Blog Postings from this week...

Image via Wikipedia First up from the Mobilizing the Region Blog:

In NJ, “Son of Toll Hike” is Born

While Utah looks at the possibility of its first toll road, the New Jersey turnpike authority is looking to increase toll charges in order to replenish the state highway trust fund. A portion would go to the New Jersey Transit project to build additional tunnels from New Jersey to Penn Station in New York to deal with train congestion out of the area.

From the Denver Transit Stop Blog:

Public Private Partnership Pilot Program (Penta P)

This talks about the RTD in Denver looking at Public-Private partnerships in order to get some lines built in its Fastracks program.

The author has an excellent description of the various types of partnerships and how they work so it is differently worth a look.

From the Xing Columbus (Ohio) Blog:

Money Never Disappears for Sprawl

The blog mentions that Ohio has instituted a policy of fix it first meaning that it will fix existing highways before starting new ones.

From the Transit Miami Blog:

Boondoggle

A couple of weeks ago an article was published in some magazine that listed the biggest boondoggles (by who's classification?) and Transit Miami points out while its own project the expansion of Metro Rail has not happened so far, you have to question some of the others on the list including the unique Sydney Opera House.

From the Transbay Blog:

Sunday Streets and More, This Labor Day Weekend

San Francisco closed a street to create a pedestrian fair.

From the Overhead Wire:

Making San Francisco More Accessible by Amtrak

There is a couple of ways to get to San Fransisco by Amtrak. First by long distance train you can get off in either Emeryville or Oakland and take a bus to the San Fransisco or if your on one of the corridor trains you can take BART from Richmond (which I did on multiple occasions).

However, the post points out about the disconnect between local, state and national carriers which was pointed out in the intragration series.

Battlefield NIMBYism

Article from New Jersey were NJ Transit wants to put commuter trains on a existing rail line but people who run a revolutionary war battlefield think railroad tracks are a blight and should be eliminated.

From the RT Rider:

The cost of free parking

Growing a transit lifestyle in barren soil

John talks about difficulties in buidling a transit lifestyle in Sacramento. You can see the comparisons to many places in along the Wasatch Front.

From the N-Judah Chonicles:

Just What IS A "Green Bus Shelter" Anyway?

Putting grass on top of a bus stop shelter makes it a green shelter?

From the CTA Tattler:

Higher gas prices mean big CTA ridership increase

Chicago is also having a major increase in ridership in both rail and bus.

Articles of Note...

Image via WikipediaOne problem that many small businesses face is government regulations that are skewed against them and to big businesses and the automobile. One of these is parking regulations that keep small businesses from doing business and also are a deterrent to creating pedestrian friendly areas.

The Salt Lake City Council is now looking toward lower the standards that businesses have to meet when it comes to parking. However, there is homeowners who don't want people parking in front of their homes so they are opposed to the new regulations. While I can understand the people who have had moron's block their driveways, this is a policing issue and should be taken care that way.

Proposed parking revisions a hot topic

Next is a proposal in Sandy to eliminate high restrictions in order to allow a new development north of the South Towne Mall. This new development includes the Broadway Theater that the city leaders think will make them even more special.

What is laughable about the whole thing is that Sandy is calling the area around their city hall "downtown". Clearly the folks running Sandy are having delusions of Grandeur as that area is in not shape or form a downtown.

Maybe they think that calling it downtown will magically create an atmosphere? Clearly it is not a downtown area, but a suburban sprawl autocentric commercial office and retail area, nothing more.

Sandy Council delays height-limit vote

Finally we have an article about UTA buying used coaches from New Jersey Transit to add additional capacity for Front Runner.

While the cars are not ideal, they will provide needed capacity to the commuter rail system. It will cost substantially less to remodel these cars as apposed to buying new ones although they do not seat as many passengers compared to the cars from Bombardier.

The only downside is, they are not stainless steel cars that can last upwards of 50+ years, but if UTA can get 5 or even 10 years worth of use out of them they will pay for themselves and hopefully can get more Bombardier cars at that time.