Breakfast links: High-speed suburban buses

by David Alpert • December 10, 2009 8:42 am

Photo by Unhindered by Talent.

ICC buses will go to BWI, Fort Meade: Maryland is buying 18 buses to run along the ICC once the first segment opens. They will travel with limited stops from Gaithersburg to BWI and Fort Meade. (Baltimore Sun)

Fairfax plans dedicated bus lanes: Fairfax plans a comprehensive system of dedicated bus lanes to move people and circumvent traffic cheaply and (hopefully) effectively. I kept meaning to write in more detail about this but haven't yet had time. Meanwhile or instead, enjoy Ashley Halsey's great reporting, which includes the statistic that one mile of a bus lane could carry 4,693 people while one mile of a crowded car lane carries only 264. (Post, Cavan, Michael P)

C is for calming: Capitol Hill's grid is quiet and pedestrian-friendly, except for the high-speed C Street, NE where cars speed from RFK to the Capitol area. Ken Granata has been fighting for a traffic study to calm and reroute the traffic, and has a blog about it; he recently got DDOT to start the study and a nice writeup in The Hill Is Home.

Marketing transit: The LA Metro is marketing their system hard, and it seems to be working. Billboards feature slogans like "Let the other superheroes wrestle with traffic" (showing a caped crusader on the train) or "It beats the 101." (TheCityFix)

New York Avenue Costco: DC's first Costco and second Target may anchor a 42-acre shopping center off New York Avenue near the Maryland line. Now-GGW contributor Jaime Fearer hoped for a less big-box design when the last version of this project collapsed in 2007; will this version be better? But if there are going to be big boxes, this is probably the least walkable and least transit-oriented corner of DC. (WBJ)

Cool subway architecture: Designboom shows off some of the most distinctive subway stations from around the world. (JTS)

Come transformare una chiesa: An Italian blog published Erik Bootsma's article, Transforming a suburban church into a neighborhood. Here's the automated translation so you can read the comments (sort of) if you don't speak Italian. (Fides et Forma)

And...: Fairfax is trying to persuade people to telecommute to avoid Tysons construction (Post) ... Some Alexandrians don't want a nice waterfront promenade (Examiner) ... Maryland MTA is delaying its smart card system yet again, now to next fall. (WTOP)

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14 comments

Tags: Alexandria, architecture, bus priority, buses, California, Capitol Hill, churches, DC, development, Fairfax, Fort Lincoln, Fort Meade, ICC, links, Los Angeles, marketing, Maryland, press, retail, telecommuting, traffic calming, transit, Virginia, waterfront

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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The DC Costco has been talked about for years. I'll believe it when I actually see it built. It'll be nice to have a Costco in DC, rather than spending sales tax money in Pentagon City.

by Fritz on Dec 10, 2009 9:32 am

"Capitol Hill's grid is quiet and pedestrian-friendly, except for the high-speed C Street, NE where cars speed from RFK to the Capitol area"...

...and also, if one extends Capitol Hill that far east, except for 17th Street and 19th Street. Both are wide, one-way streets that Maryland commuters treat as freeways and are a menace to pedestrians.

by rg on Dec 10, 2009 9:36 am

No kidding, 17th/19th are death (hopefully not literally) to pedestrians. As is Independence once it gets past 15th or so. The street widens and Maryland drivers think this is an excuse to hit the gas.

by TimK on Dec 10, 2009 10:12 am

That C St NE traffic is terrible for the west-bound D6 too. It's true that the route is jammed once again going past Stanton Park and approaching Union Station (and certainly in the CBD) but it would help the RFK-Union St section if C St weren't so packed. Making this a dedicated loop was one of the proposed changes to the D-buses, right?

by HM on Dec 10, 2009 10:14 am

I'm optimistic about the Fairfax bus plan, but given the nature of traffic and commuting in Fairfax, buses may never take off.

Most of the traffic problems are on secondary roads, and dedicated bus lanes may not help. And people are going so multipoint to multipoint it would be really hard to map that out.

Plus, every suburban office park has tons of free parking. Why spend the $2 on a bus ride when you can drive?

That all being said, I do wish more buses would use the highways.

by charlie on Dec 10, 2009 10:18 am

i'm doubtful about how well the marketing is working, if at all. public transit ridership skyrocketed when gas prices went up, with no marketing at all. many other reasons could be possible for increased ridership, including new rail lines, which produce a 'network effect' (of real transit), new and improved express bus routes, etc.

and the bus blog 'overstated' the case (lied, if you prefer) -- no transit agencies have marketed their services before? lie much?

that said, marketing can be useful, even if it's very purpose often is to deceive.

it'd be nice if we could put together an honest national marketing campaign.

and the 2nd largest ad market in america finally produces some marketing for a local transit agency. in 2009. gee, that only took la a few decades.

by Peter Smith on Dec 10, 2009 10:21 am

While Fairfax has jobs spread out, I think the main draws are Reston/Herndon and Tysons Corner (after all they are the 1st and 2nd largest CBDs in Virginia), so putting in quality transit to these places might just work.

by Joshua Davis on Dec 10, 2009 11:18 am

I've always wondered why a streetcar line running along the northside of New York Avenue, where the existing train tracks are, isn't included in transportation plans. A 2-mile line connecting the proposed retail center at South Dakota Avenue to the Florida Avenue Metro station and future steetcar line would be a great way to revitalize this corridor and ensure transit accessibility.

by AwkWord on Dec 10, 2009 11:25 am

"Capitol Hill's grid is quiet and pedestrian-friendly, except for the high-speed C Street, NE where cars speed from RFK to the Capitol area"...

While nowhere near as bad as C St, the intersection of 7th St NE, D St NE and Maryland Ave is pretty horrible. Not only is crossing Maryland hazardous, but certain times of day, so is crossing D street on the east side of the intersection.

by lou on Dec 10, 2009 12:50 pm

@AwkWord

I have always wondered about New York Ave why is there no transit along the avenue except for the P6 5 1/2 bocks, and the D4 & E2 for 1 block each.

There should be buses running down the avenue atleast from Bladensburg rd to 13th street to take traffic off the b2 route and the X2 which most of the people on the B2 transfer to.

@ lou

The easy way to fix the problems would really be to change the street plan of the area on the other side you have Independence Ave which the cars use connecting straight to East Capitol St while on the other side you have East Capitol connecting to C street and then that connects to Constitution Ave. If East Capitol connected to Constitution instead of C there would not be as many problems

by kk on Dec 10, 2009 4:47 pm

This go-around on the Fairfax transit proposal is better than the quickie write-up of the exact same plan in the Breakfast Links from two months ago by Joey Katzen, who seemed to only get the point of reduced peak-only service for "affluent" neighborhoods.

by Wes on Dec 10, 2009 10:38 pm

@Wes, I didn't only get that point.

In fact, my exact language in full context was, "Among many points of interest, the report explicitly calls for reduced peak-only service for "affluent" neighborhoods."

For a three-sentence write-up in a links revue, it was something that stuck out to me that I could include for color.

by Joey on Dec 11, 2009 1:38 am

I'd love to see bus service running from the NVCC Annandale, Alexandria and Medical Campuses. Another bus line from the NVCC Alexandria and Annandale campus to GMU.

by Zac on Dec 11, 2009 7:34 am

@Joey, that was such a minor point, using it as the takeaway point was misleading. Plus that phrase gives the impression that Ffx Co. was going planning to reduce bus service. Reading the plan, it looks like they want service levels to stay the same or be increased. The affluent areas with "reduced peak-only service" are the areas that currently have peak-only service.

It was a bad summary.

by Wes on Dec 11, 2009 2:59 pm