Jun
04

Third Train to Charlotte Coming

A third state-sponsored Amtrak train between Raleigh and Charlotte will be on the tracks before the end of the year. The $3 million, federally-funded route will leave both cities midday.

Currently the Piedmont leaves Raleigh at 7am and arrives in Charlotte just after 10am. The Carolinian leaves Raleigh at 4:50pm and arrives in Charlotte at 8:15pm.

May
27

Raleigh Ranks As 8th Most Expensive Commute

Forbes Magazine recently released a survey showing which cities cost the most for commuting. They studied gas prices along with commuting distance, congestion, carpooling rates, and use of public transportation and other factors to determine the per-capita daily commuting costs. Riverside-San Bernardino, CA finished first, Atlanta was second, and Washington, DC was third. Raleigh was the only North Carolina city in the top ten with its 8th place ranking.

Apr
28

Bus Bench Design Charrette Coming Saturday

image The Triangle American Institute of Architects’ Young Architects Forum will be hosting a design charrette to design bus benches that will be build and installed in 4 of the most under utilized sites in Raleigh. This project marks the first step in a system-wide series of improvements.

The charrette will be held at North Carolina State University’s College of Design Rotunda at Brooks Hall on Saturday, 05.03.2008, from 2 pm to 5 pm.

YAF will provide refreshments as well as a range of design materials (markers, pencils, paper and modeling supplies). Personal design supplies are also welcome.

I have a few of my own designs already:

Bus_Bench_ITBand Bus_Bench_OTB

Finally, we have a design for areas of Wake Forest needing a bench:

Bus_Bench_WOTB (Way…)

Apr
10

Clayton Bypass To Open One Year Early

Good news for Atlantic Beachers! The highway 70 bypass around Clayton will open this summer instead of the planned July of 2009. The bypass connects Interstate 40 just north of highway 42 over to the 70/70 Business split (near the "Cutter plant"). Here’s the project map (.pdf)

map it

Mar
24

Cary Aims to Duck Railroad

image The Town of Cary held an information session on a proposed major road project. The town wants a new underpass that would allow traffic to bypass train delays (that can last up to 25 minutes) in downtown Cary. The $15 million project includes extending Walker Street 1,200 feet from its current end at Cedar Street northwards to Chapel Hill Road, installation of a grade-separated railroad crossing, and realignment of cross streets. The project is expected to be complete in early 2011.

map it

Feb
26

Two Raleigh Bridges Among NC’s Worst

AAA’s latest list of the top 20 worst bridges in North Carolina is out and it contains two bridges in Raleigh. One is the Pullen Road bridge which was built in 1952 (map it). Carrying 33,000 cars a day, the bridge ranks 14th on the list, and it not slated for any service.

The state’s 4th worst bridge is the I-440 bridge over Hillsborough Street and the railroad (map it). At 47 years old, the bridge carries 84,000 cars per day. Interestingly its status is "Located on widening project in 2009".

I have not heard of specific I-440 widening plans for the western portion of the 440 "loop". The Western Blvd interchange needs to be improved. Unfortunately the state will probably take the easy way out by putting a diamond interchange with dual (artery-clogging) traffic signals on Western Blvd. Stay tuned on this project.

Feb
06

Transit Proposal Evokes Deja Vu

20051015-993 The Special Transit Advisory Commission, STAC, agreed Monday to a long-term plan for area transit. The plan’s details will be released later this month, but it appears that the new plan isn’t much different than the old TTA plan that suffered a massive political defeat.

Recommendations include pushing the plan for self-powered diesel locomotives on the L-shaped route joining North Raleigh, Downtown Raleigh, Cary, RTP, and Durham. Additionally, a light-rail route from UNC Hospitals to downtown Durham would be built, along with a better supporting bus network.

Designing a rail system for an area like this, one with so many small foci, is tough, but doable. While the new plan proposes to add Chapel Hill to the mix, it still is wrought with many of the TTA’s old problems that left taxpayers luke-warm at best. The overriding problem which transit “experts” keep ignoring is that people don’t envision themselves using this plan. The more the same plan is forced, the more resistance there will be.

The focus for the plan is getting people to their RTP workplaces, but the problem with RTP is that it is, in fact, not a focal area. It is widely dispersed and commands an extra transit leg for each employee choosing to join the anticipated 14,000 daily train riders. Not many will choose to drive to a park-and-ride, wait for a train in the elements, ride the train through many stops, then wait for a bus to slowly get them to their office. Real estimates show that people with 35 minute commutes would spend at least 75 minutes for each leg.

What we need is a plan that entices people to ride; one that people realistically see themselves using. If STAC wants to put together a plan that people will welcome, they need to show us that they did go back to the drawing board by producing a dream plan we’ve never seen, with no price tag. Otherwise habitual emotions will reject this plan, too. Show that this month’s plan is just “Phase I” of a master plan that works for most instead of being the implied final product. Instead of 56 miles of rail and buses at a cost of $2 billion, shoot for the sky. Put together a plan like this one which has something like 150 miles at a cost of $6 billion. Another idea uses several interlocking “U” shaped routes to overlap and serve RTP well.

transit_flower People have a comfort zone for spending and cannot comprehend numbers above that zone. Very few people will have a different emotional response to a $6 billion price tag than they would a $2 billion price tag. Either way, the John Locke Foundation hims and haws, right? The difference is that the more comprehensive plan is something people see themselves using more than just for novelty purposes.

There is a nice little dreamy transit site on the net called Carfree Cities. The site outlines a plan where 6 million people could live in an area smaller than the Triangle all less than 35 total minutes away from each other. The plan calls for the typical “string of pearls” transit-oriented-developments, but the string resembles a flower. Something similar could be done in the Triangle, actually, and would actually be able to serve many of RTP’s largest employers without a local shuttle bus system.

I’m not a huge fan of the inefficiencies of a custom-built, high occupancy transit vehicle-based system, but if we’re going to do one, let’s do one that is better than Atlanta’s. I repeatedly hear Atlanta critics who think we can avoid Atlanta’s problems by implementing dumbed-down version of Atlanta’s rail system! This makes no sense. Let’s do better.

Go ahead STAC. Dream and give us something to dream about. Give us something that excites more than 14,000 of our 1,000,000 people.

Feb
03

RDU Videos on YouTube

There is a nice little assortment of YouTube videos from people taking off and landing from/at RDU airport.

  • Inbound Runway 23 Left
  • RDU RWY 5L
  • Glass at RDU
  • Landing at RDU
  • Taking Off from RDU
  • RDU to RSQ
  • more…
Jan
23

Quick-View Traffic Cams

For the last few years the NC Department of Transportation has developed a nice arsenal of highway traffic cams. Other traffic sites exist, but this is my favorite because cam thumbnails can be seen by simply hovering. This allows one to scan the entire I-40 segment of the RTP is less than 10 seconds!

Unfortunately there is not a direct link to the Triangle region cams, so the link still requires one click to get to the good stuff. You’ll continue to find this resource in the “Tools” section to the left.

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