BIKE: Austin Commuter rails

[Mike Dahmus]

>
>Above all, getting into the rail business gets us into the development 
>game (see above), which is critical to the city's public investment 
>strategy.  With light rail levels of service, a train every 15 minutes in 
>both directions at peaks over the length of the line and 15 to 20 minute 
>service to time-transfer buses to more stations in the core, the line 
>would have considerable ridership and attract clusters of 
>development.  Past Capital Metro modeling puts the numbers in excess of 
>20,000 riders a day, year 2020, or higher daily ridership than the number 
>1 bus along Congress, Guadalupe and North Lamar, today.  The November 
>ballot proposal does not give us this level of service, but it does give 
>us the only chance we have to get to the desired level of service and a 
>core rail system at a later date.

This is a huge myth.

Increasing levels-of-service has done nothing to improve Tri-Rail's dismal 
image among the choice commuter in South Florida. Running bad rail more 
often doesn't help anybody except those who had to use transit anyways. The 
performance and reliability and comfort are still horrible when you require 
a transfer - especially since NOBODY'S GOING TO BE WALKING TO THE TRAIN 
STATION EITHER.

The hypothetical Leander to Capitol passenger would do this:

1. Drive to train station
2. Take train station to station at MLK
3. Transfer to shuttle-bus which is stuck in traffic behind the cars of the 
other people driving in from the 'burbs
4. Get off shuttle bus and walk to work

Running the train more often doesn't make that the slightest bit more 
attractive to somebody who is trying to decide whether to leave their car 
at home on any given day.

And transit-oriented development along this corridor is NOT going to 
happen. The neighborhoods through which it runs are uniformly more hostile 
to density than the ones along the 2000 light-rail corridor. The new 
developments at Robinson Ranch and in Leander are twinkles in peoples' eyes 
- meanwhile we just approved massive increases in density in West Campus, 
and the Triangle is actually UNDER CONSTRUCTION.

Only a complete lunatic would think that this line is the way to go for 
transit-oriented development - it's providing rail ONLY to those who, in 
2000, told us they DIDN'T WANT IT.

Meanwhile, Capital Metro won't even say off the record that an "urban core 
rail system" is a possibility. That's because they know, like I do, that 
this line precludes the 2000 light-rail line OR ANYTHING LIKE IT from being 
built, both technically and politically. Dave, you're being dishonest by 
continuing to hold this out to people - if it was even a REMOTE part of 
Capital Metro's plan, they would not have completely removed the original 
language about Rapid Bus being a "placeholder for possible future rail 
service".

THERE WILL BE NO URBAN CORE RAIL IF THIS PLAN PASSES. I CANNOT EMPHASIZE 
THAT ENOUGH. IF YOU BUY THIS CRAP, YOU'RE BEING TAKEN FOR A RIDE.


Mike Dahmus
mdahmus