El Paso - Juarez Commuter Rail?

They are thinking about it:

On Tuesday, Juarez Mayor Jose Reyes Ferriz and most of the Juarez city council accepted a resolution from the El Paso city council, saying the two cities will work together to create a commuter line between the sister cities.

Midweek Notes

Arlington is the largest city in the United States without transit, but will run trains through the city for the Superbowl coming in 2011.
~~~
Vancouver does Granny Flats in high rises.
~~~
Seattle Mayoral candidate McGinn is floating ideas for another light rail election in two years. But by light rail does he mean rapid streetcar or light metro?
~~~
A dustup over trolley buses in Seattle. I'd be interested to see if the bean counters actually did a lifecycle analysis considering how long electric trolleybuses actually last. Anyone who takes away existing hydro powered transit and replaces it with diesel needs a head check. It's unfortunate that it is even being discussed at all.
~~~
The economy isn't being so kind to mixed use projects in Atlanta.

Governor Good Hair

Does this mean that we can give Governor Perry a hard time for all his contacts within the toll road community? I'm not sure he really wants to start this fight.

OT: Hook 'Em Walter

I am not old enough to be in the era of Walter Cronkite reading news. But I did experience him through a connection with my University, one that runs very deep. His voice is masterful and I can only imagine what it was like to hear him nightly. But if you're a Longhorn this hits you pretty hard, especially when the memories of your school are tied so well together by the imagery of Austin and his voice.



You can see all the spots he voiced for the University of Texas here. May you enjoy a Shiner in the sky good sir. Tell Arthur and J Fred I said hi. Hook 'em.

Running: Determined to Be a Better Man

Sometimes I'll post something on running which many of you know happened to be a big part of my life before transit. Today I'd like to point folks to a post in Jogger's World about a friend of mine named Darren Brown. It's a good story about how DB dealt with his father's (who was a famous and decorated runner) suicide and came into running on his own. Recently DB broke 4 minutes in the mile and with his deceased father became the first father-son duo to break 4 in the United States. My tie to Darren is that I failed to get him to come to Texas when I recruited him out of high school. He eventually came to school at UT but we were glad he came late instead of not coming at all.

"You see, I want to become a better runner than my father," Darren Brown says, "but I'm determined to become a better man."

Texas Legislature Holds Dallas Hostage

It's unfortunate that legislators in Texas choose to keep people from voting on a tax. Not the tax itself, but the ability to pick a fee to vote on to fund transit. Sigh.

Texas Senator Wants to Secede from DOT

Imagine if all the money for transit that is provided by the federal government was gone and states had control. That's something that Kay Bailey Hutchinson thinks is a great idea. While in theory it would keep money from places like Alaska, in practice the State DOT (read road building) would likely keep it all for itself. Personally, this smells of the same secession talk that Gov Hair discussed only a week ago.

Linkfest: Quotes Edition

I wanted to try something a little different, so I'm just going to link a quote from the articles I'm posting today.

~~~
DC: "Some residents of the District cling to a suburban mentality."
~~~
National: "Americans travel by car twice as much per year as Germans and use transit only a sixth as much."
~~~
Texas: "This isn’t a transportation funding crisis," said Keener, whose Austin group promotes low taxes and small government. "It’s a funding priority crisis."
~~~
Las Vegas: "The zoning provides incentives, such as bonus density, for developers who build projects that combine residential, professional and commercial space and encourage residents to use the mass transit line."

Inaguration Sinkhole

Looks like the news is on hold, at least anything I would find interesting enough to post on at great length. At least Governor Rick Perry is kind enough to let locals vote on taxing themselves for a North Texas rail network. Thank you oh benevolent 38%er. Seems like there are a few (at least 2 as of today) of those low marks in Texas these days. Who wants LBJ and the Great Society Subway idea back?

Rebranding

Wouldn't be surprised if they came back with the free auto movement.

Round Rock Rail?

Hmm. Doesn't anyone else think they should pay their fair share before they start thinking they can use Capital Metro's tracks. And when is Central Austin going to actually get rail?

Remember the Alamo

In the back of my mind, this seems like a really bad idea. Should I have a reason not to be skeptical?

The shocker last night wasn't so much that a local toll-road official will take over as chairman of VIA Metropolitan Transit.

It had more to do with a revelation that behind-the-scene talks have drifted toward the possibility of merging the toll and bus agencies into a super agency. The Alamo Regional Mobility Authority, which is banking on toll-road plans but can pretty much do any type of transportation project, recently outlined an idea to create an overarching Multi-Modal Transportation Finance System.

With it, VIA and the RMA would combine to maximize financing capacity while allowing each agency to operate independently, says the RMA document, which was prepared for a city-county transportation task force.

This might be the first shot in a long Texas war that would attempt to combine these recently created mobility authorities with local transit agencies. Not something that is unfamiliar so close to the Alamo. My fear is a region wide transportation authority focused on toll roads will give suburban jurisdictions too much clout over all transportation and leave the more urban areas hanging out to dry. Specifically, Austin's outside pols have been trying to take away Capital Metro's sales tax for as long as anyone can remember. We'll have to watch and see what happens, but color me skeptical.

A Change of Direction for Texas?

I was disheartened by the lack of urgency from Lawmakers in Austin though I guess it is to be expected in Texas. The Dallas-Fort Worth area has been working on this commuter rail plan for a number of years and it seems as if there is a local leadership consensus on the matter. But lawmakers seem like they are already calling it dead.

State representatives from the western side of the Metroplex lined up Wednesday in support of Rail North Texas — a proposal to create new taxes, with voter approval, and build a regionwide web of commuter trains.

But the lawmakers warned elected leaders from Tarrant, Johnson and Denton counties that their chance of success in the legislative session that begins in January is a long shot at best. Attempts to win approval for commuter rail failed in 2005 and 2007.

But this morning there was some other interesting news. Kay Bailey Hutchinson is looking to run up against Rick Perry for Governor in 2010. If she won, this would be a shift in transportation policy from the Trans Texas Corridor of clear cutting to perhaps a more balanced approach that could be friendly to rail. I'm not sure where KBH stands on livable community stuff like biking and walking (though she was a mindless supporter of drill baby drill), but her support for rail would bode well for the Texas High Speed Rail project (she's written bills before with Joe Biden) and local light rail lines. She's worked hard to get funding for DART and even helped Houston some when Tom Delay and John Culbertson snubbed their nose at Houston's future.

We'll see what happens, but past work on behalf of transit on the hill has been fairly good, and amazing if you compare her to the current Mr. 39% (Rick Perry, not GWB).

OT: BCS - Better Check the Scoreboard

I could type a lot of stuff here. But as a Texas fan and alum, it's disappointing to see two teams you've already beaten play in the Big 12 Championship, one of which you had the same record as and beat, the other which has a worse record than three teams in the other division. It's also annoying to watch football games of teams you don't like and have to root for one because of football politics. For all those who think the BCS is a good idea, you're not in it for the right reasons and if the only reason you can make is money, you need to put your greed in check.

This is one reason I liked running track than playing other sports. The stopwatch doesn't lie.

And to keep this a little transit related, you'll be able to take Light Rail to the Texas - OU game next year in Dallas.

Not Quite Dead Yet

Though the rail and utility portions of the Trans Texas Corridor might as well be. It seems that Craddick was only telling his constituents what they wanted to hear about segments close to them, rather than saying the whole thing is DOA.

Urban Bumper Sticker

Considering a lot of people around here don't have cars and take transit, the bumper sticker is not an available option of displaying your politics or causes. However, I've noticed even before the presidential election that messenger bags can have the same affect. After the election started though, they have increased exponentially around here. Mostly Obama and No on Prop 8. I've noticed people on the train checking out my bag as well, which has my own "urban bumper stickers"


I've got the longhorn patch which has brought me closer to fellow Texans randomly on BART and the Hey Mercedes buttons of my favorite band that have gotten comments from some rock kids. Though no one has said much about the SF Municipal Railway or the Market Street Railway pins, it might be because we're usually smooshed together on the J Church.

The thing though is that unlike bumper stickers, you have to be in close quarters to see what the pins and buttons say, which makes people a bit more cordial than if they were in the space of their own car. No honking on transit.

Is the TTC Really Dead?

The Trans Texas Corridor is what keeps a lot of ranchers and landowners up at night worrying if their property is going to be cut into pieces by the largest land grab in state history. As of now, it might be dead. What a huge waste of space. It was supposed to be a quarter mile wide for trucks, pipelines, cars, and trains or so they said. I won't count my chickens until the smoke disappears but I hope it doesn't just die, but goes down in a fantastic fireball that takes slick Rick and his hair with it.

"I want to clear this up. I did not vote for the Trans-Texas Corridor and you're welcome to look at the voting records," he said in a broadcast by KXAN in Austin. Then Craddick, a Republican who was debating his Democratic opponent, Bill Dingus, in Midland, stuck a fork in the Trans-Texas Corridor and declared the ambitious plan done, according to KXAN. "Everybody in Austin knows it's dead," he said. "Everybody across the state knows it's dead. It's just something to be talking about."

Fleet Week Awesome. Muni FAIL

Today was an awesome day on the North end of the city that started with Texas(5) beating Oklahoma(1). I watched from a bar on Union Street with about 200 Texas exes and friends. Then I went with some friends to watch the Blue Angels fly over San Francisco at varying angles. All of this was great and made me pretty tired but glad I got out today. It was an amazingly beautiful day.

On the other hand. It was an epic epic Muni FAIL. In my first year here. I made the mistake of driving the 3 miles North to watch the football game during fleet week. Bad idea. No parking (when is there ever?) and traffic you wouldn't believe. The last few years, I've decided to take Muni which I try to do as much as possible. This morning I would take my usual J to 22 connection. But it started out badly. When I left my house, the NextMUNI webpage said 3 and 15 minutes for the J at 24th and Church. I got to the stop and the 3 min J was just leaving. I felt that was ok. 10 minutes wasn't bad and I would be a little late to the game but no problem right?

Not right. I waited 25 minutes for the J and the driver was chatting away with what seemed like a supervisor with a yellow MUNI vest. I was already annoyed that they were 15 minutes late and the talking really wasn't doing much harm, but because they were late more people had gathered meaning more people had to pay as they entered which always slows the whole process down. And why they have so many stop signs on Church I'll never know.

So i get to Duboce and Church where I would hop on the 22 and the next one comes in 12 minutes. It's already 9am and the game starts at 9am. I wait 12 minutes and off we go. The 22 gets there and I'm responding to texts from my friends telling them I'll be a little late but not too bad. Then some crazy stuff happens. The driver decides that at stop lights he'll read the SF Chronicle. And at one point he hops out of the bus at a stop and walks into a store to pick up a sandwich. What?!

Obviously I was annoyed. I was already late because of Muni. But this was ridiculous. So what would have taken me about 15 minutes in a subway or a car took me an hour on Muni. I know this is the reason people drive. It annoys the heck out of me that we can't get it right. Between the late train and the crazy bus driver...it was enough to make me almost declare war on Muni.

The way home pretty much sucked as well. So much traffic on Van Ness (I walked that way to see the ships from Fort Mason) I decided to go back to the 22. Well I got passed by three full buses and ended up just walking the 2 miles to the J. It was ok though. I got to take some pictures on Union Street. But for the once in a while rider, that day would probably kill your riding for about a year. Cabs it is!

In any event. This needs to be improved. And the TEP would really do almost nothing to change that trip. BRT on Van Ness could possibly help that trip but honestly there needs to be an east west and north south subway. I should be able to get anywhere in a 7 mile by 7 mile city in 30 minutes. That should be the goal. That would be quite impressive mobility for here and guess what, more people would take transit!!!

Here are some pictures and movies. The first one shows the final seconds of the game at the Blue Light bar. Pretty exciting.



The following pictures are of the Fleet Week traffic...

Van Ness



Lombard



North Point Street



People Traffic and Ships!



Marina Street - They would be dumb not to put the future F Line extension to the presidio in its own lane when you see this:



Union Street Life