Metrolink Expansion?

sc4mayor · PostJun 22, 2020#8762020-06-22T15:37+00:00

wabash wrote: ↑
Jun 22, 2020
GoHarvOrGoHome wrote: ↑
Jun 22, 2020
Small yikes when he suggested that Metrolink should be extended to Fenton, Florissant, Arnold, Chesterfield, and St. Peters
That highlights an overarching contradiction of the video. He's critical of how much track goes through St. Clair County, but questions why it doesn't run to St. Charles and Jefferson Counties.

It's clear from the video that he's not very familiar with the St. Louis area. I appreciate his interest, but this is armchair analysis, with a heavy reliance on Wikipedia and glances at Google Maps.

Pretty much took the words right out of my mouth. He seems to understand that MetroLink, primarily due to it's design and right of way, is more similar to SEPTA's commuter lines in Philly, or Denver's A Line as a more recently constructed example, but then in the next breath bemoans the lack of stations when compared to the systems mileage. Well, duh lol...SEPTA Regional and the A Line don't have stations every block either.

I'm almost certain he referred to the Clayton Station as the North Hanley Station too, and I could definitely be wrong...but I don't think Boeing has over 7,000 employees in Mascoutah either. He seems to think there are a combined 20,000+ employees between Scott AFB and Boeing out there, and I don't believe that to be true. But I don't know for sure either.

I also found the ridership comparison with Toronto amusing...it's only one of the largest and densest cities in North America with a full blown subway, streetcar and commuter rail network lol. He said this was his first analysis and he wanted to refine his process as he did other cities. I would probably start with getting off the Wikipedia and Google Maps and maybe just try and interview a public relations person at whatever transit agency he's focused on. They'd probably be willing to talk to him and could give him better information and context for how a system turned out than whatever this was supposed to be.

Wait until he discovers how Chesterfield, Fenton, and St. Charles County people feel about public transit...he may feel a little different toward St. Clair County after that haha.

symphonicpoet · PostJun 23, 2020#8772020-06-23T04:46+00:00

^I think he knows. He said this was the first episode of a series. And I took some of his comments early in the video to be the surprise at a "first glance" superficial examination which he said he would examine in greater depth. Further, he said the station densities on the Missouri side clearly work for something more commuter like, and that the Illinois side was likely cheap to build, which is correct. When you add in that an expansion to St. Charles has been discussed, an expansion to Florissant would be logical and inexpensive, and an extension to Fenton could pass through some of the regions more densely populated suburbs on the way out and I think his first impressions are pretty forgivable. Overall, he seemed to have a pleasant impression of our system, and his initial reactions don't feel unreasonable for an outsider.

Further, I got the impression he is himself a transit planner. So I expect he knows how to consult the agencies and read the proposals, but he's trying to refine his own analysis on its own merits before he digs into a critique of his home town team. All in all, I thought it was a fair critique. And I'm not too worried if he confused one garage for another. I wasn't paying such close attention that I saw which garage it was. Even if he got the wrong one, that seems a pretty forgivable error. He was just describing what he sees as useful assets to the system. I am inclined to agree.

sc4mayor · PostJun 23, 2020#8782020-06-23T14:50+00:00

^ I wouldn't say he was super critical, but I didn't take it as you did either. He was not describing the Clayton garage as a "useful asset"...he seemed to be quite critical of the land use around the stations (which is absolutely fair for quite a few of them), including the parking facilities. I would also say that just like the Missouri side, the Metro East portion functions more like a commuter rail then a light rail (maybe even more so)...so I found it weird he was decrying the upwards of "6 minutes" between stations in the Metro East, especially after comparing MetroLink to SPETA and others like it.

Do agree with you about an expansion to Florissant (primarily from Clayton north through the 170 corridor) basically finishing the original Cross County line. Outside of that any lines to Fenton, Chesterfield, and St. Charles would be a total waste of resources and money as they just don't have the density or the political support.

Now, Metro's older plan for a traditional commuter rail line between downtown and Eureka/Pacific would accomplish a lot of that for a fraction of the cost. Downtown, TG/Vandy, Ellendale, Webester Groves, Kirkwood, Valley Park, Eureka, Pacific. It would get within 10-15 min of Fenton, which isn't particularly dense anyway and traditional commuter trains work well for park and ride. Maybe even a whistle stop for us rail fans at the Museum of Transportation. Hell, I'd run it all the way out to Hermann, at least on Fridays and Saturdays. Another traditional commuter corridor could be run from downtown up north to St. Charles too. Stops in North City, Ferguson (close to Florissant), Berkley, and eventually out to St. Chuck with a big park and ride for St. Charles commuters at 3rd and Depot Lane right over the river. Personally I think folks over there would be more amenable to this type of service than MetroLink anyway. We'll call it MetroRail. I think Chesterfield's best bet for enhanced transit service is going to be some variation of the proposed 64/40 BRT line. I don't ever see rail service getting to Chesterfield.

A transit planner (which I am not) should be able to figure this stuff out, even if he's just using the google machine for his research like this one is.

sc4mayor · PostJul 28, 2020#8792020-07-28T13:29+00:00

MetroLink expansion in Illinois moves forward:
https://www.bizjournals.com/stlouis/new ... inois.html

The St. Clair County Transit District Board of Trustees has selected a company to oversee the extension of MetroLink to MidAmerica St. Louis Airport.

Gonzalez Cos. will ensure the design and construction will stay on budget and on time for the 5.5-mile extension of the light rail system from the Shiloh-Scott MetroLink Station to MidAmerica St. Louis Airport in the Metro East. Officials are expected to select the design company next month, and the design process is slated to take nine to 12 months, said Ken Sharkey, managing director of the St. Clair County Transit District (SCCTD).

wabash · PostJul 28, 2020#8802020-07-28T13:55+00:00

sc4mayor wrote: ↑
Jul 28, 2020
MetroLink expansion in Illinois moves forward:
https://www.bizjournals.com/stlouis/new ... inois.html

The St. Clair County Transit District Board of Trustees has selected a company to oversee the extension of MetroLink to MidAmerica St. Louis Airport.

Gonzalez Cos. will ensure the design and construction will stay on budget and on time for the 5.5-mile extension of the light rail system from the Shiloh-Scott MetroLink Station to MidAmerica St. Louis Airport in the Metro East. Officials are expected to select the design company next month, and the design process is slated to take nine to 12 months, said Ken Sharkey, managing director of the St. Clair County Transit District (SCCTD).

Great to hear things are moving along. This is probably just a synopsis of the Biz Journal article, but no pay wall: KSDK - Metrolink Expansion Illinois

ldai_phs · PostJan 11, 2021#8812021-01-11T03:52+00:00

In 1969, St. Louis studied a 67 mile below ground subway with 90 second to 10 minute head ways. 7 lines were proposed with an 8th to Kirkwood being considered. Looks like 67 miles is just the below ground portion with many more miles would be above. 600,000 daily riders were expected by 1990.

Anyone know more?

quincunx · PostJan 11, 2021#8822021-01-11T03:56+00:00

IIRC we were in the running with DC and they got it.

MarkHaversham · PostJan 11, 2021#8832021-01-11T05:12+00:00

Seems like it was for the best, I can't imagine getting 1/3 of the pop to ride daily.

symphonicpoet · PostJan 11, 2021#8842021-01-11T05:56+00:00

^I don't know. If they'd built something like that back when we were the tenthish biggest metro maybe we'd still be the tenthish biggest metro. Of course by now it would be undermaintained and breaking down badly.

tbspqr · PostJan 11, 2021#8852021-01-11T17:56+00:00

ldai_phs wrote: ↑
Jan 11, 2021
In 1969, St. Louis studied a 67 mile below ground subway with 90 second to 10 minute head ways. 7 lines were proposed with an 8th to Kirkwood being considered. Looks like 67 miles is just the below ground portion with many more miles would be above. 600,000 daily riders were expected by 1990.

Anyone know more?

Better quality (visually) & later version (dated 1972) of this document can be downloaded here:
https://rosap.ntl.bts.gov/view/dot/693/dot_693_DS1.pdf?
(252 page document covering all USA - see the following sections for St. Louis:
PDF page 31 - "Volume 1: Executive Summary",
PDF page 32 - "Volume 1: Impacts and Public Perceptions",
PDF page 33 - "Volume 3: Appendices", and
PDF Page 34 - "Staff Report, Los Angeles".)
-OR-
Full text of the scan can be found here:
https://archive.org/stream/urbanmasstra ... 0_djvu.txt
In Dec. 2015, NEXTSTL did a good write-up on what would become this proposed system - centered around a video clip from 1965 (4:23 in length - from MO History Museum); the video centers on the need / desire of the city / region to explore rapid transit ideas, no details on where or what:
LINK: https://nextstl.com/2015/12/rapid-trans ... rity-1965/

Also related is this March 1973 NYTimes article on the plans scrapping / failure:
LINK: https://www.nytimes.com/1974/03/18/arch ... ystem.html

ldai_phs · PostJan 11, 2021#8862021-01-11T17:58+00:00

quincunx wrote:IIRC we were in the running with DC and they got it.

I read into this further. KC also explored a subway and approved a sales tax to pay for it. However, the city council voted down bonding capacity for a subway with a 1 vote margin.

The Feds paid for studies into rapid rail in both cities and geotechnical studies were also completed.

wabash · PostJan 11, 2021#8872021-01-11T18:08+00:00

Wow. Interesting. What a missed opportunity. Nonetheless, I can't help but be somewhat impressed that St. Louis City, St. Louis County and St. Clair County have managed to go it alone and cobble together 46 miles of designated right-of-way mass transit (soon to be 51 miles), with limited federal support (following the initial line) and negligible state support from Missouri.

chriss752 · PostJan 11, 2021#8882021-01-11T19:47+00:00

wabash wrote: ↑
Jan 11, 2021
Wow. Interesting. What a missed opportunity. Nonetheless, I can't help but be somewhat impressed that St. Louis City, St. Louis County and St. Clair County have managed to go it alone and cobble together 46 miles of designated right-of-way mass transit (soon to be 51 miles), with limited federal support (following the initial line) and negligible state support from Missouri.

I think what has been done is commendable. If only we could get the North-South line built at well as the line out to Westport Plaza built in addition to upgrading Grand to BRT and creating a Gravois and Kingshighway BRT, we would have a truly great transit system for a City of our size (at least in my view). 4 rail lines connecting our two airports, the job hubs of the Central Corridor, and having BRT connect several dense neighborhoods together.

In regards to the old St. Louis Streetcar plan for Lindell, it's a shame that didn't happen. If it did, we could be talking about connecting the Loop Trolley line to the Lindell-Olive Streetcar line and actually make the Loop Trolley worthwhile. Although the trams/trains would have to be different.

sc4mayor · PostJan 11, 2021#8892021-01-11T20:10+00:00

wabash wrote: ↑
Jan 11, 2021
Wow. Interesting. What a missed opportunity. Nonetheless, I can't help but be somewhat impressed that St. Louis City, St. Louis County and St. Clair County have managed to go it alone and cobble together 46 miles of designated right-of-way mass transit (soon to be 51 miles), with limited federal support (following the initial line) and negligible state support from Missouri.

Completely agree considering the state of affairs for public transit (really just public infrastructure in general) in Missouri.

One of my favorite things about my neighborhood is being only a 10-15min walk to the station. My doctors at BJC (and the CWE), the airport, the Loop, Forest Park, downtown, some friends of mine that live near the end of the blue line on the southwest side, etc. And I live in the suburbs...

Like Chris said...just need that N/S expansion (and eventually some others...but really need N/S). Speaking of that...does anyone know when we should hear more on this?
https://www.stlouis-mo.gov/government/d ... cfm?id=174

Submittals were due back in September. DB mentioned in another thread there's roughly $40 million sitting unused in the City's transit account and growing by $12-$15 million a year. If they settle on a lower cost option like trackless tram or high-quality dedicated lane BRT...maybe we see some movement sooner rather than later.

goat314 · PostJan 11, 2021#8902021-01-11T20:39+00:00

I really think St. Louis should have went for modern streetcar for N-S line like KC. I really like the idea of a massive metrolink line from SoCo to NoCo via the city and at one point it looked like it was going that way until that fraud Stenger wrote that egregious letter to the feds and then ironically got sent to the feds soon after. Now it seems we are shooting ourselves in the foot with the crime narratives again and I really wish media would stop pushing these Metrolink is a vehicle for crime narratives. I think the best outcome we could hope for is either A) the Biden administration really is serious about expanding public transit and starts giving cities 90% matches. or B) a modern streetcar in the city with some BRT to the county and possible a Westport Metrolink breaks ground in the next 10-20 years. With that said, we have to keep in mind that many of the great systems we love around the country literally were started a century ago. So we are actually doing pretty well and have about the most rail transit of any city our size, save Portland or Denver.

RockChalkSTL · PostJan 11, 2021#8912021-01-11T20:53+00:00

As I have always understood it, N-S would run on rails in the street.

I don't see how this is that much different than a streetcar.

The KC streetcar is nice... but it can be very, very slow while running with traffic. A major traffic jam would render it useless.

I want something better for St. Louis. I want something that can still move people when the Blues or Cardinals have a championship parade, for instance.

sc4mayor · PostJan 12, 2021#8922021-01-12T00:42+00:00

^ Agree 100%. Nothing against what KC has done, but supplementing our existing MetroLink system with a mixed traffic streetcar, would be, for lack of a better word...dumb (speaking of N/S primarily here, if a private operator wanted to build an east/west streetcar (or even BRT) to compliment the existing red/blue lines I could see some merit to that). But any N/S trunk line needs to be separated from traffic. I’d rather continue the separation of modes like we already do here. Much, much faster and more efficient.

arch city · PostJan 12, 2021#8932021-01-12T00:43+00:00

KansasCitian wrote: ↑
Jan 11, 2021
As I have always understood it, N-S would run on rails in the street.

I don't see how this is that much different than a streetcar.

The KC streetcar is nice... but it can be very, very slow while running with traffic. A major traffic jam would render it useless.

I want something better for St. Louis. I want something that can still move people when the Blues or Cardinals have a championship parade, for instance.

I'm not a transportation planner, but it seems "right-of-way" lanes with proper above grade flyovers - planned at the right intersections would address the problem.

RockChalkSTL · PostJan 12, 2021#8942021-01-12T03:29+00:00

sc4mayor wrote: ↑
Jan 12, 2021
^ Agree 100%. Nothing against what KC has done, but supplementing our existing MetroLink system with a mixed traffic streetcar, would be, for lack of a better word...dumb (speaking of N/S primarily here, if a private operator wanted to build an east/west streetcar (or even BRT) to compliment the existing red/blue lines I could see some merit to that). But any N/S trunk line needs to be separated from traffic. I’d rather continue the separation of modes like we already do here. Much, much faster and more efficient.

I really think the KC streetcar is nice. It has activated that entire area of KC and that's fantastic. I want whatever St. Louis does to do the same.

But I just see limitations with it that I don't want to see replicated in St. Louis. Neither city is going to stop developing with the car in mind for a long while. Most new developments have parking and add more cars to the streets.

I'm just saying, there may be a day when they reach a higher population density and wish the thing didn't run down Main Street with the rest of traffic.

If St. Louis' N-S runs in the street.... fine. But I do hope it will at least have a dedicated lane or something to ensure speed of transit.

It is important to me that this thing can continue to run under any traffic condition, even with complete gridlock.

Unfortunately, I don't think St. Louis is going to do that. Everything I have seen shows it running in the street.

sc4mayor · PostJan 12, 2021#8952021-01-12T04:43+00:00

^ The original N/S LRT plan you describe is planned to run in the street...in a dedicated right of way (it’s own lane) with signal priority.

Street running LRT is not the same as a streetcar.

The city can’t afford that original plan though...hence the new study. I imagine any new plan will not be mixed traffic either.

GoHarvOrGoHome · PostJan 12, 2021#8962021-01-12T15:16+00:00

While I won't argue to replace the N/S with a KC style streetcar, I believe the concept does have a place in STL, and that is in the central corridor along Wash Ave/Lindell (Maybe eventually down Broadway/4th to Soulard). Metrolink is OK at serving the central corridor, but really fails as you go north of the line (outside of downtown proper.) Parts of Downtown West, Midtown, Grand Center, and the CWE north of Lindell are functionally not served by rail and thus don't benefit from the development that comes from being a transit neighborhood.

A free and high frequency streetcar going through this corridor completely changes the equation for these high potential neighborhoods. A free streetcar essentially extends the pedestrian range for anywhere along the line, allowing Grand Center residents to access downtown as if it in their own neighborhood and vice versa.

Will it be reliable enough for commuters? Maybe not, but that isn't what the streetcar excels at. It's about attracting residents to the line, and focusing their spending along it. Metrolink is great for what it does (although I would argue that it should also be free) which is reliably getting people long distances at decent speeds. A slower streetcar with stops every three blocks is about creating granularity and concentrating wealth along it's corridor.

RockChalkSTL · PostJan 12, 2021#8972021-01-12T16:04+00:00

It makes me happy to hear that St. Louis' system would likely not be mixed traffic.

Do we have any kind of guesses on what the new study might propose?

I do want N-S to be a rail-spine for north and south transit in St. Louis City and St. Louis County. Then I hope St. Louis will go hard with BRT lines down our biggest corridors.

We clearly don't have the money to run something from Fairground Park to Chippewa yet. Could they reduce the size again just to get something started?

It's important to me that St. Louis firmly establish downtown as the jobs and culture center of the region. Any large transit path that hopes to one day cut through north and south city, and into the county, should go through downtown.

symphonicpoet · PostJan 13, 2021#8982021-01-13T05:05+00:00

^I have to wonder if things will be different with a new administration. I felt we had a good shot at federal money under Obama. Maybe we will have a good shot at such a match with Biden and they can build the original plan. (Maybe minus some of the silly downtown doglegs.)

ldai_phs · PostJan 13, 2021#8992021-01-13T05:24+00:00

symphonicpoet wrote:^I have to wonder if things will be different with a new administration. I felt we had a good shot at federal money under Obama. Maybe we will have a good shot at such a match with Biden and they can build the original plan. (Maybe minus some of the silly downtown doglegs.)

Grants for LRT projects have trended towards 30-40% over the past 2 administrations. I am hoping for a restoration of 50% and maybe even 80% grants. The question is if St. Louis can qualify after previous hiccups with grants for rail and the relative low density along the proposed corridor.

Even if a lot of federal money is made available, there are a lot of cities with denser railless corridors.

symphonicpoet · PostJan 13, 2021#9002021-01-13T06:42+00:00

^The part of the area that's the least dense is also the part of the area with the highest concentration of poverty and disadvantaged residents. And the new administration has talked about tackling that in the highways to boulevards initiative. I wonder if they just might bite.

Metrolink Expansion?

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