Breakfast links: Playoffs?

by Steven Yates • October 4, 2012 8:35 am

Photo by wallyg on Flickr.

Playoff costs and benefits: Nats playoff games will cost the District up to $76,000, mainly in extra police around Nationals Park. However, each game could produce up to a half million in tax revenue. (Post)

Don't need parking: The Tenleytown ANC prefers ground-floor retail to parking in a new building, but DC's 1958 zoning code requires a cumbersome special exception. Requests for parking exceptions have recently doubled, as the parking rules become increasingly out of step with the needs of today's city. (City Paper)

Driver hits kids on Walk to School Day: A driver ran off the road and hit 2 teens on Randolph Road during Walk to School Day. Police statements and press reports use tortured language to avoid describing the driver as controlling the car. (Gazette)

Don't walk, says LeMunyon: In a letter, Virginia delegate Jim LeMunyon (R-Fairfax) decries transportation spending on streetcars, bike paths and sidewalks. He wants it all to go to more roads. (Post)

Low income and bikeshare: Bike sharing systems around the country struggle to attract low income riders. While culture and station locations play a role, the biggest factor is that many low-income people don't have bank accounts. (Streetsblog)

Housing list may close: The DC Housing Authority may suspend its waiting list for public housing, as the wait has gotten up to 20 years long. Housing groups say the city isn't seriously tackling its affordable housing shortage. (City Paper) ... Federal housing tax credits are also on the chopping block. (RPUS)

Study sees red: One study found that Virginia red-light cameras dramatically reduce red-light running. When the cameras are removed, drivers very quickly go back to running reds at previous rates. (Atlantic Cities)

And...: Can bikeshare stations be more attractive? (Atlantic Cities) ... You can now grade 5 more DC agencies, including the police and library. (Examiner) ... The vote to have Bombardier run MARC's Camden and Brunswick Lines has been delayed. (WTOP) ... You think your traffic light is confusing? (xkcd)

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12 comments

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Steven Yates grew up in Indiana before moving to DC in 2002 to attend college at American University. He currently lives in Southwest DC.

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each game could produce up to a half million in tax revenue.

Yet the city has no clue where to look for k$30 to get fans home...

One study found that Virginia red-light cameras dramatically reduce red-light running.

OMG! Law enforcement increases obedience! Study from the Journal of the Obvious.

You think your traffic light is confusing?
There's always this baby in London.

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xkcd rocks!

by Jasper on Oct 4, 2012 9:49 am • link • report

@jasper the city knows exactly where to get 30K for extending metros hours, the same place it always does from teh entitiy requesting the extra time. I honestly don't know why the metro took any flack for this, everythign from marathons, to concerts, to other sporting events have always paid for the extra service. Seems reasonable to me if you want something you have to pay for it.

The nationals position seemed particularly strange since it is playoffs there is almost no chance they would have to actually pay anything as the extra riders would exceed the 29,000 cost and all of the Nats money would be refunded.

by nathaniel on Oct 4, 2012 10:20 am • link • report

@ nathaniel:the same place it always does from teh entitiy requesting the extra time.

Indeed. It asked pocket change (0.1%) back from a massive tax break. Well done City Council.

A well run city does not give tax breaks to failing companies and runs its transit system when needed.

by Jasper on Oct 4, 2012 10:39 am • link • report

That Gazette article is much better about reporting what happened to the teens struck than the Post article I read.

by drumz on Oct 4, 2012 10:43 am • link • report

Wow. 3% of bike share annual members black.

I'd argue, however, from the same survey, they are actually capturing lower income:

"A quarter (25%) of respondents had household incomes of less than $50,000 per year, 36% had in- comes of $50,000 to $99,999, and 39% had incomes of $100,000 or more per year. (Figure 4) Bikeshare survey respondents had lower household incomes than did the regional employee popula- tion, as measured by the 2010 SOC survey. Nearly two-thirds (65%) of all regional workers had in- comes of $100,000 or more, compared with 39% of bikeshare members."

by charlie on Oct 4, 2012 11:11 am • link • report

And Marion Barry is right. DC should be buying up mortgages of foreclosed homes and working out deals of their own to stabilize certain neighborhoods. I was going to post this on Layman's blog, but it seems as if the tax credit still forces the poor into certain sections, while at least the IZ rules spread them out. Does this prevent gangs from forming?

by charlie on Oct 4, 2012 11:15 am • link • report

Nothing on the ridiculous baseball taxi surcharge that the Taxicab Commission tried to impose?

by Phil on Oct 4, 2012 11:32 am • link • report

Does that quote compare household income to individual income, charlie?

by selxic on Oct 4, 2012 11:36 am • link • report

charlie, a post I've been meaning to write for about a month is carving out and including tax credit projects as a component of larger projects, based on a couple of senior housing tax credit projects in Tempe and Mesa.

by Richard Layman on Oct 4, 2012 1:40 pm • link • report

Nice post on more attractive bikeshare stations.

Unfortunately, Alta's bikeshare stations (e.g. those in Washington, Boston and, in some months, NYC) are the ugliest I have seen. The fact that they're 'modular' means they look out of place on the pavement with the metal floor.

In London, the bike share docks are individually stuck in the pavement ,street, cobbles, etc., which is not only more attractive and allows for unique placements (i.e. diagonals), but also lends a sense of permanence to the stations, which is good for NIMBY-prevention. Further, the illuminated maps on kiosks are downright beautiful.

It's sad that US bikeshare is some of the ugliest in the world.

by james on Oct 4, 2012 7:09 pm • link • report

Alta doesn't make the bike stations, they just operate them. Bixi makes them. And while those other stations are very pretty I wonder how well they would hold up

by David c on Oct 5, 2012 8:43 am • link • report

Also, having them modular instead of built in is a huge cost savings. It means you don't need nearly so much labor to install them, and they can be moved at a moment's notice if the agency decides on a better spot. DDOT has often shifted stations based on community feedback or just if they want to expand it but there isn't room in that spot.

by David Alpert on Oct 5, 2012 8:59 am • link • report