AUSTIN | Transportation Updates

[ATX2030]

Austin's light-rail plans have shrunk. Here are 5 new options.
KUT 90.5 | By Nathan Bernier
Published March 21, 2023 at 4:00 PM CDT

https://www.kut.org/transportation/2023-...ns-have-shrunk-here-are-five-new-options

[Novacek]

Originally Posted by ATX2030

PROJECT CONNECT
Project Connect debuts 5 scaled down light rail options
by: Kelsey Thompson

Posted: Mar 21, 2023 / 03:59 PM CDT

Updated: Mar 21, 2023 / 04:24 PM CDT

https://www.kxan.com/traffic/traffic-pro...debuts-5-scaled-down-light-rail-options/

Jumps out at me that the downtown portions are relatively sparse.

I’ve heard some say “we must do the full downtown tunnels now, or it will be impossible to add them later”. But that really doesn’t seem the case. Especially with the cross downtown street being 3rd. Seems like you could completely build a tunnel across on 4th, then just connect the ends (and yes, I know I’m simplifying)

[H2O]

Originally Posted by Novacek

Jumps out at me that the downtown portions are relatively sparse.

I’ve heard some say “we must do the full downtown tunnels now, or it will be impossible to add them later”. But that really doesn’t seem the case. Especially with the cross downtown street being 3rd. Seems like you could completely build a tunnel across on 4th, then just connect the ends (and yes, I know I’m simplifying)

Are you at the open house? Are they saying why they are suggesting 3rd instead of 4th? I can only imagine it is to preserve the option for a future tunnel on 4th. Otherwise, 4th is better as previously recommended. It directly connects the Downtown MetroRail Station with Republic Square (not sure why they are eliminating that station?) and it is relatively free of utilities. The City passed an ordinance in the late 90s to prohibit major utilities in 4th Street to reserve it for rail. Because of that, some major utilities have been installed in 3rd, adding additional expense to relocate them for rail.

[enthurzan]

Over/under for even the new plan costing north of $20 billion? Fundamentally unserious country. Can't even do public transit right? What a joke.

Each of the proposals is estimated to cost less than $5 billion, including a whopping 40% cost contingency.

"let's do a cost estimate and then plan to be 40% overbudget!"

[ATXboom]

Ugh... that's a gut punch presentation. So we only get one of those options? Basically 1 line?

[enthurzan]

Originally Posted by ATXboom

Ugh... that's a gut punch presentation. So we only get one of those options? Basically 1 line?

ATP claiming $291M per mile before contingency. NO! 12 miles of rail do NOT cost $3.5 billion dollars. WTH is going on?

Originally Posted by enthurzan

ATP claiming $291M per mile before contingency. NO! 12 miles of rail do NOT cost $3.5 billion dollars. WTH is going on?

1.) Self-licking ice-cream cone.

2.) Bottom feeders.

Originally Posted by smallfrie

1.) Self-licking ice-cream cone.

2.) Bottom feeders.

Sorry, forgot one.

3.) Get the poor out of the COA ASAP. (Increase property taxes for them for this lily-white project).

[Novacek]

Originally Posted by enthurzan

ATP claiming $291M per mile before contingency. NO! 12 miles of rail do NOT cost $3.5 billion dollars. WTH is going on?

Several years in the future, in a high inflationary environment and skyrocketing property costs.

That’s what’s going on.

[freerover]

183 to Pleasant Valley still looks like the best start to the plan. However, lots of ppl I'm seeing have a real boner for the freaking airport to it may end up airport to UT.

Originally Posted by Novacek

Several years in the future, in a high inflationary environment and skyrocketing property costs.

That’s what’s going on.

This project had 3.5 % inflation per year ad infinitum budgeted in. I don't think we've even met that in the time period since the vote. Steel rebar is at 2020 and 2021 levels now. Plywood at 2019 levels.

Property levels were very high before the vote. i don't know that my two houses could be sold now for much than at the time of the vote.

The bottom feeders are latching onto a couple of years of temporary covid spike to gig us, imo.

I called this at the time of the vote. No secret, just read about mass transit in the US in the last 20-40 years.

[Novacek]

Originally Posted by smallfrie

This project had 3.5 % inflation per year ad infinitum budgeted in. I don't think we've even met that in the time period since the vote. Steel rebar is at 2020 and 2021 levels now. Plywood at 2019 levels.

Property levels were very high before the vote. i don't know that my two houses could be sold now for much than at the time of the vote.

The bottom feeders are latching onto a couple of years of temporary covid spike to gig us, imo.

I called this at the time of the vote. No secret, just read about mass transit in the US in the last 20-40 years.

The cost estimates weren’t set during the vote, they were set no later than that spring.

Labor costs especially are way up.

[austin242]

Do they need a 40% cost contingency?

[Novacek]

Originally Posted by austin242

Do they need a 40% cost contingency?

If they don’t need it, great, then extensions will come quickly.

Not including sufficient contingency risks FTA funding, which we definitely need.

[Geckos_Rule]

Originally Posted by Novacek

Several years in the future, in a high inflationary environment and skyrocketing property costs.

That’s what’s going on.

How much of this budget is dedicated towards property purchases though? While surely the plan needs some, I can't imagine it needing a lot more than the city (or state) already owns near all of these lines.

[Novacek]

Originally Posted by Geckos_Rule

How much of this budget is dedicated towards property purchases though? While surely the plan needs some, I can't imagine it needing a lot more than the city (or state) already owns near all of these lines.

When they actually did the parcel by parcel design, real estate estimates for the initial plan went from ~250M to almost 1 billion.

These proposals cut the length by about half, but a lot of the cuts are more on the edges. So you still need land in the most expensive areas, so I wouldn’t be surprised if real estate costs are still near that figure.

In most places the existing RoW is enough for the existing travel lanes, maybe a center turn lane, and sidewalks if we’re lucky.

To that you need to add two tracks, sometimes an extra turn lane, sometimes stations or track approaching stations, bike lanes or shared use paths…
Plus whatever they need for the maintenance yard.

[atxsnail]

Any Project Connect initial investment route that does not include the North Lamar Transit Center is an absolute failure

[H2O]

Light Rail Virtual Open House is up. Please provide your feedback there instead of on this forum. https://publicinput.com/lightrailopenhouse (or at least in addition to)

[Jdawgboy]

Wow really? Not even to the St. Elmo District??? So much for my vote of confidence in this crap. I understand costs have gone up but if they didn't think they could reasonably afford the plan they first proposed to the public then don't propose something that may end up being too expensive to begin with. No rail access to St. Elmo is a stab in the back to everyone who was anticipating a stop in this area.

[Enghum]

If you build out to the Lamar Transit center you're removing a lot of motivations for North Austin to vote for phase 2 of the project connect. There's additional extensions up there that could be included but nothing like what's being left off the blue and south orange lines in these plans. A phase 2 that needs votes but doesn't have any major North Austin investments could lead to a failure of phase 2 initiative to pass.

It would also reinforce the historical narrative that South Austin continues to be under invested in vs North Austin. Another aspect of an unbalanced extension towards North Lamar is that it'll create massive redevelopment pressure in one of the most affordable areas of town. If the difference between phase 1 and phase 2 completion is about 5 years that's going to be 5 years of transit oriented development mostly focused on far north Lamar and Pleasant Valley/Riverside.

There's definitely a failure of the past Capmetro to not purchase any land in downtown. We've been operating transit centers off of 10 foot sidewalks and saying that's good enough for decades. Now we're basically stuck competing with 800' skyscrapers for land. Those parcels are not going to get any cheaper and a transit center that could have been built for 5 - 10 million 10 years ago is now going to be a subway station that costs 100 - 200 million 10 years in the future.

For all the talk of South Lamar as a better route than Congress we sure are forgetting that the state controls that road and has a position that any main travel lanes can't be taken away. There's not enough right of way for at grade so most of that route would need to be above grade or tunneled. It was also not a part of the maps sold to voters so would probably be seen as a scope change. South Lamar rail is probably a phase 3 or phase 4 rail extension and I wouldn't expect that any earlier than the 2040s.

A lot of the previous plans were really great in showing a system view of how downtown would work well for extensions and serving Austin as a final solution. I'm struggling to see how these new plans would allow for the gold line or second river crossing. If rail lines on Guadalupe are elevated does that mean there is no option for going down 3rd/4th street at grade or tunneled to connect over to the red line and future gold line? You can definitely see a bit of a plan where the original underground wishbone patter for rail lines is pushed south of the river onto Riverside instead of 4th street. Still two river crossings but actually no rail on 3rd or 4th street.

Also why is Republic Square station missing from all the routes that take 3rd street downtown? Are all bus routes going to shift to Trinity or does 15th street become the new transfer point?

My initial reaction is that the Partial Elevated: 29th to Oltorf to Yellow jacket would be the most likely to get us to a successful vote on phase 2. Get construction started and tee up a vote on phase 2 for 2026 on extensions North and south on the Orange line plus to the airport. Phase 3 vote would be the second river crossing, gold line extension, Orange line to tech ridge, and Orange line to Slaughter after the initial operating segment is completed in 2030. That gets us nearly everything in the initial plan by 2040. Seattle did this really well with their vote timings and maintaining voter motivations for each phase of their plan.

Edit: I know pleasant valley to North Lamar isn't a bad plan. I am just afraid that is all we will get done for a while.