238 replies to this topic

[The Voice of Reason]

not sure how to type anything here other than....   POOP crap darn.... nope,, crap crap crap fork fork damn!!!

i hate this i hate it so much there is no way to remotely express my disgust

[Theophrastus Bombastus]

Is this still killable, or on his say-so, do the railroad track digger-uppers start rolling?

[Theophrastus Bombastus]

Un-effing-believable..... build ANYTHING but this.

State Sen. Andrew Roraback ripped the proposed New Britain to Hartford busway Friday morning before the measure was approved in a fast vote.

Roraback said the $567 million project was a waste of money at a time when the state and federal governments are running up large deficits.

A Litchfield County Republican, Roraback said that the state could buy 28,350 new Jeep Patriots with the amount of money that was being spent on the 9.4-mile busway.

After comments by Roraback and Rep. Sean Williams, Democratic Gov. Dannel P. Malloy immediately called for a vote. Neither Malloy nor any of the proponents for the busway made any comments before the vote.

The measure passed by 7 to 3.

[The Voice of Reason]

 Theophrastus Bombastus, on 29 April 2011 - 11:00 AM, said:

Un-effing-believable..... build ANYTHING but this.

State Sen. Andrew Roraback ripped the proposed New Britain to Hartford busway Friday morning before the measure was approved in a fast vote.

Roraback said the $567 million project was a waste of money at a time when the state and federal governments are running up large deficits.

A Litchfield County Republican, Roraback said that the state could buy 28,350 new Jeep Patriots with the amount of money that was being spent on the 9.4-mile busway.

After comments by Roraback and Rep. Sean Williams, Democratic Gov. Dannel P. Malloy immediately called for a vote. Neither Malloy nor any of the proponents for the busway made any comments before the vote.

The measure passed by 7 to 3.

yeah, I read it and well, I guess I have had to accept that its happening for a few months now.

frekin stupid

[HartfordTycoon]

http://www.courant.c...0,6551149.story

Michael Nicastro of the Central CT Chamber of Commerce has now shifted his focus from fighting the Hartford-New Britain Busway to trying to get the Waterbury branch of Metro North extended all the way to Berlin. This would connect the Bristol area with Metro North and provide a direct connection between Central CT and NYC. This would also enable the line to connect with the planned New Haven-Hartford-Springfield rail service, and while not the most direct route from Bristol to Hartford, there would still be a rail connection in place. I really would like to see this happen. The Busway fight is over, and I'm willing to give it a chance and see if it works out, but hopefully the state will see the value of further expanding CT's rail infrastructure as well and we can actually have both projects implemented.

[The Voice of Reason]

and today, funding was finalized.  Construction starts this spring.


and one more little jab I read I think over the weekend about this....

the 22000 daily passenger trips they are after, or whatever the number is includes existing riders, and I finally read the number of new trips they are after.... 5000

mutha futha! 6 billion dollars, 11 stations 9 miles of pavement for 5000 passenger trips per day.... thats just 2500 people commuting to and from work each day.!!!   not even to mention the loss of train tracks and such

oh well, at least there was also an article about the commuter rail in the HBJ (2016 completion date)

Edited by The Voice of Reason, 21 November 2011 - 04:44 PM.

[Chessplayer]

I applaud the decision to go ahead with the busway; there's a lot in here to like. The route serves low and middle income populations historically ignored by state transportation planners. The busway will be used, just not (at first or exclusively) by the upper middle class suburban repatriates always posited as the salvation of the state's urban areas. So, the short term effect will be increased access to those who already use or stand to benefit from mass transportation as well as economic windfalls from short-term government investment. And this is all something that can be done right now.

More broadly, the Hartford region has seen a steady shift toward a more sober assessment of how to allocate state resources, one that focuses on incremental, steady, responsive improvement as well as eschewing a vision of a final state -- i.e. the pretty pictures of a "finished" Hartford with one-off attractions and shiny urban renewal projects. The busway is an example of this; so is the public safety complex and the emphasis on downtown housing.

In the long run regional mass transportation always strengthens urbanity. Also, New Britain will feel mentally closer to Hartford, especially if there are definite positive economic synergies created between the two downtowns. This is a good development from a regional perspective.

VoR, I'm not sure what you mean by existing riders. Does that mean riders taken from city buses? If so, the busway will be a giant improvement in quality for those who switch. City buses can also be reassigned or curtailed, which should help with either operating costs and coverage. Lastly, I believe the total cost is also $567 million; I'm not sure where you're getting $6 billion.

[beerbeer]

Almost every U.S. busway has failed.  They work pretty well in places like Bogata, Columbia that are teeming with poor people.

There is a huge difference between well designed regional mas transit and busways. One works and one doesn't.

The Griffin Line was a terrific idea. It was killed. This is a boondoogle. It got approved.  The key to any project in Connecticut is how much goes through the DOT to unions to be funneled back to Democrats. it's a sad state of affairs.

[Bill Mocarsky]

In my opinion, the busway as planned doesn't make  a lot of sense.

But nobody asked me.

For what its worth, I would have considered putting the effort and resources into realigning a small segment of tracks so New Britain could be on the New Haven - Springfield line. The older alignment would still be used as a bypass.

[Chessplayer]

Beerbeer, BRT systems with dedicated infrastructure have been a success even in the U.S. Where cities have slapped the BRT name onto limited stop city buses the service hasn't been what's promised -- you can't get something for nothing. As to your other point, there are a lot of poor and working class people living in Hartford and New Britain (as an aside, many are from Brazil) that already use the bus and deserve to have their transportation needs addressed.

Bill, commuter rail offers a different service -- trains every half hour compared with busway frequencies of less than five minutes at peak. I'd argue that the latter service is more valuable and also won't preclude commuter rail in other parts of the region. In fact, the two systems should benefit one-another.

At any rate, looks like it's going to happen. I think (hope) your concerns will be proven wrong.

[The Voice of Reason]

 Chessplayer, on 22 November 2011 - 12:26 AM, said:

VoR, I'm not sure what you mean by existing riders. Does that mean riders taken from city buses? If so, the busway will be a giant improvement in quality for those who switch. City buses can also be reassigned or curtailed, which should help with either operating costs and coverage. Lastly, I believe the total cost is also $567 million; I'm not sure where you're getting $6 billion.

yeah, I know the actual price is just over half a billion, so instead of using 6 billion, my point would have better been made with the figure, 6 BAZILLION as it was a hyperbole, sorry for the confusion.

yes city busses can be reassigned, but who gives a crap when this 600 million dollar project is only capable of taking 5000 people off the road.   yes it creates jobs for certain people, butit will not create economic impact like rail, or like spending 600 million on new apartment towers in downtown New Britain and in dowtown Hartford.  its an absolutely stupid idea.  STUPID!  I lived in Auckland when they build and opened a busway.... yippee, the busway required people north of Auckland to drive south to Albany, get off the motorway and get onto a bus.  by the time you park and get on a bus you would have been in takapuna, and the only thing in your way at that point is the bridge, and well thats why they built the busway because its 290 million NZD pricetag was quite a bit cheaper than a new bridge or tunnel, and there was no way to further expand the existing bridge.  fyi 290 NZD is about 200 million US.  
in addition, they didnt have a robust bus service before, unlike Hartford, where we have tons of bus traffic between NB and Hartford.  
the NZ busway took 500 cars out of the peak commute per day, and is estimated to reach 5100 per day in the future.   while that is great, it is but a  scratch on the surface of the traffic issue.

tell me that there was no traffic monday tuesday wednesday and today through that part of 84.... the holiday had taken far more than 500 workers off the road.  I had traffic every day(except I am not working today, so today might have been OK.  but the busway is an intense expense for such minor gains and limited high end potential while the begining of a rail netowrk has much more potential for both passenger load and future expansion and connectivity.  and a rail system would also allow the city buses to be re-routed.

5000 new bus riders "max capacity"  $560,000,000.00

112,000 per rider.....

I would LOVE to eat crow on this one as I adore public transit, but I just do not see it happening.    The asphalt lobby wins another!

[The Voice of Reason]

 Chessplayer, on 24 November 2011 - 01:53 PM, said:

  Bill, commuter rail offers a different service -- trains every half hour compared with busway frequencies of less than five minutes at peak. I'd argue that the latter service is more valuable and also won't preclude commuter rail in other parts of the region. In fact, the two systems should benefit one-another.  

while I agree, a busway or limited stop bus service feeding a commuter rail is a great option, it is not the backbone system we need, its more like a vestigial tail.  

also 30/minutes per train is just the moronic inception concept for commuter rail some places.  commuter rail can and is typically run on the 15 minutes, and can be even more regular. 5,10, and minutes are the longest spaces between trains in the morning commute times from the North concord station of BART.  there are some 15 minuted gaps, and some 20 minute gaps after 9am.  This is a far off station at the end of a line, so its not even where two lines cross, those stations get trains every couple of minutes.  trains can be stacked up just as much as busses can, but a bus can hold 55 prople, a train can hold 1000.   (future state.... concert ends at XL center, 16000 people pour out of the arena and walk to the bus station, and load busses 50 at a time.... sure the busses were perfectly co-ordinated and the entire fleet was there to greet the crowd, all 50? 80? busses... they slowly leave one by one until they are all gone with 2500? 4000? people?   then the good people of hartford wait and hang out at the bus stop.    or the train swings by, loads 1000 in the time it takes to fill 2-3 busses and wisks them off to NB, Bristol, or even waterbury. each train comes in 5 minutes another train, then another, and thats without stacking every train up.  

So, while a bus is more flexible than a train, the train can much more efficiently cary a more diverse clientele (and their bikes) MUCH FASTER with less pollution.  

besides the panache of being a train city actually matters to young professionals in deciding where to live.


but I too admit its happening and hope it "works" better than anyone imagined and wets the appetite for the NH-H-S commuter rail forcing them to expand rapidly!

[Luca Brasi]

Can we make an "In Progress" thread for the busway project now that construction has started? Recently I would pass the corner of Park and Francis or the corner of New Park and Flatbush and saw work crews clearing these spaces and would wonder what was going on. I never made the connection that construction was getting ready for busway stations. I guess because I am not a fan of this project, I never really followed it and because of it, never made the connection.

And can someone explain something to me? I thought the whole concept of this project was to pave over existing rail lines.. is that still happening? Because when you go to the CT Fastrak website http://www.ctfastrak.com/index.php/en and look at the site plans, it shows the busway as a paved road NEXT to existing Amtrack lines which are still obviously in use.

[The Voice of Reason]

it is paving over rail right of way in most cases.  I think the rail bed was 4+ tracks wide

it is taking up a great dfeal of that space, but leaving some rail there.  The real issue is that at one point along the route the busway squeezes out the rail down to 1 track, so it virtually eliminates the ability to put commuter rail through the area without major MAJOR changes.

thats my understanding anyways

[Theophrastus Bombastus]

so it begins... i cannot see how this succeeds

[Luca Brasi]

At one point I asked someone with the city why we didn't just buy trains and use existing rails rather than pave them over. He told me it would be virtually impossible without raising the tracks above existing roads (he pointed out the intersections like we see at Flatbush, Hamilton, etc.) because with trains running every 10 minutes at peak, you would virtually stop traffic constantly at rush hour which would be disastrous.

[Luca Brasi]

Theophrastus Bombastus, on 23 May 2012 - 01:04 PM, said:

so it begins... i cannot see how this succeeds

Agreed. I hope I am wrong, but there is a stigma attached to riding city busses everywhere and I don't think this will be any different. I also thought that these busway stations would be enclosed. Looking at the website they clearly are not. Of course the renderings show nice summer days... what commuter  is going to wait in sub freezing temperatures or inclement weather at these outdoor stops?

[MichaelQReilly]

Luca Brasi, on 23 May 2012 - 01:24 PM, said:

Agreed. I hope I am wrong, but there is a stigma attached to riding city busses everywhere and I don't think this will be any different. I also thought that these busway stations would be enclosed. Looking at the website they clearly are not. Of course the renderings show nice summer days... what commuter  is going to wait in sub freezing temperatures or inclement weather at these outdoor stops?

I don't think the buses are quite that bad. In 2007 I was working downtown and didn't need my car to leave work for the day. For a couple of months I took the express bus in and out from Glastonbury. I was pleasantly surprised with the experience. If I didn't need to travel during the work day, I would definitely still use the bus.

The intra city buses are another story. I've never used those.

[HartfordTycoon]

I hope this project can somehow prove to be a success and not a total boondoggle and waste of money. I really do. Only time will tell.