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The Transportation and Mass Transit Megathread


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On 2/19/2022 at 7:25 PM, Pdt2f said:


I fixed it for them:

91E969B4-8B47-4D95-8659-444EA309A2D1.thumb.jpeg.5ba0ad16f420b2e3ee5f0b56bfecb8e5.jpeg

Most of the proposed lines are awkward looking, like the one connecting Meridian straight to New Orleans, but skips on Jackson? Or the lines to Montgomery and Auburn from Atlanta, but the line skips Birmingham? Such a Bizarre plan. Connection from Louisville and Memphis to Nashville makes sense, but instead Nashville is just an extension from Atlanta. 

Edited by MagicPotato
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On 2/19/2022 at 9:27 PM, MLBrumby said:

Weird... and the line from Chicago to New Orleans is wide open, but with a couple of exceptions NOBODY lives along that line.  Amtrak has been notoriously mismanaged from its inception. 

That's a great point. The fact that the Chicago-New Orleans route bypasses St. Louis is just silly. There should, theoretically, be plenty of traffic between Chicago-St. Louis-Memphis-New Orleans (especially tossing in some of the low and mid tier cities along the route like Cape Girardeau and Jackson), but as it is to get from Memphis to St. Louis you have to go all the way to Chicago. So, of course no one is going to make that trip when they could fly, drive, or take the bus, even though the distance between St. Louis and Memphis is pretty much the sweet spot for intercity rail travel.

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25 minutes ago, Armacing said:

And look at that unused river right next to the train.  I still contend river & lake passenger ferries would be less capital intensive, more flexible, and just unique enough to capture the public's attention.

I'd have to agree to disagree that river ferries could be a suitable substitute for passenger rail, but I absolutely agree that they can and should play a role in a larger transportation plan.  It really does make a lot of sense!  

Edited by BnaBreaker
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26 minutes ago, Armacing said:

And look at that unused river right next to the train.  I still contend river & lake passenger ferries would be less capital intensive, more flexible, and just unique enough to capture the public's attention.

The biggest issue is the condition of the banks in many places. especially along downtown (with the exception of Riverfront Park) the banks are pretty steep an unnavigable without extensive engineering. Water Taxis have been thrown around a fair amount in recent years and would certainly play a role in our greater transit needs. Especially because of the sheer lack of river crossings. I always found it unbelievable how little we have in the form of crossing the river. 

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18 hours ago, donNdonelson2 said:

I remember there being significant problems with river bank erosion when Opryland’s river taxis were running regularly. They were forced to reduce their speed dramatically  in order to lower the wake and limit impact on the banks. 

Good point.  But it's probably a good idea to reinforce the river banks for a variety of reasons, not just to accommodate increased river traffic.  So I look at it as a multi-purpose improvement to the river that guards against industrial/public boat traffic and erosion from floods.  If we truly want to make the river into a centerpiece for the city, then we need to improve the banks to make it more durable for human use and resistant to natural erosion.  If that reinforcement can also take the form of a "riverwalk" that provides opportunities for pedestrian recreation and bike riders to and from the water taxi docks, then so much the better.  Not every part of the river will need to be reinforced, only those parts vulnerable to erosion.  Some of the banks are solid rock.

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On 2/24/2022 at 7:10 AM, markhollin said:

Nashville Dept. of Transportation has released WalknBike 2022, a five-year update to Nashville's sidewalk and bikeways strategic plan. According to the report, NDOT plans to complete 148 miles of bikeways and 23 miles of sidewalks from 2022-2024.

More at Fox17News here:

https://fox17.com/news/local/ndot-releases-walknbike-update-to-create-safer-environment-for-pedestrians?utm_source=Sailthru&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=2022.02.24 NASH&utm_term=NASHtoday Subscribers - MASTER

Full report here:

https://www.nashville.gov/sites/default/files/2022-02/WalknBike_Plan_Final.pdf?ct=1645552096&utm_source=Sailthru&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=2022.02.24 NASH&utm_term=NASHtoday Subscribers - MASTER
 

Screen Shot 2022-02-24 at 7.06.09 AM.png

They’ve got some balls to call Gallatin Pike in Madison a “bikeway” when at best it’s an alternating series of painted lanes and sharrows.

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3 hours ago, GregH said:

As someone who has biked in Nashville a lot, I think it is both true that Nashville is a better biking city than most people realize or give it credit for, and that some of the "bike infrastructure" is really bad and/or misguided. If I'm reading that map right, it considers Hillsboro Pike between 440 and Green Hills to be a bikeway. That's a 40 mph 5-lane road with no shoulder that is slammed with cars at all hours and honestly somewhat terrifying to even drive on. Similarly, even though parts of Gallatin and Charlotte have bike lanes, if you are occasionally spitting bikers out into a sharrow situation on a busy road you are setting them up to have a bad time that will scare them and make them not want to bike, no matter how nice and protected other portions of the route are. If you're slapping a sharrow on a street with a 40 mph speed limit you've already lost and you're just wasting paint. They should focus efforts on finding and marking routes on quiet side streets, even if they're less direct.

Part of the problem (and one that is shared by all cities looking to upgrade their bike infrastructure) is that the preferred applications for bike infrastructure change frequently. Generally if you are driving and turn on an unfamiliar road you know where to go: stay between the yellow and white lines. Similarly for pedestrians, you're on a sidewalk or mixed-use path. But if you're on a bike you might be in the travel lane or on a path or in a bike lane either one-way on the right side of the road or two-way on the "wrong" side. This is not to mention bike boxes and other features that may or may not be present. So it's hard to keep up consistent infrastructure and consistent expectations for what is and isn't a bike-friendly street, especially on retrofits on limited ROW.

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