainment and culture from Boulder than Denver. I'd guess most probably only go to Denver for DIA and pro sports.

Originally Posted by SnyderBock

Need to use 2010 census data, not 2000.

Actually what we really need are DRCOG's population and employment projections for 2030. But I'm too lazy to look any of that up. RTD will have to do it anyway.

[Zmapper]

How do the calculations figure out if you include Loveland, Fort Collins, and Larimer County? If I recall correctly, about 9% of Loveland residents commute to Boulder and 5% to Denver, while only about 3% from Fort Collins commute to both Denver and Boulder.

[EngiNerd]

Originally Posted by SnyderBock

Need to use 2010 census data, not 2000.


I think RTD should just make Boulder the hub of a BRT spoke system to Longmont, Broomfield/US36/Denver and eventually other Boulder area communities.

Then RTD can extend the NW rail in phases, as it has money and as population growth makes it more feasible. Possibly even using new ROW separate from the railroad ROW and build it all electrified. Maybe Broomfield/Interlocken is as far as it needs to go.

As for Longmont rail, I think that if/when a Front Range rail line is built, it should just be designed to be compatible with RTD's North, east and Gold commuter rail EMU lines. Then through Denver, it can share RTD's tracks, access DUS, DIA and serve Northern Colorado via the North line. Just extend it to Longmont and Fort Collins as part of a CDOT project, not RTD project (or joint venture). That same CDOT rail plan could look at extending RTD's NW rail from Broomfield or Louisville the rest of the way to Boulder.

I completely agree with this, and don't know why this isn't on the table as an option. Finish the NW line to Boulder, makes them happy, makes everyone else along the way happy (Broomfield, Louisville, etc.), and extend BRT up to Longmont, which should make them happy. As the numbers show most in Longmont won't use the rail anyway because it doesn't go into their major place of employment (Boulder).

[Wizened Variations]

Originally Posted by bunt_q

That's not really true. Because you assume that RTD's goal is transportation related. Their actual goal is to placate a tax base. The reality is that the only transportation alternative that makes sense in the northwest quadrant is some slightly improved bus. Otherwise, the populations and employment are too dispersed to serve effectively; what we're discussing is essentially suburb to suburb transit, which is always problematic. So I would even argue that the current study is less about analyzing transportation alternatives, and more about feeling out the politics, and seeing what the least cost solution is that we can get away with. Because no matter what we choose, it isn't going to make a difference for the transportation. It's about making people feel like it will. Placate the voters. From where RTD sits, it doesn't matter if you succeed, only whether you can claim success.

In a way, I feel like that's what most of our transit investments are anymore. They provide political cover at a reasonable cost to allow us to continue the other investments (roads). We are essentially greenwashing our transportation investments, without actually making much change in how people move. At least that's what I see here. And I'd be willing to bet that you see the same thing around the country. Not everywhere for sure, there are places that are building with an eye toward a car free life. That's not us. The BRT on I 70 is going to be a fine example. We've been talking about the Parsons plan for all of a week, and the articles already have the BRT in the last sentence as an afterthought - the purpose clearly being to say, "see, it's not just a highway widening." Of course, in that case it's the right solution. *If* there is focus on the bus.

I hate to have to compliment you, AGAIN, so soon after the last time I complimented your 'on the money' wisdom.

Those of us who have followed the evolution of the Seed System, TRex, the DUS light rail extension, the DUS plan itself, the West Line, and, the DIA line, I suspect have gone through an education of sorts. The politics involved, IMO, at least since 1997 when "Guide the Rail" failed, have not changed. Instead, we have lost some of our idealistic innocence as we wear our 'Rose Colored' glasses less.

I know I have..........

[wong21fr]

Originally Posted by bunt_q

That's not really true. Because you assume that RTD's goal is transportation related. Their actual goal is to placate a tax base. The reality is that the only transportation alternative that makes sense in the northwest quadrant is some slightly improved bus. Otherwise, the populations and employment are too dispersed to serve effectively; what we're discussing is essentially suburb to suburb transit, which is always problematic. So I would even argue that the current study is less about analyzing transportation alternatives, and more about feeling out the politics, and seeing what the least cost solution is that we can get away with. Because no matter what we choose, it isn't going to make a difference for the transportation. It's about making people feel like it will. Placate the voters. From where RTD sits, it doesn't matter if you succeed, only whether you can claim success.

Who says democracy is the best form of government? Especially direct democracy? In Colorado, where governance operates under the constant threat of a citizens referendum, it's clear that the system is broken when it comes to allocating our limited resources. All we have ended up with is a tyranny of the majority where regional entities must placate their stakeholders by evenly serving them even if that isn't the most effective solution.