Evaluating the Streetcar (Portland, Salem, Beaverton: transfer, neighborhoods, tax)

[ChehalemValley]

Sorry, looking closer I see that my link is actually a bit short on maps. Try this: Portland Trolley System Maps

[urbanlife78]

Originally Posted by ChehalemValley

Sorry, looking closer I see that my link is actually a bit short on maps. Try this: Portland Trolley System Maps

I would love to see an inner city streetcar system that was something like that again in Portland. A number of those lines would be worth bringing back.

[Minervah]

Originally Posted by Nell Plotts

I think it is one piece in a foot based transportation system.

Likely I am the only one on the forum who actually used the old Portland Streetcar system. I loved it, busses will never replace what it accomplished.

I didn't but I have two friends who were born in Portland who have said the very same thing.

I remember the bus system replacing the streetcars in Chicago but they did a very good job. And there were electric buses as well as gas run ones for a very long time. It's all in the planning really.

[hamellr]

Originally Posted by urbanlife78

I would love to see an inner city streetcar system that was something like that again in Portland. A number of those lines would be worth bringing back.

I'd like to see that, AND the daily trains out to areas like Seaside, Astoria, Newport, Estacada, Bull Run, etc. Or even the train that ran from Portland to Beaverton, places like Garden Home and Raleigh Hills started as Station Stops on that original line.

Read Interurbans for a glimpse of what we've lost.

[turquoise1]

I look forward to reading the Interurbans link, thanks for posting it.

[BajanYankee]

Originally Posted by hamellr

It's the LightRail that is touted as a model of success, not the streetcar.

But in other cities, the Portland streetcar is being touted as a model of success. Or, at the very least, they are arguing that light rail and streetcar projects are equivalents. So when people make the economic stimulus argument as it pertains to streetcars, you often hear "Look at Portland!" This argument is obviously not taking into account the fact that light rail with its own dedicated ROW is completely different from a streetcar that operates in traffic.

[BajanYankee]

Originally Posted by Nell Plotts

Urbanlife78 is correct.

Portland Trolley Chronology I would take the 23rd Ave. Line.

He's correct except for the part about "new car companies shutting the streetcar lines down." There used to be a streetcar/trolley that ran through my neighborhood that got shut down in the early 90s. That obviously had nothing to do with the auto and oil industries.

[turquoise1]

BajanYankee, for a really great perspective on this subject, read "The Geography of Nowhere" by James Kunstler. It doesn't deal with Portland per se but does talk about the West, which is a much different animal than the Northeast. Portland, Seattle, LA, even San Francisco - nothing like NYC, Boston, DC...

[BajanYankee]

Originally Posted by turquoise1

BajanYankee, for a really great perspective on this subject, read "The Geography of Nowhere" by James Kunstler. It doesn't deal with Portland per se but does talk about the West, which is a much different animal than the Northeast. Portland, Seattle, LA, even San Francisco - nothing like NYC, Boston, DC...

But I'm not even sure if streetcars are very practical in the Northeast.

The strongest argument for streetcars over buses is the economic stimulus argument. The first example that's always used is Portland. But there's never any evidence offered to back the claims. It's simply "Portland built a streetcar and development took off." I'm not from Portland, so I can't really say whether that's true or not. I do know that a commission in the region did a study and concluded that they could not say for sure that the streetcar promoted development. So at best we have a study that shows the effects of streetcars on economic development are inconclusive. If we can't establish a causal link between the streetcar and economic development, then does it really make any sense for any jurisdiction to toss $90-100 million into a streetcar line?

So now we're left with the mobility argument. I can see the merit in the "streetcars hold more people" argument. It's undoubtedly important to be able to get onto transit in the first place, but it's also important that headways be as short as possible, which costs more money to accomplish using streetcars. While the capacity argument may hold some weight as it relates to very high demand routes that literally have riders bursting out of the doors on their existing bus systems, it doesn't hold much weight, imo, for cities like Atlanta where that will hardly be a problem.

The operating cost argument, imo, goes out of the window if you run streetcars at the same frequency as buses.

[turquoise1]

The book I'm referring to is about public transportation in general, not just streetcars - I am not arguing about streetcars one way or the other.