Atlanta Streetcar (Downtown Loop) progress (Pitts, Buckhead: apartment complexes, universities, manufacturing)

[MDAllstar]

Originally Posted by BajanYankee

Look at all of the development the bus has stimulated in Portland!

Human Transit: can local buses "stimulate" development?

From the article
"Frequent bus lines clearly do attract tenants and buyers to some locations over others. The resulting market can cause more dense housing to be built on frequent bus lines than away from them. The resulting developments may not be as dense or centrally organized as Portland's streetcar-stimulated Pearl District, but they form, in aggregate, a huge amount of the recent growth in inner city urban fabric, all over North America."


That is the issue at hand. Streetcars are for dense development. Development that can reach densities of 40,000-60,000+ people per square mile. The type of development a bus attracts is not the kind of development cities are trying to build. Take Walter Reed's redevelopment in D.C. Here is a piece of land that has no residential units right now. In connection with the streetcar, 2,000 units are planned to be built there. That amount of density would not be built so far from the core without some form of rail transit. That is how the development world works. You would not be able to charge the necessary rents to get a large ROI without being able to offer some form of rail on people's door step. How do you think they are going to advertise bus lines? I have never seen class A highrise buildings make any mention of bus lines as a selling point. Streetcars will be all over all marketing material though.

[arjay57]

Originally Posted by MDAllstar

That is the issue at hand. Streetcars are for dense development. Development that can reach densities of 40,000-60,000+ people per square mile.

Once again I'm not sure why we're holding up D.C. as the be-all and end-all of what a city should be.

Be that as it may, I am a fan of compact urban development, including walkable communities served by transit.

However, when it comes to densities of 40,000-60,000+ people per square mile you can include me out. That's more than London or Tokyo. Atlanta has never been about that and I don't see why we should set that kind of density as our goal.

The Evolving Urban Form: Tokyo | Newgeography.com

[tikigod311]

Originally Posted by bryantm3

i think it's because they are hopefully planning a heavy rail project on the 'west side'. i had an idea for this actually. check the orange line on this map (the rest is in progress):

Untitled - Google Maps

Originally Posted by pit2atl

I also believe there will be a heavy rail project for the West Side. However I feel it needs run on howell mill not Northside.

Has any real interest materialized on a heavy rail line on the westside?

I think the most realistic chance for heavy rail on the westside will be local stations or an exclusive local line running on a future commuter rail line on the existing tracks.

Orrrrrrr a new tunnel under west midtown. Two levels, first for the HRT tracks, lower level for express commuter rail trains heading out to Gwinnett and Athens. That would take care of the problem with Howell junction. The tunnel dead ends at the southern end at the MMPT. But that will pretty much never happen. One can dream...

[bryantm3]

Originally Posted by arjay57

However, when it comes to densities of 40,000-60,000+ people per square mile you can include me out. That's more than London or Tokyo. Atlanta has never been about that and I don't see why we should set that kind of density as our goal.

i seriously doubt tokyo has population density that low. there are many cities in the US that have a few tracts with 60,000+ people per square mile. the only city that i know of where that is the average is new york city.

[arjay57]

Originally Posted by bryantm3

i seriously doubt tokyo has population density that low. there are many cities in the US that have a few tracts with 60,000+ people per square mile. the only city that i know of where that is the average is new york city.

Bryant, did you read the link I cited?

Tokyo is often portrayed as one of the world's highest density urban areas. It is not. At a density of 11,300 per square mile (4,300 per square kilometer), Tokyo is less dense than London (13,700 & 5,300), one-sixth the density of Hong Kong (67,000 & 25,900) and one-tenth the density of Dhaka (115,000 & 44,400). There are two reasons for this:

1. Tokyo does not have intensely dense central areas. The ku area has a density of 37,300 per square kilometer (14,400 per square kilometer). This is well below the densities of Manhattan (69,000 & 27,000) and the ville de Paris (51,000 & 21,000). Only one of the ku (Toshima) exceeds the density of Paris.

2. Further, according to the Japan House and Land Survey of 2008, Tokyo has a large stock of detached houses, by definition lower density. Nearly 45 percent of the Tokyo region's housing is detached. One-third of the dwellings within 30 kilometers (18 miles) of the core are detached. This figure rises to more than 60 percent outside 30 kilometers from the core and 85 percent between 60 and 70 kilometers (37-43 kilometers) from the core (Figure 2).

More...The Evolving Urban Form: Tokyo | Newgeography.com

[waronxmas]

Originally Posted by arjay57

Bryant, did you read the link I cited?

Yeah, while Tokyo is dense it's no where near as dense as a lot of other places around the world. Now take somewhere like Manila where they have tracys with 500,000 densities....that's density.

In all honesty though I think if we build the streetcar network, the Beltline right and add commuter rail we could use Tokyo as a great model for the city proper. At least from the way one can get around the various districts. We're already half way there with what we already have.

[MDAllstar]

Originally Posted by arjay57

Once again I'm not sure why we're holding up D.C. as the be-all and end-all of what a city should be.

Be that as it may, I am a fan of compact urban development, including walkable communities served by transit.

However, when it comes to densities of 40,000-60,000+ people per square mile you can include me out. That's more than London or Tokyo. Atlanta has never been about that and I don't see why we should set that kind of density as our goal.

The Evolving Urban Form: Tokyo | Newgeography.com

Having 40,000-60,000 people per square mile tracts is normal density for an urban city. D.C.'s core is full of those type of tracts and a large part of the city outside the core will have density that high soon as the infill continues. That is why the streetcar is so important. It will allow that type of density in area's outside the core. Cities like Tokyo and London have higher total city density because they have sustained density. Isn't that what you want for Atlanta? D.C.'s density is going to go up across a large part of the city because of the height limits. It spreads the development out. Other cities can build up keeping all their growth in a small area. That is not good when you want to urbanize an entire city though. It's much better to have as many urban neighborhoods as possible. Don't you want that for Atlanta?

[arjay57]

Originally Posted by MDAllstar

Cities like Tokyo and London have higher total city density because they have sustained density. Isn't that what you want for Atlanta?

No, I said I don't think that's necessary here. I'd love to see our disinvested areas filled in and the vacant lots around the city filled in with urban, midrise development.

But in my mind, density on the scale of London or Tokyo simply isn't the quest we need to pursue. You can have an extremely nice, livable city without that.

[bryantm3]

because of the limited space we have for urban development, i think it would be the best idea to build high rise development wherever you can. outside of the narrow strip of land along peachtree, northside drive and ponce de leon, you have historic neighbourhoods and parks that won't ever be torn down. practically speaking, it just makes the most sense. downtown and midtown atlanta are urban districts, it wouldn't make any sense to try and retrograde them into mid-rise neighbourhoods.

i mean, it's like you're trying to make atlanta into something it's not. one of the most interesting things about atlanta is the immediate juxtaposition of dense urban neighbourhoods and single-family homes and parks. of course, there are only two corridors where it is like that currently, buckhead and midtown, and they both really need work to become "true" urban districts. i think we should capitalise on that aspect and try to reproduce that kind of immediacy to nature that those two urban areas have, rather than try and reproduce boston or washington with the "miles of low-rise development" that i so commonly see touted on this forum. the fact of the matter is that atlanta doesn't have a history of that kind of development, and we really have limited space. think of the downtown/midtown corridor as manhattan (it's not— just for the purposes of this illustration pretend that it is). manhattan has miles and miles of high rise development and since it's surrounded on both sides by water, there is a barrier to development— so the high rises essentially go right up to the hudson and just stop. atlanta has a similar potential for development, except view neighbourhoods like VaHi and Vine City as the barrier to dense development— historic neighbourhoods that aren't going to be torn down. i think that we should use the limited area that we have between the east side and the west side to make development as dense as it can get, to really create a vibrant urban core. tracts with density up to 80,000 or so would not be unusual. if we just try and pretend that midtown and downtown are not really urban districts and do this low-rise business, atlanta won't ever be a truly vibrant city.

i mean look at atlanta now, we've got 5.5 million people in the metro area, and suburban development is starting to become passé. where are those people going to move? we've got to have a vibrant urban core that is a hub not only for the southeast, but for the entire east coast, else atlanta won't ever reach its true potential. i think that you're really underestimating the potential that downtown and midtown have.

[MDAllstar]

Originally Posted by arjay57

No, I said I don't think that's necessary here. I'd love to see our disinvested areas filled in and the vacant lots around the city filled in with urban, midrise development.

But in my mind, density on the scale of London or Tokyo simply isn't the quest we need to pursue. You can have an extremely nice, livable city without that.

Well, 13,000 people per square miles is really not high density. Do you think San Fran or Boston are livable? What about D.C.'s density? What kind of density do you feel is ok?