CATS Long Term Transit Plan - Silver, Red Lines

[southslider]

On 2/4/2023 at 7:41 AM, elrodvt said:

And miss out on our share of a "once in a generation investment in transit"?

Even if the stars aligned, CATS won't be ready for a Full Funding Grant Agreement for Silver Line until the BIL/IIJA expires.  And since Council and MTC are keeping the higher cost alignment mostly missing Uptown, the project may not even achieve a high enough rating to gain Federal approval to enter Final Design.

Edited February 5, 2023 by southslider

[KJHburg]

Good news on the bus front

Joe Bruno
@JoeBrunoWSOC9
·
1h
No strike for CATS:

Bus operators of SMART Local 1715 in Charlotte, N.C., on Saturday, Feb. 4, 2023, ratified a new collective bargaining agreement with a vote margin of 20 to 1 
@wsoctv

[JRCLT]

The density Charlotte needs is one conducive to a lively neighborhood and a land use that accommodates walkability. That doesn’t necessarily need to be skyscrapers or buildings taller than 4 stories give or take. Walking to places should be encouraged…clearly obesity and overweight in the US are clear indicators of not just our diet but our exercise habits and overall health. That of which is in no insignificant contribution by our extreme car oriented society.

My comment on density.

[southslider]

^Urban design is essentially more crucial than density. Height matters less than vibrant street-level spaces and the interaction of streets, as if an outdoor room.  Urban spaces must carefully balance the invitation and comfort intrinsically sensed by people to linger, interact, and move freely.

[kayman]

On 2/1/2023 at 5:33 PM, MarcoPolo said:

This thread is an everything-and-the-kitchen-sink discussion.  Very enjoyable!  

A few points to keep in mind as you continue.  Apples to apples comparisons are possible and valid as long as geography is kept consistent for the places being compared, ie: the physical locations of the communities discussed, such as southeast US, midwest US, west US; and the increment of measure kept non-political, ie: not based on jurisdictional boundaries.  Charlotte and Atlanta are very much an apples to apples comparison regarding their urban structure and physical location, and even though they have a different form of government it is arguable through observation that they have behaved very similarly due to the oversized business power base in both Cities.   The only ingredient that differentiates the two is "time".    In every other way they are the same.   Older brother and younger brother.  Holding physical location consistent and adding time allows you to travel forward or backward along a communities historic arc and make observations that are meaningful, even into the future.  Same can be applied to political ideologies as long as you don't hold a party name as the constant.  As already brought up by a few in reference to former Mayor Pat, ideologies within parties do change over time resulting in beliefs that can be very different from those held before.   A further wrinkle in the "political" discussion is the need to isolate an individual within a party, and where they call home, ie: urban democrat, suburban democrat, rural democrat; urban republican, rural republican, suburban republican, as a partial influence on the approach to their ideology.  A few thoughts to add to the salad bowl of topics on this thread in no particular order...........

Atlanta was always a "bigger city" than Charlotte, and its infrastructure "boom" happened earlier than Charlotte's for many reasons, not least of which was the benefit of having a President from the same State, at a time when the only infrastructure options were highways, freeways, and wide suburban arterials.   While that is still somewhat true, the 70's did not benefit at all from our present understanding that such infrastructure actually dilutes urban "stuff", dispersing it across the landscape.  The photo of Atlanta's Downtown Connector is a prime example.  It is the reason Atlanta's CBD office total (not population total) is not larger, yes you read correctly.... not greater, not denser.   The wonderful aerial of "downtown" Atlanta (Downtown and Midtown which are considered the CBD for the City) posted by CarolinaDayDreaming at the top of this page represents just over 44 million square feet of office space, the Nation's 13 largest downtown.  But, the corridor is just over 3 miles in length!  There are a dozen cities with larger CBD's, including three from our northern neighbor Canada, (Calgary is as large as Atlanta, Montreal significantly larger, and Toronto...well Toronto is the 4th largest CBD in North America, after DC, Chicago...and you guessed it, NYC).   That same 3 mile distance in these cities, and others with larger CBD's, encompass much more office space.   An interesting aside, the Charlotte CBD, is usually defined as Uptown, South End and Elizabeth.   Some add The Plaza.  I do not because of intervening non-office land uses, and an insignificant office total.   Here is an interesting observation.....if you overlay this geography (Clanton Rd to Brookshire Freeway) onto Atlanta's Downtown/Midtown corridor (1-20 Interchange to I-85/I-75 split) you will see they are almost identical in length, and if you smooth out some of the bulges here and there, they are roughly the same shape too.  Charlotte has 26 million square feet in its footprint, just over half of what Atlanta has in its footprint.   Food for thought as Charlotte's CBD continues to grow in the years to come.   A wonderful comparison study opportunity that would inform some of the questions raised by those on this thread.  

Back to the ingredient of "time", Atlanta was a victim of substantial State and Federal Highway dollars, which is why the City has such an extensive highway system.  MARTA is an interesting aberration in that same period of time, one caused by the local desire to be recognized as world class (similar to the City's infatuation with hosting the Olympics) and not truly an endeavor based on mobility freedom.   Because MARTA was mostly built along freeways, (sound familiar..... hint, hint!) 40 years were required for suburban development in the City to be  begin to modify in form.   During the 40 years some of you may recall the very racist alternative wording of the initials MARTA?   This achilles heel design flaw is why so little has been added to the system since its inauguration, and why repeated measures to extend it into surrounding counties was, and still is, a battle today.  Fortunately, they did manage to route it through the center of the City, which is a major reason (hint, hint) select suburban stations have experienced turbo charged redevelopment recently.  These mini real estate booms will be the carrot that entices others in the metro to rethink their ideological stance against MARTA.  And, as already argued....this will be precisely the wrong foundation to argue for such an expansion.

In the meantime, Kermit, I like your list of "things to try to implement while we wait for the adults to come back to the table" as regards the Silver Line.   All our sound.  

About Atlanta envy.........

I believe the real reason many verbally fret about Charlotte becoming Atlanta has more to due with repressed envy at Atlanta's "status" which its rapid growth has bestowed it within the national urban pecking order.  Kinda like, "oh, go ahead and brag about your airport, movie studios, music, sports, shopping, rich folk....but look at all your traffic......what a nightmare place to live!  If that's what it takes to have all that then count us out!"   That is every Charlottean's refrain for the last thirty years when any discussion of Atlanta finds its way into a conversation, (often such conversations happen on weekends while driving down to shop at Lenox Mall, see a concert, or stay at a fine hotel).   Meanwhile, if I were to drop you blindfolded in parts of suburban Atlanta from which you could not see towers on the skyline, you would not discern any difference to Charlotte.  If you could go back in a time machine 25 years, the resemblance between the two cities would be even more striking.   And every time Charlotte "achieves" some new milestone shared with Atlanta the fear of becoming Atlanta seems to dissipate, even though, just like Atlanta, every such milestone brings us closer to the traffic nightmare we critique it for.   Kayman, I particularly enjoyed your post about Atlanta.  It's a bit "all over the place" like the discussion on the last few pages of this thread.   Would love to share stories about ATL with you.  It sounds like we may have been working there at similar times through the years?  Your follow up post I'm not so sure about.  Political will is important, but uninformed political will is destructive.  Nobody has properly discussed, presented, debated what transit is and why it's important, and specifically how it can be provided to Charlotte's residents.  As I've stated before, this is CAT's and the City's fault.  In this deep information chasm, politicians and journalists mouthing off and amplifying uninformed opinions only serves to further derail progress.  Your reply to Kermit hints that you believe "political will" is the secret sauce for progress.  This wrongly assumes that politically willed outcomes always represent progress.  This is not the case.  History is replete with examples to the contrary, almost all resulting from a lack of knowledge and understanding.  Kermit was right to disparage the article and quote.  

Back to envy... Atlanta had its teenage growth spurt spatially at the precise moment in time when the certrifugal forces stretching cities across the landscape where at their peak.   And in Atlanta, these forces were turbo charged by the extensive highway system gifted to the metro area by the federal government under Jimmy Carter's presidency.   Charlotte did not receive its "highway gift" until much later.  Had we been unlucky enough to have had the outerbelt completed before the early 80's the City of Charlotte would look much different today.   Fortunately for us, Charlotte's teenage years were largely free of steroid use unlike our bigger brother, who came back from summer camp a walking billboard for popping roids, lol!  Had Atlanta not constructed the highways it did, much of the growth in the suburban office sector scattered along the northern perimeter today would have instead located along the Peachtree corridor.  Imagine more than doubling the office stock from downtown to past Lenox Mall!  The repercussions of that on residential and retail would have been impressive.  Atlanta could have laid claim today to being an "experientially" world class urban place, instead of relying largely on statistics to fill in the many holes in that facade.  One big hole is the food scene.  While "ok", for a City its size, it greatly underperforms.  

My office market is bigger than your office market.........

I know many of you are data geeks.  Through my work I have access to many surveys and studies with all kinds of urban data sets.  I've attached one which may be of interest given the posts about CBD's, office space, comparing them etc.... It is not complete.   It represents several public data surveys from groups like Cushman, JLL and others, but with some proprietary algorithms to parse the variables with more precision.  Don't fixate too much on the exact numbers as it is almost impossible to achieve total accuracy for measures such as these.   Even amongst the providers, the figures vary.   What is important is the ranking of the places and these are pretty accurate.  Charlotte holds up well, especially in new office construction.   The arrows indicate velocity of change based on office market size.   Red is hot, blue is not.  Charlotte is in an exclusive pack of fast movers, joining Vancouver, Austin, and Raleigh     All the others on the list are growing at a slower pace, holding their own, or barely inching forward.   The CBD list is especially interesting if you've never been exposed to such rankings.   I have not provided you the geographies for each CBD, but they are based on industry standard assessments, and where such clusters abut other clusters, but may have an intervening river, lake, park, or freeway corridor, less than a mile in width, my algorithms combine them.   I also have not included government office space, which most providers also break out separately.  

Ok, I couldn't resist!   You will notice that Raleigh does not make the CBD top 26 list......even though it is represented on the other two lists..........hmmmm why is that?  Well, the largest concentration of office space in the Triangle is the RTP, roughly 13,400,000 ft2.  That's over twice as large as downtown Raleigh's 6,544,510 ft2, (if you add government space the total inches up by almost a couple million square feet).   And yes, if you go back to do the same to DC, you would understand why it is widely recognized as the second largest office concentration, and the second largest CBD (well north of 200,000,000 sf2) in North America.  Only NY is bigger.

 

 

 

 

@MarcoPolo Yes we have likely worked on the same projects in several cities including here in Charlotte.  I understand where you are coming from on the rebuttal. However,  you have understand that politicos (politicians)  maneuver while us the citizens (constituency) must make them move policy along to passage and into implementation.  Altman has the mindset to listen to us the constituency to make the necessary changes to policy or policy direction with regional mass transit. Also she's a younger and newer so she understands the pertinence of why policy needs to change. 

Also the local news publications tend to take statements out of context because of their lazy journalism style of not verifying things. I've seen several times where the local media have transposed the Charlotte Regional Transportation Planning Organization, the Charlotte urban area metropolitan planning organization, with the Metropolitan Transit Commission, the policy board for the Charlotte Area Transit System (CATS). That's why I suggest that. 

[rancenc]

Hopefully a new operational partnership can be developed with a new company to stem the decline in bus service and ridership.....

https://www.wfae.org/charlotte-area/2023-02-06/cats-to-hire-new-company-to-mange-bus-system

 

[Matthew.Brendan]

Imagine circulator loops that run between popular nodes. Imagine timely frequencies. Imagine upgraded waiting spots that arent just a pole in the dirt. Improving ridership is easy. Implementing any of it seems impossible.

[Hushpuppy321]

Does anyone know how CATS (Charlotte Transit) operation/frequency/reliability/ridership compares to that of CATS (Capital Transit Raleigh), or is this an Apples to Oranges comparison?  Maybe our resident Transit Expert @kermit knows….

 

[kermit]

On 2/9/2023 at 9:45 AM, Hushpuppy321 said:

Does anyone know how CATS (Charlotte Transit) operation/frequency/reliability/ridership compares to that of CATS (Capital Transit Raleigh), or is this an Apples to Oranges comparison?  Maybe our resident Transit Expert @kermit knows….

 

Thanks for the vote of confidence but I am just a guy who reads a lot.

Interesting question though and one that can be answered. My read on reputation is the Raleigh bus system has always provided low quality service (e.g. 2 buses per hour on list routes) but generally did that reliably. CATS was (until the Lewis era) know as a bus system with much higher frequency but more inconsiently (which I guess might go hand in hand).

One way to answer the question of ridership is to look at bus ridership per route mile. But that can be awkward to find

Raleigh (GoRaleigh -- this does not include GoTriangle)

Number of stops (best proxy I could find for route length): 1,300

Ave daily ridership: 16,000 (feels like wiki authors are kinda casual w their numbers)

Daily Bus ridership per stop:  12.3

Charlotte CATS (BOD local, excludes express and rail):
(this ridership number is from the May 2022 CATS quarterly report, they changed their reporting after May to a much less detailed report?)

Number of stops 2,961 (data from here, not sure about reliability: https://moovitapp.com/index/en/public_transit-lines-Charlotte_NC-3660-857372)

Ave daily bus ridership: 17,185 (weekday)

Daily Bus ridership per stop:  5.8

Some insight on operations might be gleaned from Digging into the FTA transit system database: https://www.transit.dot.gov/ntd/transit-agency-profiles?field_geography_target_id=All&field_address_administrative_area=NC&combine&page=1

CATS pays $4.24 per passenger mile for bus trips ($2.82 for rail trips)

Go Raleigh pays $2.43 per passenger mile for bus trips (less than CATS pays for rail trips)

While the numbers make it look like GoRaleigh is kicking CATS' ass, these numbers don't tell us anything about the quality of service being provided. It is possible that GoRaleigh operates once per hour on many routes (which would give them lower costs per mile) while CATS has 15 minute service on some routes (I don't know if this is the case or not).

 

Edited February 10, 2023 by kermit

[Hushpuppy321]

3 hours ago, kermit said:

Thanks for the vote of confidence but I am just a guy who reads a lot.

Interesting question though and one that can be answered. FWIW the Raleigh bus system has always had a reputation as providing low quality service (e.g. 2 buses per hour on list routes) but generally did that reliably. CATS was (until the Lewis era) know as a bus system with much higher frequency but more inconsiently. 

One way to answer the question is to look at bus ridership per route mile. But that can be awkward to find
 

Raleigh (GoRaleigh -- this does not include GoTriangle)

Number of stops (best proxy I could find for route length): 1,300

Ave daily ridership: 16,000 (feels like wiki authors are kinda casual w their numbers)

Daily Bus ridership per stop:  12.3

Charlotte CATS (BOD local, excludes express and rail):
(this ridership number is from the May 2022 CATS quarterly report, they changed their reporting after May to a much less detailed report?)

Number of stops 2,961 (data from here, not sure about reliability: https://moovitapp.com/index/en/public_transit-lines-Charlotte_NC-3660-857372)

Ave daily bus ridership: 17,185 (weekday)

Daily Bus ridership per stop:  5.8

Digging into the FTA transit system database: https://www.transit.dot.gov/ntd/transit-agency-profiles?field_geography_target_id=All&field_address_administrative_area=NC&combine&page=1

CATS pays $4.24 per passenger mile for bus trips ($2.82 for rail trips)

Go Raleigh pays $2.43 per passenger mile for bus trips (less than CATS pays for rail trips)

 

While the numbers make it look like GoRaleigh is kicking CATS' ass, these numbers tell us nothing about the quality of service. It is possible that GoRaleigh operates once per hour on many routes (giving them lower costs per mile) while CATS has 15 minute service on some routes (I don't know if this is the case or not)

 

Thanks!  As someone who moved to Charlotte from Raleigh (2013) I was initially shocked to see how Robust Bus service in Charlotte was as compared with Raleigh.  I guess Service was on the decline from 2013 to now.  I never used to see as many buses in Raleigh and service ended on a lot of routes much earlier in the evening (Wake) than in Mecklenburg.

Edited February 9, 2023 by Hushpuppy321

[carolina1792]

Since the 2016 Wake County Half Cent Sales Tax Referendum Passed the GoRaleigh (formerly Capital Area Transit) has slowly shifted gears from trying to build a light rail system  to shaping up the bus system in Wake County/Raleigh first before investing in a light rail transit system.  Durham/Orange however decided to invest in a light rail system that ultimately failed and cost that region over $150 million and a decade of transit development. 

Since the Transit Referendum passed, Raleigh/Wake created a new comprehensive and cohesive Wake County Transit Plan. Per the mission statement of the plan:

 

"The Transit Plan envisions four “big moves” to connect the region across county lines, connect all Wake County communities to the transit network, provide frequent, reliable urban mobility to the densifying areas of the County, and give enhanced access to transit across Wake County. This will be accomplished by tripling of bus service in Wake County, investing in commuter rail and bus rapid transit infrastructure to enhance speed and reliability for transit customers, and focusing on improving the transit customer experience."

 

1) Add new bus services. More GoRaleigh lines, expanded GoCary system,  the city of Garner and Knightdale are now working on bus systems. 

2) Increase bus service from 4:45 AM to Midnight on most routes.

3) Add frequency, reduce 1 hour headways to 30 or 15 minutes. 

4) Decentralize the bus system by creating new regional transit hubs. This includes adding local bus service. For example, routes 23L, 24L, 25L. These routes operation in a smaller section of the city as local routes unlike regular bus service that starts in downtown Raleigh. 

5) Build out a network of 4 Bus Rapid Transit lines (now maybe 5 lines) that will provide an express connection from these new regional transit centers to a main transit hub downtown. 

6) Ultimately, the Triangle Commuter Rail line.  The 'main transit center' that is currently under construction is called the Raleigh Union Station Bus Station and the hope is that all the bus services will funnel into this new transit center so that people from around Wake County can reasonable use the commuter rail system to get to Durham. Example, take local bus from east Raleigh to a BRT line that will reach the main station then transfer to the commuter rail line to reach Durham. 

 

Of course, COVID has delayed or slowed down much of the progress made however the ridership levels are starting to go back up to pre-covid levels now.

 

Big Move 1: Connect Regionally Cross-county connections will be strengthened with a variety of bus and rail investments. The Wake County Transit Plan will fund the Wake County share of a new commuter rail in the NCRR corridor. This commuter rail line also could eventually extend to Johnston County to the east, with state, federal, and Johnston County support. The Transit Plan also would enhance the connections to Orange County, RDU, and other key destinations with more frequent express bus routes while providing strong connections to the planned light rail line linking Orange and Durham Counties. Other agencies, including the adjacent counties, would participate in funding the interegional connections. This figure illustrates major elements of each connection across the region proposed in the first 10 years.

Big Move 2: Connect All Wake County Communities The new plan will connect all 12 municipalities. This will include links between the communities and downtown Raleigh. New links also are provided between some of the smaller communities for employment, shopping, and medical trips. These connections will be a combination of 30- and 60-minute all day service, peak-only service, and commuter rail. The proposed plan will connect the twelve municipalities, RTP, the airport and many other major destinations. The figure to the right shows the range of services that will connect the Wake County communities. Thirty-minute all-day services connect to Cary, Morrisville, RTP, the airport, and the Wake Tech campus on the northern edge of Fuquay-Varina. Sixty-minute all-day services connect to Apex, Garner, Knightdale, and Wake Forest. Peak focused services, including the regional commuter rail, are provided to and between other communities and destinations. Additionally, BRT infrastructure such as dedicated busways, will benefit all buses using those routes. As the communities grow and change over time, it is anticipated that the transit connections also will change and grow.

Big Move 3: Frequent, Reliable Urban Mobility The size of the frequent network (15 minutes or better all day) in Raleigh and Cary will increase from 17 miles to 83 miles. Weekend and evening service hours will expand throughout the County, which is particularly important to people working in the service sector and other jobs that don’t follow a traditional 9-to-5 weekday schedule. BRT improvements along the north, east, south, and west corridors will improve the speed, reliability, and amenities of bus services. Frequent service follows patterns of high demand (usually characterized by density, walkability, linearity, and proximity). BRT is a key element of enhancing urban mobility in the Transit Plan. This can comprise many different speed and reliability improvements, including exclusive busways in many locations as well as priority treatment at traffic signals and fixed stations with off-board fare collection to speed boarding.

Big Move 4: Enhanced Access to Transit The Transit Plan will improve fixed-route service by extending the number of hours per day and days per week the transit system operates, increasing frequency and expanding the extents of many fixed routes, especially in Raleigh and Cary . The Transit Plan also will improve nonfixed route paratransit service by increasing funds for TRACS (serving non-urbanized Wake County). Finally, the plan includes a 50% match for towns to establish local services . The towns will work with the County and transit agencies to set the frequency and span of service, and choose the sizes and types of vehicles based on the needs of their residents . The 50% match would be available for the 10 municipalities (other than Raleigh and Cary) that are not currently directly funding transit systems .

 

GoRaleigh has stated in peak COVID 2021 that the daily ridership of GoRaleigh system was about 18,000. 

 

Edited February 11, 2023 by carolina1792

[Reverie39]

RUSBUS is one of the coolest developments underway in the state. Big high-rise project on top of the station too.

[JRCLT]

RUSBUS is one of the coolest developments underway in the state. Big high-rise project on top of the station too.

CGS needs to catch up!!

[15895]

3 hours ago, JeanClt said:

CGS needs to catch up!!

Which is sort of crazy IMO given the actual platform and infrastructure is in place. 

Clayton would know, but are we seriously just waiting for basically an office tower to get going before the Amtrak Station is actually built? We could be years away from passengers utilizing Gateway? 

Personally, I’m fine with a stand alone Gateway. It looks more grand IMO (that and there’s plenty of lots uptown that can be developed…). And I dunno. It just seems like by the time it’s built, due to inflation etc we probably could’ve built it cheaper as a Public/government project. I wouldn’t be surprised if they too pull out like Hines did. But. Well seeee. I’d seriously be happy with a Temporary cheap Amtrak station uptown - the current one… is a garbage can (I assume we can all agree on that and no one will be offended? If so xD sorry) 

[Reverie39]

How difficult is it to build a station structure that looks nice while also allowing for potential major future additions like a high-rise on top?

[southslider]

^The greatest difficulty may be convincing Greyhound to move.

[kermit]

59 minutes ago, southslider said:

^The greatest difficulty may be convincing Greyhound to move.

This makes me wonder how confident we can be that Greyhound is a viable ongoing business. Now that they compete with firms like Megabus etc. who can offer bottom dollar fares because they don't maintain any stations. I know the Greydog has been through quite a few bankruptcies, even before the new bus-light competition existed. I would imagine they will needs to find ways to trim their cost structure and stations seem like the obvious option.

Just wondering, and I guess this is just academic since (IIRC) they owned their Charlotte station space.

Edited February 15, 2023 by kermit

[#1Son]

21 minutes ago, southslider said:

^The greatest difficulty may be convincing Greyhound to move.

IDK if Greyhound is the hold up.  They have already moved the bus station to a temp location off 4th and Graham.  My guess is Amtrak doesn't want to commit to building a temp facility and is willing to continue using the N. Tryon location until the new CGS is finished.

https://goo.gl/maps/NsAoV2Hk4kQs82GS9

[videtur quam contuor]

http://landmarkscommission.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/Charlotte-Union-Bus-Terminal-SR.pdf

This is the bus station I most remember. I had a job in the miocene period where I took items to be shipped by bus every afternoon after my work day was over. At that time buses went to so many of the out of the way and off main highway locations. UPS and FEDeX were nothing like today or undreamed of. 

Last time I was in the current location was 25 years ago when my wallet was stolen and a phone call from someone said he would return it for a reward. I called the police and they went with me to the rendez-vous point, the bus station. I retrieved my wallet, they had their man, he was homeless and thus had nothing to lose. He claimed he "found" it and with no other evidence he returned to his exciting life.

[kermit]

19 hours ago, #1Son said:

IDK if Greyhound is the hold up.  They have already moved the bus station to a temp location off 4th and Graham.  My guess is Amtrak doesn't want to commit to building a temp facility and is willing to continue using the N. Tryon location until the new CGS is finished.

https://goo.gl/maps/NsAoV2Hk4kQs82GS9

Amtrak does have some tricky operational issues in Charlotte and I have not seen anything about how they will get resolved when they move to Gateway. First, we are a crew change point for the Crescent and an origin point for all other trains, so there needs to be a supply of secure parking, break room, etc. for all of these crews. Second, Amtrak needs to handle baggage here so they will need storage space, carts, elevator to the platform, etc. Finally, Charlotte is a refueling point for the Crescent and Carolinian. At the existing station they have a fuel truck drive up a ramp from the parking lot to the platform, but that does not look possible to me at Gateway. I am sure they have a plan for all this (and some of the end of run stuff can happen at the new equipment yard off Summit) but much of it will need to happen at the new station. Basically Gateway will need much more than a temporary shelter and platform canopy before Amtrak can start running there.

Edited February 16, 2023 by kermit

[southslider]

3 hours ago, #1Son said:

IDK if Greyhound is the hold up.  They have already moved the bus station to a temp location off 4th and Graham. 

https://goo.gl/maps/NsAoV2Hk4kQs82GS9

Greyhound at 4th and Graham covers part of the planned Charlotte Gateway Station site.

[RANYC]

It seems I'm always getting alerts that the rail is operating on delays due to manpower constraints, which really just reinforces the general perception that the rail really can't be an essential part of a choice rider's daily mobility plan.

[JRCLT]

It seems I'm always getting alerts that the rail is operating on delays due to manpower constraints, which really just reinforces the general perception that the rail really can't be an essential part of a choice rider's daily mobility plan.

Isn’t that the same with busses too? The answer might be automation or increasing wages…at least when it comes to rail.

[CLT2014]

34 minutes ago, JeanClt said:

Isn’t that the same with busses too? The answer might be automation or increasing wages…at least when it comes to rail.

Yes, both rail and bus operations are struggling to back fill positions. Older workers have retired and younger people are not interested in a career operating public transit. The rail operator position requires a CDL B license or higher too.... and there are 3,000 CDL job openings within 35 miles of Charlotte. Many of those CDL job postings are offering $5k - $10k sign on bonuses and if you have a CDL A, you can easily make $75k+ instead of the $50k as a rail operator for CATS. That leaves CATS largely targeting the CDL B crowd, who can work on getting their CDL A in parallel and then quit for higher pay when they can move on to CDL A positions. I have also not seen CATS offer tuition reimbursement... meaning those without a CDL B need to spend ~$3,500+ in training and CATS does not appear to offer tuition reimbursement or a sign on bonus like other job postings that require a CDL.

Overall, the local labor market remains unbalanced. ~3% (~49,000 people) unemployment in the metro area... but over 70,000 job openings. A portion of the unemployed population is not going to be eligible for many of the 70k job openings (criminal record, can't pass drug test, skill mismatch, et.) leaving significant constraint in the labor market. 

Edited February 18, 2023 by CLT2014

[lit]

On 2/18/2023 at 9:38 AM, CLT2014 said:

Yes, both rail and bus operations are struggling to back fill positions. Older workers have retired and younger people are not interested in a career operating public transit. The rail operator position requires a CDL B license or higher too.... and there are 3,000 CDL job openings within 35 miles of Charlotte. Many of those CDL job postings are offering $5k - $10k sign on bonuses and if you have a CDL A, you can easily make $75k+ instead of the $50k as a rail operator for CATS. That leaves CATS largely targeting the CDL B crowd, who can work on getting their CDL A in parallel and then quit for higher pay when they can move on to CDL A positions. I have also not seen CATS offer tuition reimbursement... meaning those without a CDL B need to spend ~$3,500+ in training and CATS does not appear to offer tuition reimbursement or a sign on bonus like other job postings that require a CDL.

Overall, the local labor market remains unbalanced. ~3% (~49,000 people) unemployment in the metro area... but over 70,000 job openings. A portion of the unemployed population is not going to be eligible for many of the 70k job openings (criminal record, can't pass drug test, skill mismatch, et.) leaving significant constraint in the labor market. 

So you're saying there's a chance.... I could maybe drive the choo-choo train?