Orange Line / 35W@94: Downtown to Crosstown Project

[EOst]

Route 146 makes seven inbound trips in the morning and six outbound in the evening. Would switching those buses/drivers to the 46 be enough to gain more than a tiny frequency boost?

[Tcmetro]

Not only that, but I would imagine that the converted trips would have very low ridership between the 46TH/35W station and the Sibley Plaza terminal. The ridership at that hour is more focused on downtown travel, and the ridership lost by forcing a transfer would likely not be outweighed by new crosstown riders.

[billhelm]

As someone who can ride either the single seat 133 or the 46 to 535 to downtown, I usually chose the former, even though it sometimes takes longer (I can catch it at the beginning of the route a block from my house or towards the end of local service on Chicago Ave about 5 blocks from my house). The connections are too iffy at the 35W/46th Street station, and I've sat there for 15-20 minutes often when there's a tight connection and I miss the second bus (particularly in the afternoon). At that point, I would have been better off on the 133 or even the 14 local bus. Orange Line will help, but if they don't also increase the frequency of the 46, I'm still not likely to take it that often.

[mattaudio]

Keep in mind, there are plans to reroute the 133 via Park/Portland (limited stop) and I think plans for the 135 on 1st/Blaisdell as well. The point there is to get an equity gain by running via inner neighborhoods without much time delay. I think that's an excellent compromise to all of this.

[RailBaronYarr]

The point of inbound/outbound trips and the frequency boost those hours would provide to the 46 is well taken. At the same time, transit costs aren't so cut and dry. The 146 basically requires 3, maybe 4 buses (are they articulated?) to meet even the low frequency it provides. Do we know if they deadhead back to downtown or do they run a different route? What about the drivers? Are we paying 3-4 drivers to work a morning shift only, or do they pick up other routes? These routes have a much higher overhead for these reasons than a standard bus making all-day runs where a driver gets a full 8 hour shift in at maximum utilization. Could those articulated buses be run on local routes like the 18 or 19 or 6 to reduce crowding and speed up dwell times?

Point being, there's a bigger opportunity cost to these express routes than meets the eye. Maybe it's worth it in certain cases, but my gut tells me express routes with 250 daily users (500 total boardings a day) maybe don't make the cut. Maybe there's an argument than some of these express bus route could be better served with a more robust aBRT network overlay on local routes. Maybe I'm just talking out of my ass. Who knows.

[MNdible]

Sure, but you need to also acknowledge that the 535, while not technically dead-heading, is probably running 100% full inbound and 10% full outbound.

And because of the nature of rush hour, there are always going to be bus drivers working funny shifts. That's certainly not unique to the 146 or the 133. Just because the 18 runs all day long doesn't mean that there aren't twice as many 18 buses and drivers on the road during peak as opposed to off peak.

[RailBaronYarr]

Well actually, the 18 runs 8 buses an hour fro 7am all the way through 3pm, with 11 from 3-4, 9 from 4-5, 7 from 5-6, 8 from 6-7, and 5 from 7-9. Since it's a bus route that runs in places with heavy all-day traffic stemming from high population, job, and shopping destinations all along the route, the am peak to midday ratio is 1:1, and the PM peak only gets 37% above the midday frequencies. Some local routes may have the pattern of doubling the midday frequency for a rush hour or two, but most don't add *that* many. And in any case, I've advocated on this board several times for spreading out some of the revenue hours to a better grid with more even all-day service while replacing the heavily used peak hour (but slightly less frequent) routes (like the 6 or 18) with articulated buses to handle the capacity. Which isn't too different from the philosophy employed by the Green Line, which replaced 2 buses that ran at high combined frequencies during rush hours with a high-capacity train that comes every 10 minutes (less often!), morning, noon, or evening. Seems to have worked out okay.

I'm not saying express buses evil & local buses have zero peak revenue hour/directional loading imbalances. I'm saying some routes are better than others. I see plenty of northbound 6 buses at 5:45 PM near Uptown with 20+ people in them. Same goes for the 18 around Lake. In the middle of the spectrum is the 535, a bus that may only be 10% full running southbound in the AM hours, but at least it's a bus that allows passengers on it every 30 minutes from 6 am until the PM rush when it improves the frequencies a bit.

Bringing this back to the Orange Line... I'm just asking whether or not it's a good idea to continue every single express route that doubles up on the trip from somewhere along the I-35W corridor into downtown if a marginally worse experience/travel time could be had by shuffling those revenue hours (which are wasted *in comparison to other ways they could be spent*) into local route service. Again, similar to the Green Line implementation, which timed connecting routes and improved frequency/span, has proven to be a key component of improving accessibility for people outside the walkshed of GL station areas. We're spending money on these stations that allow for super-fast boarding and have warm, comfortable waiting areas, and the Orange Line is already slowing to a stop to let people off/on. Why not maximize those sunk costs by slightly inconveniencing the (relatively) few people riding express buses serving downtown to improve all-day bus service for a larger transit market in more walkable areas?

[LakeCharles]

Keep in mind, there are plans to reroute the 133 via Park/Portland (limited stop) and I think plans for the 135 on 1st/Blaisdell as well. The point there is to get an equity gain by running via inner neighborhoods without much time delay. I think that's an excellent compromise to all of this.

What's the timeline on those changes? To be implemented once orange line gets up and running, or sooner?

[Tcmetro]

Perhaps they'd make the change once the 35W/Lake construction project starts. Local streets will probably be a better option to access downtown, especially considering those buses only use the freeway from 12th St to 35th St.

[EOst]

Both are marked High-priority and 2018-20 in MT's SIP, for what it's worth. But I think the change depends on being able to increase their frequency.

[twincitizen]

PUBLIC OPEN HOUSE
Tuesday, April 5, 2016
6:00 to 8:00 p.m.
Presentation at 6:30 p.m.
Colin Powell Center - 3rd Floor
2921 - 4th Avenue South

Not sure what the point of this open house will be... perhaps just one last look for the public before everything is finalized and goes out to bid. Portions of this project will be under heavy construction next year. As a reminder, there are 4 separate components that will all be under construction at the same time: "Chapter 152" bridges (12th to 26th St), Lake St Transit/Access project (26th to 32nd, new exits, transit station), "gap project" (32nd to 42nd pavement resurfacing + southbound HOT lane), and finally Lake Street reconstruction from Blaisdell to 5th Av.

[FISHMANPET]

Orange Line still isn't fully funded, so I don't think they'll be going to bid this soon.

This is an open house for the 3 35W projects, and specifically for their geometry, which they'll be seeking minincipal consent for this May. Part of that physical geometry involves a four Lane exit ramp from 35W onto Lake St.

The Lake St access portion of this is a little bit of a turd, with giant access ramps, and what's destined to be another Hi-Lake situation under the bridge.

Sent from my Nexus 5X using Tapatalk

[intercomnut]

Most recent newsletter just came out. 2 items of interest:

• The Environmental Assessment for the 35W project and Orange Line's Lake Street Station has been released
• The stops in downtown have been changed. The line will now stop at 3rd, 5th, 8th, and 11th Streets.

[Silophant]

I think it'll be good to have a stop closer to Washington, though I feel like they should maybe just push further and do actual Washington stops. Or single stop on Washington itself, if the buses could make those turns. (Probably not?)

[RailBaronYarr]

Not sure if it's been noted, but Hennepin County & the City of Minneapolis will be reconstructing Lake St on either side of the 35W transit access project for the few blocks that weren't done when Lake St was reconstructed over the past decade. Project boundaries are Blaisdell to 1st Ave on the west side, and 3rd to 5th Aves on the east side. It's being done at the time of the 35W project, so it's included on the project page.

I only bring it up because the PAC saw it yesterday to give feedback. I took some exception to the fact that, even though these are short segments, east of 35W keeps a 4-lane design. To be fair, the project team is scraping every inch they can from thru-lanes to give back to the pedestrian space, and are implementing bump-outs at corners in place of parking. But it still leaves just 10.3' of sidewalk where cars are parked, which is wholly inadequate in my opinion for such a busy street full of walkable businesses, transit stops, and actual people out and about, particularly when the amenity zone of lighting and trees and benches cuts away from ped space. This will be even worse in the places we build aBRT stations, which will be raised and leave 4-5' of space between building walls and the ~18" high platform.

I questioned whether they would be interested in even looking at a 3 lane design east of 3rd to give some space back to the sidewalk. In my mind, the new exit ramp directly to 28th should alleviate a good chunk of cars exiting 35W heading to Abbott/WF or even further east. Beyond that, AADTs in 2012 in this section were just shy of 20k, with a long history of that level (and, notably, the most recent counts at other points east of here are around that level, too). West Lake is even more frustrating, as traffic counts between 35W and Uptown are int he 17k range. I think we were way too conservative with our design when Lake was reconstructed. Speeds are high and crashes happen.

I was met with a very strong "no chance." I understand that a 4-lane section might work a little better for transit (stopping in the thru-lane) than a 3 with bus pull-outs, and any time we talk about road diets of any sort on major streets the way to shut up urbanists is impacting transit operations. I know that the 20k number is just a "rule of thumb," and it depends very much on peak hour counts vs total daily, turning movements, etc etc. But that is still a rule of thumb that basically assumes we won't meaningfully, negatively impact vehicle LOS. I've seen cities implement them with AADT up to 26k. And, if we're thinking that in the next 50 years we'll be speeding up buses with aBRT and building rail in the trench and shifting modes, I dunno. I was disappointed. Our commercial right of ways are often limited, and it's a real shame to see Lake St have such substandard sidewalks and no appetite to even try making them better.

[David Greene]

I questioned whether they would be interested in even looking at a 3 lane design east of 3rd to give some space back to the sidewalk. In my mind, the new exit ramp directly to 28th should alleviate a good chunk of cars exiting 35W heading to Abbott/WF or even further east.

Perhaps, but there are still huge tie-ups especially during rush hour going west. Lots of people turn E-Lake -> S-Stevens to get on the freeway.

Not that I disagree with your sentiments at all, but that whole Lake/35-W area is a mess, traffic-wise. I would love to see the exit/entrance ramps terminate at 31st to relieve some pressure from Lake St. I can't remember what that area will look like after construction.

[RailBaronYarr]

I was more talking about the sections of Lake that aren't the freeway entrance/exit points. The number of lanes feels excessive there, but I won't argue that backups happen thanks to the mix of thru-and freeway traffic (to/from), and the dedicated block of left turn lanes in each direction seems to solve that. I dunno, my more general point was that Lake is an actual pedestrian and transit corridor, and with 28th getting a direct ramp and 31st being slightly under-used east of 35W (and definitely under-used west of it), there's room for calming on Lake itself. Without even talking about really negatively impacting average vehicle trip times in the area, which itself could/should be a long-range policy goal.

[twincitizen]

In terms of smaller things we could change, does anyone know if the new SB exit to Lake (aka Stevens Ave) still planned to be 4 lanes across (left, thru, thru, right)? I know the Whittier Alliance bristled at this a little bit, and frankly Metro Transit should take issue with it as well, given that it will be awful for pedestrians heading to/from the station. I thought I had heard at one point there was some openness to having just 3 lanes there, but I don't know if that change was ever made. All layouts available on the project website show the 4-lane.

http://static1.1.sqspcdn.com/static/f/1 ... etPlan.jpg

This could be something to reach out to Lisa Bender on, as the municipal consent vote nears. I did not attend either of the recent open houses for the EIS, so I haven't seen any updated layouts

EDIT:

Written comments on the Environmental Assessment document will be accepted through April 27 and may be sent to Rick Dalton, Minnesota Department of Transportation, 1500 West County Road B2, Roseville, MN 55113 or [email protected]

Note that the above is for the freeway project and presumably the transit station, not the design of lanes on Lake Street itself, as that is a separate project. I would think that comments on the number of exit lanes on Stevens would be germane to the EIS.

[Qhaberl]

So what will the station types for the Orange line be? I know it will run down the middle of interstate 35W. Are they planning on making the stations inline? Will the bus have to exit 35W before stopping at a station?

[intercomnut]

So what will the station types for the Orange line be? I know it will run down the middle of interstate 35W. Are they planning on making the stations inline? Will the bus have to exit 35W before stopping at a station?

It varies by station. You can get more details here.