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Seattle did a wonderful job with their downtown transit tunnel. I love the bus access, the express buses, and high frequency routes. They are wonderful. However a large portion of the light rail line is in MLK in the median on the ground with no grade separation, no crossing guards, etc.. It has to be slow enough to stop for cars, and has to stop for traffic lights.
Um, where did you get those "facts" from? The portion along MLK has complete signal priority, crossing guards, and never has to stop for traffic unless there's some kind of accident where a car is blocking the tracks. Second, the next portion of the light rail line will extend from the Downtown tunnel to Capitol Hill to Univ. of Wash. to 45th/Brooklyn to Roosevelt to Northgate all underground. The segment to Bellevue will be almost completely underground, elevated or in its own right of way.
As someone who has ridden the top transit systems in the country (NYC, DC, Chicago, SF BART, etc.) I can tell you that Link Light Rail functionally feels exactly like them. By design it shouldn't stop unless it's at a stop. Yes, there is one section that goes along MLK, but as I said it has full signal priority and unless there's an accident or a car illegally blocking the tracks it never has to stop. Not to mention, there are no more planned sections like that.
I'm not sure why you'd post something like that that is completely and blatantly untrue.
Um, where did you get those "facts" from? The portion along MLK has complete signal priority, crossing guards, and never has to stop for traffic unless there's some kind of accident where a car is blocking the tracks. Second, the next portion of the light rail line will extend from the Downtown tunnel to Capitol Hill to Univ. of Wash. to 45th/Brooklyn to Roosevelt to Northgate all underground. The segment to Bellevue will be almost completely underground, elevated or in its own right of way.
As someone who has ridden the top transit systems in the country (NYC, DC, Chicago, SF BART, etc.) I can tell you that Link Light Rail functionally feels exactly like them. By design it shouldn't stop unless it's at a stop. Yes, there is one section that goes along MLK, but as I said it has full signal priority and unless there's an accident or a car illegally blocking the tracks it never has to stop. Not to mention, there are no more planned sections like that.
I'm not sure why you'd post something like that that is completely and blatantly untrue.
Seattle system may be underground a lot but those cars dont carry the capacity of heavy rail nor to they move nywhere near the speed of heavy rail.
Daily ridership for Seattle Light rail is under 34,000 versus Atlanta's MARTA subway at under 230,000 people per day.Its really irrelevant whether it has its own right awa or not.Its obviously much slower and cannot match the capacity of heavy rail
Um, where did you get those "facts" from? The portion along MLK has complete signal priority, crossing guards, and never has to stop for traffic unless there's some kind of accident where a car is blocking the tracks. Second, the next portion of the light rail line will extend from the Downtown tunnel to Capitol Hill to Univ. of Wash. to 45th/Brooklyn to Roosevelt to Northgate all underground. The segment to Bellevue will be almost completely underground, elevated or in its own right of way.
As someone who has ridden the top transit systems in the country (NYC, DC, Chicago, SF BART, etc.) I can tell you that Link Light Rail functionally feels exactly like them. By design it shouldn't stop unless it's at a stop. Yes, there is one section that goes along MLK, but as I said it has full signal priority and unless there's an accident or a car illegally blocking the tracks it never has to stop. Not to mention, there are no more planned sections like that.
I'm not sure why you'd post something like that that is completely and blatantly untrue.
It is a 13.9 line. The MLK section is 5.5 miles, so about 40% of it is in street... just on MLK.... This doesn't take into account other streets.
Only 2.5 miles is actually underground most of which is in the downtown transit tunnel.
That is great abut the segment to Bellevue, however it doesn't really exist right now and we are talking about what does exist.
Signal priority is a wonderful thing! However!!!... it isn't failproof. It isn't grade-separated. A train driver must always approach intersections prepared to stop based on surrounding traffic. This slows the train, even if it doesn't have to stop.... and IT DOES STOP sometimes. I know this 'fact,' because I've ridden it and it had to stop a few times. Sometimes it had to wait for the light to finish cycling and sometimes a car was just late clearing the intersection. It happened.
So I went to their website. The train goes 13.9 miles and takes 39 minutes. This means the train travels at an overall 21 miles per hour (including stops) airport to Westlake. This is as long as nothing keeps the train from running as scheduled.
Compared to a HRT system: MARTA's airport station is 10 miles from Five Points, takes 18 minutes, and runs 33 miles per hour (including stops of course). There is very little to interfere with the train running as scheduled. This is not uncommon for many HRT systems.
This means Atlanta's system is running more than 50% faster than Seattle's Light rail, with lower risk if an event to take it off schedule.
I like LRT. I even want Atlanta to put it in several places, but it isn't the same as a full HRT system.
Quote:
Originally Posted by orzo
As someone who has ridden the top transit systems in the country (NYC, DC, Chicago, SF BART, etc.) I can tell you that Link Light Rail functionally feels exactly like them.
.....
I'm not sure why you'd post something like that that is completely and blatantly untrue.
That's great kid! I'm glad you have your little transit riding merit badge!
You'll never guess what!? I do too! As do many C-D posters.
I have been on the DC Metro, BART, Chicago's El + Red line, 3 of NYC area's systems including New Jersey light rail (which is NOT a subway/heavy rail!), Seattle's Light rail, Munich, Hamburg, Berlin, Prague, London, Amsterdam, Singapore, Barcelona, Rome, Jerez de la Frontera/Cadiz, Naples, Marseille, Copenhagen, and that isn't even all of them. I travel for a living. Seen alot of various things, alot of good things, and alot of bad things.
There are also tons of people on this board just like me and/or even more experienced. I'd be careful what you say to make your argument.
I have personally ridden Seattle's system. I actually liked it. I liked the shared use downtown tunnel, however that doesn't make it the same as grade separated heavy rail. It does not work as fast. It does not carry as many people. It does not make other posters who originally said most of it was underground true either. Nothing I have said has been untrue, much less "blatantly untrue." I didn't need a fancy source to get my facts. I saw them. I saw the train stop. I saw lots of intersections with no crossing guards, which are more common on Charlotte's light rail. I saw long stretches with no grade separations from the road at all... we're talking about more than half the length entire system.
I recommend checking out Charlotte's Lynx. It is a small start up system and has a ways to go to be quite honest, however for a good portion of their suburban stretch is grade separated, when its not there are usually crossing guards. There are a few spots where there aren't, which is usually because of a station at the intersection and the street is a relatively minor backstreet with little to no traffic. At the end of the day... its light rail.
Last edited by CaseyB; 05-11-2014 at 04:47 AM..
Reason: off topic
Seattle system may be underground a lot but those cars dont carry the capacity of heavy rail nor to they move nywhere near the speed of heavy rail.
Daily ridership for Seattle Light rail is under 34,000 versus Atlanta's MARTA subway at under 230,000 people per day.Its really irrelevant whether it has its own right awa or not.Its obviously much slower and cannot match the capacity of heavy rail
That's because Seattle currently only has one line open and it doesn't go to many dense areas, aside from Downtown. Between now and 2023 there are 4 new lines expected to open - one of which will connect the three densest neighborhoods in the Pacific Northwest via underground stations - and by that point ridership is supposed to jump up to about 200,000 per day. Heck, once the Capitol Hill and Univ. of Washington subway opens up in 2016, you'll probably see ridership jump up to 80,000.
Last edited by orzo; 05-11-2014 at 04:22 AM..
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That's great kid! I'm glad you have your little transit riding merit badge!
