AUSTIN | Transportation Updates

[H2O]

Originally Posted by N90

It’s easier to make a list of cities that don’t have LRT or HRT.

Austin, Karachi, Detroit, Kabul, Johannesburg, Lahore, Las Vegas, Nashville, San Antonio, Orlando, Raleigh, Kansas City, Memphis, Jacksonville, and Tampa.

Not exactly the kind of list you want your city’s name on but TX manages to have two on this list.

Austin has commuter rail. Detroit has a street car. Las Vegas has a monorail. Nashville has a street car. Kansas City has a street car. All of them have plans to expand rail. I don't know about the others.

[ahealy]

Yeah, there really is no debating this. My husband works in the capital and is planning on selling his car when/if rail arrives. I must have a car working in real estate--there really isn't an alternative right now....and I'm a gear head

But what I look forward to is an Austin with options for those who are willing and able to take rail and ditch their cars, like my husband. It's something I truly believe we must face together, whether we love it or not.

[mercury6]

I'm not convinced rail alleviates traffic to an overwhelming degree. Major US cities with robust rail systems still face extreme traffic challenges. (NYC, Chicago, LA, SF, Seattle, Dallas, DC, etc). Maybe Americans just really love owning cars, even when their city has great public transpo.

[freerover]

Originally Posted by mercury6

I'm not convinced rail alleviates traffic to an overwhelming degree. Major US cities with robust rail systems still face extreme traffic challenges. (NYC, Chicago, LA, SF, Seattle, Dallas, DC, etc). Maybe Americans just really love owning cars, even when their city has great public transpo.

What do you think the roads would look in those cities without rail and the same number of people? Austin is so focused on how prop A will REDUCE congestion when the reality is we are looking for ways to mitigate the massive future increase in congestion.

[mercury6]

Originally Posted by freerover

What do you think the roads would look in those cities without rail and the same number of people? Austin is so focused on how prop A will REDUCE congestion when the reality is we are looking for ways to mitigate the massive future increase in congestion.

So with rail we can look forward to a future traffic situation similar to Dallas, LA, and DC?

[atxsnail]

Originally Posted by mercury6

I'm not convinced rail alleviates traffic to an overwhelming degree. Major US cities with robust rail systems still face extreme traffic challenges. (NYC, Chicago, LA, SF, Seattle, Dallas, DC, etc). Maybe Americans just really love owning cars, even when their city has great public transpo.

To their credit, the Project Connect boosters have avoided over-emphasizing this message. For them to claim it would meaningfully solve traffic would be professional malpractice. I think the 2014 messaging was straight up misleading about this idea.

Transit is not supposed to reduce traffic, it is supposed to move people efficiently. It impacts traffic, but not in the way that most people interpret that phrase. If everyone on the road today took a bus instead, other people in cars would move in to fill that new capacity until it became just as congested as it was prior to the shift. So to the ground-level observer, traffic is "just as bad as before."

However the statistical reality is that many times more people can flow through the same limited street space in the same period of time due to the geometric efficiency of mass transit.

Once you add in the reality that our LRT lines will have their own travel space, you will have both increased the capacity to move people by many multiples AND offered people an escape from traffic should they choose to accept it.

Traffic will always exist because we are constrained by geometry (be the cars gasoline, electric, fryer oil, automated, hand cranked, whatever). The drum everyone needs to be beating is that we are being offered a traffic-proof travel option in the form of rail (or bus too if we ever get true bus lanes).

[drummer]

^^ Well said.

Having lived and worked where there were ample mass transit options including a fantastic bus system, separated bike lanes, commuter rail, subway rail, and HSR - there was still a crazy amount of traffic on the roads. Yet a city of 11 million people with a footprint only slightly larger than the Austin metro was able to function every day.

[Sigaven]

Originally Posted by mercury6

I'm not convinced rail alleviates traffic to an overwhelming degree. Major US cities with robust rail systems still face extreme traffic challenges. (NYC, Chicago, LA, SF, Seattle, Dallas, DC, etc). Maybe Americans just really love owning cars, even when their city has great public transpo.

It's not about alleviating traffic. It's about providing an alternative method of transportation so we can *avoid* traffic-congested roads, which is currently our ONLY option of getting around.

[mercury6]

Originally Posted by Sigaven

It's not about alleviating traffic. It's about providing an alternative method of transportation so we can *avoid* traffic-congested roads, which is currently our ONLY option of getting around.

I don't know man, rail seems like a very old, limited, and expensive option. Perhaps some smart progressive people need to rethink the transit options from a first principles perspective.

[freerover]

bahaha, notch this for a win for tried and tested high capacity transit:

Elon Musk’s Las Vegas Loop might only carry a fraction of the passengers it promised
https://techcrunch.com/2020/10/16/elon-m...-fraction-of-the-passengers-it-promised/

[JAM]

Originally Posted by H2O

Self driving cars will not take cars off the road. it will just take drivers off the road.

Exactly! Drivers are the problem. Not the roads. Roads have unlimited capacity if there was cooperation. There is no cooperation when humans get behind the wheel.

For example, if cars were spaced apart, merging at the speed limit would not be an issue. Drivers start bunching up, and the system breaks down.

Rail on the other hand, will always have limited capacity. Always.

In case you haven't ran across this, thought provoking.

https://ourmobilityourfuture.com/2020-transportation-position-paper/

[freerover]

Originally Posted by JAM

Exactly! Drivers are the problem. Not the roads. Roads have unlimited capacity if there was cooperation. There is no cooperation when humans get behind the wheel.

For example, if cars were spaced apart, merging at the speed limit would not be an issue. Drivers start bunching up, and the system breaks down.

Rail on the other hand, will always have limited capacity. Always.

Oh man....

[N90]

Originally Posted by H2O

Austin has commuter rail. Detroit has a street car. Las Vegas has a monorail. Nashville has a street car. Kansas City has a street car. All of them have plans to expand rail. I don't know about the others.

Right, so it’s exactly what I said. None of those are light rail or heavy rail.

[verybadgnome]

I don't believe they can build this for the amount they are claiming which means that $X/day in property tax increase will be higher by probably 50%. Shoot by having parts of this underground this could turn into Austin's Big Dig.

So one question I have is in regards to the "Ridership of up to 129,060 people per weekday" claim. Is that 129,060 riders on the new lines or is that a net gain of 129,060 riders to the system as a whole? Big difference.

[JAM]

Originally Posted by H2O

Ever tried to get out of Downtown at evening rush hour? It often took me 30 - 45 minutes just to cross I-35. Once I crossed it, I could be home in 15 minutes. If we had rail and better bus service into Downtown from multiple directions, people would be less inclined to drive to work, and the demand for over sized parking garages would be reduce. We just can't continue on the course we are on. IT DOES NOT WORK!!!

We will pay for our employees to take the train into downtown to show up for work. None of them will take us up on it. They have places to go, and don't want to be stuck on a train schedule. the ladies are worried about safety. Non of them want to take us up on it. We have had a few in the past, that did it from time to time, but for the most part, people love their cars. this group is a microcosm of the real world - we are fascinated by trains, and want to use them and explore. not all are cut out to be that way. I've taken my share of subway/tube rides, not always the most pleasant experience.

[atxsnail]

Originally Posted by JAM

We will pay for our employees to take the train into downtown to show up for work. None of them will take us up on it. They have places to go, and don't want to be stuck on a train schedule. the ladies are worried about safety. Non of them want to take us up on it. We have had a few in the past, that did it from time to time, but for the most part, people love their cars. this group is a microcosm of the real world - we are fascinated by trains, and want to use them and explore. not all are cut out to be that way. I've taken my share of subway/tube rides, not always the most pleasant experience.

Not going to spend any time trying to make you like or understand trains, but the "schedule" thing doesn't really apply to Project Connect/Prop A. Trains will arrive every 5-10 minutes depending on where you are. That's not really a scheduling thing. It generally takes longer to catch an Uber at that point (also probably less "safe" for ladies than transit).

[JAM]

Originally Posted by verybadgnome

I don't believe they can build this for the amount they are claiming which means that $X/day in property tax increase will be higher by probably 50%. Shoot by having parts of this underground this could turn into Austin's Big Dig.

So one question I have is in regards to the "Ridership of up to 129,060 people per weekday" claim. Is that 129,060 riders on the new lines or is that a net gain of 129,060 riders to the system as a whole? Big difference.

This study covers some of the costs in the intro. their position is that the costs are way more than they claim.
https://ourmobilityourfuture.com/2020-transportation-position-paper/

[freerover]

Originally Posted by JAM

This study covers some of the costs in the intro. their position is that the costs are way more than they claim.
https://ourmobilityourfuture.com/2020-transportation-position-paper/

This is not a study. This is a bunch of 🞵🞵🞵🞵 put out by the Auto dealership funded pac. The lady who wrote it as a batchlors in English and has been trying to make a career of of pacs like this and the one that tried to recal Ann kitchen a few years ago. Keep this 🞵🞵🞵🞵 off the forum.

Just want to add that this fake "study" wasn't peer reviewed while the project connect ridership projections and cost were.

[Novacek]

Originally Posted by JAM

Exactly! Drivers are the problem. Not the roads. Roads have unlimited capacity if there was cooperation.

100% false.
That claim doesn't even work even on the level of simple physics. At a given speed on the road, there's a maximum number of vehicles that can pass a given point in a given duration of time (even pretending for a moment that you can have them safely bunched with minimal following distance).

Originally Posted by JAM

For example, if cars were spaced apart, merging at the speed limit would not be an issue. Drivers start bunching up, and the system breaks down.

So now you want the cars to be spaced out _more_ than today? So you'll have even less capacity?

Originally Posted by JAM

Rail on the other hand, will always have limited capacity. Always.

Yes, and that limit will always be higher than roads. Always.

Originally Posted by JAM

In case you haven't ran across this, thought provoking.

https://ourmobilityourfuture.com/2020-transportation-position-paper/

For those who lack a grasp of basic math, physics, or economics.

[Novacek]

Originally Posted by JAM

This study covers some of the costs in the intro. their position is that the costs are way more than they claim.
https://ourmobilityourfuture.com/2020-transportation-position-paper/

Complete, utter 🞵🞵🞵🞵🞵🞵🞵🞵 and 🞵🞵🞵🞵🞵🞵🞵🞵

Copied and pasted from further back in this thread, because apparently someone isn't paying attention:

I held my nose and went to their site, reading their methodology for how they come up with their $2800 /year /property claim. I don't recommend doing so, I feel slightly dumber for having read it.


Their methodology is such: They determine the cost it would take to simultaneously borrow $9.8B dollars (in 20 year bonds). Even though Austin (actually ATP) borrowing $9B was never on the table . Even though the construction schedule doesn't require everything to be borrowed all at once. Even though certain projects were never going to borrow, and instead are being done through "pay as you go".

And especially, critically, as ATP is never in a million years, going to pay for the federal share. In the extremely unlikely, almost impossible scenario that the feds don't pay for a big chunk*, the program would be downgraded.

ATP simple doesn't have the ability to increase taxes any more.


To all of the above falsehoods, they pile on. They then take the _2040_ operating costs of the _entire_ system, and add that on to the tax bill.

Even though not all the operating costs are coming from taxes.
Even though we'll be finished paying for construction of large parts of the system before operating costs even approach that 2040 number.
Even though those are the operating costs of the 10B system, and we're not voting on the 10B system.

They then take this entire cost, and divide by the number of taxpaying properties in Austin _in Travis County_, on 2020's tax rolls.
The former (not including Austin/Williamson and such) is relatively small but adds up big. The later (assuming no growth in Austin in 20 years) is blatantly false.
Among other problems, the system will be cheaper to run if Austin (impossibly) sees no growth.

The fact that they are claiming taxpayers are paying 2040 expenses, in 2040 inflated dollars, with today's dollars is almost a trivial error alongside their other whoppers.



*Austin is the fasted growing large city in the country, the 11th largest city, and has made almost no transit investment. If the feds are paying for transit anywhere, they're paying for it here. The cost/benefit ratio is the largest for us (just because we've neglected it for so long).
The fact that CapMetro went from talking about a 40% federal share to a 45% federal share shows that they have confidence in the feds picking up their share.