urbanSTL

^ Yes, I would ride it, as I often do ride the Wilshire Line within the city. I have never ridden the lines on the freeways here however, as I have no reason to go out to the burbs. My earlier point is that BRT, at least from my own perspective would work on a route like Grand, which reminds me of Wilshire in some respects. Do you think suburban county riders from Chesterfield or some other locale would? Is there even enough demand for that? Like i said earlier, I would suspect the people, who would be more likely to ride it would be people from the city going to low-skilled jobs in the county.

As for the psychological factor, I do believe it exists and it even exists in my own mind, as a self-described 'urbanist'. Again, I would advocate BRT as an alternative to streetcars in the city, perhaps on Grand or the N/S alignment, where people could and would use it. I would not advocate running these buses out to the suburbs however, for the reasons listed here and in my previous post.

^ Ahh, I just found this link http://www.movingtransitforward.org/stl ... ssion.aspx after reading your post. I agree, the Page route seems the most logical of them all, although it does seem to mirror the current Metro Link line in many ways.

I still think straight up and down north and south would be the wisest next move for any new transit. I mocked up my thoughts here. As you said, this has been talked about until we are all blue, but here it is. https://mapsengine.google.com/map/edit? ... sBZA5IJEzA As much as I would love to see a streetcar going down Gravois and/or Jefferson, I think to keep the line in the south up to the standards and speed of the current Metro Link, it should travel on the tracks already there. I know Amtrak travels through there, does any freight still use those tracks?

Freight still uses those tracks, but the usage is pretty limited. I think it's down to 2-3 freight trains a day, and 2 amtrak trains.

Also, you couldn't run Metrolink on those actual tracks. You'd have to either build Metrolink tracks parallel to the freight tracks, or do away with the freight and Amtrak and just run Metrolink through that corridor (which would still require building two new sets of tracks).

^ Right, but is the corridor wide enough to support Amtrak, freight and Metro Link? Looking at Google Maps, it seems there's only one set of tracks there now.

I would assume they would get the utility work done during the construction of the streetcar line. If in the future they need to do more work, the streetcar would have two sets of tracks, one for each direction, that are connected via switches every so often. If construction needs to happen, you shut down one side, then the other. Same thing that you would do with roads that need to be kept open during construction.

It be great to have both an expanded light rail and street car system.

I would like the N-S line to go along the Jefferson/I-55 route with the second phase of the streetcar running on a dedicated lane along Kingshighway, where at the northern and southernmost points it will connect to MetroLink stations. You know how the song goes:

"Life is KINGSHIGHWAY, I wanna ride it all night long

If you're going my way, I will drive it to the Grove"

It was that song in the movie Cars.

Metro won't be putting in an expansion project for consideration for the 1% sales tax project list that Missourians could vote in November (over $2.4billion over 10 years up for grabs across all modes for the st.louis region, see the other thread in here about that), they are most likely putting in for operations

How would that help expansion?

In theory it would free up other money but if there is no other money to free up, all it would do is cover operational deficit that metro may have

At the end of day the reality is North-South Line is distance wish and wonder if the discussion needs to change for both the City and County sake.

Instead, what I think about when discussion pops up on this thread is seeing the San Fran muni buses using the Embarcadero streetcar right of way anytime they exceed capacity or having problems with the PCC cars/overhead. Which gets me to the fact that the central corridor streetcar alignment includes a near north city offshoot that also follows one of Metro's BRT preferred alignment if I read the maps right. In other words, an alignment that can be used by two different means of transit expansion, one within the city and the other that will service the county if built with that in mind. Future street car expansion within the city after the initial phase is built can easily be expanded to included the denser city neighborhoods to the south and north in time either favoring the North - South line or a separate alignment altogether.

I think this gets the discussion beyond it has to be a light rail line when everyone discussing what they really want to see is the regions most densest neighborhoods have more or better transit option. In addition, County politics have decided to pay down cross county extension not expanding transit while at the same time transferring dollars via 1/2 cent transportation tax to fund roads. Think the terrible idea of south county road connector.

Realistically, I also think the best chance for the region to add transit capacity in near future is by far the St. Louis Streetcar Company. Why?

1) Entirely within city limits and doesn't have to be part of Metro. Loop Trolley is happening between two cities, not part of Metro while at the same time was able to bring in/contract Metro expertise at end of day. Heck, you could probably amend city bylaws to incorporate streetcars as part of the street department.
2) As Loop shows, and more importantly what KC and a number of other cities have shown. You can make a streetcar happen with a mix of local and Federal Grants. You don't need state or regional funding or regional transit agency, In addition, their might a political opportunity for more federal funding if a compromise comes about from a broke highway trust fund (think Obama's plan) in the near future and TIGER grants are becoming more popular not less.
3) Metro can use the cities 1/4 cents sales tax increase to build the infrastructure that both BRT and streetcar can use which in essence becomes another funding source.
4) You have a ready made group of supporters and developers from Downtown to CWE for getting a streetcar program going. At same time, the current economy, housing markets favors the very type of residential development that is happening right now in the central corridor which very much favors additional fixed transit

My thoughts come down to the fact that you won't see transit expansion beyond a watered down BRT with current thoughts and/or county and state politics let alone current Metro dollars. However, their is a means to make it happen in the one area of the region that would embrace it and where it would flourish. Of course, this would require Slay to get on the soap box with supporter and tell everybody that this is what is going to happen for St. Louis City.

Anyone know how Denver, Salt Lake City, etc. manage to fund their lightrail expansions in a "fast track" fashion? It's discouraging to see us continue to fall behind.

As dredger noted, the examples of Kansas City and the Loop are extremely relevant here. If it is economically feasible, I think the city itself should go about bringing a shorter line from around Cherokee Street up to Old North or Hyde Park as a sort of starter line, similar to what KC has done.

This shorter route would A) cost less than an extended version and B) appease both the north and south sides about equally. Most evidence suggests a streetcar line brings about investment on and around the corridor and I believe with such a start and evident progress soon thereafter, support for extensions of such projects would grow.

Let Metro control the longer stretches of Metro Link into the county on right of ways and let the city and neighborhoods focus on bringing streetcars to the city's streets for shorter trips. Obviously this will bring up the debate about whether streetcars are a waste of money compared to buses and of competing or overlapping agencies dealing with transit.

I think it's of utmost importance to get this going NOW however!

I believe Denver and SLC get a lot more state support since they are their states only major cities and are both state capitols.

Do you think in the future the state of missouri wont have much of a choice but to fund transportation for both cities? People aren't going to want to live here without good reasonable transportation and to continue the status quo wont bring people here to the state either... I just wonder will this North South line ever get built or is just a very distant pipe dream? I would like for St.Louis to focus on the street car more than anything else and other realms of transportation. I do believe people would support BRT here..

^ I agree that this is of vital importance, but I wouldn't count on any state help. The state legislature is controlled by representatives who represent people who live outside the 'urban' areas, where this sort of transportation. There is nothing in it for most of them and it isn't seen as something that's necessary.

That's one reason of many, that the city must do it alone or with a combination of local and federal funds if at all possible. Hopefully there will be more grants akin to the Tiger grants, which could get a small line going.

^ You also have to look at the fact that rural area transit needs are very different. You got an older population on fixed income over a larger area not looking to commute. They are looking for periodic rides that is addressed by call a ride transit options. Those voters are making it very clear to state house reps what they want.

St. Louis City + County and Jackson County (Kansas City) account for about 1/3 of the state's population not counting the metro areas. Even if we worked together, I don't know that the two of us combined would have enough leverage to pass legislation to get MO to provide the money for transit in our two cities because the other 2/3 of the state would most likely vote "NO" on it.

I think what metro is afraid of is that the new line will just move people from bus to light rail and not from cars to light rail, there are plenty of studies to suggest that would be the case. If that happens, they basically spend $1b on a new line and solve nothing, not to mention hundreds of millions spent in operation of the line. This exact reason is why FTA is encouraging more brt instead of LRT, it costs less, much less. Again, I understand the "sexiness" of light rail but sometimes rationality has to over come it.

http://www.planetizen.com/node/60960

Basically look at it this way, what would help this city more $1billion metro link expansion or $1b invested in schools and reducing crime?

Few will move or stay here because of a new line, a lot will move or stay with better schools and crime lower than you can easily justify a new line.

^ I don't know if I agree with the premise that we either spend $1B for metrolink or $1B for schools and public safety. I think the argument is do we spend $1B for metrolink or $1B for a new highway, seeing that transportation funds usually come out of the same pot. I also dont agree with the BRT for LRT argument. BRT is alright in certain aspects, but its been proven that people not only prefer LRT but LRT systems bring much more economic development. I look at light rail as just as much of a redevelopment tool/economic development tool as it is transportation. I also think Metro is potentially giving away LRT dollars to regions we compete with like Minneapolis and Denver. Those regions have vision and can attract and retain young people, because they are thinking about future transportation needs/desires and not stuck in our current 1970s projection models. I also think it is wrong to assume that people will just switch from bus to LRT.