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Charlotte's Light Rail: Lynx Blue Line


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12 hours ago, JacksonH said:

Haha!  Yep, with that parking job you definitely pass the test for surviving in DC!  Just don't make the mistake I made by taking those skills elsewhere because they're not much appreciated outside of DC.  Re: Eastern Market, I regret that I never went there.  Is there anything like that in the Charlotte area?

Oh no!  I must say, one thing I don't miss -- DC drivers.  I've driven all over this country, including Manhattan, and there's nothing in my experience that comes close to the drivers in DC.

You should visit Union Market rather than Eastern Market when you return again. Especially with the redevelopment of that entire area really becoming the Union Market District. 4th St NE, 5th St. NE & Morse Street have a nice vibe since Union opened. You can Street View on Google Map to see some updates but it’s under growing such an explosion in growth, it still is quite outdated. 

I think Union Market is  like if you picked up Optimist Hall and plopped it near the Common Market in SouthEnd. Charlotte IMO doesn’t have anything like Eastern Market though. 
 

To reply to quite a few topics, I nor none of my friends but 1 have a car in DC. I had 1, but like the other poster it became such a pain to have and it became rare to drive that it was more convenient to get rid of. And man did I learn how to parallel park and get my car into spaces with just a couple inches between the car infront and behind. Luckily, for the times I do need a car, there are plenty of Zipcars around the city and it cost like $11/hr. And gas is free (each car has a credit card so you can fill up). It’s very convenient. 

Sorry for off-topic. :p but the DC sub forum is absolutely dead on this forum despite quite a few DC posters or former Washington posters. 

 

Edited by AirNostrumMAD
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8 hours ago, AirNostrumMAD said:

You should visit Union Market rather than Eastern Market when you return again. Especially with the redevelopment of that entire area really becoming the Union Market District. 4th St NE, 5th St. NE & Morse Street have a nice vibe since Union opened. You can Street View on Google Map to see some updates but it’s under growing such an explosion in growth, it still is quite outdated. 

I think Union Market is  like if you picked up Optimist Hall and plopped it near the Common Market in SouthEnd. Charlotte IMO doesn’t have anything like Eastern Market though. 
 

To reply to quite a few topics, I nor none of my friends but 1 have a car in DC. I had 1, but like the other poster it became such a pain to have and it became rare to drive that it was more convenient to get rid of. And man did I learn how to parallel park and get my car into spaces with just a couple inches between the car infront and behind. Luckily, for the times I do need a car, there are plenty of Zipcars around the city and it cost like $11/hr. And gas is free (each car has a credit card so you can fill up). It’s very convenient. 

Sorry for off-topic. :p but the DC sub forum is absolutely dead on this forum despite quite a few DC posters or former Washington posters. 

 

NoMA and Union Market are the current eclectic hipster epicenter of the DMV

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9 hours ago, AirNostrumMAD said:

You should visit Union Market rather than Eastern Market when you return again. Especially with the redevelopment of that entire area really becoming the Union Market District. 4th St NE, 5th St. NE & Morse Street have a nice vibe since Union opened. You can Street View on Google Map to see some updates but it’s under growing such an explosion in growth, it still is quite outdated. 

I think Union Market is  like if you picked up Optimist Hall and plopped it near the Common Market in SouthEnd. Charlotte IMO doesn’t have anything like Eastern Market though. 
 

To reply to quite a few topics, I nor none of my friends but 1 have a car in DC. I had 1, but like the other poster it became such a pain to have and it became rare to drive that it was more convenient to get rid of. And man did I learn how to parallel park and get my car into spaces with just a couple inches between the car infront and behind. Luckily, for the times I do need a car, there are plenty of Zipcars around the city and it cost like $11/hr. And gas is free (each car has a credit card so you can fill up). It’s very convenient. 

Sorry for off-topic. :p but the DC sub forum is absolutely dead on this forum despite quite a few DC posters or former Washington posters. 

 

I didn't even know about Union Market.  Thanks for that tip.  And good to hear from somebody who gets it.  When I last lived there (Pentagon City) I could walk to work, walk to the grocery store, the drug store, the gym, restaurants, post office, my doctor and so much more.  Even Costco!  Most of my friends there live near Metro, so I could visit  easily, or we'd meet somewhere that was Metro accessible (which is most places thssd t are worth going).  And on the rare occasion I needed to go somewhere in the 'burbs off the Metro grid, yes, I used Zipcar, too.  Northern Virginia also has a fantastic network of bike trails.

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9 hours ago, JacksonH said:

I didn't even know about Union Market.  Thanks for that tip.  And good to hear from somebody who gets it.  When I last lived there (Pentagon City) I could walk to work, walk to the grocery store, the drug store, the gym, restaurants, post office, my doctor and so much more.  Even Costco!  Most of my friends there live near Metro, so I could visit  easily, or we'd meet somewhere that was Metro accessible (which is most places thssd t are worth going).  And on the rare occasion I needed to go somewhere in the 'burbs off the Metro grid, yes, I used Zipcar, too.  Northern Virginia also has a fantastic network of bike trails.

I do get it but the vast majority of Washingtonians just can’t afford to live this lifestyle of the utopian urban experience that makes the metro the most convenient option.  It is great that you could but keep things in perspective....there is an entirely different DC that you have probably never seen or frequented.  This statement alone show that disconnect...”most of my friends lived near the Metro”...this is simply not the case in DC.  

Apologies for thread digression but just want to make there is a balance discussion of  what is the reality of convenience with even a robust metro system as DC metro.  And some of the delusional expectations from CATS and the Blue Line.

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5 hours ago, Durhamite said:

I do get it but the vast majority of Washingtonians just can’t afford to live this lifestyle of the utopian urban experience that makes the metro the most convenient option.  It is great that you could but keep things in perspective....there is an entirely different DC that you have probably never seen or frequented.  This statement alone show that disconnect...”most of my friends lived near the Metro”...this is simply not the case in DC.  

Apologies for thread digression but just want to make there is a balance discussion of  what is the reality of convenience with even a robust metro system as DC metro.  And some of the delusional expectations from CATS and the Blue Line.

My friends are one thing, the people I worked with are another.  I agree that the experience of people who live and work in the suburbs is different, but people who work in the District almost all rely on Metro to get to work, *especially* those of lesser means because public parking, to the extent it's available, is too expensive.  Nobody I worked with in the District (and they ran the full economic spectrum) drove to work, at least not on a regular basis.

Edit:  I will qualify this to acknowledge that there are many people in the suburbs who work in DC who will commute by car because there are no Metro stations convient to where they live.  Often these people carpool, though.  And early on when I lived in Springfield I occasionally hitched a ride with strangers who would pick up folks like me so that they could drive in the HOV lanes.  And other people would drive alone and just deal with the traffic.  But people who were close enough to walk or drive a relatively short distance to a Metro station would almost always take Metro.  I had a friend who worked as an administrative assistant.  She lived way out in Rockville, MD.  She always took Metro, which is a very long ride from Rockville.  It would have cost her too much to drive to the office and park.

Edited by JacksonH
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1 hour ago, AirNostrumMAD said:

Is that allowed under State law? (A 1/2 cent tax for transit)

No, its not currently allowed. Mecklenburg is 1/4 cent below the state imposed sales tax cap IIRC.  So the first step in Meck transit expansion is to go, bended knee, to Raleigh to get permission to have a vote on a 1/2 cent increase. The y’all qaeda in Raleigh have made it clear that they are not going to make that change easy (I suspect they will require a portion of the funds go, paradoxically, to roads)

Edited by kermit
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State legislators won't allow Charlotte to raise more local funding for transit. North Mecklenburg won't allow Charlotte to use local funding for any more rail transit outside North Mecklenburg.  NSRR won't allow rail transit on or along their line in North Mecklenburg. Until any of these standoffs are resolved, Charlotte won't be taking advantage of the newly expanded federal funding for rail transit.

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On 11/22/2021 at 1:10 PM, AirNostrumMAD said:

Union Market is  like if you picked up Optimist Hall and plopped it near the Common Market in SouthEnd. Charlotte IMO doesn’t have anything like Eastern Market though. 

Union Market was redeveloped by Edens. The same Edens of Atherton Market, Kenilworth Commons, Park Road Shopping Center and Myers Park Center here in Charlotte. It's an easy walk from The Gallaudet U Metro station.

Edited by davidclt
Added Metro info for relevance to this thread.
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On 11/24/2021 at 11:03 AM, kermit said:

No, its not currently allowed. Mecklenburg is 1/4 cent below the state imposed sales tax cap IIRC.  So the first step in Meck transit expansion is to go, bended knee, to Raleigh to get permission to have a vote on a 1/2 cent increase. The y’all qaeda in Raleigh have made it clear that they are not going to make that change easy (I suspect they will require a portion of the funds go, paradoxically, to roads)

"ya'll qaeda."  I'm dyin' :tw_lol:

Out of curiosity, how much of the silver line or even the transit plan could we fund now without a tax increase, or just with the 1/4 cent we can raise on our own?  This thing is going to take a generation anyway.  Can we get started now on some scaled down version and then go back to voters in the next generation?  Does this have to be all or nothing?  If CATS came out and said we're just doing the silver line to connect Charlotte Airport and Uptown by light-rail, putting all the investment now in the cheaper real estate of West Charlotte, I feel that could reap huge rewards, and it's very sensible to be a big city connecting our airport and center city with rail.

Can the city use Tax Increment Financing (TIF) to pay for the Silver Line?

Edited by RANYC
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1 hour ago, RANYC said:

Out of curiosity, how much of the silver line or even the transit plan could we fund now without a tax increase, or just with the 1/4 cent we can raise on our own?  This thing is going to take a generation anyway.  Can we get started now on some scaled down version and then go back to voters in the next generation?  Does this have to be all or nothing? 

Can the city use Tax Increment Financing (TIF) to pay for the Silver Line?

The sales tax revenue has been coming in ahead of projections, but I suspect the accumulated overages are in the neighborhood of a few million (rather than 10s of millions that would be needed for a minimal segment). I also suspect CATS has a significant reserve fund that is allocated to the Red Line since that was one of the other projects promised with the original tax. I am fuzzy on all this since CATS has made a point of not discussing their current financial posistion, although I think all of that info is available in the quarterly reports.

Starter segments are very costly since you need a) vehicles; b) maintenance facility (which is generally located in the lowest ridership portion of track) and c) base load electrical. I suspect the bigger issue for CATS is that any starter segment could reduce the amount of federal funds which could be provided for the larger project (and worse, perhaps reduce the probability of receiving federal funds at all (“you guys have shown you can build without federal money so you clearly don’t need any more”).

I suspect that the only rail transit segment that CATS could pay for out of pocket is a Severesville trolly along the existing tracks.

Supposedly the city investigated all possible funding mechanisms and combinations for the big bang (including tif and bare property tax increases). I think that some tif revenue is penciled into their big bang plans, but they fell back on the tried and true sales tax for the bulk of local revenue.

Edited by kermit
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  • 1 month later...
19 hours ago, buildleft said:

 

As of October '21 (the most recent data I could find), Blue Line ridership is higher on Saturdays (11.8k/day) than on weekdays (10.6k/day). Sunday ridership is not much lower at 9.7k/day; traditionally transit ridership is significantly higher on weekdays. This is obviously a post-pandemic trend but it will be interesting to see how or if CATS restructures service patterns to accommodate this change.

I'm also surprised to see Gold Line ridership above 1,000. Hard to believe there's any ridership at all with the service we're being provided. :(

https://charlottenc.gov/cats/boards/MTC Agenda Package/MTC_Final_Agenda_Packet_for_Wednesday_November-17-2021.pdf 

Where do they get these ridership numbers? Is it from number of tickets or transit passes being used, or is there some kind of counter that physically tallies up the number of humans that board the trains?

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  • 4 weeks later...

I’m beating a very dead horse here, but I’ve ridden both the original Blue Line, and the BLE this week. The BLE is still maddeningly jerkey in terms of consistent speed. Operator I had today slowed wayyy down before pulling into stations, and coming down the flyover bridges at Tryon and U-City. Meanwhile the damn Gold Line feels like it’s running as smooth as the south line. So what gives? 

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9 hours ago, go_vertical said:

How often does this sort of thing happen?  I saw literally the same situation near Scaleybark Thursday night (or maybe it was last night, can't remember).  Someone in a BMW 3 series tried to turn onto northbound South Blvd from Clanton but ended up straddling the tracks. 

Feels like once or twice a month. Seems to happen most often around Southend, much less often on the BLE. 

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