Breakfast links: Green places also have quick curbs, market-priced meters, and safe trains

by David Alpert • July 22, 2009 8:59 am

Photo by rllayman.

DC's "green" places: What makes a public space "green"? The National Building Museum has created a series of films on "Great Green Places" in the DC area, including Dupont Circle, U Street, Columbia Heights, and Barracks Row (coming soon). They are then accepting user-submitted videos at the end of the summer.

Giving with one hand, taking away with another: The Triangle would like DDOT to install quick curbs at ~~4th~~ 5th and Mass, as they did at 15th and W. They used paint to restrict cars to a smaller section of slip lanes, but cars are just driving on the paint. One block away, DDOT is actually adding new slip lanes at 4th and Mass, which Richard Layman argues is a terrible idea.

Track circuts keep breaking; Metro restricts info?: Track circuits continue to fail across the Metro system. Metro has taken six more circuits out of service, forcing trains to proceed more slowly. (Post) ... Back in the days right after the crash, the press initially found out through leaked documents about the malfunctioning track circuit responsible for last month's crash. Metro responded by restricting employee access to safety information. (Frederick News-Post, Michael P)

270 bad for environment, political balance: The Post covers the environmental and Smart Growth groups' anti-270 letter. The Baltimore Sun's transportation blog also raises equity concerns about the state planning to spend $4 billion on a freeway in western Montgomery while needed transit expansion in Baltimore remains uncertain.

Watergate sold! Or, nobody bids on the Watergate!: Yesterday's auction for the Watergate Hotel, with a $25 million minimum bid, attracted one bid right at the start, from the bank. Or, maybe the auction was quiet with no bids at all until the bank made a private agreement at the very end to buy. It depends on which press outlet you read. (City Paper, Post)

Business owner prevents customers from parking at meters: Some Nashua, NH businesses are frustrated that people park for longer than the maximum two hours along the town's main street, and the police don't ticket violators. The worst violator is a fellow business owner, who parks his rare sports car on the street all day, every day. Why not drop the limit but charge the right price? (Nashua Telegraph, Michael P)

Maybe San Francisco will do it: San Francisco is considering performance parking and other pricing tools to manage neighborhood parking. There's not enough of it, and permits are "too cheap" at $76/year. (By comparison, DC's permits are $15/year). They are also considering raising rush hour rates. (SF Gate, CBS 5, Michael P)

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16 comments

Tags: 15th Street, Baltimore, California, DC, DDOT, I-270, links, Maryland, meter rates, Metro crash, Mount Vernon Triangle, New Hampshire, pedestrian safety, performance parking, press, public spaces, RPP, San Francisco, U Street, Watergate, WMATA

David Alpert is the Founder and Editor-in-Chief of Greater Greater Washington. He has had a lifelong interest in great cities and great communities. He worked as a Product Manager for Google for six years and has lived in the Boston, San Francisco, and New York metro areas in addition to Washington, DC. He loves the area which is, in many ways, greater than those others, and wants to see it become even greater.

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From what I've heard, most foreclosure auctions happen just like what happened yesterday with the Watergate. I.e., the aution is a means of foreclosing and getting legal ownership over to the creditor. I'd bet the creditor was surprised to see all the local media attention to this 'auction' ... which brought about the expectation that we'd actually see competitive bidding on it. That's not the way these 'auctions' usually work.

by Lance on Jul 22, 2009 9:19 am

David, reread the articles: the first is about 5th and Mass, the second is about 4th and Mass. They're very different situations. At 5th and Mass, DDOT is being lazy. At 4th and Mass, DDOT is continuing a decades-long policy of trying to get pedestrians paralyzed. I don't know what DDOT gets out of it, but if you walk down to 4th St some time, you'll see the difference. It's breath-taking (especially when a driver distracted by the giant interstate signs smacks his car into your ribcage).

by tom veil on Jul 22, 2009 9:30 am

Oops, I knew they were one block apart (hence the "one block away" in the original), but then typoed the first intersection as 4th and Mass instead of 5th.

by David Alpert on Jul 22, 2009 9:34 am

The most disturbing part of the Post & Examiner stories today is that Mr. Catoe previously denied that there was any evidence other incidents had occurred. "...unable to give any legitimacy..." were the words he used. I can understand that the head of an organization only knows what their subordinates tell them, but a thorough investigation of all records related to ATP train protection failure was certainly warranted. The 2005 incident was initially reported immediately after the fatal accident in June and was widely known throughout the organization. Two of the train operators involved received awards from WMATA management for their actions.

by kreeggo on Jul 22, 2009 9:38 am

I do not believe Richard Layman has properly analyzed the 4th and Mass situation. The slip lane has been there for years. DDOT has a plan to widen this segment of Fourth Street, between Mass and L Street, to change from one way to two way traffic flow. When the upgrade is executed the slip lane will go away.

by Paul S on Jul 22, 2009 10:18 am

Wow. Mass Ave between 3rd and 4th Streets was already a horrible place to try to walk through, DDOT seem to be trying to make it worse.

by Steve on Jul 22, 2009 11:03 am

The problems with the train system are worrisome. In the meanwhile, it would seem a relatively easy and cheap interim fix to put GPS units on all the trains. Then at least the dispatchers could track everything above ground in real time. If a GPS is on each car (or two-car consist), then they would have redundancy on every train. GPS units are cheap.

by Steve O on Jul 22, 2009 11:58 am

@Steve O: How do the GPS units communicate back to central control?

How do the GPS units provide positive control to prevent collisions?

How does the GPS work underground or in tunnels?

by Michael Perkins on Jul 22, 2009 12:16 pm

How do the GPS units communicate back to central control?
Via satellite dishes, but you might not need central control for a backup system. One way is to decentralize control for redundancy of failsafes, as is done in CBTC, so that the computers onboard the train know where other trains are and how to adjust speed appropriately.

How do the GPS units provide positive control to prevent collisions?
Plenty of ways. If they can be synchronized to a GIS database that knows where the blocks are, or simply know what safe distances between trains are, then you just have to hook them up to the ATO. Again, this is a technical problem, not a conceptual one.

How does the GPS work underground or in tunnels?
Well, that's pretty much an insurmountable problem.

by цarьchitect on Jul 22, 2009 12:30 pm

To the degree that Metro's train control systems seem antiquated...well, they *were* built over thirty years ago, and designed probably more like 40 years ago. You can update some of the bits but the fundamental design can't change much if you'd going to maintain compatibility.

We know that the next ten years or so is going to necessitate major overhauls for Metrorail. I wouldn't be surprised if a modernized train control system were at least considered among that. In speccing out the 7000 series rail cars WMATA's already said they're going to significantly update control systems.

by Distantantennas on Jul 22, 2009 12:35 pm

How does the GPS work underground or in tunnels?
Well, that's pretty much an insurmountable problem.

Which is sad, if the problem were soluble, one could have GPS guided tunnel boring robots.

by Steve on Jul 22, 2009 12:38 pm

Which is sad, if the problem were soluble, one could have GPS guided tunnel boring robots.
Guidance isn't the problem -- a fully digital odometer, gyroscope, and compass can tell an underground robot where it is on a map. The real problem with tunnel-boring robots is that they don't know what to do when they hit unexpected objects, like undocumented sewer pipes or anomalous geological formations. You need to have a human inside the machine to make decisions in those situations.

by tom veil on Jul 22, 2009 2:00 pm

Paul S -- I know that I have so much on my mind that I can't remember everything, but I do not remember a slip lane such as this.

Sadly, various photos I have of this area during the construction of the buildings don't fully show this spot.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/rllayman/2439557196/in/photostream/

You might be more right than me. But I would aver with the finished construction of the building, that the slip lane should have been removed whether or not the street goes to two way (which it should).

And it's not indicated on page 6 of the Mt. Vernon Triangle Public Realm plan:

http://www.ddot.dc.gov/ddot/frames.asp?doc=/ddot/lib/ddot/mtvernonsq/docs/mtvernonsq_finalreport.pdf

by Richard Laymanr on Jul 22, 2009 2:35 pm

@Richard Layman

You might consider using Google Earth, the satellite photography can be selected by date. I think the photos in Google maps date from c.2007 and the slip lane is there

by Steve on Jul 22, 2009 2:45 pm

@Richard Layman - the slip lane is not on page 6 of the Master Plan because page 6 is representing more of an end state. If you look at page 9 you'll notice a specific bubble inset comment that points to this slip lane and says "remove right turn diverter."

by Paul S on Jul 22, 2009 3:23 pm

Yep, you're right. And rather than repave this, they should have removed it... Thanks too for the tip on Google Earth.

I will add an addendum to my blog entry, covering this.

by Richard Layman on Jul 22, 2009 3:55 pm