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We can either embark on a massive infrastructure overhaul of Brookhaven. Or we can leave them alone. That's it for now.
Once we have far better transit in and around the city as well as into the suburbs, we can revisit this as then more people will actually be able to take transit. The streetcar network will help a lot. For Brookhaven, something else that would help considerably is commuter rail service into Gwinnett possibly as far as Gainesville through Norcross and Duluth. Even then, there will be considerable traffic to and from Perimeter and Alpharetta, and I don't know what the solution there is.
Red Line extension north?
As more large employers relocate close to transit, more employees will have the option to take transit. So we are at a chicken or egg road block, do we build TODs and step down density now, while it's cheaper, or wait until congestion is too bad and materials costs more?
People already dislike transfers when they're in the same direction. Red Line from Alpharetta would require people to backtrack at Lindbergh. Maybe they could transfer at Buckhead to ART/BRT/streetcar to Brookhaven and vice versa.
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As more large employers relocate close to transit, more employees will have the option to take transit. So we are at a chicken or egg road block, do we build TODs and step down density now, while it's cheaper, or wait until congestion is too bad and materials costs more?
The issue isn't Brookhaven wanting to maintain some kind of "rural town feel" it's a matter of infrastructure. We can go on and on and on forever about how this new development would have been on top of a heavy rail station with direct access to three major employment areas. But the reality of the situation is, most of the people that would move in, will drive to work, and everywhere else they go; most of the people that will visit/work there, will drive to this development. That's the cold, hard reality of the situation and no amount of "good feelings" toward transit is going to help!
Even if most people who live in this development drive, not building it doesn't do anything better. The fact of the matter is that the same quantity of people who would have occupied the development will come here to the metro regardless. By building the TOD, they would have at least had the option to use transit instead of a car. By not building the TOD, there is less housing near transit, and so they do not have that option.
All that's happened is that there are now fewer options for those who may have made the choice to use transit over a car. Even if a small percentage of those who took up residence in this TOD took advantage of the transit there, that's more than can take advantage of it now. Nobody's been kept from moving here. Aggregate traffic has likely actually been made worse for the metro.
Brookhaven has just pushed the traffic off on someone else, and not even that, necessarily.
You can talk about preparing other parts of the metro, but the cold hard reality is that Brookhaven is part of the metro, and part of the existing transit network. They are, themselves, a component of that preparation.
To keep the city from suffering from the Growth Ponzi Scheme's end
To allow more people to move to the metro in general
To allow development specifically near high-capacity transit
To support lifestyles that do not require a car for every day activities
To reduce the reliance on energy inefficient methods of living (single, detatched homes, personal cars, etc.)
For the nth time, Brookhaven is not some exurban town with a historic downtown that they wish to 'preserve' the character of against evil developers. They are a city in the core of a massive metro, which is expecting incredible growth over the next few decades. Nearly all of our problems can be attributed, in some way, to our historically car-dependent method of development.
In a time of moving away from that, there are some who still believe that it's the right course to maintain the space expensive, and energy inefficient style of building in the core of the nation's 9th largest metro area.
This, in turn, creates spin-off problems for anyone around them, not to mention themselves.
They are not in this on their own. They are not making decisions only for themselves. To say 'no more' is simply a snub to all around them who must bear the burden of those who they refuse to take on, while dealing with their own growth as well. Especially considering the high-capacity transit station that is in the best interest of the entire metro to develop as densely around as possible.
To want to halt all new development, especially around the station, is an act of selfishness that the metro as a whole must pay for.
No offense intended, but this sounds downright Maoist.
Why can't people choose to live the way they prefer?
And bear in mind that Brookhaven has hardly "halted all new development, especially around the station." To the contrary, Brookhaven has absorbed massive development in recent years.
Brookhaven is no worse than any other part of the city on transit and it's far better than most areas. I'll guarantee that if you told the folks in Virginia Highland that you were going to ram a heavy rail transit system through the heart of their neighborhood and slap up a bunch of builder grade apartments you'd get severe pushback. They nearly had a heart attack over one single mixed use development.
Even if most people who live in this development drive, not building it doesn't do anything better. The fact of the matter is that the same quantity of people who would have occupied the development will come here to the metro regardless.
You're talking like "the metro" is one big homogenous environment. It isn't! The fact is there are some places with better infrastructure, better able to absorb traffic increases than others. It's not amount of vehicles, it's congestion of vehicles.
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By building the TOD, they would have at least had the option to use transit instead of a car. By not building the TOD, there is less housing near transit, and so they do not have that option.
Or they will just move elsewhere where they can either use transit, or where driving won't be nearly as bad.
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All that's happened is that there are now fewer options for those who may have made the choice to use transit over a car. Even if a small percentage of those who took up residence in this TOD took advantage of the transit there, that's more than can take advantage of it now. Nobody's been kept from moving here. Aggregate traffic has likely actually been made worse for the metro.
Wrong, if there's no places to live, then people won't live there.
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Brookhaven has just pushed the traffic off on someone else, and not even that, necessarily.
Again, the key is that they are pushing the people to a place that can better absorb them!
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You can talk about preparing other parts of the metro, but the cold hard reality is that Brookhaven is part of the metro, and part of the existing transit network. They are, themselves, a component of that preparation.
And short of drastic rebuildings of infrastructure (Dresden to 6 lanes for instance), they won't be prepared for any more people locally.
No offense intended, but this sounds downright Maoist.
Why can't people choose to live the way they prefer?
And bear in mind that Brookhaven has hardly "halted all new development, especially around the station." To the contrary, Brookhaven has absorbed massive development in recent years.
Brookhaven is no worse than any other part of the city on transit and it's far better than most areas. I'll guarantee that if you told the folks in Virginia Highland that you were going to ram a heavy rail transit system through the heart of their neighborhood and slap up a bunch of builder grade apartments you'd get severe pushback. They nearly had a heart attack over one single mixed use development.
I'm not suggesting people can't choose where they want or how they want, but rather that they shouldn't be able to impose that life style on others. No one is suggesting that people be forced to give up their land for more apartments, but if a developer buys people's properties through free exchange, then why shouldn't those developers be allowed to develop the properties? If anything, I'm advocating on the market's behalf, quite the opposite of Maoism.
If those people wish to live somewhere with ample 'elbow room' then they are free to sell their home and use the proceeds to move elsewhere. That is a cost-benefit analysis that they must make on their own, though.
You're right that Brookhaven hasn't necessarily stopped the developments (heck, the continuation of the MARTA TOD is evidence enough of that), but you yourself, as well as others, have suggested that there should be a stop to further development, regardless of what the market has to say.
Personally, I wouldn't mind having rail transit in Virginia Highlands (after all it was a streetcar suburb before). A new heavy rail station would be quite disruptive, though, and you're right that it would be protested, though I don't think it's a proper comparison as to why it would be.
A new heavy rail station in VaHi would require a massive amount of property acquisition on MARTA's end, an ample amount of immanent domain to acquire said property, and the razing of property that wasn't necessarily given to them freely. I would have to see the numbers, but I doubt a heavy rail station there would justify the effort or expense over other, less disruptive and more productive, projects. If you suggested running the Midtown-Crosstown streetcar up Virginia to the Highland Ave, though, I bet there would be far less complaining.
On the other hand, Brookhaven already has a station built in a corridor that was already mostly devoid of structures, their TOD would not require anyone being forced to give up property via immanent domain, nor would any existing structures be torn down. Yes there would be traffic, but at least now quite a few people would have the option of living somewhere with direct access to the train station.
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Originally Posted by MattCW
You're talking like "the metro" is one big homogenous environment. It isn't! The fact is there are some places with better infrastructure, better able to absorb traffic increases than others. It's not amount of vehicles, it's congestion of vehicles.
In aggregate, though, the traffic gets worse. Those places who are less able to absorb traffic increases will still feel the affects of that, over time. Especially if the people who can't make use of the transit at the never built TOD must now drive through those areas.
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Or they will just move elsewhere where they can either use transit, or where driving won't be nearly as bad.
I'm talking in aggregate numbers of people moving here. There are a total predicted 2.5 million people who will be joining the metro. If the TOD had been built, some amount of those (and of existing residents) would have had the option to live with direct access to the station. Without the TOD, that same amount does not have that option.
If those individuals moved to a different TOD, then that's one less slot for another person.
In aggregate terms, we've lost some of the total number of available residencies, and jobs directly on top of high-capacity transit.
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Wrong, if there's no places to live, then people won't live there.
But people will still come to the metro. Again, in aggregate terms, we're worse off. They don't move to Brookhaven, but they may now move to Lawrenceville, and still need to commute through Brookhaven to get to their job in Buckhead.
They're going to get absorbed somewhere, and traffic is going to increase somehow. A TOD at Brookhaven is one of the few places that makes sense from a long-term sustainability angles given its access to high-capacity transit.
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Again, the key is that they are pushing the people to a place that can better absorb them!
Except that that's not what's happening. There're a limited number of potential TOD sites. To not develop one means that people are just being pushed to a place where there is less access to high-capacity transit, one of the best possible ways to take on new people. Chances are, they're being pushed to a place without transit at all, and are now required to have a car, adding to traffic on their way in to where they work regardless.
At least with the TOD some would have had the option of transit.
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And short of drastic rebuildings of infrastructure (Dresden to 6 lanes for instance), they won't be prepared for any more people locally.
Sure they could. Sidewalks, bike lanes, and buses could carry many times more people for the existing road space. The build environment isn't conducive to it, though. If we keep everything spread out and car-centric, is it any wonder everyone drives?
Adding Brookhaven to the TOD list, and developing more around the station, would only add to the options for people to work, live, and shop without needing a car.
I'm not suggesting people can't choose where they want or how they want, but rather that they shouldn't be able to impose that life style on others. No one is suggesting that people be forced to give up their land for more apartments, but if a developer buys people's properties through free exchange, then why shouldn't those developers be allowed to develop the properties? If anything, I'm advocating on the market's behalf, quite the opposite of Maoism.
If those people wish to live somewhere with ample 'elbow room' then they are free to sell their home and use the proceeds to move elsewhere. That is a cost-benefit analysis that they must make on their own, though.
You're right that Brookhaven hasn't necessarily stopped the developments (heck, the continuation of the MARTA TOD is evidence enough of that), but you yourself, as well as others, have suggested that there should be a stop to further development, regardless of what the market has to say.
I can't believe you're seriously suggesting that if Brookhaven doesn't go along with the request for tax incentives from MARTA and its development partner that they are "imposing their lifestyle on others" and should "feel free to sell their homes and move elsewhere."
For heaven's sake, is MARTA's every whim that sacred?
Let us not forget -- MARTA was quite content to do nothing whatsoever with this parking lot for 35 years. Why is everybody suddenly supposed to say "how high?" when MARTA finally gets around to doing something?
Brookhaven has simply made the very reasonable decision to tap the brakes on this development process. They've been dealing with a tsunami of apartments and it's far better to get this right from the beginning than to blindly appease some developer.
I can't believe you're seriously suggesting that if Brookhaven doesn't go along with the request for tax incentives from MARTA and its development partner that they are "imposing their lifestyle on others" and should "feel free to sell their homes and move elsewhere."
For heaven's sake, is MARTA's every whim that sacred?
Let us not forget -- MARTA was quite content to do nothing whatsoever with this parking lot for 35 years. Why is everybody suddenly supposed to say "how high?" when MARTA finally gets around to doing something?
Brookhaven has simply made the very reasonable decision to tap the brakes on this development process. They've been dealing with a tsunami of apartments and it's far better to get this right from the beginning than to blindly appease some developer.
I am suggesting that if, as has been suggested in this thread, there is a hard stop on development, then yes, Brookhaven is imposing its will on the market over market demand.
Just because MARTA was 'content' (though I doubt if the market, and mentality was truly there MARTA would have sad idle) for the past 35 years doesn't mean they should be now. Nor does it mean that it's alright to keep going in such a way.
It's not about blindly appeasing 'some developer', it's about meeting housing demands in a time of high-growth that's not likely to slow down. Especially if that means taking the most advantage of our existing heavy rail infrastructure.
Brookhaven had 2 years worth of MARTA's attention to negotiate a path forward regarding the tax breaks. It wasn't even that Brookhaven had rejected them specifically, something which could have been worked with, but that the City refused to move at all, simply stopping the development all together.
How long do you want to wait, because the reality is that we're growing now, we need the housing in the metro now, and we especially needed the housing on top of transit stations a few years ago. Prolonging such sustainable development patterns only hurt the metro as a whole to longer it takes to happen.
I am suggesting that if, as has been suggested in this thread, there is a hard stop on development, then yes, Brookhaven is imposing its will on the market over market demand.
Just because MARTA was 'content' (though I doubt if the market, and mentality was truly there MARTA would have sad idle) for the past 35 years doesn't mean they should be now. Nor does it mean that it's alright to keep going in such a way.
It's not about blindly appeasing 'some developer', it's about meeting housing demands in a time of high-growth that's not likely to slow down. Especially if that means taking the most advantage of our existing heavy rail infrastructure.
Brookhaven had 2 years worth of MARTA's attention to negotiate a path forward regarding the tax breaks. It wasn't even that Brookhaven had rejected them specifically, something which could have been worked with, but that the City refused to move at all, simply stopping the development all together.
How long do you want to wait, because the reality is that we're growing now, we need the housing in the metro now, and we especially needed the housing on top of transit stations a few years ago. Prolonging such sustainable development patterns only hurt the metro as a whole to longer it takes to happen.
But the "aggregate effect" of giving up one TOD on the Metro area is a tiny drop in the bucket. Those, let's say, 1500 people will be spread over what? Dozens of areas? In what? Hundreds of neighborhoods? But concentrate them in a single area, and the effect on Brookhave is immense.
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