urbanSTL

Xing you're on target, but just North City would not be enough north because if North County will see a rise in employment at the new business park to be built on formerly Kinloch/Berkley/Furg and today eastern airport property. Many Northians communte to West Port and some can't afford a car so they ride the long bus routes. A line through north city is not enough, we need this tri-fold. North City, North County with the large business park, and South City. After those places have their Metro finished around the same time than south county and lets open this thing up to JeffCo. If they will support it unlike St. Chuck or Westians than they should get it at least to Arnold.

Everyone loves poor people and public transit. The two seem to go hand in hand, but this is not a bus system, or even fixed

guiderail trams. Metrolink is a high speed light rail commuterline. Poor people ride mass transit, but the highest percentage of metro riders are people who can afford a car but choose to ride metro because it's easier than 1. Fighting bridge traffic/highway traffic, and 2. Cheaper than monthly parking.

Now, sending a line through north city really won't improve mass transit ridership as much as you would expect, because all you'd end up doing

is have people who rode the buses start riding the rails, and you might actually lose ridership since metrolink goes to so few locations out in the county where many of these people work. Everyone again loves TOD/TDD. I like it too, but the greatest impact TOD/TDD projects come from large scale, well integrated stations, which St. Louis refuses to build. The Grand stop is a prime example of ruining potential.

Scoff all you want to about rich executives getting a luxury, but the fact is in cities like NYC (the Long Island RR), Chicago (Metra), San Francisco (BART), Boston (MBTA Commuter Lines), etc, these people have commuter park and ride lines, and they use them frequently because of their convienince. Many people use these trains to do work during their commute. How easily can you work on a proposal with a steering wheel in your lap going 55 MPH?

Ducky (Jmed), I know you and I have discussed south city/county many times, but the people who live in that area are far more intolerant of public transit riders (in my opinion, put down your nooses everyone) than are those in west county. Placing a line in south city is tantamount to deseg busing, IMO. Based on my studies and obervational truths, lower income

whites and blacks generally do not get along, and south city is mainly inhabited by lower income whites. I know I said most people who ride metro are upper income people, but a lot of lower income people ride it too, and I can see south city people fighting hard to keep a train line out. There's not a lot of love for the current immigrants in the area (IMO),

adding more ethnicity to the mix might start more serious problems. In regards to cost effectiveness, NO public transit makes a profit, and I believe only NYC comes close to breaking even. No matter where any new line runs it's going to lose money, especially with the honor system fare colletion method Metro uses. I realize this post is rambling, so I'll

make my points more succinct.



1. Metrolink is high speed and high capacity, and high cost. You should place a line where the greatest convienience is received by the largest group able and willing to pay. That would be North and West county, though I strongly feel that any line through north county should bypass the north city as much as possible to avoid conflicts with the bus system



2. Don't think of Metrolink in TOD/TDD terms until Metro, the City & County govt's get together and require all stations to be adequately integrated into the surrouding areas, and provide at least some commercial space in their larger stations.



3. St. Louis is a highly segregated and racist city. Introducing lines into the most racially sensitive areas are probably a very bad idea. I know many will say that West County is racist and segregated, and while this is very true, my proposal was for express lines during morning and evening rush hour. I doubt more minorities will be riding these lines than the same ones that ride the buses currently out to these areas for work. Essentially, if you disguise it as an all white office person line, it becomes easier to swallow for the segregated West County.



4. Seriously, stop with the snide comments, everyone. I do this for a living. So does Jmed. If you don't like what I have to say, fine. Make points in disagreement. But seriously, stop with the snide comments and insults.

Country Day is right. Unfortunately, there are far too many racist idiots in this town that think a metro ride coming near their neighborhood will only bring the black people to rob their house. I like the idea of a westward expansion first, because I think that could speed up the progress of a revamped 64/40 which is really important to transit in STL IMO.

The unfortunate reality is that there is a big difference between Metrolink expansion on the metro-east side and on the Missouri side of the river. You are correct, there does seem to be strong support for the expansion of Metrolink in Illinois. Therefore the politicians have responded and somewhat stepped up to get the expansions. However, that just does not seem to be the case over in Missouri. Despite the expansions in Illinois, you only hear a smattering of publicity in the region wide media about the Illinois expansion?s of Metrolink. Moreover, what little media coverage there is of Metro is mostly negative. These factors play into why people in Missouri seem to be more unwilling to step up and develop a great transportation network with Metro as the leader. Is it sad this is the case? Yeah, you betcha. Does this dictate the political and social reality on how Metro should tailor further expansion plans? Yes it does, if Metro is determined to develop the type public support for Metrolink expansion and operation that already exists in Illinois.

Is there a way to expand Metro from the Airport to Northwest Plaza so that the place gets leveled and replaced with an urban village or is STL County could make it a park? I support Metro, and its future expansions anywhere as soon as possible except Warren County, lol.

Good job Jmed and Coda!

I just read online that the rail company that provided the Post with service transporting newsprint to their printing facility downtown has petitioned the federal rail board to abandon their right of way, since the Post is no longer going have the newsprint delivered by rail. I know this segment of rail ran from the riverfront over I-70 and then entered a tunnel under Tucker to at least Delmar/Convention Plaza. Does anyone know the further extent of this tunnel, if any? I wonder if this tunnel if this tunnel could be redesigned to handle Light Rail as the Eads Bridge Tunnel was. I know that some of the extensions from North City/County plan to enter Downtown roughly along this route. Anyone have any info on this?

thanks.

Seems like a few years ago there was a KETC 9 special on areas like that around St. Louis and they went down to the rail yard you speak of. I know you can see it along Tucker. But i thought the tunle and ended there at Tucker and didn't go farther. It would be great to know, where and how far it goes and where the line comes from?

I have thought about that with Metrolink, but I have no idea how far it goes either. From what I can remember from under St. Louis from Channel 9 was that it ended at the Post, only going a little further for cars to be spoted past the door. That plaza on Tucker has openings where you can see down into it. There are tons of rail maps around. I think I will look for something next week, if I remember.

That railroad used to supply the Post-Dispatch and I think the Globe-Democrat with newsprint rolls. It used to connect with the McKinley bridge via the rail bridge that now crosses I-70 downtown.



Back on MetroLink, East-West Gateway Council of Governments has issued an RFP for the Northside/Southside Lines. Hopefully something good comes out of it.



Details (40 page pdf)

The believe the rail tunnels were used by commuter railroads to connect the northern Illinois burbs like Granite City, Edwardsville and Alton with downtown. The Globe Democrat building was once a train station, you can still see a train carved into the facade over the main door. The trains came in the basement and people exited the station through street level.

^Now that I think about it, it was originally a commuter line, as you said. You can still see the supports for the old power lines on the elevated rail that runs near 70 and to the bridge. Would be cool to bring metrolink in over that, but it would probably require sharing with freight traffic along part of it, but maybe not. I'll check Trains magazine next month, they should have it in their list of track applied to be abandoned.

Wow, if those commuter lines were abandoned it does sound like an almost ready made Metro route.

I followed the tracks out of downtown to the mckinnley bridge on terraserver, and all I could tell was the part connecting to the bridge is definately abandoned. It looks like there may be a few industries served just north of downtown, but they looked empty. Other than that, I can't see a reason for any other traffic over the whole line, although it does tie into a yard. The only issue I could see is that the tracks went across the middle of the vehicle deck on the bridge. The tracks have been ripped out, but the approach structure remains. I wonder how much weight the whole trestle could handle. Light Rail cars would be lighter than a locomotive and one boxcar of newsprint. It would probably be rebuilt anyway. The real problem is going across the river.

The bridge over I-70 will be torn down if the MRB is ever built. The line is abandoned now. You can still see some tracks if you look down Hadley while travelling down Cass, but they are in bad shape.



Great Rivers Greenway has plans now to make a trail out of the line in question from I-70 to the riverfront trail and across the McKinley bridge.



If they build Metro to north St. Louis it should go down Florissant to Natural Bridge like it shows in the map on the first page. There is so much room (6 lanes plus turn lane)there it could be built on the cheap. Also, the population would be better connected to downtown/IL if a route is built there than on the tracks going to McKinley. I doubt if trains will run over the McKinley bridge ever again.

I was thinking hypothetically for Illinois, not north St. Louis. I remember the trail plan now though. That would be really cool.

I feel that this disjointed talk about Metro link goes to the heart of our transit trouble and ultimately the cities decline. I have felt all along that Metro will continue to fail as long as the powers that be build routes based upon criteria that puts political/regional favoritism and political correctness over common sense. This way of thinking has led to a region of individually incorporated cities that are inefficient, expensive and parochial. I believe all transit routes should fan out from city center into the surrounding suburbs in a even pattern. All trains should meet in one area (Downtown and East St. Louis) so that riders have fewer trains to transfer between. This will decreases commute time and increases efficiency of the system, in addition it will reinforce the idea that downtown is the regions hub. The cross county extension route was chosen not because it was best, but to appease those critics who complained that the county was not getting a big enough piece of the funding pie. In my mind to have the route terminate at Forest Park is poor planning. Instead a route from Southwest city and Clayton should terminate downtown. Eventually there should be a true cross county extension that would mirror highways 270 or 141 but not until south, north and central portions have been built. Also shame on the people and politicians who play politics with transit funding, instead of responding that the Northside got it last time so now its the Southsides turn. Or, the city had its portion of the pie so now St. Charles should get theirs. All should rejoice when track is laid instead of bickering. Downtown Now is running a campaign that encourages the community to "think big" unfortunately those in power tend to think about themselves first.

southcitygent wrote:I feel that this disjointed talk about Metro link goes to the heart of our transit trouble and ultimately the cities decline. I have felt all along that Metro will continue to fail as long as the powers that be build routes based upon criteria that puts political/regional favoritism and political correctness over common sense. This way of thinking has led to a region of individually incorporated cities that are inefficient, expensive and parochial. I believe all transit routes should fan out from city center into the surrounding suburbs in a even pattern. All trains should meet in one area (Downtown and East St. Louis) so that riders have fewer trains to transfer between. This will decreases commute time and increases efficiency of the system, in addition it will reinforce the idea that downtown is the regions hub. The cross county extension route was chosen not because it was best, but to appease those critics who complained that the county was not getting a big enough piece of the funding pie. In my mind to have the route terminate at Forest Park is poor planning. Instead a route from Southwest city and Clayton should terminate downtown. Eventually there should be a true cross county extension that would mirror highways 270 or 141 but not until south, north and central portions have been built. Also shame on the people and politicians who play politics with transit funding, instead of responding that the Northside got it last time so now its the Southsides turn. Or, the city had its portion of the pie so now St. Charles should get theirs. All should rejoice when track is laid instead of bickering. Downtown Now is running a campaign that encourages the community to "think big" unfortunately those in power tend to think about themselves first.

Well said. I've often felt the best way for MetroLink to succeed was an even distribution filtering out into the burbs.

Xing and Trent-

I agree that common sense (and other factors) should determine how MetroLink is layed out rather than political correctness. We should think big. That being said.... God doesnt work for the transportation planners (and definately not Metro), which is to say designing a regional transit system is very complicated. There is no magic button. There is no "They". It's not SimCity.



Also, I dont believe the route from S.City & Clayton 'terminated' at the Forest Park station. You wont be required to get off the train, you'll be able to continue DT.



Here's a quote you might like about thinking big...



"Make no little plans, they have no magic to stir men's blood..."

--- Daniel Burnham

There is an article in the Kansas City Star online page today with the headline, "Mass Transit Goes for a Trial Run" or something like that. Turns out there was a focus group in Kansas City that took out a few Chevy's to look at traffic patterns on a highway and talk about their view on taking Mass Transit rather than driving. Not much of a trial run! I thought they might have meant a transit rail line was being tested or something. Anyway, I don't mean to pick on KC, but just wanted to tell all of you St. Louis enthusiasts to not get discouraged. St. Louis is way ahead of a lot of places in the transit category.

MattnSTL wrote:I followed the tracks out of downtown to the mckinnley bridge on terraserver, and all I could tell was the part connecting to the bridge is definately abandoned...The only issue I could see is that the tracks went across the middle of the vehicle deck on the bridge. The tracks have been ripped out, but the approach structure remains.

Have the tracks indeed been ripped out across the bridge deck? I assume that as it is rebuilt, this will be the case. But I can testify that 15 years ago, we used to cross the McKinley 6 or 8 times a year to visit family, and the tracks were still on the deck then. There were also holes in the deck - and grassy little meadows growing in less-traveled portions of the center lanes, as most traffic took the newer outer lanes. It was a frightful experience...

Look like they were. In any case, when I rode the north riverfront trail about 2 weeks ago, there were 2 excavators on the bridge jackhammering off the deck, so even if the tracks are still there, they won't be for long.