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Another cool development comes from the cities with active proposals to cap their freeway networks in major urban centers. Atlanta, Houston, parts of the Los Angeles area, and Minneapolis are all looking into capping some of their freeways and putting either parks or commercial development above them.
In Atlanta, it is known as "the Stitch" and it will essentially cap the I-75/I-85 connector that bifurcates through Atlanta's urban core near both Downtown and Midtown. The cap will feature commercial development, transit stations, and green space, but will serve to stitch the urban core back together. In addition to that it will give Atlanta more space to develop commercial areas and expand its core and better connect neighborhoods more seamlessly. Greenspace is always a big boost to the core of any city and will be a huge recreational zone for prospective downtown and midtown residents. It will also give Atlanta more breathing room as it will give the city more developable territory in a core area that is quickly running out of plots to develop on. This will give the city a means to continue expanding its core commercial district towards even more residential areas that are currently on the other side of the Downtown Connector. Basically it will make getting from Atlantic Station to Midtown, or from Georgia Tech to Midtown, Downtown, and the Old Fourth Ward a better pedestrian experience. The bigger purpose will serve to give the city more area to develop office space and residential units over the deck.
In Houston, the plan is to tear down the Pearce Elevated, re-route I-45 to conjoin I-69 in the area between Downtown and East Downtown ("EaDo"). Then bury the conjoined freeways and build a massive park system in its place to connect Downtown and EaDo more seamlessly with one another in one direction and due to the tearing down of Pearce Elevated then make the transition zone between Downtown and Midtown more seamlessly cohesive as well. It will also add needed greenspace and trail systems into the urban fabric between the two areas. This will serve to address two critical needs for the core region of Houston, the first is to connect downtown with the neighborhoods that ring around it with a greater presence in the pedestrian realm by tearing down the freeway structures that prohibit a seamless transition and the second is to continue adding more green space into the core region. That will in turn give residents more recreational area to enjoy and connect to the bayou trail network. In sum, it will connect the city's bayou park system with the parks created on the decks, thus connecting the urban trails and will make the pedestrian realm from downtown into Midtown, EaDo, and East End a whole lot better and much more human scaled.
Detail on Los Angeles' vision is more sporadic as it involves not just Los Angeles but several satellite communities as well like Santa Monica. It appears that the Greater Los Angeles region has a number of proposals all over to either cap various freeway systems that currently bifurcate the urban fabric or dismantle segments of freeway systems entirely and replace them with surface streets and greenspace to make the urban environment more human scaled. However, given the structure of the urban build in that region, I would imagine the end-goal they wish to achieve by capping the freeways or outright dismantling them is similar to the cities mentioned above. In essence Los Angeles wants to bridge one urban neighborhood with another more cohesively and improve its pedestrian presence inside the core of the city as well as in the core regions that include satellite cities such as Santa Monica and possibly others. I would imagine that they want to also make downtown more accessible to its surrounding core neighborhoods and make the pedestrian experience from downtown and towards those neighborhoods a more enjoyable walking experience. It will benefit the city tremendously to add more greenspace, the city could really use more of it in its core.
In Minneapolis the freeway caps will serve to undo the mistakes of the past that broke the cohesion and connectivity of certain core neighborhoods and worked to alienate various groups of people from each other. I don't know much else about the Minneapolis network and have never been to the area to even understand the geographic area they are referring to but the main objective is to re-stitch neighborhoods that were torn apart by freeway networks and bridge cultural and social gaps that developed due to that.
In the cases of both Atlanta and Houston, the plan will spur more commercial development around the capped network, which will allow the area to organically meld into the surrounding neighborhoods with more cohesion. Los Angeles already has built up a good deal of density but it desperately could use more greenspace in its urban core and more connectivity, both of which will be accomplished by capping the freeways mentioned around the city core.
All of these projects appear to be in different stages of development from what I can understand. If I'm not mistaken, the Atlanta project appears to be in the initial conceptualization phase that is still being studied and evaluated and looking to attract prospective investors to take on the $300 million Stitch project. The Houston project appears to be moving forward and seems to have incoming funding from its state's DOT likely in phases ($7 billion total remake of I-45 as an undertaking) but is still under further analysis with regard to redirecting traffic and congestion with construction on the first phase nearing. While the Los Angeles projects appear to have moved beyond the conceptualization phase and is now in the outreach phase and entering the next step (route evaluation, DOT funding, community input, so on). People from these cities can feel free to correct any misinformation they may see here. I'm not an expert on these cities.
Pittsburgh and Philadelphia both have plans to cap sections of freeway as well. I-579 in Pittsburgh and I-676 in Philadelphia.
I'm surprised that Canada isn't pushing harder for true high speed rail between Quebec City and Windsor for the Quebec-Windsor Corridor. That corridor is Canada's central nervous system in many ways. I'm not trying to incite competition here but that corridor is Canada's approximation to the Bos-Wash Corridor, obviously on a smaller scale. There should be more of a push to get it going. There also needs to be high speed rail from Vancouver to Portland, going through Seattle as well, for the Cascadia Corridor. I'd like to see a starter line from Atlanta to Nashville also, that'd be a dope line for sure. Chicago-Detroit-Toronto would be a great true high speed rail line too, always has been a concept line that I've wanted to see come to fruition but the roadblocks for it are huge because it would be dealing with the regulatory environment of two countries (three states and one province) which further complicates matters.
The Quebec-Windsor Corridor has the fastest growing cities in North America, and transit is getting the more funding and construction right now than it has ever received in the past.
These are cities building or expanding light and rapid transit right now off the top of my head
Kitchener-Waterloo
Hamilton
Mississauga
Brampton
Toronto
Vaughan
Ottawa
Montreal
Ontario especially has no money for high-speed rail at this time
The Quebec-Windsor Corridor has the fastest growing cities in North America, and transit is getting the more funding and construction right now than it has ever received in the past.
These are cities building or expanding light and rapid transit right now off the top of my head
Kitchener-Waterloo
Hamilton
Mississauga
Brampton
Toronto
Vaughan
Ottawa
Montreal
Ontario especially has no money for high-speed rail at this time
Quebec City (800,000 metro population) and Gatineau (about 300,000) also have plans in the cards.
Quebec City's are further along and should see things start to move fairly shortly.
Quebec City (800,000 metro population) and Gatineau (about 300,000) also have plans in the cards.
Quebec City's are further along and should see things start to move fairly shortly.
I feel like saying Gatineau has 300,000 people is like saying Jersey City is a small city to have such Transit richness, or St Paul has a light rail line.
I feel like saying Gatineau has 300,000 people is like saying Jersey City is a small city to have such Transit richness, or St Paul has a light rail line.
Gatineau is a part of the 1.3M Ottawa area.
Yes, but our transit system is separate from Ottawa's. We don't have anything like the PATH that crosses borders (administratively).
Massive mixed use project where Amazon is locating, as well as MGM entertainment complex, and a Grand Hyatt hotel. In addition, over 1,000 residential units and 3 million+ office space.
If anyone has visited the lower Broadway section in Nashville over the last 2 years or so, they've seen this massive development rising across from Ryman Auditorium.
Two towers, one 400 ft + residential tower and the other 350 ft + office tower that will be the HQ for Alliance Bernstein. A huge entertainment, food hall and National Museum of African American Music will be built.
2) Memphis has lagged way behind Nashville, but recently a huge project was announced, which is very cool and will transform that area of the city, as well as jumpstarting development in general for Memphis:
Forgot to mention this other exciting project in Nashville, "River North."
This $250 million dollar+, 125 acre development is essentially taking an industrial scrapyard/once manufacturing area along the north side of the Cumberland River, and turning it into a live/work/play mini city.
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