Will MARTA ever make to Cobb and Gwinnett? (Atlanta, Marietta: buses, safe)

[sciblue]

Originally Posted by toll_booth

If there had been a lot more rail in the plan, would you have voted for the expansion?

Absolutely! I would be on board if rail extended out 78 and up 85, at least to Gwinnett Place.

[Otakumaster]

Originally Posted by Turnerbro

Not sure why people are acting like racism is such a major factor. Gwinnett has bee a majority minority county for some time now. True racist should have moved out of Gwinnett a long time ago.

Actually, while this is true most of the white conservatives live in the further out areas of the county like Buford of Dacula. Older white conservatives vote more than young - and even older- POCs in general so if turnout was bogus it is not surprising what side won.

[Otakumaster]

Originally Posted by bu2

The HOV lane inside 285 does move faster. It doesn't move a lot faster sometimes after the 400 merge, but that can and should be fixed. Atlanta's HOV lanes are like a lot of stuff GDOT does, the cheapest way out, just putting down a stripe. Other places do HOV/HOT lanes much better and its not terribly expensive to improve.

The problem is that HOV lanes are not actually dedicated lanes for BRT. We need to just bite the bullet and get real rail expansion - be it commuter or not.

[Otakumaster]

Originally Posted by bu2

I thought it was a good plan.

What doesn't make sense is to spend billions of dollars and give people worse service. Beyond a certain distance, rail is just slower than express bus in HOT/HOV lanes because you have so many stops and it can't provide as good a service to the end destination.
(there are limited express trains to distant suburbs in places like Paris, but that is a whole separate system from the Paris metro, so you would be adding extra infrastructure instead of building on MARTA and that certainly couldn't be cost justified here).


Rail is only justified in that case when you need the extra capacity of rail. Gwinnett is not dense enough to justify rail to Suwanee, even commuter rail. And the dispersion of their jobs as Arjay showed means its difficult for rail to service. So a lot of people would be paying taxes and get little to no benefit. And as mentioned, the long time frame before "payoff" gave some people pause.

This plan would tend to generate jobs around the end of the rail station that could be served by rail coming out and express bus coming in. And it gave right-sized transit to the rest of the county.

Gwinnett is about to have 1 million residents. It's totally reasonable to have a rail going to Mall of Georgia ideally but AT LEAST Gwinnett place. You don't need to have 100 stops at first ( maybe 3-4 max including the endpoint) but more can be considered as density around the system builds up. Heck the density around 85 may be more than enough now.

[Otakumaster]

Also, it shouldn't take 30 years to build rail to anything in this metro even if it was going to Tennessee or Alabama. If this country/state was serious about it's infrastructure we could do this in 4-5 years.

[arjay57]

Transit is a real conundrum. People are always hollering about wanting it, but it's hard as heck to get them to actually use it.

It's been nearly three years since State Farm opened its new office campus in the Atlanta suburbs.

The project was touted as an ideal example of transit-oriented development: It sits on top of MARTA's Dunwoody station. But despite the influx of about 2,000 State Farm workers in 2017, average daily ridership at the Dunwoody station has dropped.

Read more at: Even Transit-Oriented Development Can't Stop The Ridership Drop

[bu2]

Originally Posted by arjay57

Transit is a real conundrum. People are always hollering about wanting it, but it's hard as heck to get them to actually use it.

Americans are abandoning transit almost everywhere.

https://www.wired.com/story/transit-...ransportation/

The author echoes one of your themes:

"...That might mean there is an opportunity to convince those riders to get back on the bus or train or light-rail car. Survey respondents who reduced their transit use said their number one transit wish is more frequent service, followed by safer, and then more predictable, trips...."

[primaltech]

I liked the ramp from the Sugarloaf Mills P&R directly to the Peach Pass lane, and the in-line I-85 bus stop at the Indian Trail P&R with pedestrian bridge- hopefully those still happen at some point.

But yeah, in general I too wonder what the heck was up with only one new rail station for billions of dollars of tax revenue.

[ATLTJL]

The author echoes one of your themes:

This author really uses the word "transit" irresponsibly. When you read the full article, all he really talks about is buses.

We all know nobody rides buses. Well, I mean... poor people who don't have cars ride them. That's noble and everything, but that's not the problem we are trying to solve here.

Many voters probably did feel paying an extra 1% on everything for a bunch of buses to whirl around the county was a silly investment. I'm sure the racists definitely helped the vote, but train supporters may have been able to outnumber them if the vote, in fact, supplied a train.

I'm firm in my point of view. Do whatever you want with buses. Give them their own dedicated lanes. Deck them out with leather seats and a wet bar. Make them free. It really doesn't matter because nobody is going to ride buses in meaningful numbers in this metro. You're not going to change minds, so just build a train...which people will ride, so long as it goes far enough to make getting out of traffic worth the hassle. Going to Gwinnett Place would likely do it. Going to Infinite Energy Arena definitely would. Going to Mall of Georgia absolutely would.

The train itself would probably never be profitable or break even. But, the amount it would increase land values and attract corporate HQs would likely cover the cost in time. Even if it didn't, it would at least be a source of pride for the metro.

Next time you talk to someone who visited another city, especially in Europe or Asia, you may hear them rave about how great the trains were. You'll never hear them talk about awesome bus service. Buses suck. That's the way it is.

[bu2]

Originally Posted by ATLTJL

This author really uses the word "transit" irresponsibly. When you read the full article, all he really talks about is buses.

We all know nobody rides buses. Well, I mean... poor people who don't have cars ride them. That's noble and everything, but that's not the problem we are trying to solve here.

Many voters probably did feel paying an extra 1% on everything for a bunch of buses to whirl around the county was a silly investment. I'm sure the racists definitely helped the vote, but train supporters may have been able to outnumber them if the vote, in fact, supplied a train.

I'm firm in my point of view. Do whatever you want with buses. Give them their own dedicated lanes. Deck them out with leather seats and a wet bar. Make them free. It really doesn't matter because nobody is going to ride buses in meaningful numbers in this metro. You're not going to change minds, so just build a train...which people will ride, so long as it goes far enough to make getting out of traffic worth the hassle. Going to Gwinnett Place would likely do it. Going to Infinite Energy Arena definitely would. Going to Mall of Georgia absolutely would.

The train itself would probably never be profitable or break even. But, the amount it would increase land values and attract corporate HQs would likely cover the cost in time. Even if it didn't, it would at least be a source of pride for the metro.

Next time you talk to someone who visited another city, especially in Europe or Asia, you may hear them rave about how great the trains were. You'll never hear them talk about awesome bus service. Buses suck. That's the way it is.

That's why so many people ride buses in Europe?

Its easy. You don't need to look at a schedule. You just stand on the corner and one will be there fairly shortly.

And park-n-ride buses work very well in other places. They will work well here with good HOV lanes.

What doesn't work well is buses that take 3 times as long as a car and only run every 30 minutes or an hour. Or is unreliable. Or isn't safe. The latter two apply to trains as well. And if you run a train out to the distant suburbs, the first does as well because you can't justify 10-15 minute headways for 10 riders.