Light Rail in the valley

[traal]

I thought the VF Factory Outlet in East Mesa (the one that Hurricane Bay Club wants to move into) was the dead mall. Although even VF is not quite as dead as this one.

[MJLO]

fiesta mall is actually pretty busy, it's not as nice as it was when it was built, but it's still has better stores than Mesa's nice mall, Superstition Springs center.

[MJLO]

What is the length of the first stretch of track and where will it run?

[MJLO]

The sherrifs office is investigating corruption with light rail Geez, lots of corruption going on. That's ok, Sherriff Joe Likes the attention.

[traal]

A Light Rail Mini-Movie of Car 101 Initial Test Run, 3-29-07 [mpg].

It's kind of hard to believe this is Phoenix!

[colin]

So it should be rocketing through the city at that speed by mid-08?

Very cool. Thanks for posting.

[nuplanner]

The fiesta mall area has potential to redevelop to a nice urban area. Light rail would have been nice, especially 20 years ago. Now it cost so much and the valley is so huge and spread out it is going to take a long time to serve an auto dependant metro area.

I also would not consider ASU the bob college vs. UofA. The kittycats better watch out b/c the devils are right behind and in position to pass as the better school in the next few years rankings wise.

[colin]

The little UA - ASU rivalry is kinda stupid. Both schools have their strengths and weaknesses.

I think light rail in that zone would encourage density though. It's certainly poised for it, or, at least, seems to be. Good example is Dallas, how DART encouraged major high-density developments near the semi-suburban stations, although there's a different dynamic there.

[convulso]

I also would not consider ASU the bob college vs. UofA. The kittycats better watch out b/c the devils are right behind and in position to pass as the better school in the next few years rankings wise.

[colin]

I think ASU is trying to at least improve its reputation as a research institution, although it's not like I've read any of their mission lit or anything like that.

Not that this has anything to do with this topic, but ASU is at a significant advantage simply from a geographical standpoint as it's in a much larger metropolitan area and has more available land. UA is practically built-out and would have to invest in an entirely separate campus (although there is UA South) to continue to grow.

But, yeah, I think you're right: neither are really trying to be the other. The sense of competition is a bit, if not entirely, unfounded.

Zoom goes the light rail.

[MJLO]

the planners of Light Rail were damn smart in my opinion, i hear alot of people griping that noone will ride the trains. But look at this initial line. Of course noone who lives at Val Vista and Williams Field are going to park their cars and hop on a train for downtown. But that initial line is in the most dense part of the valley accessible to atleast 1.5 million people. I can gaurantee ridership will be ok and only grow.

[traal]

I can gaurantee ridership will be ok and only grow.

[traal]

Looks like last night's "high" speed test was successful. It runs and stops.

[MJLO]

i'm glad it was successful. I was under the impression that once the trains are in action they will move relatively slow, am I not correct?

[colin]

Not sure on the specs of this one, but most of the at-grade light rail I've seen runs at about 20-30 mph, which usually coincides with the speed limit. Even monorail runs at about that. Only heavy rail runs at higher speeds, I believe.

[MJLO]

heavy rail is cool as hell. Are they doing heavy rail anywhere anymore?

[colin]

Yeah, the newly-completed New Mexico Rail Runner is heavy rail. And I'm sure other cities have at least plans if not current construction. Actually, I just happened to be reading about Scranton, PA about a week ago and they have a plan for heavy rail between there and Philadelphia, maybe even up north into New York State.

It's really interesting to me, but it's almost impossible to keep track of all these projects and ideas because you basically have to follow each metro's local news.

[convulso]

...because you basically have to follow each metro's local news.

[traal]

Here is a list of suburban and commuter heavy rail systems, not including Amtrak or rapid transit systems (which can also be "heavy" rail). Apparently they're building a heavy rail system called Capital Metrorail between downton Austin and Leander, TX.

[colin]

Thanks, Traal. Oh, Wikipedia! What can't you answer?!

But even this doesn't cover everything. I can think of a couple of wild-eyed projects that aren't on that list.

Yeah, the Austin thing has been on the burner for a while. A light rail proposal failed a couple of years ago (while Austin is very liberal, unincorporated Travis County is more mass transit-hating like the rest of Texas) and probably directly resulted in this. Like RailRunner, it's using an existing Missouri Pacific track that just happens to run by some of Austin's more desirable areas. I hope it's successful because they certainly need some transit alternatives in Austin.

Central Texas had this whole "high speed rail" thing that Rick Perry (governor, maybe former now?) came up with. It was to bridge the Texas metro triangle and provide some alternative to the overcrowded highway system that services them now. That certainly went no where. Now they're just building a paralleling toll road between Austin and Dallas.

Off-topic, so I'll stop there.

[traal]

Heads up: Phoenix may need to use eminent domain to acquire land for Sky Harbor's "people mover" connector to the light rail system.

I think the connector is important, but I hope Phoenix approaches this responsibly.

[MJLO]

PHX having a monorail is incredibly important, being one of the busiest airports in the world, it is probabally at this point the only airport in that catagory that has a sophomoric transit system.

[convulso]

i don't know a lot about airports in that category, but isn't hartsfield pretty miserable compared to dallas, denver, sky harbor, etc? i'm miserable as hell every time i have to go there - hard to believe it's the busiest; it feels cramped, old, tiny and dirty. if there's terminal transit, i've never seen it.

in short, there's no way sky harbor can be as inadequate (from passengers' perspective, anyway) as hartsfield jackson - can it? or is sky harbor really that bad? it looks nice on a drive-by.

[MJLO]

Hartsfield is very well organized. It's simply overwhelmed with passenger traffic. Sky Harbor is Landlocked by urbanity. If you look at the terminals, they also reflect the lack of vision Arizona leadership has had over the decades. Terminal 2 was built in the early 60's, expecting to not be at capacity until 2002. Ten years later they were planning three, Which has only 28 gates, but does have a small capacity for expansion. That maxed out in about five years. So Then you have 4 which is a monster. and handles about 90 percent of sky harbors traffic. That is expecting to max out in the coming years as well. But aside from the different "architechtural styles" between the terminals, you're also confronted with the shape of the Airport and it's complete inability to expand it's borders. There are only east/west runways, and only four. So therefore, there are concourses on the north or south sides of three and four, and only on the south side of two. Terminal 4 is in my opinion ingenious in design, given what the engineers had to work with, but because of the physical layout of the airport it creates a cluster trying to get around in it. But inter-terminal transit is damn near impossible. You have to wait for one of the green busses. Or one of the car rental shuttles, it can be very unorganized at times. Given the growth rate of the Valley, and the general economic vitality of Sky Harbor, a TRAM system should have been put in place in the 80's when terminal 4 was built and the cost of constructing it was half. But that reflects the abhorence of public projects Arizona residents have.

[colin]

Phoenix to pay for study of light rail along I-10

Since the northern line is going up to the Metro Center anyway, I always thought that they would have just cut west to service Glendale. It also seems to me that the space along the canals is prime for light rail track, but I'm certainly no engineer.

But:

"Ultimately, light rail or any other public transit system doesn't work unless it's truly regional," said Phoenix City Councilman Greg Stanton.