DENVER | Transportation Thread

[Cirrus]

Oh, good.

[LooksLikeForever]

Has there been any news on the G line, or the A/B lines for that matter? At one point RTD was 100% confident that the G line would open in 2017 (for what it's worth, as discussed earlier in this thread) but no news lately. The horns are still blaring on the A line, and guards still at every crossing.

Surely this can't continue forever. The expense of staffing crossing guards have got to be eating into whatever little profits these lines can spin off for the transit partners.

[mr1138]

Originally Posted by LooksLikeForever

Has there been any news on the G line, or the A/B lines for that matter? At one point RTD was 100% confident that the G line would open in 2017 (for what it's worth, as discussed earlier in this thread) but no news lately. The horns are still blaring on the A line, and guards still at every crossing.

Surely this can't continue forever. The expense of staffing crossing guards have got to be eating into whatever little profits these lines can spin off for the transit partners.

I got stopped near home by a RTD train coming through Old Town a week or so back. This is in spite of the fact that reports are that train testing is "finished," and won't re-start until the government (at this point I'm unclear if the holdout is the FRA, the Colorado PUC, or both) signs off on the crossing arm technology which would allow the G-line to "test" its own crossing gates (very peculiar, but I guess it makes sense... they were "operating" the gates during the train testing period, but apparently weren't officially "testing" the gates themselves).

Other than that, its crickets. The local media seems to have even given up. A Google search for "RTD G line" returns nothing of much use for the past 2+ months.

[Mountain man]

Why are they holding off construction for I70 until 2018? I'm not positive but I'm sure the A line is going to spike once that starts.

[CastleScott]

I got stopped near home by a RTD train coming through Old Town a week or so back. This is in spite of the fact that reports are that train testing is "finished," and won't re-start until the government (at this point I'm unclear if the holdout is the FRA, the Colorado PUC, or both) signs off on the crossing arm technology which would allow the G-line to "test" its own crossing gates (very peculiar, but I guess it makes sense... they were "operating" the gates during the train testing period, but apparently weren't officially "testing" the gates themselves).

Sounds like you live in Arvada a place I grew up and spent some years in as an adult. Hey btw have you gone to check on the progress on the N line? I wonder if they have layed down some tracks by now-heck info on the N Line in RTD's Fastrack's portion seems to be dated a year or so.

[mr1138]

Originally Posted by CastleScott

Sounds like you live in Arvada a place I grew up and spent some years in as an adult. Hey btw have you gone to check on the progress on the N line? I wonder if they have layed down some tracks by now-heck info on the N Line in RTD's Fastrack's portion seems to be dated a year or so.

Indeed I do. Moved there in the spring after my suburban Westminster location increased prices to rents usually reserved for much more urban locations. I always liked Old Town, and it is a great place to live... though I'll admit the train was a factor in the decision, and I thought we would have some word on it by now.

I haven't been way up north in quite some time now, but construction at around 38th and Washington (new bridge over the river) in RiNo is definitely visible. They also built a large viaduct over I-270 near the oil refinery over a year ago. I have heard that that line too is now delayed, but construction is most definitely underway. This SHOULD all be visible in Google Earth by now, but for whatever reason, they haven't updated the Denver imagery in over 2 years (which is really getting on my nerves).

[Scottk]

The more and more I think about it the more of a boondoggle the entire Fastracks project seems to be.


Ridership on the west line has been so underwhelming RTD is going to cut service, and the whole line is painfully slow.

The R line is a disaster after the Florida station, and should have never been allowed to be built the way it is. Nevermind the ridiculous problems with "medical equipment" by the hospital that prevented a useful stop in that area.

The A Line opening has been a mess with the issues with the gates, and I believe ridership has been underwhelming(?)

G line and N line are both way behind schedule.

The Bus to Boulder does not resemble BRT in the slightest.


Will the southwest line extension ever even happen? RTD can't even be bothered to regularly operate the C Line, and that line has been open for almost 20 years and goes into Union Station, the "hub."



What a joke.

[FunctionForm]

Originally Posted by Scottk

The more and more I think about it the more of a boondoggle the entire Fastracks project seems to be.


Ridership on the west line has been so underwhelming RTD is going to cut service, and the whole line is painfully slow.

The R line is a disaster after the Florida station, and should have never been allowed to be built the way it is. Nevermind the ridiculous problems with "medical equipment" by the hospital that prevented a useful stop in that area.

The A Line opening has been a mess with the issues with the gates, and I believe ridership has been underwhelming(?)

G line and N line are both way behind schedule.

The Bus to Boulder does not resemble BRT in the slightest.


Will the southwest line extension ever even happen? RTD can't even be bothered to regularly operate the C Line, and that line has been open for almost 20 years and goes into Union Station, the "hub."



What a joke.

It's very frustrating to say the least. So much tax payer money has been wasted on such incredibly poor decisions. The west line is not just a joke, it's completely unacceptable. Even the southeast line has taken up valuable freeway space that will never be taken back. That line should have been above ground or underground from day one and we knew it even when it was being planned. And so we have a transportation system where neither the trains nor the freeways work. And billions in tax payers dollars wasted. People should be outraged.

[LooksLikeForever]

I know that money is always the problem, but it seems to me that the most useful projects would have been:

1) Rail line from Union Station to Boulder;
2) Rail line connecting Union Station and Civic Center Station (subway? street car? it's only two miles), thus eliminating the Mall Ride;
3) Rail line from the airport to Union Station (which was built as the A-Line);
4) Real rapid bus transit / streetcar / light rail from Union Station to CU Anschutz
5) Rail / light rail service from Union Station to Golden, CO (they got MOST of the way there...)

I understand that RTD's mission is to provide regional transit solutions and the 'biggest bang for your buck' projects are all intracity projects exclusive to Denver. Hell, the A-Line, bus transit along Colfax and a 16th Street Mall Collector pretty much wouldn't have to leave the boundaries of Denver County/City.

Perhaps the real problem is that RTD doesn't have enough funds to do proper regional rail, whereas Denver needs its own separate transit agency. Unfortunately it could never afford these projects so we're stuck with a 50% solution that doesn't really work for anyone.

Then again, there's one school of thought that believes within 10-15-20 years, we'll have self-driving & electric Ubers that will effectively replace the need for mass transit (one of many examples: https://www.citylab.com/transportati...ns-too/502430/). In theory, self-driving cars could be given their own priority lanes on highways / major arterial streets allowing them to bypass regular traffic. As they're self-driving, they'd be able to drive closer together than each other and brake/speed up more intelligently, thus not resulting in the normal congestion that human-operated vehicles create.

I'm certainly in the "I'll believe it when I see it" camp, but there is something to be said about the flexibility of a ride share-on-demand model that trains and even buses don't have.

I think there will always be a need for rail between destinations that lots of people travel, such as the airport and downtown, but maybe we really don't need rail through Aurora or out to Golden. Perhaps a combination of better bus routes, Uber/Lyft and self-driving cars can fill that need.

[Cirrus]

FasTracks just should've been all DMU from day one. These are not the sort of lines you build light rail for, or bother electrifying. If we had it all to do over again this is what I'd have built:

• DMU on the SW corridor as far as Highlands Ranch, w/ fewer stops north of Englewood
• DMU on the SE corridor as far as Lone Tree, w/ a deviation off I-25 into the heart of DTC
• DMU on the A line, more or less as it was built, but with an added DMU spur south into Aurora, roughly parallel to Chambers, as far as Alameda.
• DMU on the west line, more or less as it was built but w/ fewer stations, going all the way to Golden, and with a less restrictive speed limit
• DMU on the Gold line but ending only 1 station past Old Town Arvada
• DMU on the North line, probably more or less as is
• Scrub NW rail completely. Build better BRT.
• Scrub the 225 line completely.
• LRT on the Central Corridor, then straight down Broadway as far as downtown Englewood
• LRT from Union Station to Civic Center, then straight out East Colfax, ending at a transfer station to that A-line Chambers spur

RTD is running DMU-type service on most of these lines anyway, so it was a waste of money to build them as EMU or LRT. If they'd have been built as DMU, the savings could've gone into addressing some of these other problems. I think we'd have ended up with a better system overall for about the same amount of money.

In RTD's defense, it was very forward thinking to at least do several of the lines as EMU rather than LRT. LRT is just not a good technology for long-distance, relatively infrequent lines.

[TakeFive]

Originally Posted by Darius C

I completely agree. It is telling that airport workers are not using the R line and stick to the AT bus line instead. The AT starts fairly empty at Arapahoe Station but fills to standing room only at Nine Mile, pretty much at any time of the day. Unless the R line can cut 10-15 minutes from its current travel time, it will continue running empty.

Thanks for the great feedback. That's interesting partly since it shows demand is out there. Obviously the AT line with only two stops on the way to DIA makes for a nice express ride. The R Line? Only if you need a nice long nap before arriving.

As much of a mess as the Aurora/R Line is it is fixable. I've mentioned before but what should have been done from the get-go is to run the line along I-225 with an additional station at the SEC of Alameda. That large area has wonderful redevelopment potential - over time. Acknowledging the politics I won't bother debating the part through the Aurora Metro Center but it should have been a separate segment. Even better... Let's redesign the routes starting with R Line.

Here we go: the R Line leaves Lone Tree right on time with stops at County Line, Arapahoe Village Center, Belleview Station, Nine Mile Station, Iliff Station, the new 'express route' station at Alameda/i-225, Colfax Station and Peoria Station. That cuts the stops by half. Reason for stopping at Iliff Station is the ample parking to relieve parking-constrained Nine Mile Station as well as pulling from some of the same area as well as a different area. That would be a winning route.

With respect to the rest of Aurora it could become an extension of the H Line although they'd act virtually as separate routes from Florida. Obviously the H Line running south and around into downtown Denver is still popular. The slo-mo segment north from there could make all the stops which would serve it's local purpose.

The End.

[TakeFive]

It's that time of year when I update what is going on in the world of Light Rail costs.

Portland - finished the Portland-Milwaukie Transit Project in September of 2015. It was 7.3 miles and cost $1.49 billion. That's $204 million per mile.

Charlotte - has postponed the opening of the Lynx Blue Line to UNC from this August to March of 2018. It's a 9.3 mile extension expected to come in at $1.16 billion. That's $125 million per mile.

San Diego - which calls their light rail, Trolleys hopes to finish the 11-mile Mid-Coast Trolley extension by 2021 at a cost of $2.1 billion. That's $191 million per mile.

Seattle - is working on the Lynnwood light Rail Extension and is running $500 million over budget now expecting it to cost $2.9 billion with completion in 2024. At 8.5-miles that's a cost of $341 million per mile.

Phoenix - has the 5-mile South Central segment on fast track planning anticipating a 2019 ground breaking. At an expected cost of $668 million that's $134 million per mile.

There are many factors that can impact the cost of construction and 'cost per mile' is an imperfect comparison. That said, at the end of the day those amounts are what is being spent for whatever reasons.

[CharlesCO]

Originally Posted by Cirrus

FasTracks just should've been all DMU from day one. These are not the sort of lines you build light rail for, or bother electrifying. If we had it all to do over again this is what I'd have built:

• DMU on the SW corridor as far as Highlands Ranch, w/ fewer stops north of Englewood
• DMU on the SE corridor as far as Lone Tree, w/ a deviation off I-25 into the heart of DTC
• DMU on the A line, more or less as it was built, but with an added DMU spur south into Aurora, roughly parallel to Chambers, as far as Alameda.
• DMU on the west line, more or less as it was built but w/ fewer stations, going all the way to Golden, and with a less restrictive speed limit
• DMU on the Gold line but ending only 1 station past Old Town Arvada
• DMU on the North line, probably more or less as is
• Scrub NW rail completely. Build better BRT.
• Scrub the 225 line completely.
• LRT on the Central Corridor, then straight down Broadway as far as downtown Englewood
• LRT from Union Station to Civic Center, then straight out East Colfax, ending at a transfer station to that A-line Chambers spur

RTD is running DMU-type service on most of these lines anyway, so it was a waste of money to build them as EMU or LRT. If they'd have been built as DMU, the savings could've gone into addressing some of these other problems. I think we'd have ended up with a better system overall for about the same amount of money.

In RTD's defense, it was very forward thinking to at least do several of the lines as EMU rather than LRT. LRT is just not a good technology for long-distance, relatively infrequent lines.

I generally agree. Such a system also could have allowed for some through-lines at DUS instead of it being a terminus hub. The southwest line+A line and southeast line+B line would have been interesting.

I designed my own dream system for Denver a long time ago. I'll have to dust it off and share it sometime, but my design was BART technology, and the southeast and southwest lines converged at I-25 and Broadway into a shared underground line up Broadway, a big transfer station with a Colfax line at Civic Center, a station at 16th and California, and then all lines would fan out above grade north of DUS. A pie in the sky idea, sure, but not putting rail on Broadway in order to save money seems like a bad tradeoff in the long run.

[SnyderBock]

The light rail technology on the SW line works sufficiently. Eventually I'd like to see a front range commuter rail run parallel to the SW light rail but only with stops a a few stations such as Mineral, Littleton Downtown, Englewood and Boradway/I-25. Existing ROW is there to facilitate this along much of the line. Places where it is not, the front range rail could be elevated dirrectly over the light rail. Then the light rail could have stops added at places like Belleview and Iowa. Elevated pedestrian bridges could be built at each SW LRT station over Sante Fe and north of Englewood also east to Broadway, to improve access to SoBo and so transfers to enhanced bus could be made. The SW LRT would become more of a local service and the front range rail a faster express service.

[CastleScott]

^ Nice idea SnyderBock.

[TakeFive]

Don't Fight the Tape; Make the Trend Your Friend

Groundbreaking occurred on January 21, 1997. The SW Corridor line opened for business on July 14, 2000. The event was celebrated with balloons and opening festivities. Everybody wanted to know if the well-heeled Highlands Ranch residents and Denver Cowboys would ever ride a trolley-train to work. All the TV coverage spoke volumes. The Park n Ride filled up by 7:00 AM and by 8:00 AM cars were parking illegally and spilling over into the neighborhoods. All of the metro area, the cities and their Mayors took notice. Ridership was so strong that RTD soon ordered a dozen additional light rail vehicles.

Then Republican Governor Bill Owens happened and T-REX was born. Separate elections were held for both light rail and freeway expansion along the SE Corridor. Gov Owens stayed neutral on light rail but enthusiastically supported the road widening. I believe light rail passed by a better margin than the road widening did.

Meanwhile, the metro area which is made up of many cities and their Mayors started making noise. "Where's ours?" At this point light rail served maybe 25% percent of the metro area to the South and SE - but nothing for the rest of the RTD taxpayers. "When do we get our share?"

[Cirrus]

Originally Posted by CharlesCO

my design was BART technology

Funny you say that since BART is now doing suburban extensions using... DMU.

[TakeFive]

You've Got to strike When the Iron is Hot

Thank Your Lucky FasTracks Stars

First and foremost, without FasTracks Denver Union Station either wouldn't be there or it would be a shadow of what it is. Instead of a $450+ million Transit Center envision a $75 million project with above-ground bus terminal with buses buzzing in and out. Add a nice grassy area with flower beds as a placeholder for rail transit - some day in the future. Any development would likely have been limited to 4-6 story apartments.

November 2nd, 2004 was a magical moment is Denver history. It was no less than a stroke of genius.

The RTD district includes all or parts of eight different counties. AFter T-REX was completed RTD had two nice suburb to city LRT lines that other than Denver and one station served only Arapahoe Co. Is it any wonder that a growing cacophony from the other counties, their cities, Mayors and taxpayers wanted to know "When will we get our light rail."

It's important to remember that that in Colorado voters get to decide on any tax increases. FasTracks was designed to appeal to a majority of voters in at least six counties besides Denver. It worked.

Timing of Fastracks was Impeccable
When the Great Recession (ARRA) funding bill was signed by Pres Obama on Feb 17, 2009 Denver RTD was ready, willing and waiting; the planning and voter approval was already in place. RTD benefitted yugely as a result. Seattle, for example, is currently on pins and needles wondering how much FTA funding ST3 will end up receiving; same for many places.

What about that low hanging routes fruit
Eh, all areas take advantage of existing ROW's if they are at all useful. There's very good $$ reasons for doing so. if RTD were to start building light rail today the cost would be easily double the $57 million per mile that was spent. At twice the cost (or more) what kind of a plan could RTD come up with today that would meet voter approval?

What about today's disappointing ridership
One thing that Fastracks is NOT is a well designed urban textbook system. It wasn't intended to be; it's a Visionary plan intended to influence future development and commuter habits. mojiferous notices activity along the W Line. Today's ridership is but a snapshot in time. How FasTracks performs 15-20 years from now will be the test.

I still hold full faith and confidence that FasTracks, in hindsight, will indeed have been a stroke of genius. I still think Aurora may be the biggest sleeper due to its (convenient) location and ease of creating much denser development - over time but they need that express route along I-225.

[Cirrus]

Originally Posted by TakeFive

all areas take advantage of existing ROW's if they are at all useful.

I didn't say they shouldn't. I said they should have used a different type of train on most of the same corridors, with only a couple of tweaks replacing 1 or 2 particularly low-performing existing ROWs with 1 or 2 better existing ROWs.

Originally Posted by TakeFive

it's a Visionary plan intended to influence future development and commuter habits... I still think Aurora may be the biggest sleeper due to its (convenient) location and ease of creating much denser development - over time but they need that express route along I-225.

1. Virtually all systems are visionary plans that intend to influence future development and commuter habits. Part of the criticism with FasTracks is that the way it incorporates TOD is actually not very good, because of the pedestrian-hostile placement of the lines and the lack of truly high density zoning around them. The best TODs happen where rail lines have existing integrated street grids on both sides of the tracks, and where zoning that can accommodate high-rises (not just mid-rises) for a radius of several blocks in all directions. Precious few of Denver's proposed TODs qualify. They'll be an improvement over what's there now and they're better than what many cities are doing, but they're not going to be as successful as the best ones nationwide.
2. What express route on 225? The R line is slow. It doesn't work as an express. That might be what you want but that isn't what we got.

You keep talking about textbook planning as though it has different goals than the goals you say you want. But it doesn't! Textbook planning is textbook planning because it's proven to be the best at creating TOD and moving the most people the fastest. Design compromises & imperfections are necessary to get any project built, and are certainly not a reason to give up and go home, but this idea you seem to have that the textbook doesn't apply to Denver is wrong. There is no such thing as Denver Exceptionalism. The ingredients that lead to success apply here equally as they do everywhere else.

So look, I want to know what your answers are to the hindsight game. Hypothetically, if you had FasTracks to do over again, what would you change, while still maintaining the relative cost and political compromises necessary to get it built (ie about the same mileage, all on the surface, every jurisdiction gets served about as well)? I find it hard to believe that you wouldn't change anything at all. So tell us. Play the game. Let's see where we actually disagree.

[Scottk]

Originally Posted by SnyderBock

The light rail technology on the SW line works sufficiently. Eventually I'd like to see a front range commuter rail run parallel to the SW light rail but only with stops a a few stations such as Mineral, Littleton Downtown, Englewood and Boradway/I-25. Existing ROW is there to facilitate this along much of the line. Places where it is not, the front range rail could be elevated dirrectly over the light rail. Then the light rail could have stops added at places like Belleview and Iowa. Elevated pedestrian bridges could be built at each SW LRT station over Sante Fe and north of Englewood also east to Broadway, to improve access to SoBo and so transfers to enhanced bus could be made. The SW LRT would become more of a local service and the front range rail a faster express service.

I think that sounds great but RTD can't even be bothered to run frequent service on the C Line as it is, I feel like a commuter rail would never happen.

Extremely aggravating that 90% of the time I ride SW line you have to transfer if you are going to or from Union Station.