Mckinney Allen Dart Mass Transit? (Houston, Dallas: condos, how much, construction)

[aceplace]

Originally Posted by CallMeLaura

Ok, as long as you take back the gossip thing... I've had reason to discuss crime, laws, and policies with regards to personal safety with people in the know, outside of the murder thing, so I'm not being hysterical over water cooler gossip.

Well, if that's what you meant... OK, I take back the gossip thing. Hope you resolved your questions to your satisfaction.

Regarding Chicago... places like McKinney should be served by commuter systems like METRA, or like our TRE between Dallas and Fort Worth, rather than the regular CTA subway and El system, or DART Light Rail. Unfortunately, the DART Red Line has removed the commuter rail trackage to downtown south of Plano. So the DART Red line will need a third passing track to allow packed trains to bypass certain stations. I believe Chicago has trains that only stop at every other station in order to avoid this problem.

Laura, automobile traffic is and will always be congested. If you double the freeway miles, you quadruple the congestion. No amount of freeway construction will create a permanent improvement, just a temporary lull until more drivers fill up the new freeway. That is a phenomenon called "Induced Demand". The purpose of a rail line is not to reduce auto traffic, but to provide an alternative to it at commuter chokepoints.

I'm not against public transportation by any means. I've never been accosted, even in Chicago where only the bad guys are armed. I do realize that it's never going to make 75 a pleasant drive during rush hour, so no, I'm not willing to fund it unless it's via purchasing a ticket.

Actually, if you drive to Plano and take DART, you would not be funding it other than the cost of a ticket... or a $500 annual pass. I'd guess that much of the Plano DART parking lot is taken up by freeloaders from Allen and McKinney. Or, if Collin county develops its own transit system, and it will eventually, you can freeload by shopping in a non-transit jurisdiction. Of course if they fund transit through property taxes, as in California, you're stuck.

Traffic on US75 will get worse and worse, and gasoline will become more and more expensive. The state has no more money for new construction, and so the ability to drive to other parts of the DFW area will be severely curtailed. Then, places like McKinney will become dreary inner-ring suburbs filled with low rent housing, but places like Plano will hold their own due to their rail access. McKinney will try to play catch-up by laying trackage, but will somehow never do more than slow its own deterioration.

[CallMeLaura]

Ace, I agree. What I disagree with is the whole "Oh, fund this public transportation bill and all your travel woes will disappear" approach that it's sold with.

Perhaps if they funneled some of those funds into teaching people to drive....

[Gustav]

Originally Posted by cdelena

Raising sales taxes to 9.5% would equal the highest in the country and would probably devastate retail sales in McKinney. Worse than that you would be taxing the many to benefit the few. Probably not a workable plan.

Two comments:
1. My original figures stated that the municipal sales tax on all taxable purchases in McKinney is 8.25%, not 8.5%.

2. Washington, DC currently imposes a sales tax rate of 10% on food and beverage sales. That city has one of the most efficient public transportation systems in the country.

[lh_newbie]

Originally Posted by aceplace

Actually, if you drive to Plano and take DART, you would not be funding it other than the cost of a ticket... or a $500 annual pass. I'd guess that much of the Plano DART parking lot is taken up by freeloaders from Allen and McKinney. Or, if Collin county develops its own transit system, and it will eventually, you can freeload by shopping in a non-transit jurisdiction. Of course if they fund transit through property taxes, as in California, you're stuck.

Huh... so paying for a pass is "free loading", huh? I lived in Allen. I rode the DART when I came downtown. I paid my couple of bucks. Certainly didn't feel like freeloading to me. Is it somehow my fault the city is to short sighted to realized the benefit of rail service?

Incidentally, if someone drives to a rail station to go to work... they're working in a rail supported city... meaning when they buy lunch or shop on the way home... they ARE supporting the tax base that helps pay for the rail.

I think you're comments on freeloaders is a little off base.

Brian

[Gustav]

Aceplace, you stated it didn't matter to you if a worker traveled by highway or by train/bus. I would offer that indeed everyone is benefited from increased use of public transportation. And it is not solely in terms of economic development that we see the benefits. Cleaner air would certainly result as more people leave their cars at home. Even if they ride diesel powered trains, they are still contributing less to pollution than in the many single-occupant cars on the freeways.

[Guerilla]

McKinney and Allen won't join DART for a while, if ever. A light rail line that long would take some time to go from Point A (McKinney) to Point B (areas closer to Richardson and Downtown Dallas).

[cdelena]

Originally Posted by Gustav

...
2. Washington, DC currently imposes a sales tax rate of 10% on food and beverage sales. That city has one of the most efficient public transportation systems in the country.

...

The Washington DC metro was constructed at a cost of 11 Billion dollars almost all from federal coffers. No other city in the US gets to do things like they do in DC.

[aceplace]

Originally Posted by lh_newbie

Huh... so paying for a pass is "free loading", huh? I lived in Allen. I rode the DART when I came downtown. I paid my couple of bucks. Certainly didn't feel like freeloading to me. Is it somehow my fault the city is to short sighted to realized the benefit of rail service?

Incidentally, if someone drives to a rail station to go to work... they're working in a rail supported city... meaning when they buy lunch or shop on the way home... they ARE supporting the tax base that helps pay for the rail.

I think you're comments on freeloaders is a little off base.

Brian

Brian, the "freeloader" thing was supposed to be just a little tongue-in-cheek. The DART system is available for anyone to use, and is an amenity that encourages economic activity in the DART service area at the expense of non-DART areas such as Frisco or Duncanville. People support DART not by virtue of where they live, but by where they shop.

Technically, the DART penny is not a tax on the people, but a tax on business. It doesn't matter if you live in McKinney or Plano (or, in your case, Lakewood)... you do not pay a tax to DART. Your local hardware store or burger joint... thet're the ones paying the tax, the cost of which they try to pass on to their customers. Their customers can choose either to pay a slightly higher price for the same thing, due to the DART tax, or take their business elsewhere.

If I'm buying a six-pack of beer, the DART tax is insignificant, but if I'm buying a $1200 refrigerator, or an $8,000 home theater, I can save real money by buying it in Frisco instead of Plano. What a sweet deal... a tax that I don't have to pay!

But... if the DART tax raises prices in DART cities, how does that benefit economic activity? Easy. The value of the additional mobility overwhelms the slightly higher prices.

[aceplace]

Originally Posted by Gustav

Aceplace, you stated it didn't matter to you if a worker traveled by highway or by train/bus. I would offer that indeed everyone is benefited from increased use of public transportation. And it is not solely in terms of economic development that we see the benefits. Cleaner air would certainly result as more people leave their cars at home. Even if they ride diesel powered trains, they are still contributing less to pollution than in the many single-occupant cars on the freeways.

Actually, it does matter to me. I wish more people rode DART, not just so the freeway would be a little less congested for me, but also because of the benefits to society, and for the way that rail transit creates a more livable city.

My intent was to refute Cdelena's claim that a ride on DART did not benefit society, just the rider.

As far as the economic contribution of a worker to society, the way he gets to work does not affect the social value of the work he does. If a 911 operator saves my life, I don't feel any less dead if she took the freeway to the call center instead of getting there by DART. The social consequences of using a freeway instead of DART? That's a different issue.

[lh_newbie]

Originally Posted by aceplace

Brian, the "freeloader" thing was supposed to be just a little tounge-in-cheek. The DART system is free for anyone to use, and is an amenity that encourages economic activity in the DART service area at the expense of non-DART areas such as Frisco or Duncanville. People support DART not by virtue of where they live, but by where they shop.

Technically, the DART penny is not a tax on the people, but a tax on business. It doesn't matter if you live in Allen or Lakewood... you do not pay a tax to DART. Your local hardware store or burger joint... thet're the ones paying the tax. Their customers can choose either to pay a slightly higher price for the same thing, due to the DART tax, or take their business elsewhere.

If I'm buying a six-pack of beer, the DART tax is insignificant, but if I'm buying a $1200 refrigerator, or an $8,000 home theater, I can save real money by buying it in Frisco instead of Plano. What a sweet deal... a tax that I don't have to pay!

Coolio - we're on the same page. I just feel that when terms like freeloader are used, it decreases the emphasis on the point of the matter.

For what it's worth, cities like McKinney and others that are already at the state cap for sales tax have made choices - right or wrong - as to where to spend their extra tax. I do think that increasing the state cap on local sales tax would be a bad thing. I personally believe this is a transportation (in general) issue. We should address the transportation issue by taxing fuel if we must tax something (and let's face it, public transit needs $$ to establish it quickly). Add 10 cents/gallon of fuel and make that available for public transit. Imagine - then we could develop state-wide transportation resources. Having a more comprehensive local rail system in Dallas, Houston and Austin supported by a higher speed rail to connect the "Texas Triangle" would be a huge boon for the state, long-term.

The airline industry wouldn't be happy with that since they have so many flights between those three cities, but I would think this solution would increase traffic between the member cities, would be a boon for the cruise line industry in Houston... would do wonders for Galveston... and so on...

Brian