BIKE: Downtown: shuttles or feet?

[Mike Dahmus]

Phil Hallmark wrote:

>
> Mike,
>
> I think the most compelling part of your argument is the shuttle bus 
> component. And I have been nodding in agreement with it. But, I'm not 
> sure it is totally accurate to claim that every single rider must 
> transfer to a shuttle. How many high-rise offices are within a 5-block 
> radius of the stop downtown? Aren't there quite a few? Yes, the 
> Capitol and UT people will need to use shuttles. That could be a 
> disaster as you predict. But there are possibly thousands of people 
> who could walk from the stop to their office. TOD may not happen out 
> in Leander, but it sure might downtown. If you were going to build a 
> high-rise office and there was a commuter rail stop down there, where 
> would you build it? I would build it as close to the stop as possible.
>
> Even an in-street light rail system requires some amount of walking 
> for the vast majority of riders. I think a 5-block walk would be 
> perfectly acceptable to most people. If not, then they would not ride 
> light rail either, especially if the light rail ride would take longer 
> than commuter rail due to more stops along the way.

Most downtown offices are NOT within 5 blocks of the station, and 5 
blocks is beyond the limit of walking for most potential commuters. 
Typically 1/4 mile is considered the golden circle around a light-rail 
station, which boils down to around 3 blocks downtown.

That doesn't even get you to 4th and Congress, much less 6th and 
Congress. The distance from 4th at Red River to 6th at Congress is 0.5 
miles according to yahoo maps.

If you want to see what an 0.25 mile radius looks like in our downtown, 
there's a map in this issue of On Track: 
http://www.ci.austin.tx.us/planning/downloads/OnTrack2.pdf (page 3) in 
which the far right station is where the commuter rail station for 
"downtown" will be. Notice it doesn't even get within a block of 
Congress and 4th. Note: the city uses 0.25 miles to judge how far "most" 
people would be willing to walk from a rail station because that's what 
the standard is in the transit biz. I didn't make it up.

Anyways, this isn't close enough to office buildings downtown for 
anybody other than a transit zealot to walk. Yes, that includes most 
readers of this list, including yours truly. (I used to walk down to 6th 
street from my condo, which was more like 3 miles; but I'm not out of 
touch enough to consider that typical for suburbanites!). And remember, 
this line isn't going near any neighborhoods full of people who WOULD 
walk that far; it's relying SOLELY on suburban low-density neighborhoods 
for passengers.

- MD