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Much of the MTA 40% per your own link is above ground, a lot of the CTA is also above ground. Yeah portions of the green line are at grade but I really do not think it’s the majority, and where it does it usually has right of ways. Chicago has a little more mileage because it’s a larger city and like 15 more stations but they’re obviously in the same class. I think we both know greenline is rapid transit. It literally started as the Tremont Street Subway (first in the country) The link says even if some of its is above ground it’s still considered rapid transit if the system goes underground or is elevated. It also has the shortest headways of any line.
I’ve ridden the Metra from Hyde Park to Millenium Park, it’s solid-but does remind me of the commuter rail. But what I found was large swaths of the south side do not have reasonable access to the train.
In my opinion the Orange Line is the one that should be extended southward along Washington Street or Hyde Park Ave could replace or buttress service on the 34(E)/32/36/35. Straight down to Wolcott square or down to the Dedham Mall.
It's not the above ground part that's bad--it's the lack of grade separation. A massive amount of the L is above ground, but that's a lot of grade-separated, elevated track that does not have to have traffic light interference. The Brown Line *does* have a part of it that's also at-grade for a bit over a mile from Rockwell Place on west and crosses 6 streets at-grade, and while that's not great, it's also not a very large part of the system (though hopefully they take the dedicated right-of-way and build it as perhaps an elevated extension). I do think the Yellow Line in Chicago though is arguably not rapid transit given that in its short length there are something like 7 streets it crosses at-grade and gets headways outside of peak hours at every 15 minutes which is pretty bad.
I do not consider the Green Line overall to be rapid transit. I think I've made that pretty clear, but I'll explicitly state that again now. I understand there's a gradient on how different systems work and there are fuzzy boundaries, but at a certain point if it wanders far enough out and there are better terms to use, then I don't think it makes sense to stretch the terms that far. Light rail's also a fuzzy term in a way, but that feels pretty applicable to the Green Line and I think the even less used term premetro fits parts of the Green Line like the D branch.
Yea, Chicago has more mileage and is the larger city and urbanized core than Boston. The size differences aren't a rounding error if just compared between Boston and Chicago, but pales in comparison once you put in New York City. I do think Boston and Chicago are roughly in the same class, and if you're looking at just the same class, then the differences don't get buried in the way they'd be if you put them in comparison with a city that's very much in a different weight class.
Metra Electric is definitely commuter rail, it's an example of what I was saying about there being a bit of a gradient where there are parts of it that lean towards rapid transit. That's similar to what I'm saying with the Green Line in Boston where it's definitely light rail, but parts of it leans towards rapid transit. We can slide with the definitions.
I'm all for more extensions! Do all of them. If going down to Dedham, then I think it should at least connect to one of the Dedham commuter rail stops for transfer. I do think giving the E branch its own dedicated median so it's not in mixed traffic should supposedly be a technically very easy thing to do and would be quite helpful and extending back out to Arborway does mean serving some rather dense areas. I think the Blue Line extension to connect to the Red Line would make a lot of sense--I think generally a good network topology has most of the lines directly connecting because it makes it more than a sum of its parts. One thing I've been wondering about is if there's a reasonable direction for the Blue Line to go after connecting to the Red Line as having terminal stations downtown isn't very efficient.
Last edited by OyCrumbler; 11-30-2023 at 09:49 AM..
I do not consider the Green Line overall to be rapid transit. I think I've made that pretty clear, but I'll explicitly state that again now. I understand there's a gradient on how different systems work and there are fuzzy boundaries, but at a certain point if it wanders far enough out and there are better terms to use, then I don't think it makes sense to stretch the terms that far. Light rail's also a fuzzy term in a way, but that feels pretty applicable to the Green Line and I think the even less used term premetro fits parts of the Green Line like the D branch.
Yes, "premetro" fits. I think that word's used more in Europe than in North America.
I think I've said this upthread, but I've taken to using the term "light metro" to refer to systems that use lower-capacity railcars that resemble modern streetcars or trams instead of "heavy" rapid transit cars but otherwise have all the operating characteristics of rapid transit save maybe high platforms (a difference that low-floor LRVs render irrelevant).
The D branch of the MBTA Green Line is a light metro. Other examples include the Norristown High-Speed Line in Philadelphia and Seattle's LRT system, or rather parts of it.
Some systems that operate at grade through the city center, like those in San Diego and Buffalo, also qualify IMO. Buffalo especially because once it leaves downtown, it operates in a subway tunnel all the way to its end.
All of these were HUGE hits when I was in high school, and they often get played on the "classic rock" or "classic hits" stations today.
Chicago was always on in my house growing up. Most specifically, the Chicago II album. For whatever reason, they haven’t had the same staying power as many other bands from the 60s and 70s. For a band that sold more than 100 Million records, they hardly exist.
When I graduated high school (early 2000s), it was cool to like Zeppelin, the Allman Brothers, Skynyrd, The Rolling Stones, Eagles, Pink Floyd. Softer or more “alternative” bands like Chicago and Steely Dan never translated.
But, Chicago in the world of rock music, is the more prominent band than Boston. Sales speak to that. And, personally, Chicagos early records were cool, unique. Boston was arena rock, not dissimilar to a dozen other bands in the 70s.
But, Chicago in the world of rock music, is the more prominent band than Boston.
I dunno if the data really supports this. At 745 million streams, More Than a Feeling has almost twice as many listens on Spotify than Chicago’s #1 song, If You Leave Me Now (395 million listens).
Granted, Boston falls off more after, with its #2 (Peace of Mind) and #3 (Foreplay / Long Time) at 185 and 109 million respectively. Chicago’s #2 (You’re the Inspiration) and #3 (Hard to Say I’m Sorry) have 318 and 212 million.
Personally, I don’t like any of those Chicago songs. My faves are 25 or 6 to 4, Saturday in the Park, and Does Anybody Really Know What Time It Is?. For Boston, Smokin’ and Rock and Roll Band are faves.
Regardless, perhaps “having a classic rock band with the city’s name in the title” is a way that Chicago is closer to Boston than NYC. It’s not like there’s a popular band that’s just called “New York City”.
I dunno if the data really supports this. At 745 million streams, More Than a Feeling has almost twice as many listens on Spotify than Chicago’s #1 song, If You Leave Me Now (395 million listens).
Granted, Boston falls off more after, with its #2 (Peace of Mind) and #3 (Foreplay / Long Time) at 185 and 109 million respectively. Chicago’s #2 (You’re the Inspiration) and #3 (Hard to Say I’m Sorry) have 318 and 212 million.
Personally, I don’t like any of those Chicago songs. My faves are 25 or 6 to 4, Saturday in the Park, and Does Anybody Really Know What Time It Is?. For Boston, Smokin’ and Rock and Roll Band are faves.
Regardless, perhaps “having a classic rock band with the city’s name in the title” is a way that Chicago is closer to Boston than NYC. It’s not like there’s a popular band that’s just called “New York City”.
There is a brilliant band called The Manhattan Transfer, and if you go by total Grammy awards, is much bigger than Boston or Chicago.
Yes, "premetro" fits. I think that word's used more in Europe than in North America.
I think I've said this upthread, but I've taken to using the term "light metro" to refer to systems that use lower-capacity railcars that resemble modern streetcars or trams instead of "heavy" rapid transit cars but otherwise have all the operating characteristics of rapid transit save maybe high platforms (a difference that low-floor LRVs render irrelevant).
The D branch of the MBTA Green Line is a light metro. Other examples include the Norristown High-Speed Line in Philadelphia and Seattle's LRT system, or rather parts of it.
Some systems that operate at grade through the city center, like those in San Diego and Buffalo, also qualify IMO. Buffalo especially because once it leaves downtown, it operates in a subway tunnel all the way to its end.
Yea, that's also a term I've heard being used and that makes sense to me. There's a difference in the actual capacity there, so I think the distinction is important there in terms of larger planning decisions and I reckon that as long as the "light metro" system has enough capacity so that it's not dangerously overpacked, gets frequently obstructed operations or impossible to board, then a person's experience with it and utility of it can be the same as high capacity rapid transit.
I guess it's outside of the scope of this topic, but perhaps we can find one that fits, but I'd be interested in knowing why you feel San Diego and Buffalo's systems should qualify as light metro. My guess is something along the lines of when it's in the downtown core, stop spacing needs to be close anyways so it never gets to a high enough speed so as long as it still has dedicated lanes, then it makes rather little difference? Something along those lines perhaps?
Chicago was always on in my house growing up. Most specifically, the Chicago II album. For whatever reason, they haven’t had the same staying power as many other bands from the 60s and 70s. For a band that sold more than 100 Million records, they hardly exist.
When I graduated high school (early 2000s), it was cool to like Zeppelin, the Allman Brothers, Skynyrd, The Rolling Stones, Eagles, Pink Floyd. Softer or more “alternative” bands like Chicago and Steely Dan never translated.
But, Chicago in the world of rock music, is the more prominent band than Boston. Sales speak to that. And, personally, Chicagos early records were cool, unique. Boston was arena rock, not dissimilar to a dozen other bands in the 70s.
They certainly aren't on the pop radar the way they were in their heyday, but they're still plugging away. Their most recent album, Chicago XXXVIII: Born for This Moment, dropped in July of last year.
Possibly relevant aside: Have you noticed who's the presenting sponsor of the Rolling Stones' tour promoting their new album?
Random data point. APTA reported transit ridership over 12 months ending this past September.
1. MTA 2.8 Billion
2. metrolosangeles 280 Million
3. cta 270 Million
4. wmata 243 Million
5. MBTA 239 Million
Pretty neat! One thing to note is that some agencies have a much higher portion of metropolitan mass transit ridership than others.
MTA has a very large proportion and massive numbers, but PATH (rapid transit) and New Jersey Transit (commuter rail, light rail, and bus) also post very significant numbers. The ridership of non-MTA agencies in the NYC area if combined would post a top five number, perhaps right after MTA itself.
Metro in Los Angeles is a bulk of the ridership though there is a very large number of smaller agencies operating bus services except for SCRRA running Metrolink. Metrolink doesn't yet post particularly big numbers, but there's a decent change that can change within a decade.
CTA is the majority of Chicago-area ridership, but Metra and Pace also put up substantial numbers. There's also the smaller numbers put up by NICTD with its commuter rail service.
WMATA takes the lion's share of ridership within the metropolitan area with the most significant non-WMATA agencies being two commuter rail agencies that post fairly decent number, but more in line with NICTD than Metra.
MBTA is interesting as the agency operates pretty much all modes (even a ferry system) and is perhaps the most comprehensive of all the major transit agencies and there is pretty much no other agency unless you're stretching out to Rhode Island.
Note that Philadelphia area and SF Bay Area agencies are off the list. Philadelphia area does have other agencies aside from SEPTA with somewhat substantial ridership via NJT and PATCO. SF Bay Area is probably the *most* balkanized of all the metropolitan areas where its total transit ridership for the metropolitan area is quite high, but is split among about two dozen agencies without a single one of them having majority ridership share.
MBTA is interesting as the agency operates pretty much all modes (even a ferry system) and is perhaps the most comprehensive of all the major transit agencies and there is pretty much no other agency unless you're stretching out to Rhode Island.
This is MVRTA erasure.
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