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Charlotte Center City Streetcar Network


Sabaidee

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31 minutes ago, kermit said:

Phase 2 ends between Sunnyside and Central so before the light. 

Light rail / streetcar vehicles are not allowed to cross ‘real’ rail tracks at grade for any reason. The phase 3 plan remains (afaik) to cross Central, run down Hawthorne and go under CSX and then turn right (east) through the Barnhardt Manufacturing land. I think it returns to Central using Clement. This is kinda wonky but I don’t believe that thinking has changed on this since the initial sketch design.

I assume there's no way in Hell this might get some sort of exemption? Only reason being that this seems like a definite cost burden, plus, selfishly, it would look cool running in front of my building. Though where phase 2 will stop is more than convenient for me, and I will more than likely be in this building, either alone or with my roommate when it opens. 

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8 hours ago, kermit said:

Nope, the FTA would never grant an exemption. Even if he’ll froze over and that did, CSX would never allow it to happen.

Honestly I don't see what the issue is, freight and passenger tracks cross each-other all the time. They're called diamond crossings. It just seems that this layout will add unnecessary cost to the project, add time to the route, and be kind of weird going down a very tight side street. There's already not enough room to drive two wide down Clement, much less run a two track streetcar route. Whats the risk with crossing a freight track? Follow bus rules. I guess if anything this will be a unique route because of this, but still, knowing how overly cautious CATS is, I can guarantee this "kink" will be a nightmare. My only "hope" might be that the manufacturing plants sees the increased value of the land and sells to a developer. I hate to see industry leave, but at the same time that land could be better utilized as TOD. 

Diamond Crossing.jpg

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^ The issue isn’t the tracks, its the vehicles.  The FTA has a separate set of regulations for transit vehicles that allows them to be significantly lighter than ‘real’ rail cars (for passengers).  In order for the FTA to permit the lighter vehicles they stipulated that the LRT vehicles could NEVER be commingled with ‘real’ rail since the risk of collision was grave for occupants of the lighter vehicles. 

This is an area of regulation that the US is really bad at, every other country of the world has lighter rail equipment and fewer regulations about commingling (they protect against collision with better signaling). These strength/weight requirements are also part of the reason why we don't have true HSR here — our ‘real’ rail cars are tanks and it takes lots of power to get them up to speed.

Edited by kermit
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5 hours ago, nicholas said:

^Is there any chance that the streetcar lanes will be dedicated just to the streetcar? Clearly there's plenty of room for a dedicated vehicular lane, and I feel like the west side of Trade St isn't heavily traveled enough to warrant four vehicle lanes.

Certainly a candidate for a future push to do so. These days I doubt it would have traction... But give it 10-15 years...? 

Edited by SgtCampsalot
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On 7/3/2019 at 12:50 PM, kermit said:

^ The issue isn’t the tracks, its the vehicles.  The FTA has a separate set of regulations for transit vehicles that allows them to be significantly lighter than ‘real’ rail cars (for passengers).  In order for the FTA to permit the lighter vehicles they stipulated that the LRT vehicles could NEVER be commingled with ‘real’ rail since the risk of collision was grave for occupants of the lighter vehicles. 

This is an area of regulation that the US is really bad at, every other country of the world has lighter rail equipment and fewer regulations about commingling (they protect against collision with better signaling). These strength/weight requirements are also part of the reason why we don't have true HSR here — our ‘real’ rail cars are tanks and it takes lots of power to get them up to speed.

sounds like an opportunity for the current administration to deregulate!

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12 hours ago, southslider said:

I can't wait for this bridge to be rebuilt yet again for Silver Line.  Or maybe sooner for extra toll lanes.

We should come to terms with the fact that this bridge is not going to open to the public for the next 10+ years...

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according to lynx golden line twitter
The first S70 streetcar traveled from California is in Asheville NC now.

Hope these street cars can be used to add frequency on blue line when they finished testing and before golden line open.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

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On 7/20/2019 at 5:42 PM, tarhoosier said:

System built by diamonds

Very true, but it's not like Charlotte doesn't have it's own money. Antwerp's tram system was well established before the second world war. In fact, a lot of Belgian cities suffered the same fate as Charlotte's tram/trolleys, there are many small/medium Belgian towns that are only served with buses, but the difference between American and European small towns is that in most places you can easily walk to the main train station in town and ride pretty much anywhere in Europe, or to an airport that can take you across the world. My uncle took my cousin from their home in Mexico City to visit my grandmother in Belgium, they took a taxi to the airport, flew to Paris, rode a high speed train to Brussels (they could've gone to Antwerp, not sure why not) and then were picked up by my Grandpa in his car. True diversity in transport options.  

Antwerp kept the Trams and were able to build off of them. The city saw them as groundwork for future advancement, but it's tried and true tech, there are still active cars that my mom rode a child, and that my dad rode to their first date. 

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33 minutes ago, NOLA2CLT said:

Started following UP when I began working Uptown in March of 2018, first time posting.  Im on Hawthorne Lane near the proposed last stop and get weekly updates from the city and was told to potentially see bridge construction starting back in late October or September with a completion around sometime in April of 2020 (doubt that).  Anyone hearing similar things?

The project website uses the dates you mention. Bridge work resuming this fall with service in late 2020/early 2021. https://charlottenc.gov/cats/transit-planning/gold-line/Pages/project-updates.aspx

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