DENVER | Main Development Thread #7

[TakeFive]

Except From Me Of Course

Originally Posted by bunt_q

RTD is a trainwreck and Fastracks was largely a waste, I do not think you'll get much disagreement here.

Outside of DIA, FasTracks was the best investment in transportation ever with respect to the Denver/Metro area.

Without FasTracks there is no half-billion $ investment in Union Station; there is no A Line; there's no $2 Billion in RE investment in the DUS neighborhood and 38th and Blake Street is not a hot spot. If you were to bid DUS today you'd probably being looking at closer to $2 billion.

FasTracks put Denver on the map attracting Millennials in droves and RE investors to house them like never before in the history of Denver.

Fast Forward and the 5.5 mile extension through the Phoenix Barrios will cost about 3 X as much as the first 20-mile light rail project which opened in 2008 and cost $70 million per mile. That is the exact same cost for FasTracks including both new light rail and commuter rail, all of the new maintenance facilities, hi-tech security Plus the Flatiron Flyer, etc.

Over time FasTracks will be seen as a stroke of genius.

[bunt_q]

Originally Posted by TakeFive

Without FasTracks there is no half-billion $ investment in Union Station; there is no A Line; there's no $2 Billion in RE investment in the DUS neighborhood and 38th and Blake Street is not a hot spot. If you were to bid DUS today you'd probably being looking at closer to $2 billion.

FasTracks put Denver on the map attracting Millennials in droves and RE investors to house them like never before in the history of Denver.

Do you actually believe this? The development around DUS had nothing at all to do with the transit. Combine the right zoning, the right timing, and you could've put a food hall and hotel in that historic station, totally sans transit, and the development potential would've been exactly the same. If you go in Union Station today, it's everything the owners can do to keep as few transit riders in there as possible to ensure that station continues to be "Denver's living room."

Also, millennials have been going to a half dozen other cities just like Denver, with no Fastracks at all. Completely unrelated.

Look, I was as big of a Fastracks supporter as anybody. I still have my opening day Southwest Line poster on the wall in my living room (I ran the Evans station on opening day). I still think it has been an abject failure as a transportation project.

As a real estate project - I think transit gives local jurisdictions a safe excuse to upzone. But apart from that rather dumb (and rather expensive) excuse to do what policymakers should be doing anyways, the transit itself is irrelevant in cities like Denver. (Market driven parking ratios adjacent to transit that are as high as non-transit adjacent projects a bear this out.)

[TakeFive]

Welcome to the Smart Phone generation

Originally Posted by SirLucasTheGreat

I really would love to see an explosion of BRT service but it seems that RTD has some fundamental budgetary/service quality issues that I think push a lot of people into cars.

Over the last month I've worked my ass off (for a mid-70's guy) driving people wherever they need to go.

I've been to the barrios, the ghettos and every socioeconomic neighborhood there is including the gated & guarded communities in North Scottsdale.

Sunday evening I picked up the nicest young ladies (who happened to be black) from the new downtown Fry's (ie Kroger store) and loaded up the back of my CR-V with groceries and balloons (somebody having a birthday) and drove them south (of the tracks) to their affordable housing. Later on I circled back around to the same 'hood, picked up a Euro-immigrant and drove him to his 'night shift' job at Home Depot. He's been there two years and clearly proud to have a good job including benefits.

Point Being

I'd guess 95% of the people in Phoenix (or Denver) either don't live near transit or there job isn't near transit. If they don't have a car (many do) then rideshare provides them access to good jobs or just to run errands. I've also loaded up laundry and if rideshare enables people to get their clothes cleaned then God Bless em.

Welcome to the Smart Phone generation

where time and convenience is just as important to poor people as rich people. Some people spend their money on Starbucks while others spend it on rideshare to get back and forth to work.
-------------------

Originally Posted by bunt_q

Do you actually believe this?

I believe everything I said but we can agree to disagree.

[TakeFive]

Well Stated

Originally Posted by bunt_q

Interestingly, the road traffic patterns are different now too - different peaks, lower peaks, but more of them and more spread out. In some ways, we are getting more traction out of our highway lane-miles than we were before the pandemic. But it actually makes the car-vs-transit trade-off different too. It's easier to drive on the 2-3 days/week a person still does it; 40-60% drop in parking demand makes that cheaper too; etc. COVID and hybrid work have realized the dreams of every transportation-demand-management program ever by flattening a lot of the peaks.

Yes and No

Originally Posted by DenverInfill

Thanks, honorary Denver-thread member mhays for your always-insightful comments! Something needs to give because our one-size-fits-all transit agency covering an area of 1000+ square miles with a board elected from geographic districts just isn't working.

First of all Seattle is uniquely and very different from Denver for a number of reasons which would make for an interesting discussion but too long to explore here.

Bus routes (as well as rail routes) although they serve the suburbs, mostly benefit the City of Denver, specifically the city center and always have. Prior to 2008, nobody lived downtown and the light rail was designed to allow commuters access to downtown and Take Cars of the Road.

Nothing is preventing the city and county of Denver from raising money for whatever they wish to accomplish. But this goes to much of what bunt was explaining.

For the record Sam Hill takes the 'Best Comment of the Day' on the topic.

So much of the current conundrum has resulted from the Pandemic and changes bunt discusses above so it's currently very difficult to know what the best strategies should be.

The good news is that AFAIK RTD's budget is nearly $750 million (or it was) of which two-thirds of it comes from sales and use taxes. That's a helluva good start.

[TakeFive]

Have I ever said that Context is Everything?

Originally Posted by bunt_q

Do you actually believe this? The development around DUS had nothing at all to do with the transit.

Also, millennials have been going to a half dozen other cities just like Denver, with no Fastracks at all. Completely unrelated.

If you go back to the time of the Great Recession those with boatloads of cash for development started with coastal cities before they started looking around.

Going back to 2010 the hot topic and buzz among national developers was investing in urban areas with transit. It was called TOD. Whether deserved or not, Denver got a lot of buzz out of FasTracks and DUS; this appealed just as much to Millennials at that time. That's not to say that every Millennial who moved to Denver was b/c of FasTracks. Many moved to Denver b/c they liked the mountain and skiing - but that doesn't change the primary driver.

What might have, could have, would have eventually happened 'sans Fastracks' is merely speculative. DUS attracted developers from coast to coast specifically due to FasTracks-DUS.

Originally Posted by bunt_q

Also, millennials have been going to a half dozen other cities just like Denver, with no Fastracks at all. Completely unrelated.

Like where (with a timeline of 2010 - 2015)?

The only examples that come to mind would be Austin and that was due to they're being the hot new tech town and maybe the RTP in No Carolina for the same reason. Denver prior to 2015 was not seen as a hot tech town but considered okay for tech.

[SirLucasTheGreat]

Glad that Candi lost Union Station during redistricting last night. Maybe something might actually be done about it now

[mhays]

The concept of multiple coincentric funding sources seems VERY applicable to Denver. The whole metro won't contribute enough to the core area, and the city itself doesn't have enough tax base. It sounds like you need the combination.

(And thanks for your comment Ken!)

[TakeFive]

And the other side of the coin

Originally Posted by coolmandan03

Can you explain more about this? I've already paid $2,500 to have my sidewalks fixed because I was in the first zone to require it (and the city came and did it and sent me the bill). Now the city is looking to charge everyone to fix everybody else? So I get to pay all of mine and other folks?

Originally Posted by wong21fr

Yep. And those of us who live in metro districts that paid for infrastructure will have to subsidize other areas of the the city that have avoided their responsibility.

A $100 per household doesn't seem unreasonable. The problem is that this would be on top of everything else that has been approved by voters in recent years.

There's a way that this could be finessed. Instead of having a 'forever' tax, set a window of (say) ten years. It's much easier psychologically to approve something that sunsets - and won't go on forever.

[bunt_q]

Originally Posted by TakeFive

And the other side of the coin




A $100 per household doesn't seem unreasonable. The problem is that this would be on top of everything else that has been approved by voters in recent years.

There's a way that this could be finessed. Instead of having a 'forever' tax, set a window of (say) ten years. It's much easier psychologically to approve something that sunsets - and won't go on forever.

For comparison, a 10 year fee would only buy you about one-fifth of what a 30 year fee would buy you.

And truncating the fee at all would make it impossible (or at least, really dumb) to "take back" legal liability from owners, because there'd be no permanent source of dollars for ongoing maintenance (which is what the fee is supposed to do), as opposed to just upfront construction. To me, as a voter, the best story is knowing that the sidewalk will no longer be my problem. Absent that, you'd be left with the Los Angeles story. For those of you who aren't familiar with what LA did, they took back sidewalk responsibility on the back of a large-ish federal grant for sidewalk repair. They ran out of money, of course, and got dinged with a couple billion dollar ADA lawsuit and I believe had to unwind the whole thing. (No good deed goes unpunished, I suppose - total disaster.) There isn't a lot of in-between on stuff like this; there's a good reason why the City has avoided the problem entirely for so long.

By the way, wong, your metro district only paid to build that stuff once. (The price you pay for new construction!) It'll still break someday, and I am pretty sure your metro district (or master) isn't going to be out re-building your sidewalks 50 years from now. They're going to need every penny of that O&M mill levy to pay for the holiday lights and maintenance on all of that damn landscaping.

[TakeFive]

If we could start from scratch...

Originally Posted by mhays

The concept of multiple coincentric funding sources seems VERY applicable to Denver. The whole metro won't contribute enough to the core area, and the city itself doesn't have enough tax base. It sounds like you need the combination.

(And thanks for your comment Ken!)

Under current realities of post-pandemic times, light and commuter rail (presumably) lack the ridership to justify their existence. Then again, that could also be said with respect to most of the bus routes.

The issues are compounded by the escalating costs of labor in trying to hire and retain enough drivers, mechanics etc. Then add in the costs of fuel (and everything) which have only gone higher and higher, to the equation and the budget challenges get bigger and bigger.

The RTD District as we know it

Originally, there existed a six-tenths percent sales and use tax for RTD. When FasTracks was approved it added an additional four-tenths percent tax for a cool one percent.

The RTD "District" is comprised primarily of parts of seven counties (technically eight). All of the 'district' is obligated to pay the one percent tax until the FasTracks bonds are paid in full. Including re-financing that will take 25 to 30 years.

Generally, both the rail system and the bus system consist of a 'spoke and wheel' design to/from the center of Denver (or through other key parts of Denver) such that the most miles of both rail and bus routes are within the city. Given the growth within Denver, the city is not being subsidized to the level it once was but it still is the biggest beneficiary of the tax paid by all.

Assuming we all understand the basic tenets of good transit then things like frequency are highly valued. It may not be the most cost efficient model but then whoever accused a quasi-government agency of being efficient?

Presumably many of the more outlying cities/counties would prefer NOT to be a part of the bus tax but be free of the tax to do their own thing. Certainly Boulder/Boulder County would prefer to be left to their own devices. Douglas County would presumably also prefer to go their own way. Both these areas provide a lot of revenue to the RTD District.

The Pandemic/stimulus Government cheese runs out at the end of 2022 and the clock is ticking.

Consider the Cable Industry

which is currently being reorganize into various choices from the 'whole pie' or for various slices of (streaming) options. If RTD were to be reorganized, my guess is that many cities would prefer to choose (or contract) with RTD for only specific service instead of paying a flat six-tenths percent for the whole pie. (The four-tenths rail tax which is more of a regional system is more of a forever tax)

[laniroj]

Originally Posted by gopokes21

Yeah, I would support some targeted tunneling rather than full subway (ie., Speer under 8th/Broadway/Lincoln). Look my advocacy has nothing to do with wanting a "subway system" for the sake of it. It's just the practicality of serving Cap Hill, Cheesman, Cherry Creek, Glendale (the latter of which should be easier at-grade). Basically the whole diagonal from Union Station down to 25/Colorado which by the way, is where 90% of the pedestrians in Denver are.

Well intended, yes. Why not just remove street parking from one side of those dense neighborhoods and bring streetcars back? It would be WAY more cost feasible and likely see much higher ridership than a subway. Plus, think of the wonders it would do for urbanization, last mile, densification, etc...we can all dream.

[laniroj]

Originally Posted by bunt_q

Stating the obvious here, but this is going to remain difficult until we have decent transportation alternatives in place...

Ah yes but you can't put the cart before the horse now can you? You may be the king of pointing out what we want vs what we can have and so I embrace your philosophy. We need the density to get the transit, otherwise we just have the light rail cruising through scenic Lakewood four times daily with nobody on the train.

Americans always look to the destination and so easily forget the journey. Just like retail follows rooftops, transit follows density. There are a couple places where transit has been preceded by density, Denver being one of them and Washington DC being another, but that's a-typical and DC only got their monster system because the Feds made a subway under single family home sprawl happen and over the decades, DC has really been heavily densifying at transit stations (as I envision Denver will over the next 50 years).

People need to understand we can't just want things anymore - this ain't the golden age. We can't use stated income to qualify for mortgages anymore, as tempting as that may be, we actually have to have a way to pay.

[TakeFive]

Originally Posted by bunt_q

And truncating the fee at all would make it impossible (or at least, really dumb) to "take back" legal liability from owners, because there'd be no permanent source of dollars for ongoing maintenance (which is what the fee is supposed to do), as opposed to just upfront construction. To me, as a voter, the best story is knowing that the sidewalk will no longer be my problem. Absent that, you'd be left with the Los Angeles story. For those of you who aren't familiar with what LA did, they took back sidewalk responsibility on the back of a large-ish federal grant for sidewalk repair. They ran out of money, of course, and got dinged with a couple billion dollar ADA lawsuit and I believe had to unwind the whole thing. (No good deed goes unpunished, I suppose - total disaster.) There isn't a lot of in-between on stuff like this; there's a good reason why the City has avoided the problem entirely for so long.

This sounds like opening Pandora's Box.

Does this mean that everyone who stubs their toe on a sidewalk is now entitled to sue the city (for their back pain)? What's to prevent Denver from ending up in largely the same predicament as Los Angles if the fee (also) goes to cover the legal costs of defending the city?

The more I hear the less... but then my opinion of 'sidewalks' isn't what's important.

[wong21fr]

Originally Posted by mhays

The concept of multiple coincentric funding sources seems VERY applicable to Denver. The whole metro won't contribute enough to the core area, and the city itself doesn't have enough tax base. It sounds like you need the combination.

(And thanks for your comment Ken!)

Indeed. Denver can't supplement transportation funding enough to develop any kind of real intra-city rail system. But it can do enough to upgrade several of the core bus routes to BRT routes to create a comprehensive BRT network (Colfax, Federal, Broadway, Speer/Leetsdale, Alameda, etc) . Give me six to ten routes with 10 minute headways and 24-hour service and we can talk about next steps.

[wong21fr]

Originally Posted by bunt_q

By the way, wong, your metro district only paid to build that stuff once. (The price you pay for new construction!) It'll still break someday, and I am pretty sure your metro district (or master) isn't going to be out re-building your sidewalks 50 years from now. They're going to need every penny of that O&M mill levy to pay for the holiday lights and maintenance on all of that damn landscaping.

Hey, we've got a metro district and a master HOA up here to handle the landscaping the the holiday lights. Can't expect to freeload like you Country Club types.....

In all seriousness, you make a good point on the residual mill levy not being sufficient to cover sidewalk replacement costs as I believe that it's 3% in perpetuity. Though the reference time-frame, i.e. not having to worry about replacement for 50 years, isn't exactly going to persuade a ton of people.

[bunt_q]

Originally Posted by TakeFive

This sounds like opening Pandora's Box.

Does this mean that everyone who stubs their toe on a sidewalk is now entitled to sue the city (for their back pain)? What's to prevent Denver from ending up in largely the same predicament as Los Angles if the fee (also) goes to cover the legal costs of defending the city?

The more I hear the less... but then my opinion of 'sidewalks' isn't what's important.

The state supreme court has some timely thoughts on this very question: https://www.coloradopolitics.com/courts/...10db144-940f-11ec-bc81-9b87e747d106.html

[bunt_q]

Originally Posted by SirLucasTheGreat

Glad that Candi lost Union Station during redistricting last night. Maybe something might actually be done about it now

And Candi got stuck with the rich part of Park Hill too, where people probably vote in much higher numbers than the "I'm still registered to vote at my mom's house in Chicago[land]" crowd. I'd venture she might be in trouble now.

[Cirrus]

Originally Posted by wong21fr

Give me six to ten routes with 10 minute headways and 24-hour service and we can talk about next steps.

This is absolutely a thing Denver could do. You are basically describing the DC Circulator bus system. Let's see:

• City-focused system funded & managed separately from regional system ✅
• 6-10 routes ✅
• Universal 10 minute headways (all routes all the time) ✅
• 24 hour service ❌ (no, ends 12am or 3am)

Ironically, when the District was setting this up, the feasibility study cited the 16th Street Mall Shuttle as an example of a local shuttle to emulate.

[laniroj]

Originally Posted by TakeFive

...Over time FasTracks will be seen as a stroke of genius.

^^Yep, exactly. We will have paid pennies on the dollar for a system that, once the density catches up, would otherwise be out of our reach. We should also factor in operating deficits over the 30-40 years it will take density to catch up, but still a drop in the bucket compared to what it will cost to replicate that system in the future once the density is already here.

[TakeFive]

Originally Posted by bunt_q

The state supreme court has some timely thoughts on this very question: https://www.coloradopolitics.com/courts/...10db144-940f-11ec-bc81-9b87e747d106.html

So basically Denver would be 'legally' responsible financially but not legally responsible for liability. Works for me.
------------------------------------

Always nice to know you're out there!

Originally Posted by Cirrus

This is absolutely a thing Denver could do. You are basically describing the DC Circulator bus system. Let's see:

• City-focused system funded & managed separately from regional system ✅
• 6-10 routes ✅
• Universal 10 minute headways (all routes all the time) ✅
• 24 hour service ❌ (no, ends 12am or 3am)

Ironically, when the District was setting this up, the feasibility study cited the 16th Street Mall Shuttle as an example of a local shuttle to emulate.

TBH, I love the circulator concept much better than supposed BRT routes.

Pretty sure I suggested something similar that would rotate through nearby downtown neighborhoods (but I thought smaller buses might be better).

Not really transit but what is nifty fun is that in Old Town Scottsdale they have large-sized golf carts that circulate through the streets that people can use to get around or just go sightseeing.