TU Transportation Editorial: Riding a snail

[thelakelander]

By The Times-Union

If you think traffic congestion has been getting worse here, you're right.

Not that Jacksonville has the longest traffic snarls in the country. Far from it.

Los Angeles is the worst, according to a Texas Transportation Institute study.

Drivers there spend 72 hours a year - the equivalent of nearly two full work weeks - sitting in their cars because of heavy traffic.

Think of how that time could have been put to better use - making repairs around the house, doing charity work or reading to the children, for example.

Jacksonville drivers spent just 39 hours stuck in traffic.

Still, that's a lot of time.

And it's expensive.

In addition to the wear-and-tear on their cars, average motorists here burned 26 extra gallons of gasoline because of heavy traffic, up from just nine gallons in 1982, the report says.

Road construction is expensive - but so is the failure to keep up with it.

Based on the cost of excess fuel consumption and value of time spent in traffic, the study estimates that clogged roads cost a typical traveler here $700 a year.

It is often argued that mass transit is the only solution because "we can't build our way out of congestion."

Mass transit probably does make sense, in the long run. But the city's high speed transit system is still in the planning stages. It will take years to materialize. Something must be done in the interim.

And maybe we really can build our way out of congestion, after all. Economist Thomas Sowell thinks so.

In Economic Facts and Fallacies, Sowell writes:

"When Houston ... added a hundred miles a year to its road network from 1986 to 1992, average delay per traveler at the rush hour peak declined 21 percent.

"But when Houston drastically cut back on road building between 1993 and 2000, while its population was still growing, travel delays nearly doubled.

"In other words, building more roadways to keep pace with the growth of traffic only works when you do it."

Of course, it would be cost-prohibitive for the city to catch up overnight, given the amount of congestion on its major thoroughfares.

But small changes might help. Some businesses could change shifts - working employees from 7 a.m. to 4 p.m., for example, to ease traffic during the 8 a.m. and 5 p.m. peak hours.

And the time has come to consider High-Occupancy Toll (or HOT) lanes, as well.

This would involve building a single toll lane on busy roads - and charging more when traffic is heaviest.

As Reason magazine notes, this would help people in a hurry - those late for a meeting or a child's soccer game, for example - to get there on time.

And it would serve those willing to pay extra to get home earlier at night, without hurting those who would rather save money.

Tolls understandably are unpopular here. But, remember, these would be voluntary, not mandatory.

The Better Jacksonville Plan was supposed to help unclog the roadways. Costs were drastically underestimated, however, so motorists are getting less relief than they were promised.

New and innovative ways must be found to ease congestion before Jacksonville becomes "another Atlanta" - or, far worse, another L.A.

FAST FACTS: Caught in traffic

Time wasted yearly because of congestion in Florida cities:

- Orlando, 54 hours.

- Miami, 50 hours.

- Tampa, 45 hours.

- Jacksonville, 39 hours.

- Pensacola, 25 hours.

- Sarasota, 25 hours.


Source: Texas Transportation Institute

http://www.jacksonville.com/tu-online/stories/101207/opi_207424104.shtml

[Ocklawaha]

More Roads? Spell it LIGHT RAIL JACKSONVILLE!


Freeways to No Where in Tennessee

Contractor Files For Delays In Highway Project. In Nashville, the Tennessee Department of Transportation said it dismissed a contractor for costly delays on big projects in Nashville and Chattanooga. Jones Brothers Incorporated of Mount Juliet was dismissed for mounting delays, using a suspended bonding company and deteriorating finances. The department said the dismissal is not related to a price-fixing investigation.

Gee where to start? Congestion is not all negative. Congestion increases presence and in turn business and sense of community. Certainly no one likes to spend their time sitting along a road in 90 degree heat, or creeping at 2 MPH over the Fuller Warren. But consider some alternatives to this mind set of MUST HAVE HIGHWAY EXPANSION.


BRT comes up short of LRT, Trolleys, Heavy Rail or Commuter Rail in every way but COST

To expand a typical American Highway for a net gain in capacity of just ONE lane, a City like ours will have to construct 4 lanes. Why? Because of natural infill that will follow the "new" or "wider" road. Case in point? Anyone remember that little 4 lane boulevard with stop-lights, called J T Butler? It's the old, "Build it and they will come..." Rail? Well just ONE railroad track has as much passenger per hour capacity as 10 lanes of highway. But with typical head-in-the-sand we ignore the proved steel path.


Have Track? Just add Train... Nashville did it!


More and more US cities are finding various forms of regional passenger rail â€" so-called "commuter rail â€" a viable option, under the right circumstances, for introducing rail transit service on a relatively low budget ... and Nashville, Tennessee is a case in point. Beginning this past November, workers started re-laying about 80,000 feet of track as part of the rehabilitation and infrastructure improvements needed to implement a 32-mile, Nashville-to-Lebanon "commuter rail" line. More trackwork is expected to take place within the next two months.
[WKRN-TV, 2004/11/04; Nashville City Paper, 7 January 2005]


Beautiful Miami? Is this the JTA dream for Jacksonville? How about yours?

Sprawl such as that may seem a fit to endless pine woods and palmettos, but a drive around Orlando, Tampa or Miami, will quickly demonstrate how fragile our natural beauty really is. Miami? What pine woods? Orlando? Plastic forests and mice. Tampa? It's Northern edge is encroaching on Dunnellon! Clearly this doesn't work. My father would go all poetic when he spoke of his home... of rolling hills, citrus trees and flowing streams. Endless Orange Blossoms, dotted with pretty little villages and towns with that World Class Climate. Florida? No! Los Angeles!


Wouldn't this look good in YOUR neighborhood? You can see how endless expansion has fixed the problem.. Wanna bet if they build a bus freeway alongside, it would cure all their troubles? NO!

The interchange of Ventura Freeway US-101 and Interstate 405 ranked as America's worst highway bottleneck, according to a report issued Thursday by the American Highway Users Alliance, a Washington, D.C., lobbying group that presses Congress for more money for highway construction.
As traffic congeals at the Los Angeles interchange, it adds up to more than 27.14 million hours of traffic delay each year, the report claims.
Other Los Angeles-area bottlenecks, according to the Alliance, include:

    * I-10 at I-5 "East LA" interchange (shown above)


Look what Trolleys brought to Denver, The Lincoln Station Complex is far more then a place to get on and off, it is a PLACE TO BE!

The recent posts on Transit Oriented Development only touch the surface of the subject. If we allow the congestion to work in our favor, then we develop land that is rich and dense with life. Transit stations breed that type of development when the system has two factors: 1. A fixed guide-way. 2. It goes where people want to go. Our BRT plan is neither of these, which is why BRT is a failure at TOD development around the country. Light Rail accounts for well over 1/2 of all TOD space, returning $1,200 dollars for EVERY DOLLAR invested in the Light Rail System! What about ROD? Rail Oriented Development? Another term to learn. ROD is clustered around commuter rail, traditional and even Amtrak rail services. Get the "STATION" idea out of your minds. TOD's or ROD's are focused on a Station core, but they have as much to do as any good shopping mall. The Station is not a stop on Mass Transit, it is THE DESTINATION. A good TOD/ROD will include, retail, restaurants, clubs, services (library, City, convenience etc.) as well as a residential mix to suit all tastes. Putting a garage across a freeway from a Skyway Stop, building a hotel and calling it a TOD, is like going near a McDonald's and calling yourself a hamburger.


San Francisco Bay Area Rapid Transit, while heavy and very expensive as rail projects go, it also pioneered ROD's making the place one of America's MOST LIVABLE CITIES.

Jacksonville is WAY BEHIND the curve and JTA is doing us a disservice by ignoring REAL development downtown with TOD/ROD's. Why is the Republican Administration now bucking the LRT applications and insisting on BUS? Why has JTA caved to some imagined numbers to prove they can do it all with a bus? (no one else has!) Why are we talking about more and more lanes, and new bus freeways, when the data shows it to be a losing battle? How much is the OIL LOBBY and the HIGHWAY LOBBY and the AUTO LOBBY or places like Texas, or Washington and Tallahassee, pushing all of this nonsense? Do they see the end of the candy wagon? If this is not all connected then why doesn't a professional writer from a major Florida Newspaper like the TU understand that LRT and Commuter Rail CAN be fast-tracked? Several systems are up and running in the time it would take JTA to study the water-shed along the next neighborhood street. Costs? Oh, for every 25 Million spent on a mile of highway, we would have to spend as little as $2-5 Million for a mile of railroad or Light Rail Transit, COMPLETE with electrical system.


The TOP IMAGE is What Los Angeles plans to fix the highway problem.
The BOTTOM IMAGE is What Jacksonville junked in 1936, notice any similarity?


Sure a few things could change, an interchange, a fly-over and better directional signs as well as staggered work hours. Even some limited BRT in HOV lanes to feed a regional rail system, and tap the Beach Cities. But to re-invent the wheel? This is smoke and mirrors to prove the unprovable. I can hear that Whistle Blow 500 Miles!

JTA? CITY HALL? TALLAHASSEE? Time to Pull your collective heads out and catch the SPARK of LIGHT RAIL!

Ocklawaha