BIKE: Rails with Trails

[Patrick Goetz]

I recently gave a monorail presentation to a very feisty group of mature 
democrats.  At the end of the presentation, one woman raised her hand 
and then commented "your proposal has one major problem:  you don't do 
anything for Northwest Austin, and WE'RE the ones who vote!"  I 
responded that Northwest Austin was getting the Red Line, to which she 
replied "What?! You just spent an hour selling us on this fabulous new 
technology and then you tell us that all we're getting is a crappy 
commuter train?  I like your plan, but I'm telling you right now, you've 
got to have something in it for us -- even if it's way out in the future 
-- if you want us to vote for it!"  A slew of other questions saved me 
from having to respond to this immediately, but later that evening an 
obvious possibility occurred to me.  The current commuter rail plan is 
nothing short of an unmitigated disaster waiting to happen (see future 
post); but, combined with a sensible transit system servicing Austin's 
urban core, it might eventually develop healthy ridership numbers, at 
which point a monorail could be built alongside the existing track 
without disrupting the service.  Upon completion, the existing surface 
rail track (note the singular -- the Red line is single track) could be 
removed and the entire rail ROW could be turned into a hike & bike 
greenbelt extending from the Convention Center to Leander and perhaps 
even beyond.  No need to talk about pinch points; the entire 50-80ft 
would be devoted to the trail with plenty of room for greenscaping, 
thousands and thousands of trees, area gardens, etc.  Imagine how cool 
this would be:  very much like Burnham's grand vision for Chicago or 
Boston's Fenway, only much grander in scope and size.

This, in essence, illustrates the holistic, 30 second argument for an 
elevated rail system, st least as far as bicyclists and pedestrians are 
concerned.  Just ask yourself these questions:

  - Is an adequate amount of street space currently devoted to bicylists 
and pedestrians?
  - If not, will adding yet another mechanized mode of transportation to 
the street improve the situation (for bicyclists and pedestrians)?
  - Alternatively, are Austinites willing to widen existing urban core 
roadways 30ft or so to accomodate rail, bicycle lanes, and sidewalks?

We all know that the answer to all three of these questions is no. 
Consequently, there is one and only one realistic way to implement a 
rail system in the urban core, and that is grade-separated, hence 
elevated, as we don't have nearly the population density to support 
subway.  No amount of wishful thinking or head-in-the-sand pretensions 
is going to change this.  This argument is over; it's time to move on to 
figuring out how to implement and finance such a system before it's too 
late and Roger Baker gets to experience his peak oil civic catastrophe 
first hand without even having to leave town.



David Foster wrote:
> 
> A while back we had a short discussion on this forum around the value of 
> including RwT in Cap Metro's commuter rail proposal. I continue to 
> maintain that it is a great opportunity not to be missed. We need to 
> think of all three rail corridors included in Cap Metro's (evolving) 
> transit plan as corridors to move people--on foot and by bike as well as 
> rail. Cap Metro's ROW passes beneath IH 35, 183, MoPac and other major 
> barriers to continuous bicycle travel, and links several neighborhoods 
> and key destinations.  Running as it does on a roughly 45 degree angle 
> from Leander southeast to East Austin before turning west into downtown, 
> the ROW crosses or comes very near major Austin bike routes such as 
> Ohlen Road (Rt 18), Woodrow (Rt 41), Guadalupe (Rt 47), Duval (Rt 49) 
> and Red River (Rt. 51), and a RwT would in effect extend and connect all 
> of them. And of course east of IH 35, it merges with the Boggy Creek 
> Trail, and would be easy to connect to the Lance Armstrong Bikeway via 
> Pedernales. A network of RwT would no doubt increase ridership on the 
> trains and make bike-train commutes easier on both ends of the trip.
> 
> The opportunity for RwT this November is even more important because of 
> the potential to run passenger rail down the Union Pacific ROW and the 
> old MoKan ROW in the future. As Eric Anderson has argued so well, the 
> MoKan ROW can connect the Lance Armstrong Bikeway to the Walnut Creek 
> Trail, parts of which the City of Austin is already building. The UP ROW 
> passes beneath 183 near the Pickle Center and (future) Domain 
> development before passing beneath MoPac farther north.
> 
> Part of our conversation centered around whether commuter rail lines can 
> be double-tracked and still leave sufficient space for a paved trail. I 
> believe the answer is 'yes' at least for most of Cap Metro's ROW, which 
> is never less than 50' and usually more. The MoKan corridor is 100' 
> wide, and more. However, there are clearly pinch points (such as in the 
> Wooten-Crestview neighborhood) and I defer to experts like Mia Birk to 
> offer guidance on feasibility. Along certain sections, we may have to 
> take the bike route out of the rail corridor and onto nearby streets, 
> then back to the rail corridor again.
>