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Also, I'm afraid I'm not always so hip to what the kids are saying these days. Could you please explain what a CAVE is? Is that something like a NIMBY? lol
During the time I lived in Cobb (1991-2006 and 2011-14), from what I saw most of the opposition to rail transit came from not wanting to be taxed for it. Very little of it involved "keeping out minorities" and that viewpoint tended to come from long-time residents who moved to Cobb in the 1960s-70s.
You gotta pay to play. Nothing is free, not even the roads the Cobb County citizens drive on.
yea CCT is terrible that route 1o is the most reliable route for as time wise but that route 50(franklin rd/powers ferry rd) should've had the same time schedule as route 10 during non peak time. that bus stayed pack from 530am bus to the 1230am(last bus). I remember they cut route 65 and 70 when I stayed on roswell rd and in vinings a bunch of cab fare was used them days smh was only a few years ago
[quote=DawgPark;38925732]
Ott, on the other hand, has a weird dichotomy in that he represents both East Cobb and Cumberland . . . 2 Cobb districts that are about as diametrically opposed as CoA and Cumming. When push comes to shove, Ott always sides w/ the East Cobb contingent that despises all growth, transit, development, etc. in every form.
The anti-growth, anti-transit CAVE's in East Cobb and North West Cobb are opposed to virtually everything. Heck, they've been fighting like cats/dogs the last 2 months to shoot down a senior living facility in East Cobb. And they did! And it was Repub. Johnny Isakson's planned senior development, no less.[/QUOTE]
This forum has some super-funny ideas about East Cobb. But given the topic is transit, the first paragraph above really strikes me as an odd stance to take because, as a resident of East Cobb, I would say a plurality of working people I know commute to the Cumberland area. I'm sure many would love a convenient commuter rail line over there! On the other hand, it's only a few miles away (15-20 min if you time it right) so maybe it's not worth it. I don't find most people WAY out here in the boonies (you know, less than 10mi from CoA...) to be all that politically conservative. As far as transit, it really seems 'out of sight, out of mind'. It'd be tough to make it work out here. Would have to be a very well-thought out plan. Maybe that's all folks are waiting for...
As to the 2nd paragraph...Just no. I'm a pretty open-minded person who can see both sides to most issues, but this "senior living facility" was just a bad idea. It's been a while since I've followed it, so my numbers might be a bit off, but it was like 900 independent living apartments, and a tiny handful of assisted living apartments, on a pristine piece of property, right next to the only large park/community space in the area, on an already busy road, next to an important tributary to the Chattahoochee River...Adding 900 drivers to Roswell Rd?? If people want to bring East Cobb up-to-date this "senior living facility" was NOT the way to do it. That's taking all the bad of the suburbs and just making them worse. Not to mention the whole Iskason connection wreaked of unsavory political dealings...no way would they add 900 townhomes in that location! (Unless it was proposed by "Iskason Townhome Development")
(Btw, unscientifically, I would say next most common work locations: hospitals, from home, Perimeter, Alpharetta, Buckhead, Downtown/Midtown) But part of me kind of wants to keep the stereotype going of all these miserable, angry, white conservatives sitting in traffic for 1.5 hrs a day, listening to talk radio while they slog it to downtown...makes me giggle. Plus, it keeps out the riffraff
It is absolute lunacy that we would potentially pay a additional 1% sales tax on a BRT route [which, from what I've read doesn't mention how the rest of the county (Mableton/Austell/Power Springs/West Cobb) benefits (I guess because only the area within SR120/I75/US41 corridor matters)] when there is an existing regional transit system across the river that was designed to be extended (easily from the west/I20)....
I sure hope Cobb can figure something out and be successful in implementing much needed, grade separated mass transit. I took a GRTA bus out that way after work on Friday, and we literally crawled in the HOV lane the entire way there. The trip took almost 2 hours.
That is an excellent point that Cobb County needs grade-separated mass transit (in particular, grade-separated high-capacity passenger rail transit) along with the I-75/I-575/US 41 Northwest Corridor (Cobb, Cherokee and Bartow counties).
Cobb County (and the I-75/I-575/US 41 Northwest Corridor) just simply does not have the road network to handle the continuing growth over the long-term without grade-separated high-capacity passenger rail transit service (regional heavy rail and regional commuter rail on grade-separated passenger rail-only tracks).
Road space in Cobb County and that I-75/I-575 Northwest Corridor is at an increasing premium (hence the construction of the I-75/I-575 Northwest toll lanes in Cobb and Cherokee counties)....And besides going on a massive road expansion binge (something that seems unlikely to happen in what seems to be an increasingly road expansion-averse Atlanta metro region), the primary way to deal with a very limited amount of road space in a very large major metro region that continues to grow despite a severe lack of road space is to expand the availability of high-capacity transit (particularly high-capacity passenger rail transit).....That's because high-capacity passenger rail transit can expand its capacity by simply adding more trains to existing track while the road network needs more lanes to expand its capacity....Something which has had much pushback from the public in Metro Atlanta and North Georgia.
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Originally Posted by Frankster87
I can only imagine how worse it's going to be on game days or just in general, with the added development going in near the stadium site. Not a fan of Lee, but he seems to be one of the few people in Cobb that actually understand the importance of mass transit and is doing something about it. I wish him luck in that regard.
That is an excellent point that the new Braves stadium and the new development surrounding the stadium is likely not going to make the existing traffic challenges in the I-75 Northwest Corridor any better.
I agree with your excellent point that Cobb Commission Chairman Tim Lee seems to be one of the few people in Cobb that actually understands the importance of mass transit and is attempting to do something about it.
Though the important thing to remember about Tim Lee is that like his predecessor (former Cobb Commission Chairman and current Georgia Attorney General Sam Olens), Lee has very close ties to the Cobb business community which desperately wants some kind of high-capacity transit link in the county along the US 41 Cobb Parkway corridor.
Lee does not seem to have the same level of political skill that Olens has and displayed during his time as Cobb Commission Chairman, but like Olens, Lee (at the behest of the ambitious Cobb business community) still recognizes the critical importance of high-capacity transit service in a highly-populated and fast-growing urban county of 720,000 people with a severely-limited road network.
It is very good that Cobb's business and political leadership recognizes the critical importance of high-capacity transit service to the county's economic and quality-of-life fortunes.
But even with Cobb's business and political leadership's recognition of the importance of high-capacity transit, that recognition of the importance of transit to Cobb County's economic fortunes is still not enough without the involvement of state government. The direct involvement of Georgia's state government in regional high-capacity transit planning and finance is the missing link in the transit plans of Cobb County and many other counties throughout the Atlanta metro region and the state of Georgia.
The involvement of state government in regional high-capacity transit planning and finance is so important because high-capacity transit lines must operate through multiple local municipal jurisdictions.
For example, a high-capacity transit corridor in Cobb County must connect to Fulton County (and likely to Midtown Atlanta, Downtown Atlanta and the Atlanta Airport) to be viable.....High-capacity transit service in the I-75/US 41 Northwest Corridor in Cobb County cannot be viable by only operating in Cobb County alone, the corridor would have to connect to Fulton County (likely with two lines, one line connecting to Midtown Atlanta, Downtown Atlanta and the ATL Airport and a second line connecting to Fulton and DeKalb and Gwinnett counties by way of the I-285 Top End Perimeter corridor).
The high-capacity transit ambitions in rapidly urbanizing outlying counties like Cobb and Gwinnett likely are going nowhere until the state decides to get more involved in regional high-capacity planning and finance....Yes the same Georgia state government that currently seemingly can't even find its own rear end with two hands, a flashlight, a map and a mirror when it comes to transportation issues....Until that Georgia state government decides to take the lead in regional transit planning and finance, the high-capacity transit ambitions of counties like Cobb and Gwinnett are going nowhere fast anytime soon.
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Originally Posted by Frankster87
Have you Cobb residents noticed any change in the general populous' attitude toward mass transit? Also, I'm afraid I'm not always so hip to what the kids are saying these days. Could you please explain what a CAVE is? Is that something like a NIMBY? lol
I've noticed that there is starting to be much more acceptance of the concept of transit expansion in outlying suburban counties like Cobb and Gwinnett by many (but most certainly not all) community leaders than ever before because of increasingly severe traffic problems along major radial routes (like I-75/I-575 Northwest, GA 400 North, I-85 Northeast, etc) and because of increasing demand for access to high-capacity transit from the 21st Century real estate marketplace.
Cobb County's population also continues to diversify as the county's population continues to grow and the once-rural, exurban and outer-suburban county continues to densify and urbanize.
Though, like other posters have alluded to, (despite the worsening traffic issues) there continues to be some resistance to the concept of high-capacity transit expansion into Cobb County by some older residents who are reluctant to let go of their idea of Cobb County as the much more sparsely populated exurban/outer-suburban community that it was between the 1950's and the early 1990's.
(...Just last week a Cobb County state legislator attempted to add an amendment to the much-touted current state transportation funding bill that would have required a voter referendum to be held in any county that high-capacity fixed-guideway transit (Bus Rapid Transit or passenger rail transit) would be expanded into....But the state legislature wisely voted down the amendment out of fear of taking away options that will be critically needed to deal with traffic congestion that continues to worsen despite a severe reluctance to expand the multimodal transportation infrastructure.)
Also, because many of the newcomers to Cobb County are transients who may not be that politically active, the Cobb County electorate continues to be dominated by long-entrenched transit-averse political, cultural and social interests who are extremely highly-reluctant (if not just outright resistant) to accepting high-capacity transit service into the county.
Location: Mableton, GA USA (NW Atlanta suburb, 4 miles OTP)
11,334 posts, read 26,092,084 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by cqholt
You gotta pay to play. Nothing is free, not even the roads the Cobb County citizens drive on.
Cobb has pretty nice roads in general thanks to SPLOST.
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) to be all that politically conservative. As far as transit, it really seems 'out of sight, out of mind'. It'd be tough to make it work out here. Would have to be a very well-thought out plan. Maybe that's all folks are waiting for...
