urbanMSP

Seems like park & rides are a quasi-ridership generator, because if someone is parking to ride transit they can probably drive to another nearby place to park and ride transit. Similarly, this is why I'm probably somewhat ok with larger structured parking for park and rides (if priced) vs more ...

From what I can see on MnDOT's website about the 494 project, nothing will be abutting the Best Buy HQ, so I don't see why the park & ride has to be closed for the freeway expansion. I can see it being closed because they're using the parking lot for construction equipment staging, but it would...

From what I can see on MnDOT's website about the 494 project, nothing will be abutting the Best Buy HQ, so I don't see why the park & ride has to be closed for the freeway expansion. I can see it being closed because they're using the parking lot for construction equipment staging, but it would'...

Not long ago the park & ride at 35W & 98th Street Station (or as I prefer to call it by its original name South Bloomington Transit Center) was bursting at the seams except maybe Fridays. 10 years ago I said they should build a parking ramp there, and thank goodness nobody listened. Too bad ...

While it's great to see interest in improving suburban transit, this is a waste of time and money, and it would be much easier and cheaper to improve local bus routes like the 444 and 447. Throwing a lot of buses and building some fancy stations on a car sewer like County Road 42 won't change the lo...

Realistically, a 323 extension is likely to be the only additional local service in Woodbury. Another change should be to convert 351 to a "non-stop" variant of the Gold Line, using the BRT buses, or eliminate the express entirely. Also, if the Gold Line doesn't get a Gold ITDP ranking, I...

For the 2035 map the only thing I'd like added is the Orange Line extended to Burnsville Center. In reality I would hope within the next 5 years that'll happen, whether it's a quick hop on 35W, or (my preference) goes down Nicollet Avenue with a few stops in between.

This brings up the question of when is a budget set concretely and at completion if you go over it you're over budget and if you're below it you're under budget. I forget when, but sometime ago the Gold Line budget went up to account for additional parking, so assuming it's still over the original b...

I think any freeway removal here would be extremely important to get right, and I don't know how confident I'd be in that happening. Capping a freeway on the other hand I'd feel much more confident in. Yeah the freeway and traffic are still there, but at least some urban land is reclaimed for develo...

This might be a long shot, but does MnDOT or any other place have info on the timeline of freeway development in the Twin Cities? I'm curious how long it's taken to get to the freeway route mileage we have now, and for that matter what is the exact freeway route mileage in the Twin Cities.

Saw on MVTA's Facebook page they added 5 ProMaster vans to the Connect fleet.

Also a person commented if they (specifically the Connect service) accepts GoTo cards, and MVTA responded "At the moment they do not, but we are exploring that option. More to come."

Didn't read the whole article because I know how much KSTP loves to hate light rail, so the gist is there was a hiccup in which recently installed light rail track in the Kenilworth Corridor was one foot too close to the parallel freight track. https://kstp.com/5-investigates/new-problem-uncovered-o...

I'd just like to point out Uber didn't make a profit until last year. Lyft hasn't made a profit yet.

I'm pretty skeptical that the city level is the correct place for regulation of rideshare companies. But I have no sympathy for the companies themselves. From the start, they've abused information asymmetries with their "employees" to subsidize their anti-competitive pricing. The entire m...

Will Uber and Lyft really leave Minneapolis? Maybe. Here's how it could play out. I don't use Uber/Lyft and don't know anyone who drives for them, so I have the luxury of being a disinterested third party in this. At minimum, if Uber/Lyft withdrew and no other rideshare service replaced them, I'd b...

Can't say I'd miss them if they completely left the Twin Cities. Haven't used Lyft, and last time I recall using Uber was 2017 (only counting times I was by myself, but even in a group the last time was pre-pandemic).

On the subject of long unused bus stops, here's one on Normandale & 94th Street in Bloomington: https://www.google.com/maps/@44.8332729,-93.3504538,3a,20.4y,198.85h,90.41t/data=!3m7!1e1!3m5!1sLjLnZ9eiSg3LvuEPN-xkLQ!2e0!5s20160901T000000!7i13312!8i6656?authuser=0&entry=ttu The latest Street V...

Today I took a walk around the Upper Harbor Terminal site. For now it's a big and empty space, but the roads leading into the site are paved and you can tell where the street will be along the river connecting Dowling and 33rd. An old grain elevator (I think that's what it is anyway) still stands, d...

^ Hey, thank you! I fell in love with the U of M the first time I went to the East Bank a number of years ago, it has such great urban form. I have a couple more confessions: 1. I live well within biking distance of my school, but I choose to use a car to get there on days I have extracurriculars (...

Gold Line is on the verge of being officially delayed. There was substantial trouble getting some utilities moved (I think) and that delayed a large part of the work for a while. The project committee had to sign off on reordering the project's construction schedule and authorize more winter work t...