Light Rail Project Killed!

[monsoon]

[bobliocatt]

That's too bad, Louisville is a city that I believe is dense enough for light rail to be very successful. I hope the residents have fun with their new bridge across the river.

[G W North]

I lived in Louisville for 2 years when I was a kid, and the transit service was absolutely abysmal. It didn't serve the area where I lived AT ALL. The city's largest mall was maybe a 10-15 minute walk from where I lived. You'd assume it was serviced by buses, but to be honest I don't ever even remember seeing buses there either. In fact, I don't remember seeing TARC buses anywhere within reasonable walking distance of where I lived.

I think I'll see if I can find a map to see what the service is like now.

[Wendell FOX]

The Bush administration favours buses? I thought he was pretty much all for highway construction - though then again despite what people lay the finger on I doubt Bush (or any president) himself would spend hours making decisions on sideline issues these days - it's all up to his transportation minister.

Anyways I hope this project can be redeveloped sometime in the future.

[PghUSA]

That is sad, you do need a certain population density to make a system like that profitable. Louisville, Like San Francisco and New Orleans has those quaint, old fashioned street scapes that would make a trolley (LRT) system very very nice. Why not a public/private partnership, aren't the ones in SF operated by a private co.? The 2 trolleys (cable cars) in Pittsburgh are operated by private companies, Duquesne and Monongahela Incline co's. but owned by the Public Transit Authority. Public/Private or Private with public help might be the way to go for Lville.

[BrandonTO416]

Given the political climate - I doubt there is any chance that anything will be built. That's unfortunate.

[wolfdawg54]

Man, that stinks! Loisville wouls be a great candidate for light rail.

[Oldmanladyluck]

The project was also never supported by U.S. Rep. Anne Northup, R-3rd District. She instead prefers to build additional highways/bridges to deal with the traffic problem and claims that LRT would have never worked in Louisville. Between this, and lack of support from other government officials, it looks as if the project will not be build in the forseeable future.

GET HER OUT OF OFFICE!!!!

[ElGobernador]

Too bad. Maybe they can try for streetcars or trolleys. They seem to fit with LVL.

[PghUSA]

Let us know when there are any updates on this. Im curious about how Louisville is doing with their new "consolidated" government and if that could be the thing that pulls them over the edge with the rapid transit proposal. Thanks

[KCghettoboi]

I told you I thought it would be unlikely to pass. What is it with all these lightrail's failing? Even when it is a large city with a large population. KC is in desperate need of some kind of lightrail or tram from KCI(airport) to DT, because KCI is about 20-25 miles away from DT...

[Southron]

Too bad for Louisville -- streetcars and light rail would probably work well there. Hopefully Anne Northup will retire soon and allow Louisville to elect a Congressperson with a clue.

[derbycity]

Hopefully the higher gas prices will make people really think about the direction we are going in Louisville. It seems the bridge project is almost the opposite of what you would want since putting a bridge out in the suburbs will open up a significant amount of land in Indiana to sprawl-away. Are there any politicians who understand the growing need for an alternative to the automobile. All you have to do is stand at the top of the parking garage behind the Glassworks building to see a sea of parking structures that almost seem to outnumber buildings, if not in number, in sheer sq footage. I love this city, but I don't know how real changes will ever come about.

[monsoon]

Hopefully Derbycity. I take it not much has changed since I posted that article. BTW, welcome to UrbanPlanet.

[derbycity]

I would like to do a research paper on light rail in Louisville to try to stir it up a bit and maybe get some people thinking about it again, especially now that downtown is becoming a destination for people after 5 pm and on weekends. If anyone has some good leads on this topic or places I might go to gather info I would appreciate the input. I went up to the parking garage I spoke of in the last post and took some pics a few minutes ago. Thanks for the welcome monsoon. BTW I don't hate parking garages, I just think that more thought needs to be put into other means of transportation, I would much rather there be a parking garage than the equivalent parking spaces in surface lots, but if I can post these images, you can see that at this particular corner, they decided to do both. A wonderful sea of grey, which should be noted is not being used on a Saturday afternoon in the heart of the museaum district. And then there is a picture of the tallest bat in the world overlooking some beautiful old buildings which desperately need to be renovated and put to good use.

[eastsider]

I would like to do a research paper on light rail in Louisville to try to stir it up a bit and maybe get some people thinking about it again, especially now that downtown is becoming a destination for people after 5 pm and on weekends. If anyone has some good leads on this topic or places I might go to gather info I would appreciate the input.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Light Rail Now has a website that I really like. It is full of news and info on rail systems around the country. It takes quite a bit of time to go through it all but hopefully it will be helpful. Good luck on your project.

[derbycity]

Thanks for the link Eastsider. There is a lot of info there.

One section that disturbed me was the extensive attack against PRTs. I have just started to look into different PRTs such as ULTra, but it seems that although companies like ULTra don't claim that PRTs will take the place of other forms of transport, only compliment them, LightRailNow seems to be very threatened by the alternative. Does anyone have any thoughts on PRTs?

I have been to Morgantown, WV and seen the monorail. Seems more of a novelty than anything else, but that was built a long time ago. Also, I have read many places that ligthrail actually costs more in energy than cars do per rider. Is this just propoganda?

Thanks