urbanSTL

I, for one, do not consider 30 minute headways to be an adequate frequency for a bus. I’d rather drive.

Yeah I really don't understand the title of this thread. Can we get a moderator to change it to something more appropriate?

^Good call. Although, really this is entirely redundant with some existing threads and was probably just created out of laziness.

It should probably be merged with the "Where We Stand: Transportation" or "Transportation Catch All thread" thread.

There is already a Streetcar thread here: https://urbanstl.com/forum/viewtopic.ph ... =streetcar
Streetcar has been put on hold after failure to secure TIGER funds for a feasibility study.
I also don't quite understand the purpose of this thread. Where did these quotes come from? If this is Amazon related, I doubt these comments were made with much sincerity.

Long advocated improving #10 frequency and infrastructure in the near term while hoping for $100Ms for STL Streetcar.

STLEnginerd wrote: ↑

Sep 29, 2017

dtwest wrote:How is that “world-class transportation system” or “the best mass transit system in the country”.

Who said it was...?

STLEnginerd - it is on the following website: https://explorestlouis.com/travel-tools/getting-around/
world class and best in the country lol

dtwest wrote: ↑

Sep 30, 2017

....there is not a single line going from DT to Midtown, right? Or am I missing something?

Metrolink's Red and Blue lines run from Midtown (1 station) through DT proper (4 stations).

Trolozilla - No offence, but you are missing my point; the post is ironic, and the public transportation here sucks. That’s fact. Annoying is that a website directed to tourists or potential new STL citizens posts such ridiculous lie. That’s it.
After all, this is not such big city; we should be able to move freely between these neighborhoods using public transportation. What is it, 4-5 miles from forest park to the river? This is similar to a distance from lower Manhattan to the central park. The difference is that metrolink offers 4-5 stop on one far isolated line vs around 10 stops on at least 4 lines in NYC. And no direct buses going between DT and forest park.
And everyone is surprised that there is no great influx of people to the DT area. Well, some of us moved here and now are really experiencing this “best in the country” public transportation.

dtwest wrote: ↑

Oct 01, 2017

Trolozilla - No offence, but you are missing my point; the post is ironic, and the public transportation here sucks. That’s fact. Annoying is that a website directed to tourists or potential new STL citizens posts such ridiculous lie. That’s it.
After all, this is not such big city; we should be able to move freely between these neighborhoods using public transportation. What is it, 4-5 miles from forest park to the river? This is similar to a distance from lower Manhattan to the central park. The difference is that metrolink offers 4-5 stop on one far isolated line vs around 10 stops on at least 4 lines in NYC. And no direct buses going between DT and forest park.
And everyone is surprised that there is no great influx of people to the DT area. Well, some of us moved here and now are really experiencing this “best in the country” public transportation.

It's a bad equilibrium: people in car-centric cities have to drive everywhere because there's no other way to move around. And if you already own a car and are used to driving everywhere, you will typically think of public transportation as a secondary concern/waste of taxpayer dollars ("I have a car, why should I be paying for someone else's train?"). It takes either a critical mass of outsiders (which won't happen soon as the metro is not a transplant magnet) or some very forward-looking leadership to change this equilibrium.

dtwest wrote: ↑

Oct 01, 2017

And no direct buses going between DT and forest park.

Right. Instead of the bus you've got the faster, more frequent direct route via Metrolink's Red and Blue lines.

dtwest wrote: the post is ironic

Ah, so that makes sense now. You just joined the forum to take an opportunity to be funny, bash the Metro system a bit by comparing it to Zimbabwe and puff piece tourist marketing materials, dismiss the single biggest asset of the entire system (which it is now significantly designed around) out of hand, use the quirky detail that the primary transit center for the City isn't technically within the borders of Downtown (but 2 blocks away) to get hung up on how Downtown (proper) isn't directly connected to some neighborhoods by bus, and then go on to say that St. Louis isn't a big city yet compare its transit connectivity to Manhattan.

What an interesting and productive means of reinvigorating the dialogue around the St. Louis streetcar proposal. Welcome to the forum. It's so nice to have you.

wabash wrote: ↑

Oct 01, 2017

dtwest wrote: ↑

Oct 01, 2017

And no direct buses going between DT and forest park.

Right. Instead of the bus you've got the faster, more frequent direct route via Metrolink's Red and Blue lines.

dtwest wrote: the post is ironic

Ah, so that makes sense now. You just joined the forum to take an opportunity to be funny, bash the Metro system a bit by comparing it to Zimbabwe and puff piece tourist marketing materials, dismiss the single biggest asset of the entire system (which it is now significantly designed around) out of hand, use the quirky detail that the primary transit center for the City isn't technically within the borders of Downtown (but 2 blocks away) to get hung up on how Downtown (proper) isn't directly connected to some neighborhoods by bus, and then go on to say that St. Louis isn't a big city yet compare its transit connectivity to Manhattan.

What an interesting and productive means of reinvigorating the dialogue around the St. Louis streetcar proposal. Welcome to the forum. It's so nice to have you.

Wabash - Well, I just got my new state ID so I can now bash the city like every other MO residents. Joking, Wabash, I’m only joking!!!!
It wasn’t my intend to offend anyone. I do like this city a lot. I just moved here and since I am planning to live here for a long time, I want to figure out few things. And what a better way to do that than ask some people, maybe on a forum full of longtime residents?
The streetcar thread was almost dead for some time, and I am wondering if there was any progress on this subject. Is this really such an unreasonable question?

I usually take the 97 to midtown, not Metrolink. The Grand station is too unpleasantly far from Midtown. It better serves the Grand bus, which is the most frequent line, so that helps. The elevators and stairs not on the platform is annoying too.

kipfilet wrote: ↑

Oct 01, 2017

dtwest wrote: ↑

Oct 01, 2017

Trolozilla - No offence, but you are missing my point; the post is ironic, and the public transportation here sucks. That’s fact. Annoying is that a website directed to tourists or potential new STL citizens posts such ridiculous lie. That’s it.
After all, this is not such big city; we should be able to move freely between these neighborhoods using public transportation. What is it, 4-5 miles from forest park to the river? This is similar to a distance from lower Manhattan to the central park. The difference is that metrolink offers 4-5 stop on one far isolated line vs around 10 stops on at least 4 lines in NYC. And no direct buses going between DT and forest park.
And everyone is surprised that there is no great influx of people to the DT area. Well, some of us moved here and now are really experiencing this “best in the country” public transportation.

It's a bad equilibrium: people in car-centric cities have to drive everywhere because there's no other way to move around. And if you already own a car and are used to driving everywhere, you will typically think of public transportation as a secondary concern/waste of taxpayer dollars ("I have a car, why should I be paying for someone else's train?"). It takes either a critical mass of outsiders (which won't happen soon as the metro is not a transplant magnet) or some very forward-looking leadership to change this equilibrium.

Kipfilet - That’s right. Although, it seems to me that, as with any controversial issues, this should be a political decision. We can either wait for influx of people, which could never happen, or start creating conditions to attract new residents. Improvement of public transportation is a key, in my opinion. It would be such a strong asset to attract Amazon now, or any other large company in future.

and to be fair, the explorestlouis site doesn't say that we have the best mass transit in the country. it says:

Metro’s light-rail network MetroLink has been called one of the best mass transit systems in the country.

i take that to mean MetroLink has been called one of the best as compared to other light rail systems.

now, they should have at least provided a source or, better yet, left it out altogether but lets be accurate.

dtwest wrote: ↑

Oct 01, 2017

kipfilet wrote: ↑

Oct 01, 2017

dtwest wrote: ↑

Oct 01, 2017

Trolozilla - No offence, but you are missing my point; the post is ironic, and the public transportation here sucks. That’s fact. Annoying is that a website directed to tourists or potential new STL citizens posts such ridiculous lie. That’s it.
After all, this is not such big city; we should be able to move freely between these neighborhoods using public transportation. What is it, 4-5 miles from forest park to the river? This is similar to a distance from lower Manhattan to the central park. The difference is that metrolink offers 4-5 stop on one far isolated line vs around 10 stops on at least 4 lines in NYC. And no direct buses going between DT and forest park.
And everyone is surprised that there is no great influx of people to the DT area. Well, some of us moved here and now are really experiencing this “best in the country” public transportation.

It's a bad equilibrium: people in car-centric cities have to drive everywhere because there's no other way to move around. And if you already own a car and are used to driving everywhere, you will typically think of public transportation as a secondary concern/waste of taxpayer dollars ("I have a car, why should I be paying for someone else's train?"). It takes either a critical mass of outsiders (which won't happen soon as the metro is not a transplant magnet) or some very forward-looking leadership to change this equilibrium.

Kipfilet - That’s right. Although, it seems to me that, as with any controversial issues, this should be a political decision. We can either wait for influx of people, which could never happen, or start creating conditions to attract new residents. Improvement of public transportation is a key, in my opinion. It would be such a strong asset to attract Amazon now, or any other large company in future.

I completely agree. That was the spirit of my post: this is not something that you can expect the free market to "fix", as private actors have no incentives to do it. It really needs to come from government.

Below is a link to nice summary of the feasibility study from 2013 (the link to 101 page detailed final report is a page or two back). I know it is old etc, but I think is still quite accurate. And page 4 shows clearly how useless is metrolink to anyone living in DTW or MD. And why STL needs streetcar. Or at least increase in the frequency of these buses as mentioned by quincunx above.
http://www.downtownstl.org/wp-content/u ... march7.pdf

I saw some interesting streetcar track design recently in Strasburg, France:
DSCN1440 by Gary Kreie, on FlickrDSCN1443 by Gary Kreie, on Flickr
DSCN1447 by Gary Kreie, on Flickr

An interesting article by CityLab that outlines the success/failure of streetcar lines across the country.

https://trib.al/EP4MAv2

I rode the KC streetcar and wasn’t that impressed. It felt urban and exciting but slow. The success of the streetcar is really contingent on it remaining free.


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Right. It does feel a bit unnecessary -- improve bus frequency and speed and you get more bang for your buck, and you serve your population much better.

I think a streetcar grid would obviously be an awesome thing to have back, but the cost is likely super prohibitive to get anywhere near to the bus service we currently have now. Perhaps the only positive would be tearing up a street and being able to improve underground infrastructure at the same time. I doubt that would happen though. Our best bet is still a major Metrolink expansion that is a) high speed and b) has it's own ROW.

^ I think the outlying fact is fixed transit can spur denser development. I don't think St. Louis need a big network but its streets were built for streetcars and presents an opportunity.

I believe N-S light rail is not going anywhere in the foreseeable future but a well place north to south city oriented streetcar or two working off metrolink spine whether it is Jeff Ave or downtown pass through connecting south city to NGA or continue to advance Grand Ave as north south corridor will help push some development into north side for St Louis sake/future.

Heck, I think a Delmar modern low car streetcar into CWE that piggybacks off loop trolley to provide an end to end route from Forest Park metrolink station to BJC/Wash U Medical metrolink station is worth looking at because it might spur similar/more residential development that you see happening in Grove/FPSE (Clayco/Wash U is rescuing loop trolley & might see this as a good idea to put their weight behind)