What's blocking the expansion of rail mass transit? (Atlanta, Snellville: amusement parks, credit card)

[Born 2 Roll]

I’m not that high on the prospects for transit expansion in a large major metropolitan area like Atlanta because the way that transit is operated in North America is in a way that makes it a cash-poor enterprise with the lack of revenue from private sources (including large-scale TOD/transit-oriented real estate development and private sponsorships from large and small sources) and the over-dependence and often sole-dependence on operating revenues from public sources (including local and federal tax revenues).

That way that we fund (or severely underfund) transit often with the bare minimum of revenues from public sources most often seems to make transit expansions to the scale and service level that may be desired impossible.

Further complicating matters in a large major metro region like Atlanta is an intense social and cultural aversion (often fueled by matters of race and fears of crime and a deep distrust of government) to expanding a form of transportation like transit in many (if not most) areas outside of the I-285 Perimeter.

Because of the aforementioned factors, the best course of action for pro-transit interests in a region like Atlanta at this time likely may be to focus on improving, upgrading and expanding transit service in the current MARTA service area of Fulton, DeKalb and Clayton counties.

Pro-transit interests and transit activists probably shouldn’t expend too much energy attempting to expand transit into outlying areas where anti-transit interests continue to make transit expansion extremely difficult, if not impossible.

If and when outlying jurisdictions outside of the current MARTA service area are ever ready for high-capacity transit service to be expanded into their areas, they have the political resources and connections at the state level to make it happen when the time may be right for them, if the time is ever right for them.

[SEAandATL]

Originally Posted by primaltech

And I'm assuming you know how to do that? No one else does.

Name me one transit system, anywhere in the entire world, that's profitable. And before anyone mentions Tokyo (which is the closest example)- it's privately owned, but the transit part of the business is subsidized- they make their money off of their real estate holdings, and use that to maintain the trains.

And that's only possible because of the massive numbers of riders every day, because very few own a car. Which of course would not be the case in Atlanta. So if you know how to build a profitable private transit system, then by all means go for it. The government's not in your way.

Of course unfortunately Atlanta will never be anything like Tokyo. Meanwhile Florida's Brightline is another example, just not sure about the profitable part, pre-pandemic anyways. But Florida in many ways is like Japan 2.0.

[Atlanta-Native]

Originally Posted by Born 2 Roll

I’m not that high on the prospects for transit expansion in a large major metropolitan area like Atlanta because the way that transit is operated in North America is in a way that makes it a cash-poor enterprise with the lack of revenue from private sources (including large-scale TOD/transit-oriented real estate development and private sponsorships from large and small sources) and the over-dependence and often sole-dependence on operating revenues from public sources (including local and federal tax revenues).

That way that we fund (or severely underfund) transit often with the bare minimum of revenues from public sources most often seems to make transit expansions to the scale and service level that may be desired impossible.

Further complicating matters in a large major metro region like Atlanta is an intense social and cultural aversion (often fueled by matters of race and fears of crime and a deep distrust of government) to expanding a form of transportation like transit in many (if not most) areas outside of the I-285 Perimeter.

Because of the aforementioned factors, the best course of action for pro-transit interests in a region like Atlanta at this time likely may be to focus on improving, upgrading and expanding transit service in the current MARTA service area of Fulton, DeKalb and Clayton counties.

Pro-transit interests and transit activists probably shouldn’t expend too much energy attempting to expand transit into outlying areas where anti-transit interests continue to make transit expansion extremely difficult, if not impossible.

If and when outlying jurisdictions outside of the current MARTA service area are ever ready for high-capacity transit service to be expanded into their areas, they have the political resources and connections at the state level to make it happen when the time may be right for them, if the time is ever right for them.

I agree, I don't see it happening.

[primaltech]

Originally Posted by Born 2 Roll

Further complicating matters in a large major metro region like Atlanta is an intense social and cultural aversion (often fueled by matters of race and fears of crime and a deep distrust of government) to expanding a form of transportation like transit in many (if not most) areas outside of the I-285 Perimeter.

Well, it's the wealthiest and whitest areas that oppose it. So including Vinings which is ITP, and the conservative parts of Buckhead.

But there's a lot of areas of OTP DeKalb and South Gwinnett that do want transit. Look at the Gwinnett MARTA vote breakdown, there were a lot of areas in the inner part of the county that heavily voted yes.

And parts of South Cobb I'm sure too, would love rail/increase transit, and would vote to fund it.

[dtyfygiu]

You guys are arguing about expanding into suburbia and I still don't have an answer on why MARTA just won't focus on the inner city. You won't get people who live in sprawling wastelands in SFH on 2 acres to agree with transit, and unfortunately places like that encapsulate a vast majority of the ATL metro. However, there are plenty of places in or near the city that would love transit access, such as the Emory/Druid Hills Area, the Beltline, West Midtown, etc. Those areas have the density to support transit and they won't vote against it.


It's like an abusive relationship. These suburban counties keep voting no for MARTA yet they're still hyper focused on it.

[waronxmas]

Nimbys and money.

Some nimbys don't want to change the status quo because they like it, but their power is overblown for the most part in the narrative.

The true big problem is the cost. As others have stated, building the type of rail we need would be extremely expensive. We're talking 10s of billions of dollars to facilitate enough change to make a difference. You can blow this off all you want, but if you can figure out how to get $50 to $100 billion dollars of investment we're all years.

I'll also throw out another factor that often isn't brought up: The freight rail companies are reticent to play nice on passenger rail over their lines. This is despite the fact that those same lines once had hundreds of passenger trains running on them 50 years ago and as such most of the suburbs surrounding Atlanta have old rail stations in their downtown. It actually wouldn't take much to make use of this network since the most expensive part of implementing service on them (building the rails themselves) and they flow through big population centers all over the metro.

With that said, it's not a situation where nothing is going on. Work is progressing on expanding the streetcar network and the beltline is a part of that. Really the only big gap in the city though are the high usage corridors in southwest (Campbelton road corridor) and northeast Atlanta (Clifton Road corridor). With what's planned now it'll do well to making the City at least where it needs to be. We'll see what happens OTP.

[arjay57]

Originally Posted by Tarzanman

Because buses don't fix the traffic problem. More buses will mean more people on the roads. You will never put enough bus and bus stops in Roswell or Alpharetta to keep the vast majority of people from driving their cars instead. Buses get stuck in the same traffic and take longer as a commute option due to having to stop at stops.

There is also the psychological aspect of having to memorize a stop schedule. Again, you'll never put enough buses on the roads in the burbs to have one coming every 30 minutes or so.

This is why rail is more attractive for riders. Trains run every 5-20 min or so. They only get slowed down for maintenance or other comparatively rare service degradation. There is typically no need to memorize a schedule.

What's wrong with buses moving along with the flow of traffic? Sure, give them some sideouts at major stops and maybe signal priority, but traffic is a fact of life in urban areas.

If you've flooded the zone with buses and they're showing up every 15 minutes or so, there's no need to memorize complicated schedules.

And seriously, does anybody take mass transit to get somewhere fast?

[Atlanta-Native]

Originally Posted by dtyfygiu

You guys are arguing about expanding into suburbia and I still don't have an answer on why MARTA just won't focus on the inner city. You won't get people who live in sprawling wastelands in SFH on 2 acres to agree with transit, and unfortunately places like that encapsulate a vast majority of the ATL metro. However, there are plenty of places in or near the city that would love transit access, such as the Emory/Druid Hills Area, the Beltline, West Midtown, etc. Those areas have the density to support transit and they won't vote against it.


It's like an abusive relationship. These suburban counties keep voting no for MARTA yet they're still hyper focused on it.

I agree, they are better off worrying about marta in the inner city.

[Gulch]

Originally Posted by dtyfygiu

You guys are arguing about expanding into suburbia and I still don't have an answer on why MARTA just won't focus on the inner city. You won't get people who live in sprawling wastelands in SFH on 2 acres to agree with transit, and unfortunately places like that encapsulate a vast majority of the ATL metro. However, there are plenty of places in or near the city that would love transit access, such as the Emory/Druid Hills Area, the Beltline, West Midtown, etc. Those areas have the density to support transit and they won't vote against it.


It's like an abusive relationship. These suburban counties keep voting no for MARTA yet they're still hyper focused on it.

Originally Posted by Atlanta-Native

I agree, they are better off worrying about marta in the inner city.

That mindset would exclude major business centers such as Cumberland, the I-85 corridor in Gwinnett, and Windward/Alpharetta.

[Atlanta-Native]

Originally Posted by Gulch

That mindset would exclude major business centers such as Cumberland, the I-85 corridor in Gwinnett, and Windward/Alpharetta.

Indeed it would. I don't see the use justifying the costs.