Is Oakland-Downtown BRT really worth 200 million? (Pittsburgh, Highland Park: mover, transfer, neighborhoods)

[Blackbeauty212]

Future Travel: Is $200 million for Downtown-Oakland BRT the best public-transit investment? | News | Pittsburgh City Paper

[ferraris]

I do see limited benefit to it. How many people actually travel via bus between Oakland and Downtown with both of those places being the actual origin and destination and not just a transfer? It does seem questionable to spend so much money to merely make a very well served corridor somewhat faster. Even Downtown commuters from the east would see limited benefit because the BRT would be mostly a duplication of the East Busway for that purpose. And it's not like we have Oakland-bound buses coming from other directions.

Honestly it seems similar to the North Shore Connector boondoggle to me. It's not bad per se, and it will no doubt improve some people's commutes..but it doesn't seem to be the best use of the money.

[AaronPGH]

If they only do it from Downtown to Oakland, no. It needs to split in two and continue on to Squirrel Hill and Highland Park...possibly further.

[Blackbeauty212]

I don't see the need of BRT only between Downtown and Oakland...Oakland problem is not people coming and going into Downtown, its people coming/going from East End and other suburbs. Oakland is a commuting destination in and of itself. BRT would make sense if Oakland/Downtown fed each other population, they do not. People commute from Oakland to Downtown and vice-verse because Oakland doesn't have direct service from where they live so they're forced to travel via Downtown.

All that needs to be down to enhance IMO Downtown/Oakland corridor (Forget Rail its just not going to happen) is to reduce the number of Stops and try to keep the 61's and 71's evenly spaced. Also make the Bus Lane whole from Sixth Ave to Jumonville and keep the 61s on Forbes outbound and 71s on Fifth both ways. Very Simple and effective and probably costs a lot less than 200 million to put into place.

Also Oakland desperately needs direct service from the Burbs into, so people don't need to transfer Downtown.

[Evergrey]

It should be rail. Shameful that Pittsburgh never developed a rail connection between two mighty hubs of economic activity.

[szug-bot]

i agree with blackbeauty and ferraris, almost to a tee.

evergrey - the same argument might be said of rail - if its between downtown and oakland, isnt that a tremendous investment for what buses do pretty well as is?
light rail has a number of other disadvantages.

i think light rail to oakland would be good, but only if its guaranteed that they can take it out to the eastern boroughs to maximize useage on off-peak hours and on weekends. anyway, i think with ANY extension, it will be the northern suburbs that get it, first, unfortunately.

as an aside:
i actually think it might be better to go OVERGROUND, with an aerial people mover (absolutely no excavation required, and the budget inflating issues that can occur from that). that would be purely a conceptual vision at this point (but do-able!).

[LIRefugee]

Originally Posted by szug-bot

i actually think it might be better to go OVERGROUND, with an aerial people mover (absolutely no excavation required, and the budget inflating issues that can occur from that). that would be purely a conceptual vision at this point (but do-able!).

Like a system of gondolas?

[pman]

it would be nice if the article detailed why it costs $200 million. for instance, are some aspects expensive netting fewer minutes than others? can I spend $100 million and get 70% of the trip time reduction? and how was it determined that this corridor was the right one. is it better than the public match for the avrr project? what other projects was it compared to?

[zman63]

Originally Posted by Blackbeauty212

I don't see the need of BRT only between Downtown and Oakland...Oakland problem is not people coming and going into Downtown, its people coming/going from East End and other suburbs. Oakland is a commuting destination in and of itself. BRT would make sense if Oakland/Downtown fed each other population, they do not. People commute from Oakland to Downtown and vice-verse because Oakland doesn't have direct service from where they live so they're forced to travel via Downtown.

All that needs to be down to enhance IMO Downtown/Oakland corridor (Forget Rail its just not going to happen) is to reduce the number of Stops and try to keep the 61's and 71's evenly spaced. Also make the Bus Lane whole from Sixth Ave to Jumonville and keep the 61s on Forbes outbound and 71s on Fifth both ways. Very Simple and effective and probably costs a lot less than 200 million to put into place.

Also Oakland desperately needs direct service from the Burbs into, so people don't need to transfer Downtown.

This talk is all well and good, but we already got our 1 billion dollar transit expansion. That was the north shore connector. The likelihood of a city the size of Pittsburgh getting another 100 million+ for transit expansion or upgrades (public money) in the next decade or 20 years is literally slim to none. The larger cities with much bigger economies and voting base will get money on a regular basis. If Pittsburgh was growing again by the 10s of thousands every year then I would have some hope, but this is all talk.

There is not enough interest from the local private sector to invest in a project this size. This is the only way I see something like this happening.

Could anybody name the last time Pittsburgh got 100 million dollars or a more for a transit upgrade other than the north shore connector?

Where were all of you when they decided to spend a billion dollars on a tunnel instead of connecting neighborhoods and suburbs?

It just seems at this point it was too little way to late. You guys should've made this outcry 10 to 15 years ago.

[szug-bot]

for the record, that tunnel was gynormously expensive in part because of unexpected soil conditions. i wasnt living here at the time, but it certainly was common knowledge and reported in the post-gazette.

its too bad, but what would be the alternative? to just abandon a tunnel that was almost 50% done?

Also make the Bus Lane whole from Sixth Ave to Jumonville and keep the 61s on Forbes outbound and 71s on Fifth both ways. Very Simple and effective and probably costs a lot less than 200 million to put into place.

not sure i understand what you are suggesting that is different from the current routes for the 61s and 71s. is there a bus lane on sixth avenue?

it is possible that some aspects of our current system work as well as possible!?!

wasnt there a 'Violet Line' circulator in the east end, circa 2004? (i wasnt here at the time). that would be great.