Kansas City Leadership Backs Light rail Vote

Back in November, the voters of Kansas City approved a light rail initiative put on the ballot by activist Clay Chastain. Over the opposition of the transit agency, civic leaders and with no money for a campaign, the initiative won with approximately 56% of the vote. Now it appears, the Kansas City establishment is lining up to back a light rail plan of some kind. Chastain's plan probably is overly optimistic in what can be built for the money generated by the 3/8ths cent sales tax which uses money intended for the operation of buses which causes additional problems.

The following article goes into more detail and should be promising for future Missouri transportation initiatives if both urban areas are talking more about rail than highways.

Go here for the article.

Smartcards come to LA

This is a picture of the LA Gold Line Cross Mission Street in South Pasadena, adjacent to two major transit oriented condo mixed use developments.

According to the December 28 LA Times, 50 transit riders are testing the smartcard fare collection system before it is rolled out.

Metro hopes to go to smartcards. Read the artcle below to get a preview of the benefits of smartcards.


la%20smartcard.doc

Location Efficient Mortgages

Sandwich Man posted this:

What's more, homes hold or appreciate in value while cars only lose theirs, and financing a home is cheaper than a car--the interest rates are lower, and there's no deduction for interest on car loans. The mortgage interest deduction is the biggest one in the federal tax code. You're far better off putting your money into a higher priced home instead of cars. St. Louis should be using location-efficient mortgages to help people do this, too.

A location efficient mortgage program was started in St. Louis about a year ago. I doubt it gets much publicity from the real estate agents and lenders. The way the program works, is that people who live near transit are eligible to barrow more money since they will use less of their income on transportation. I believe the cap on the program is $375,000, plus the entire city of St. Louis qualifies for the program. Fannie Mae is a backer of the program. Metro and the City of St. Louis should be promoters as well.

Cross County MetroLink and Pedestrians

This spring CMT will be rolling out a pedestrian/transit program called the "Ten Toe Express." Since transit riders tend to be pedestrians, the program will focus on encouraging people to view the pedestrian portion of their trip as a positive aspect, working in some exercise as part of their work commute for instance. We have funding from the Missouri Foundation for Health to work with senior citizens to use transit to improve their mobility and as well as increase their level of exercise.

All this brings me to the point that our "Ten Toe Express" team spent the day doing walking audits of each of the MetroLink Stations. I teamed with Dr. Laura Brennan-Ramirez on the Cross County Stations. We focused on a half mile radius of each station. (When we planned the day weeks ago, it seemed like a good idea, not knowing it would be a coldest morning of the winter.) Dr. Ramirez and I noticed a number of things at the stations and want your observations as well.

Exit signage in the Skinker and Big Bend tunnel stations is confusing to me. Kayak's Coffee is a great location on a cold day.

Going south on foot from the Central Avenue Station is circuitous at best. Richmond Heights to the Galleria or Boulevard is difficult. Made more difficult today by the fact the snow plows had filled the sidewalk on the north side of Galleria Parkway with snow. Thankfully, St. Louis County and Richmond Heights are aware of the issue and are supposed to be working on a plan to address pedestrian access to the station. Pedestrians are prohibited from going east from the station. The Tropicana and surrounding parking lot appears to be a good place for transit oriented development. Steady traffic during the day today to and from the Richmond Heights Station.

At Maplewood, sidewalks on the North side of Manchester are too narrow or non existent headed west. This needs a remedy. There were walks east bound with the caveat, "walker beware."

Sunnen stations has walks the lead to the station, but unless you work at the business park, where would you want to go. We did observe one pedestrian with bags walking to the station from the south. Also there as a sign at the South platform that read "Access to All Trains."

We will be sharing the observations with Metro and the affected municipalities. Let me know what you observe.

MetroLink in the Middle of 40?

A question that I often get is “Why isn’t MetroLink being built to go down the middle of Highway 40?” In 1999-2000, the East-West Gateway Council of Governments studied improving transportation to the West which included an examination of putting MetroLink in the Highway 40 right-of-way.

(To view that study in detail go to click here and scroll down to Daniel Boone and you can see the results of that study.)

Basically East-West Gateway Council of Governments concluded that the better alternative was to extend MetroLink to West County along Page Avenue. Personally I believe this is the best decision. Locating transit stops in the middle of highways is brutal for the transit customer since the autos whizzing by on each side creates a very unpleasant environment. To see a local example, stand in the new Central Avenue Station in Clayton on the Cross County alignment to see what I mean.

I have discussed locating transit stops in the middle of highways with transit officials in Chicago and San Francisco and they agree it is a location of last resort. The attraction is that the right-of-way already is there. But being in the middle of a highway kills the desirability to do transit oriented development.

Remember transit riders also are pedestrians and there really are not many good destinations in the 40 corridor that are pedestrian friendly. The area is built up for autos. Large Park and ride lots or garages would be about the best that could be expected initially along the 40 corridor. At least West Port Plaza would have some attraction as a destination.

But nothing will be built without the City and County voters approving additional tax dollars – perhaps a half-cent sales tax – to build to West County and/or the Northside/Southside expansion which Gateway currently has advanced the study to the next level.

Highway 40 – Who Should Pay?

The pending rebuilding of Highway 40 will have significant impact on MetroLink and MetroBus. Buses will be rerouted with the rebuilding of major bridges across the highway beginning with Kingshighway this coming spring. Metro, with the opening of the Cross County alignment and the scheduled opening of a 1200 car parking garage at the Brentwood I-64 MetroLink Station at Eager Rd. will provide alternatives for commuters from the south commuting to Clayton, the Central West End and downtown.

But much of this extra service will cost Metro additional money. Larry Salci estimates the number to be $7 million in additional costs to provide additional buses and more frequent MetroLink service. Who should pay for it? MoDOT says not us. MoDOT Head Pete Rahn hides behind the Missouri Constitution supposed prohibition of spending state gas tax dollars of things other than roads and bridges. What Rahn fails to point out that MoDOT has many times spent gas tax dollars on mitigation for road projects such as adding park land to Creve Coeur Park when the Page Avenue extension went through the park. Several years ago under previous leadership, MoDOT funded extra bus service when the Blanchette Bridge was being rebuilt.

What’s more the federal dollars in the Highway 40 project face no such restrictions. State Senator Joan Bray said Ohio recently completed funded new bus service that paralleled a major road reconstruction project. Missouri is one of the lowest ranked states in terms of flexing money from highways to transit and should do better.

The St. Louis political and business leadership should insist that MoDOT fund additional costs incurred by Metro during the reconstruction of Highway 40. After all, how many times have you heard state officials complain about “no unfunded mandates” from the federal government. The same should hold true from the state government. Rahn at some future date will want voters to approve additional tax dollars for roads and bridges. He should keep this in mind when trying to win favor with large voter blocks in the Metropolitan St. Louis area where voters are more likely to support tax increases.