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Old 10-24-2012, 02:36 AM
 
7,132 posts, read 9,083,841 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by afonega1 View Post
Chicago and NYC are different cities ,but just like Atlanta they both have draw backs for some people.Chicago has nothing to do with this thread.
Last time I checked,we do have a heavy rail system and Denver does not.And while new there is the streetcar currently being built and a small part will be ready next year,

Not even 10 minutes ago,i took a drive downtown.The only part that was "a ghost town" was the are South of 5points. Even then it was not a ghost town but just some sketchy looking people.People as they usually are were hanging out and walking up and down Peachtree and its side streets from all the hotels.

Has ANYBODY been downtown lately?There are new mid to upscale restaurants.
Alma Cocina - Modern Mexican in Downtown Atlanta - Home in 191 Peachtree

Juke Joint Contact Info

Truva - Seduce your Senses

Cafe Intermezzo

The Anatolia Cafe | and Hookah Lounge

Even Edgewood AVE is the has changed so much in the last 2-3 years

There are many more
Does that sound like a "ghost town"?
Yes, it is. Cool, so a few new eateries opened up...Great! Now where are all of the people walking about at night? It's not that many, especially weekday night. It is dead south of the Peachtree Center.
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Old 10-24-2012, 06:08 AM
 
3,451 posts, read 3,890,952 times
Reputation: 1675
Chicago needs to get off that car high also it may be vibrant but there are a hell put a lot of people driving. its the world we live in people want to drive and with Chicago winters I wouldn't want to be walking everywhere I'd rather be in a car with heat on. With as vibrant as NY is look at how many people drive. Even through out the boroughs. This whole Atlanta with the car thing needs to just go away because every major city is clogging the highways with there cars. You act like its just a Atlanta issue..


Quote:
Originally Posted by ARaider08 View Post
Couldn't help but make the comparison. Here's the reason why I called Atlanta a ghost town: Atl does have its pockets of vibrancy but they're so far apart that it's really hard to know where people are. L5P, that one poplar st. downtown I think, west peachtree (I think), and Buckhead (pretty sure more car traffic than PED), and midtown are probably Atlanta's most vibrant spots from day-to-day and outside those avenues, there's really not much going on. If you're not working for one of the major headquarters downtown then there's really not much there for you. Underground Atlanta and the 5 Points section has lost its luster and really needs to reshape its image.
I dunno if you and I are picturing ghost towns the same come to think of it. In my opinion, for the size of the city and metro area, Atlanta really does feel like a ghost town in places where you'd expect more people.
The only problem I have with Atlanta's heavy rail is that it's not optimized by the users and the construction around MARTA stations has mad it extremely hard to do so. The Sandy Springs MARTA stop pisses me off. That station was clearly not meant for PED traffic -___-...
There are places that have impressed recently, Atlantic Station for one... As artificial as it is, is good for Atlanta. There's a similar urbanized creation off of I-20 near Kirkwood. I think that'll be Atlanta's future... I hope. Atlanta really needs to get off the car high.
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Old 10-24-2012, 01:45 PM
 
Location: Chicago
937 posts, read 922,218 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Staysean23 View Post
Chicago needs to get off that car high also it may be vibrant but there are a hell put a lot of people driving. its the world we live in people want to drive and with Chicago winters I wouldn't want to be walking everywhere I'd rather be in a car with heat on. With as vibrant as NY is look at how many people drive. Even through out the boroughs. This whole Atlanta with the car thing needs to just go away because every major city is clogging the highways with there cars. You act like its just a Atlanta issue..
Considering that their are alternate methods of transit in all those cities and Atlanta's the one with the struggling public transit system, I'd think it's an Atl issue more than anything.
Chicago's system is used frequently, at all hours and has 2 (3?) 24hr lines that are used perpetually. The trains I ride, ESPECIALLY the Red line, are filled to capacity during rush hour and still are about 3/4 full at all other times before 2am.
That's the thing that strikes me about Atlanta. It is on a car high and refuses to come off by even voting to support its pt system. I'm glad that all these projects are going through but in the long run, I'm not sure if people will even use them.
Here in Chicago, people actually use the pt system here and I can assume the same in NY. The reason you'll see a lot of people driving in NY and Chi is because the population is SO much greater than Atlanta. 2.8 mil ppl in Chicago vs. probably 600k in Atlanta using MARTA and the trains rarely have full passenger capacity.
One thing all the cities have in common is the lack of expansion on their heavy rail systems or even providing light rail support. Maybe investing in more trains and buses would help get people out of their cars in Chi and NY but doing the same in Atl at its current state would be a waste of money.
And that's the difference. People... MANY... People use the pt systems in other metropolitan cities but in Atlanta, the cost of living is so cheap that it's much more convenient to buy a house in the burbs and be forced to drive a car.
I'm not glorifying anyone else, I'm just saying these things in hopes that Atlanta will somehow reform its vision on pt usage.
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Old 10-24-2012, 01:48 PM
 
1,971 posts, read 3,030,952 times
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What is the reason that Chicago gets drawn into every other discussion about Atlanta, even if Chicago has nothing to do with the topic of the thread?
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Old 10-24-2012, 02:07 PM
 
Location: Ono Island, Orange Beach, AL
10,733 posts, read 13,282,914 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by ARaider08 View Post
I just moved out of Atlanta to Chicago so I've the right to be opinionated and compare Atl to one of the greatest cities in the world Chicago's very bike friendly.
Good luck too you. Hope I provided some kind of insight.
No, you just moved out of East Point. Clearly.
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Old 10-24-2012, 02:23 PM
 
Location: Atlanta
7,574 posts, read 10,700,859 times
Reputation: 6512
Quote:
Originally Posted by ARaider08 View Post
Considering that their are alternate methods of transit in all those cities and Atlanta's the one with the struggling public transit system, I'd think it's an Atl issue more than anything.
Chicago's system is used frequently, at all hours and has 2 (3?) 24hr lines that are used perpetually. The trains I ride, ESPECIALLY the Red line, are filled to capacity during rush hour and still are about 3/4 full at all other times before 2am.
That's the thing that strikes me about Atlanta. It is on a car high and refuses to come off by even voting to support its pt system. I'm glad that all these projects are going through but in the long run, I'm not sure if people will even use them.
Here in Chicago, people actually use the pt system here and I can assume the same in NY. The reason you'll see a lot of people driving in NY and Chi is because the population is SO much greater than Atlanta. 2.8 mil ppl in Chicago vs. probably 600k in Atlanta using MARTA and the trains rarely have full passenger capacity.
One thing all the cities have in common is the lack of expansion on their heavy rail systems or even providing light rail support. Maybe investing in more trains and buses would help get people out of their cars in Chi and NY but doing the same in Atl at its current state would be a waste of money.
And that's the difference. People... MANY... People use the pt systems in other metropolitan cities but in Atlanta, the cost of living is so cheap that it's much more convenient to buy a house in the burbs and be forced to drive a car.
I'm not glorifying anyone else, I'm just saying these things in hopes that Atlanta will somehow reform its vision on pt usage.
I like Chicago.... I like their transit system. It is a different type of city that is hard to compare, but I do want to to say you're being too hard on what we already have. It does fill up to capacity, especially since we increased headway times.

Hear me out.

Chicago

Daily ridership: 700,000
Metro Population: 9.4 million
Track Miles: 224
Stations: 135
lines: 8

Riders per station: 5185.2
Riders per population: .075
Riders per Track Mile: 3125



Marta

Daily ridership: 250,000
Metro Population: 5.2 million
Track Miles: 48
Stations: 38
lines:4 (but its really 2 with a long spur and a short 1 station spur)

Riders per Station: 6578.9
Riders per population: .048
Riders per Track Mile: 5208.3

I love Chicago... I like many of it's neighborhoods and would love to have a transit system as big as theirs, but the point that needs to be made here is our rail system is functioning the way it should be compared to other cities.


I also have to say... it isn't just Atlanta on a car high. It is everywhere, even the cities with the biggest transit systems have had trouble doing any major expansion. They are operating off of infrastructure from the past. The major exception that comes to mind is DC, which got alot of federal funding. San Francisco has a pretty expansive BART and there are LRT systems popping up. The LRT cities I'm ignoring for the time being... it will take them time to grow ridership to meet anything like these cities with HRT, but its growth worth noting.

Our big weaknesses are really less so the rail we have, but more so the total distance, number of stations, buses and commuter rail.
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Old 10-24-2012, 03:11 PM
 
Location: Chicago
937 posts, read 922,218 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by cwkimbro View Post
Good information
Thanks for the numbers. I really do wish cities and specifically the GA state legislature took more of an initiative to really develop MARTA better. It's really hard to do so with such wide roadways and highways though. I just think MARTA's objective should be to serve Atlanta proper first and then worry about commuters much like the METRA/CTA relationship in Chicago. It's really easy to get around Chicago w/o a car. It's unfathomable to do so on MARTA. It takes cooperation from the surrounding cities and counties instead of having the surrounding area feed off of the benefits Atlanta taxpayers have the burden of paying the most for.
Pretty sure every discussion about what Atlanta is like will eventually boil down into gripe about having to own a car to consistently get anywhere in a reasonable amount of time.
I sincerely hope the Beltline does a lot of good and really creates denser pockets of commerce. I wonder if anyone but tourists will actually use Atlanta's street cars. Considering that the roads are damn wide enough to support it, I hope it'll provide some kind of interest in more business and economic activity.
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Old 10-24-2012, 03:33 PM
 
Location: Atlanta
7,574 posts, read 10,700,859 times
Reputation: 6512
Quote:
Originally Posted by ARaider08 View Post
Thanks for the numbers. I really do wish cities and specifically the GA state legislature took more of an initiative to really develop MARTA better. It's really hard to do so with such wide roadways and highways though. I just think MARTA's objective should be to serve Atlanta proper first and then worry about commuters much like the METRA/CTA relationship in Chicago. It's really easy to get around Chicago w/o a car. It's unfathomable to do so on MARTA. It takes cooperation from the surrounding cities and counties instead of having the surrounding area feed off of the benefits Atlanta taxpayers have the burden of paying the most for.
Pretty sure every discussion about what Atlanta is like will eventually boil down into gripe about having to own a car to consistently get anywhere in a reasonable amount of time.
I sincerely hope the Beltline does a lot of good and really creates denser pockets of commerce. I wonder if anyone but tourists will actually use Atlanta's street cars. Considering that the roads are damn wide enough to support it, I hope it'll provide some kind of interest in more business and economic activity.
I think the streetcars will be used less so at first, but more so as it can expand. It is a good last-mile route, but more importantly it will be widely used by Beltline riders.

I was thinking about this the other day. If I lived on the east side Beltline and it had LRT service, would I be better off riding to a MARTA station and transferring or would I be better off getting onto a train that can run in the streets and take me right into town.... slower, but not transfer.

I have a feeling the Beltline will never be just be a single train running in a circle, but more so a series of circular routes that take people form the Beltline to the streetcar route and into town.


I'm a big supporter of commuter rail, but also spent alot of time with the issue. There are alot oddities to our area and potential for commuter rail. It is actually pretty expensive to build from scratch.... like we might as well go ahead with LRT expensive. The savings are we use existing freight tracks.

There are different issues in different corridors with that. The N. Fulton area doesn't have existing tracks, so it need something.

The Cobb area has tons of train tracks. It is just most of them are the most congested routes in the region and some of the worse freight bottlenecks in the nation. Alot of Midwest freight comes through there trying to avoid to a mountain crossing or reach southern ports.

Lines to Griffin and Lithonia via Stone Mountain show alot of promise.

The two lines existing tracks in Gwinnett show promise, but they will need the most work.

That is one reason the Concept 3 plan came to some of the conclusions it did.

Part of me thinks we should do one track LRT lines and operate them like commuter tracks and high headway milk runs during the day. Get commuter service expanded quickly with the ability to expand on that investment.

The other thing I'm curious about... If the freeways had a single barrier separated lane just for commuter buses. Not HOT lanes, HOV lanes, but a single reversible lane just for commuter buses where they can reliably travel 65 mph and not 45 in a HOT lane (with slow downs). It just might make that many more people start to hop on the bus.
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Old 10-24-2012, 04:14 PM
 
3,451 posts, read 3,890,952 times
Reputation: 1675
I know all about transit in both Chicago and NYC . There over 9 million people in Chicago metro and only 600,000 people use transit. Not impressive for a metro that big that means more people are in there cars driving.Even DC with far less people have better numbers than Chicago.. This goes to show u regardless of how good transit may be people still want to drive. For the Sunbelt southern city Atlanta is the best thing going in heavy rail ridership. MARTA is in the top ten for most used system. So if Atlanta needs to get off it's car high so does Chicago and the rest of the USA because more Americans are driving vs taking transit.





Quote:
Originally Posted by ARaider08 View Post
Considering that their are alternate methods of transit in all those cities and Atlanta's the one with the struggling public transit system, I'd think it's an Atl issue more than anything.
Chicago's system is used frequently, at all hours and has 2 (3?) 24hr lines that are used perpetually. The trains I ride, ESPECIALLY the Red line, are filled to capacity during rush hour and still are about 3/4 full at all other times before 2am.
That's the thing that strikes me about Atlanta. It is on a car high and refuses to come off by even voting to support its pt system. I'm glad that all these projects are going through but in the long run, I'm not sure if people will even use them.
Here in Chicago, people actually use the pt system here and I can assume the same in NY. The reason you'll see a lot of people driving in NY and Chi is because the population is SO much greater than Atlanta. 2.8 mil ppl in Chicago vs. probably 600k in Atlanta using MARTA and the trains rarely have full passenger capacity.
One thing all the cities have in common is the lack of expansion on their heavy rail systems or even providing light rail support. Maybe investing in more trains and buses would help get people out of their cars in Chi and NY but doing the same in Atl at its current state would be a waste of money.
And that's the difference. People... MANY... People use the pt systems in other metropolitan cities but in Atlanta, the cost of living is so cheap that it's much more convenient to buy a house in the burbs and be forced to drive a car.
I'm not glorifying anyone else, I'm just saying these things in hopes that Atlanta will somehow reform its vision on pt usage.
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Old 10-24-2012, 05:16 PM
 
Location: Chicago
937 posts, read 922,218 times
Reputation: 531
Quote:
Originally Posted by Staysean23 View Post
I know all about transit in both Chicago and NYC . There over 9 million people in Chicago metro and only 600,000 people use transit. Not impressive for a metro that big that means more people are in there cars driving.Even DC with far less people have better numbers than Chicago.. This goes to show u regardless of how good transit may be people still want to drive. For the Sunbelt southern city Atlanta is the best thing going in heavy rail ridership. MARTA is in the top ten for most used system. So if Atlanta needs to get off it's car high so does Chicago and the rest of the USA because more Americans are driving vs taking transit.
I just noticed your numbers did not include bus... If we're talking total ridership of public transit, the CTA gets above and or around 1.5 million riders daily. For a city with 2.8 million people, that's a far better statistic to go by. If you do include the 9.4 million people in the metro area, then you have to include METRA which gets 300k on an average weekday. Comparing that to 400k for the regional MARTA system makes a world of a difference. So... Comparing 9.4mil people with 1.8-2mil using transit compared to 5mil people with 450k using transit. Drastically different picture.

So in rebuttal, Chicago has better numbers than DC and Atlanta. Even in terms of percentage of riders.
Rough calculations:
16% for Chicago
11% for Washington DC
9.3% for Atlanta
Very rough calculations but comparing MSA riderships... Yeah...
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