MARTA to make an $8 billion pitch to change the face of Atlanta (Decatur: contractor, station)

[primaltech]

I got from the link in this article:
What a half-penny can do for MARTA in Fulton | Spinning our Wheels

Yeah it's new information, I'm surprised the articles haven't mentioned half this stuff yet.

Here I've been fantasizing about rapid bus, and apparently it's actually a real plan in the works at MARTA.

10 minute service (with articulated bus), "improved shelters/stations", transit signal priority (w/ queue jumps)... would be game changing for those bus routes. And some of the lines would apparently even still happen, if Fulton goes with a 1/4 penny option.

[fourthwarden]

Originally Posted by primaltech

I got from the link in this article:
What a half-penny can do for MARTA in Fulton | Spinning our Wheels

Yeah it's new information, I'm surprised the articles haven't mentioned half this stuff yet.

Here I've been fantasizing about rapid bus, and apparently it's actually a real plan in the works at MARTA.

10 minute service (with articulated bus), "improved shelters/stations", transit signal priority (w/ queue jumps)... would be game changing for those bus routes. And some of the lines would apparently even still happen, if Fulton goes with a 1/4 penny option.

Oh ****. This is the actual plan that they're perusing.

I can't say I'm unhappy, except with the loss of the I-20 BRT. That said, it looks like we gained the I-20 West HRT, which is not bad at all.

The plans with ART and high-capacity routes is real nice though. Too bad we don't get true BRT yet in the region.

[primaltech]

That I-20 ITP east "BRT" could still happen, I would think. Maybe in the form of an "ART".

I would like to see the DeKalb County equivalent of this level of detail proposal from KP.

Anyway, I still remain confused to how exactly a BRT along the express way would function. If the bus has to exit to a local road along with all the cars, every stop on the line will hugely slow the thing down. And on the other hand, if it stops along the busway lane itself as someone just mentioned, what do you as the rider do then? Walk along the express way? Walk up stairs at the side or the middle of the express way, then you have to walk along a major east/west arterial like Holcomb Bridge or Old Milton, at their least pedestrian friendly sections where they cross over the highway?

I guess I'd have to see some design renderings of the details of what exactly they're proposing, for the stations. Seems like anything really good and useful would have to be pretty expensive to construct. Might as well just make it a HRT extension at that point, save everyone having to transfer transportation modes just to continue along the same Red line.

[primaltech]

LOL @ the Medlock Bridge/141 bus route in this MARTA plan. It heads straight down 141, directly towards Doraville station, but it can't go there because Gwinnett County. So it has to completely the opposite direction for like 10 miles over to Old Milton.

Johns Creek really gets screwed because of Gwinnett not joining MARTA. They can't do anything with the 141 corridor.

Also it's a damn shame that a Holcomb Bridge bus can't continue all the way down Jimmy Carter. Just makes no sense whatsoever, how some of the 5 core metro counties are not a part of the transit system. Asinine.

[ccdscott]

These plans are pretty good, I'm impressed. That a half a penny can do all that in North Fulton is crazy, and would really impact the area in a good way. With the assurance of HRT extending that far, you'd like think that Gwinnett would see that and want to hop on board. I haven't been here long, but it doesn't seem to me much of a difference (to me) between the attitudes of North Fulton and NW Gwinnett county folks.

LOL at primaltech, that is simply crazy that a HCB bus would just stop at the county line. SMH

[fourthwarden]

Originally Posted by primaltech

LOL @ the Medlock Bridge/141 bus route in this MARTA plan. It heads straight down 141, directly towards Doraville station, but it can't go there because Gwinnett County. So it has to completely the opposite direction for like 10 miles over to Old Milton.

Johns Creek really gets screwed because of Gwinnett not joining MARTA. They can't do anything with the 141 corridor.

Also it's a damn shame that a Holcomb Bridge bus can't continue all the way down Jimmy Carter. Just makes no sense whatsoever, how some of the 5 core metro counties are not a part of the transit system. Asinine.

I would have suggest that MARTA have a commuter bus that runs from John's Creek, though Gwinnett without stopping, and goes to Doraville.

Then I realized that that would be duplicating the GRTA 408 route.


I also noticed that the bus stop pictures in the types of transit vehicles page matched those of the ARC transportation reports. Looks like we're finally getting upgraded bus stops with this plan.

[primaltech]

It's going to be the most hilarious thing when Gwinnett joins MARTA someday. The first bus that rolls in, it will seriously be like the fall of the Berlin wall in 1989. The bus drivers will be like, "You mean I can keep driving past the invisible line?" Damn county lines of Atlanta are like a Korea DMZ or something.

It's particularly ridiculous because 140 and 141 are both ideal transit corridors, with GCT running on the East Germany side of the invisible wall. Hopefully if MARTA does a bus line down Holcomb through east Roswell, they will be able to work out some kind of service agreement at least, where the buses can transfer at shared stops. Most likely that will involve the GCT bus going into Fulton, which is for some reason less controversial than MARTA crossing the county armistice line.

But yeah, it's a shame that Johns Creek and Peachtree Corners can't do an arterial rapid bus line down 141 that connects with Gold line. Hopefully the situation will be sorted out by the time their ambitious planned downtowns are ready to go.

[primaltech]

Originally Posted by fourthwarden

I also noticed that the bus stop pictures in the types of transit vehicles page matched those of the ARC transportation reports. Looks like we're finally getting upgraded bus stops with this plan.

I noticed that little bit too, and color me excited!

I hope that happens, because I feel like the 'pole in the ground with a logo on it' is a terrible representation of what bus transit can and should be. A stop should feel like an actual little place, with some concrete on the ground. Not some marker for a random piece of mud to stand around at the side of some poorly lit road.

And it should give information to the rider as to what lines stop there, and maybe what train stations those lines serve. Which I think hopefully is the plan.

[glovenyc]

Originally Posted by cqholt

Interesting...

Thanks for the share, interesting perspective. Also one of the comment pretty much sums it up:


Aaron,
I've lived in Portland for 5 years now. I grew up in the Chicago area, and have lived in several other places with much larger African-American populations than Portland. Your article touches on an interesting and important subject, and I don't have time to do it justice right now, but want to take issue with one of your arguments.
If I understand you correctly, you are suggesting that the main reason that Portland-style transportation policies don't transfer to rust-belt cities is because they don't address the needs of minority populations in those places. That may or may not be true, but I think the larger issue is that many whites in cities with high minority populations are unwilling to fund public transportation and other public goods, because they see it as taking money away from "us" and giving it to "them" (poor minorities. In most of those areas, middle-class whites have long since fled to the suburbs, and don't see public transportation as benefiting them. I have a hard time believing that minority populations in most Midwestern cities wouldn't benefit from and want better public transportation - in fact, a significant challenge is that in many cities, jobs have fled to the suburbs along with middle-class whites and minority residents can't access them because they have no way to get to them.
That said, it stands to reason that what works in Portland might not work in Cincinnati and that Portland's policies can't just be transferred wholesale to another city.

[jsvh]

Here is a direct link to the letter to Eaves on what they can get for 0.25% and 0.50% options: https://cmgajccommuting.files.wordpr...12-15-2015.pdf

Option 1A - 0.25% Sales Tax increase through 2057 solely in Fulton County

• 12 Miles of High-Capacity Bus service (but not bus rapid transit) from North Springs to Windward Parkway
• Bus service improvements and premium service expansions throughout Atlanta, East Point, Sandy Springs, Johns Creek, Union City, and Palmetto.

Option 1B - 0.25% Sales Tax increase through 2057 solely in Fulton County

• 12 Miles of Bus Rapid Transit service in dedicated lanes from North Springs to Windward Parkway

Option 2 - 0.50% Sales Tax increase through 2057 solely in Fulton County

• 12 Miles of Heavy Rail Transit from North Springs to Windward Parkway
• Bus service improvements and premium service expansions throughout Atlanta, East Point, Sandy Springs, Johns Creek, Union City, and Palmetto.
• High capacity transit expansion in the City of Atlanta to be determined in consultation of the city. This could take the form of a 2 mile Heavy Rail Transit expansion from Hamilton E. Holmes to I-285 / MLK Drive. This could also take the form of anything in the City's transit plans (see: streetcar / light rail on the BeltLine)

Option 3 - 0.50% Sales Tax increase through 2057 in Fulton and DeKalb Counties

• 12 Miles of Heavy Rail Transit from North Springs to Windward Parkway
• 12 Miles of Heavy Rail Transit from Indian Creek to the Mall at Stonecrest
• 8 Miles of Light Rail Transit from Lindbergh to Avondale
• High capacity transit expansion in the City of Atlanta to be determined in consultation of the city. This could take the form of a 2 mile Heavy Rail Transit expansion from Hamilton E. Holmes to I-285 / MLK Drive. This could also take the form of anything in the City's transit plans (see: streetcar / light rail on the BeltLine)