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View Poll Results: Which city is faster?
Philadelphia 31 37.35%
Washington, DC 52 62.65%
Voters: 83. You may not vote on this poll

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Old 03-22-2011, 06:07 AM
 
Location: The City
22,379 posts, read 38,665,395 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by MDAllstar View Post
Septa Regional Rail with 289 miles and a ridership of 120,700 daily riders = major FAIL. You would have been better off not including Septa Commuter Rail and just boosting Septa Heavy Rail. At least it has good ridership for the amount of miles it has. Trying to disguise commuter rail for a subway = Major FAIL. Look at the ridership difference between heavy rail and commuter rail. Probably shouldn't compare any kind of Philly transit to D.C.'s metro system anyway.

http://www.apta.com/resources/statis...rship_APTA.pdf
So on transit usage you are saying that the Philly metro Transit is a major Fail; hmm tell that to the combined 1.2 plus million daily riders (which includes all the Septa, NJT, Patco, and Dart users per day or can we only include massively Federal subsidized systems that american pays for in your fair city) compared to the 1.5 million (And Yes MD everyone agrees that the Metro is a very good and well utilized system; though is a pittance compared to the best system in the US as all others are in comparison) DC users per day, yes epic fail. I will assume you will not use anything but your strict criteria on the DMV is and when these are ever built as they dont qualify in your myopic little world.

Good day MD
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Old 03-22-2011, 07:20 AM
eek
 
Location: Queens, NY
3,574 posts, read 7,691,623 times
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i'm not going to get into this discussion too much...i'm not from philly and i'm not from dc.

but there is NO WAY that either philly or dc's mass transit system are failures. ESPECIALLY considering the failure that is the u.s. in mass transit. these are two of the few cities that have it right within this country.

i get that we all want our cities to shine but lets be realistic.
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Old 03-22-2011, 10:27 AM
 
Location: Washington D.C.
13,674 posts, read 15,574,875 times
Reputation: 4054
Quote:
Originally Posted by kidphilly View Post
So on transit usage you are saying that the Philly metro Transit is a major Fail; hmm tell that to the combined 1.2 plus million daily riders (which includes all the Septa, NJT, Patco, and Dart users per day or can we only include massively Federal subsidized systems that american pays for in your fair city) compared to the 1.5 million (And Yes MD everyone agrees that the Metro is a very good and well utilized system; though is a pittance compared to the best system in the US as all others are in comparison) DC users per day, yes epic fail. I will assume you will not use anything but your strict criteria on the DMV is and when these are ever built as they dont qualify in your myopic little world.

Good day MD
Then stop saying metro is commuter rail. You keep saying Metro is commuter rail which is why I made the comparison of commuter rail and heavy rail. Your definition of commuter rail is anything outside of city proper. My question is how does D.C.'s metro compare to commuter rail in ridership anywhere in this country? By the way, DC's metro system only has 106 miles of track but over 1,000,000 riders. I have never seen a commuter rail system with that type of ridership. NYC has 8,000,000+ people in their city and over 20,000,000 in their MSA. I would hope they could manage the ridership they have. Also, nice try including NJT numbers in for Philly. You know as well as I do that NJT is almost all NYC commuter's from New Jersey and even if you did try to include NYC, you still are off:

Philadelphia rail ridership Q3 2010:

Septa Heavy Rail: 293,700 daily riders
Patco: 35,300 daily ridership
Septa Light Rail: 94,400 daily riders
Septa Commuter Rail: 120,700 daily riders
Septa Trolley Bus: 17,100 daily riders

Total: 561,200 total Philly MSA daily riders


NJT is 95% a New Jersey system for NYC. And even with all of New Jersey's riders, Philly would only come to about 850,000 daily riders total. I don't know how you got 1.2 million for rail ridership in the Philly MSA. Only D.C. and NYC average over 1 million riders a day for their rail systems.


By the way, Purple Line and Corridor Cities Transit way go to the FTA New Starts program this year according to this:

http://www.montgomeryplanning.org/tr...mary101410.pdf

Last edited by MDAllstar; 03-22-2011 at 11:05 AM..
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Old 03-22-2011, 10:53 AM
 
Location: Washington, D.C.
60 posts, read 90,237 times
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This is a commuter train, they are extremely heavy and built to travel Amtrak type distances:




http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HbeAqw7wXJg

Also they are faster than heavy rail trains, the platforms are much higher, they accelerate and decelerate a lot slower than heavy rail trains.

This is heavy rail, a metro subway, they tend to run more frequent than commuter rail, travel shorter distances, accelerate and decelerate faster, alighting and boarding times are much quicker, and subways don't have a person who has to check you're ticket once you're on:




http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SPMGadEwBhE
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Old 03-22-2011, 10:56 AM
 
Location: The City
22,379 posts, read 38,665,395 times
Reputation: 7974
Quote:
Originally Posted by MDAllstar View Post
Then stop saying metro is commuter rail. You keep saying Metro is commuter rail which is why I made the comparison of commuter rail and heavy rail. Your definition of commuter rail is anything outside of city proper. My question is how does D.C.'s metro compare to commuter rail in ridership anywhere in this country? By the way, DC's metro system only has 106 miles of track but over 1,000,000 riders. I have never seen a commuter rail system with that type of ridership. NYC has 8,000,000+ people in their city and over 20,000,000 in their MSA. I would hope they could manage the ridership they have.


By the way, Purple Line and Corridor Cities Transit way go to the FTA New Starts program this year according to this:

http://www.montgomeryplanning.org/tr...mary101410.pdf
Like Marta and Bart (or even Path or Patco or even the Chicago Blue line) the Metro is a hybrid as incorporates aspects of both; not truly a subway and not truly a commuter rail line, older systems built both based on the technology of the time. They may be different but serve similar functions. This is no slight at all to Metro which continually is proven to be a highly effecient system; but it is note truly one or the other.

By a stricter comparison the Metro is nothing like an old school subway like the Broad Street line

Also on your description of miles, take out the Newark DE line which adds a ton of miles to regional for basically no riders and the milage is significantly reduced. The majority of the regional rail sans the extemely long Newark line (I think is like 50 miles by itself) extend in a range very comparable with the Metro system. I have lived in both areas and am very familiar with both services; some of the regional rail lines never even leave the city borders.

Also stations within the city limits represent 33% of stations and 66% of all boardings. The system covers areas no different than that a Maclean or Shady Grove in a typical fashion plus there are more lines which obviously add to the miles covered.

Look at these scaled maps, you will see more similarity to regional rail of Septa in term of how the system is laid out than the 10 mile subway of Broad street for example

DC Metro
File:Washington DC Metro Map (To Scale).svg - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Septa Regional Rail (note beyond Thorndale on the map below Amtrak covers this service to harrisburg)
File:Philadelphia Transit and Commuter Rail System.png - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
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Old 03-22-2011, 11:15 AM
 
Location: Washington D.C.
13,674 posts, read 15,574,875 times
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4
Quote:
Originally Posted by kidphilly View Post
Like Marta and Bart (or even Path or Patco or even the Chicago Blue line) the Metro is a hybrid as incorporates aspects of both; not truly a subway and not truly a commuter rail line, older systems built both based on the technology of the time. They may be different but serve similar functions. This is no slight at all to Metro which continually is proven to be a highly effecient system; but it is note truly one or the other.

By a stricter comparison the Metro is nothing like an old school subway like the Broad Street line

Also on your description of miles, take out the Newark DE line which adds a ton of miles to regional for basically no riders and the milage is significantly reduced. The majority of the regional rail sans the extemely long Newark line (I think is like 50 miles by itself) extend in a range very comparable with the Metro system. I have lived in both areas and am very familiar with both services; some of the regional rail lines never even leave the city borders.

Also stations within the city limits represent 33% of stations and 66% of all boardings. The system covers areas no different than that a Maclean or Shady Grove in a typical fashion plus there are more lines which obviously add to the miles covered.

Look at these scaled maps, you will see more similarity to regional rail of Septa in term of how the system is laid out than the 10 mile subway of Broad street for example

DC Metro
File:Washington DC Metro Map (To Scale).svg - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Septa Regional Rail (note beyond Thorndale on the map below Amtrak covers this service to harrisburg)
File:Philadelphia Transit and Commuter Rail System.png - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Why would D.C. stop their subway system at the city line when the city is only 61 sq. miles? Better yet, how would D.C. stop their subway system when D.C., Maryland, and Virginia all pay for metro? D.C. could not run metro by itself financially even in city proper. The DMV is unlike any area in the country with a unique dynamic and can't be compared to any place else. What would Philly's system look like if you cut it off at 61 sq. miles? How would it compare to D.C. proper's system? Maybe that is a better comparison.

Philly: 135 sq. land miles
DC: 61 sq. land miles

So, Philly is more than twice the size of D.C. proper so let's compare the systems on the same level. What would the Septa system look like for only 61 sq. miles?
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Old 03-22-2011, 11:17 AM
 
Location: The City
22,379 posts, read 38,665,395 times
Reputation: 7974
Quote:
Originally Posted by MDAllstar View Post
4


Why would D.C. stop their subway system at the city line when the city is only 61 sq. miles? Better yet, how would D.C. stop their subway system when D.C., Maryland, and Virginia all pay for metro? D.C. could not run metro by itself financially even in city proper. The DMV is unlike any area in the country with a unique dynamic and can't be compared to any place else. What would Philly's system look like if you cut it off at 61 sq. miles? How would it compare to D.C. proper's system? Maybe that is a better comparsion
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Old 03-22-2011, 11:28 AM
 
Location: The City
22,379 posts, read 38,665,395 times
Reputation: 7974
Quote:
Originally Posted by MDAllstar View Post
4


Why would D.C. stop their subway system at the city line when the city is only 61 sq. miles? Better yet, how would D.C. stop their subway system when D.C., Maryland, and Virginia all pay for metro? D.C. could not run metro by itself financially even in city proper. The DMV is unlike any area in the country with a unique dynamic and can't be compared to any place else. What would Philly's system look like if you cut it off at 61 sq. miles? How would it compare to D.C. proper's system? Maybe that is a better comparison.

Philly: 135 sq. land miles
DC: 61 sq. land miles

So, Philly is more than twice the size of D.C. proper so let's compare the systems on the same level. What would the Septa system look like for only 61 sq. miles?

Ok on subway ridership per mile

Septa Subway 12K people per mile
DC Metro 9.3K people per mile


Really I am not saying there are more riders or the metro is a bad system at all but to compare Metro to just one facet is incorrect. Metro acts to serve two different functions whereas other systems have two (or more) different types that serve similar functions but again I see none of this will help you understand and at this point enjoy your myopic viewpoint
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Old 03-22-2011, 11:36 AM
 
Location: Washington D.C.
13,674 posts, read 15,574,875 times
Reputation: 4054
Quote:
Originally Posted by kidphilly View Post
Ok on subway ridership per mile

Septa Subway 12K people per mile
DC Metro 9.4K per mile


Really I am not saying there are more riders or the metro is a bad system at all but to compare Metro to just one facet is incorrect. Metro acts to serve two different functions whereas other systems have two (or more) different types that serve similar functions but again I see none of this will help you understand and at this point enjoy your myopic viewpoint
O well, I would take our system over your system anyway. Whether it's commuter rail or subway it's the future. You don't have to transfer and it cost less money over the distance traveled. You can take the train 20 miles outside of city proper into the city and make a million transfers for $2.50 off peak total. I can see why you would say it is commuter rail but I'm sure happy it's a hybrid as you call it. Taking commuter rail and then transferring to the city subway is doing the most. Maybe the convenience of DC's subway and modern buildout is why our ridership is so high. Who knows, but I'm happy to have it our way.
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Old 03-22-2011, 11:45 AM
 
Location: The City
22,379 posts, read 38,665,395 times
Reputation: 7974
Quote:
Originally Posted by MDAllstar View Post
Then stop saying metro is commuter rail. You keep saying Metro is commuter rail which is why I made the comparison of commuter rail and heavy rail. Your definition of commuter rail is anything outside of city proper. My question is how does D.C.'s metro compare to commuter rail in ridership anywhere in this country? By the way, DC's metro system only has 106 miles of track but over 1,000,000 riders. I have never seen a commuter rail system with that type of ridership. NYC has 8,000,000+ people in their city and over 20,000,000 in their MSA. I would hope they could manage the ridership they have. Also, nice try including NJT numbers in for Philly. You know as well as I do that NJT is almost all NYC commuter's from New Jersey and even if you did try to include NYC, you still are off:

Philadelphia rail ridership Q3 2010:

Septa Heavy Rail: 293,700 daily riders
Patco: 35,300 daily ridership
Septa Light Rail: 94,400 daily riders
Septa Commuter Rail: 120,700 daily riders
Septa Trolley Bus: 17,100 daily riders

Total: 561,200 total Philly MSA daily riders


NJT is 95% a New Jersey system for NYC. And even with all of New Jersey's riders, Philly would only come to about 850,000 daily riders total. I don't know how you got 1.2 million for rail ridership in the Philly MSA. Only D.C. and NYC average over 1 million riders a day for their rail systems.


By the way, Purple Line and Corridor Cities Transit way go to the FTA New Starts program this year according to this:

http://www.montgomeryplanning.org/tr...mary101410.pdf

I am talking overal use of PT

So here goes: per your link (go to page 15)
http://www.apta.com/resources/statis...rship_APTA.pdf

Numbers based on Average Weekday Riders (all PT in 000's)

DC Metro Area TA 1,415.7
PG County 12.9
Rockville MD 89.0
VA Farifax/Arl/Alex/VRE 68.0

Total 1,585.6


Septa 1,021.4
Patco 35.3
NJT Bus (philly MSA) 89.0
NJT Camden River Line 9.4
NJT AC Philly CR 8.2
Berks Transit 11.8
Dart (Wilmington DE) 37.7

Total 1,212.8

Yes we have established the extensive use of DC transit but not an insignificant PT ridership either in the Philly area
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