The Train That Saved Denver (Pittsburgh, Lincoln: buy, school district, casino)

[Blackbeauty212]

Originally Posted by Geeo

The people of the Denver region voted to raise their sales tax in 2004 to help pay for the estimated $6 billion transit system, which would include heavy rail, light rail, complete streets, and transit oriented-development public-private partnerships.

There is no reason it couldn't be done in the Pittsburgh region. But my guess is that there is no political or civic will to do so.

There you have it..... Denver is NOT located in the politically dysfunctional state of Pennsylvania. Not mention Denver is Top Dog of its state. Pittsburgh still has to fight with Philadelphia for attention, and both have to do battle with the "T" of PA that hates both cities getting anything.

[Geeo]

It's also probably easier in Denver because it's on the prairie and pretty flat. And they probably still have space to build a new system without some of the expense of acquiring property, so they can guide future development. Metro Denver only had 1.7 million people in 1970 and now has 2.8 million.

They want to include rail as part of their strategy to move people and mitigate traffic, and their plans still include buses, complete streets and bike lanes.

[UKyank]

Originally Posted by Blackbeauty212

There you have it..... Denver is NOT located in the politically dysfunctional state of Pennsylvania. Not mention Denver is Top Dog of its state. Pittsburgh still has to fight with Philadelphia for attention, and both have to do battle with the "T" of PA that hates both cities getting anything.

They also voted to raise it to the 'high' rate of 3.65% in Denver whereas it's already 7% for allegheny county so no, I doubt you'll find much political will to further increase the local sales tax.
Denver also has an income tax of about $70/ yr vs 3% of wages in Pgh...

[theta_sigma]

Originally Posted by UKyank

They also voted to raise it to the 'high' rate of 3.65% in Denver whereas it's already 7% for allegheny county so no, I doubt you'll find much political will to further increase the local sales tax.
Denver also has an income tax of about $70/ yr vs 3% of wages in Pgh...

Sooo... how does Denver pay for, like, anything? Are they just getting a firehose of money from Colorado, or the Feds, or what?

[lprmesia]

I'm all for better transit in Pittsburgh, but there aren't a lot of reasons people use it. People tend to support it, but few actually use it. Here's why people do use it:

Cost savings
For people working Downtown or in Oakland, using transit is cheaper than paying for a monthly parking pass. I work in South Side and it's about a wash in terms of cost. I pay $117 Pre-tax through my employer compared to $97.50 for a monthly PAT pass. There are cheaper parking options for me too, but for a potential $20/month in savings (sans wear and tear on my car), I'm not turning a 12 minute drive into an hour and 12 minute bus ride each way. $20 isn't worth 40 extra hours a month of commute times.

On that map that floated around this site for a while, they proposed a T line from Station Square to the South Side Works. If this existed, I'd actually consider using this to get to work because there would only be one stop. Not having to sit through every single traffic light on Carson or Sarah Streets would be nice. If it were only a 20-25 minute commute, I could live with that. Right now the only bus that goes into SSW comes from Oakland, and the only ones that route from Station Square through Side Side stop about a 15 minute walk short of my work (again, I can drive the ENTIRE trip in 12 minutes). But we all know this is impractical since this comes down to right-of-way to pull this off (expensive). Replacing buses on E Carson St with a T line while a cool idea adds no value. In addition to the impracticality of this actually happening, the only real lure is that there's slight cost savings for only a slightly increased commute time (if there's right of way). It's not a major selling point.

Some might suggest we increase parking costs to incentivise more people into taking public transportation. This type of thinking is why places like Moon Township and Cranberry exist.

Time savings
If you work an 8-5 M-F job in Downtown and live anywhere West, South, or East - this makes sense. The Blue-Line is faster than West Liberty Ave or 51. The Busways (especially the West Busway) are faster than sitting on the Parkways. No one likes being fed to the tunnel monster.

Necessity
People use it if they have no other way to get around. I first moved to Pittsburgh without a car because I knew I could somewhat get around without one. Both the transit and economy in my hometown was much worse (Toledo) so from both angles moving to Pittsburgh was a huge upgrade. I couldn't afford a car at the time, but eventually ended up having to get one because with route cuts and bus breakdowns, I was spending the cost of a new car payment in cab fares to get to work each month. This was part of the lure of Pittsburgh compared to my hometown was that I didn't need a car, but Pittsburgh isn't facing rapid growth like a Denver or Austin where we're needing to expand this infrastructure to support a new influx of population. When I moved in, I replaced someone moving out of the metro area.

Plus once you have a vehicle, how likely are you going to be to sell it and go back to having limited mobility? Some might, most won't. Count me in the latter. I prefer to not have to call a Lyft to get groceries home or to move something or to spend 2 hours on a bus to go see friends in another neighborhood or to wait an hour and 20 minutes at a bus stop in the freezing cold because a bus broke down. If I had to use it because my car is in the shop or in the event of job loss (which I hope never happens), then yes it's nice to have. But again, that's out of necessity, not desire. This notion that improving mass transit will drastically increase the demand for service by having people sell their cars is pie in the sky.

Overall
To summarize, people use transit to either go downtown to save a few bucks or a few minutes in commuting, or because they have no alternative.

The Denver region has doubled in size since the 1980's while Pittsburgh has remained relatively flat. This substantial growth and projected future growth of their region puts strains on their current infrastructure in a way which does not parallel Pittsburgh's story at all. Denver is expanding their system because there is a NEED to expand their system in order to sustain their levels of growth. Parking cost and commute times are a huge driver. While Pittsburgh has infrastructure issues, they're not nearly on the magnitude of Denver's. In just the last 5 years, the Denver area has added the population of Westmoreland County, the 2nd most populous county in our area.

Denver is creating supply to meet the demand, not the other way around. There seems to be this notion in Pittsburgh that by increasing the supply that it will drive the demand. The "build it and they will come philosophy" is dead. Again, while more T lines would be "cool" and "nice", this level of wide scale expansion is not in high demand.

Pittsburgh would need to have a lot more growth to necessitate an expansion of the T (or just increasing the number of right of ways in general). Unless traffic starts hitting (or is projected to hit) critical mass, or parking rates increase above a certain threshold in more areas than just Downtown and Oakland, then there's not really a level of demand high enough to warrant this level of investment.

I'd love to see trolley's more than buses because it increases the coolness factor, but we need to be honest with ourselves.

[bluecarebear]

I would love a T expansion but it is too late. There is no money and no enthusiasm for one. The best chance was back in the late 00s. The Pittsburgh region would rather spend it's money on the feeder highways in and out of the city.

[UKyank]

Originally Posted by theta_sigma

Sooo... how does Denver pay for, like, anything? Are they just getting a firehose of money from Colorado, or the Feds, or what?

https://www.denvergov.org/content/da...ors_Budget.pdf

For example, even with the lower sales tax, they pull in more money then allegheny county does with it among other things.

[MountainDewGuy]

Maube Denver should be awarded the $50 million Smart City grant, as they have shown to plan in a smart way. We can't even get something established from Downtown to Oakland.

[Geeo]

Colorado residents pay more in state income tax than Pennsylvania: 4.63% vs 3.07%.

[gg]

Originally Posted by UKyank

They also voted to raise it to the 'high' rate of 3.65% in Denver whereas it's already 7% for allegheny county so no, I doubt you'll find much political will to further increase the local sales tax.
Denver also has an income tax of about $70/ yr vs 3% of wages in Pgh...

Glad you posted this to do a little schooling. Some people like yourself actually research things and don't make snap judgements. Here is another little tidbit or knowledge.

Looking at the levy on a $300,000 home across the nation’s 50 largest cities, Colorado Springs homeowners paid the lowest property taxes at $1,432 a year, with Denver ranking fourth at $1,988 a year, according to a separate study from the Lincoln Institute of Land Policy.

How much tax is a $300,000 home here in Pittsburgh? What about suburbs?

What is left for infrastructure and things like money for transportation? How much are we paying teachers compared to the national average? How much is our school tax? National average in the US is around mid $40's, but in my district? Over $80K!!!!

What is really left for working people in our region to pay towards infrastructure and transportation? HA! NOTHING!

Thank you UK for the schooling.