Breakfast links: Growing pains for area transportation

by Erik Weber • October 1, 2010 8:30 am

Photo by zaklee on Flickr.

Metro needs some Clearasil: Metro's Assistant GM Dave Kubicek says the organization is "going through puberty." Dave Jamieson notes that puberty usually doesn't require $10 billion in safety fixes. But it does tend to involve buying new cars, and a few years later, huge drains on the family budget. (TBD)

And more from Metro: At yesterday's Metro board meeting, it was revealed Alexandria mayor Bill Euille was injured by a closing door at Braddock Road Metro recently. Also, credit cards with chips are likely to replace SmarTrip cards as they run out. In good news: customer complaints are down, though it's unclear if it's because people are happier or because it's still hard to register complaints. (TBD)

Capital Bikeshare falls short?: A fan of Montreal's Bixi tests out CaBi and finds it lacking due to low station density, and no stations around the Mall, museums and other landmarks. He fails to mention until halfway through that only half the system is in place. (The Urban Country, petrograd)

Arlington wants its money: First parking, now taxes: Arlington is stepping up its collection of delinquent taxes, a move TBD calls "heavy-handed." Really?

Trying car-free in Tysons: A Tysons resident discovers just how hard it is to get around the area where she lives on Car-Free Day. Clearly it takes more than just the will to live car-free. (The Durable Human)

Do the sprawl crawl: A new report from CEOs for Cities critiques the traditional measures of traffic congestion. When sprawl is factored in, the least congested cities actually turn out to be the worst for transportation ... Market Urbanism critiques the whole idea of primarily measuring transportation by cost per passenger mile. (via CNU)

Eats on the street: Market Urbanism looks at issues surrounding street food and Tyler Cowen's question why poor neighborhoods have so few restaurants. Turns out you just can't see them, because they're illegal. (SS)

Looking down on the suburbs: 26 overhead images, artfully and analytically juxtaposed, provide a visual critique of suburban development and the housing bust in Southwest Florida. One area once planned as the largest subdivision in the U.S. became a state forest instead when the development failed. (Boston Globe, Pinkshirt)

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Erik Weber has been living car-free in the District since 2009. Hailing from the home of the nation's first Urban Growth Boundary, Erik has been interested in transit since spending summers in Germany as a kid where he rode as many buses, trains and streetcars as he could find. Views expressed here are Erik's alone.

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That last link is awesome.

I don't understand Florida. Most of those subdivisions are pretty dense, some of the pictures don't look that different from typical DC row house blocks.

So why would you want to live in a place that has all the downsides of living in a city (small lots and not much privacy) but none of the advantages, like transit, or something to walk to? Don't people in Florida like corner stores and restaurants? It's the worst of all worlds.

by Jamie on Oct 1, 2010 9:01 am • link • report

any critique of cabi that notes the lack of stations around the mall (and other federal land) is a valid critique, though. not cabi's fault, of course. the park service needs to be slammed on this over and over until they get it through their heads that they need to actually be progressive about their stewardship of urban parks.

by IMGoph on Oct 1, 2010 9:04 am • link • report

The article I read said Eullie slipped on wet tiles and fell. It said nothing about the doors injuring him.

by Lou on Oct 1, 2010 9:16 am • link • report

I disagree that puberty doesn't require $10b in safety fixes. Cars and liquor alone require that much protection from teenagers.

by ah on Oct 1, 2010 9:21 am • link • report

@IMGoph

Completely true and astute. However, you already know who's going to be blamed by the general public...

by andrew on Oct 1, 2010 9:48 am • link • report

Cabi really is too dispersed, though, and will remain that way even when the stations are built. I understand the political necessity of spreading it throughout the city, but that doesn't change the fact that the system as designed is much less functional than Montreal's, even leaving aside the stupidity of NPS.

by jcm on Oct 1, 2010 10:00 am • link • report

People have been slipping on these wet tiles for years. This has fallen on deaf ears. Now that a board member slipped and fell, its going to be looked at?

[quote]Euille says wet tiles in Metro stations have been a subject of controversy before.

"Now that I have had that experience, it may be time to take another look a better surface," he says. [/quote]

Insane!

by Jan4 on Oct 1, 2010 10:05 am • link • report

"So why would you want to live in a place that has all the downsides of living in a city (small lots and not much privacy) but none of the advantages, like transit, or something to walk to?"

Yes, thanks for mentioning that. I've also been wondering the same thing for awhile now. Adding to your point, as I have a family member in a location such as this, I've also noted that basic urban living conditions, such as fences between backyards, don't even exist in these areas, so folks are living with even less privacy than they would in the city. It seems folks get the living in the middle of nowhere aspect in terms of having to drive miles to get anywhere, but still have to live cheek to jowl to their neighbors.

by Van Ness Family on Oct 1, 2010 10:14 am • link • report

Well, it's not like WMATA isn't doing anything about the tiles:
http://greatergreaterwashington.org/post.cgi?id=2520

by Matt Johnson on Oct 1, 2010 10:27 am • link • report

Replacing SmartTrip with embedded credit cards seems like a huge fail. I don't want my SmartTrip tied to a credit card, banking account, or pre-paid debit card. How hard is it to have a RFID enabled device?

Not to mention potential processing fees.

by charlie on Oct 1, 2010 10:39 am • link • report

Regarding the difficulty of Car Free Day in Tysons, my normal response is, "Then don't live there". However, my response is tempered by the fact that affordability typically makes people live in such places in the first place. It's too bad the counties didn't consider this before rubber stamping uni-modal, auto-dependent subdivisions.

by Eric Fidler on Oct 1, 2010 10:53 am • link • report

What I found interesting about the critique of the CaBi system is how outsiders simply don't "get" all the invisible boundaries that subdivide Washington into various bureaucratic fiefdoms and multiple layers of review and approvals. Park Service, DDOT, NCPC, Commission on Fine Arts and on and on. Nor should these observers from afar have to "get it", because these arcane turf battles are largely silly and parochial. It's probably incomprehensible to someone from Montreal that the city government controls none of the parklands within its boundaries.

by Paul on Oct 1, 2010 11:10 am • link • report

You don't have to go to Florida to find dense row-house subdivisions with no transit or other walkable urban amenities. These developments are common in the suburbs of any American city -- there are plenty of them off of Route 1 in Fairfax County, for example. These are the slums of the future -- places where nobody lives who can afford anything else.

by jimble on Oct 1, 2010 11:11 am • link • report

@charlie

The technology that runs credit card systems like PayPass is an ISO standard. This technology is used for the ORCA card in Seattle and a bunch of other transit passes. I THINK the CharmCard also uses this standard.

So I guess my answer is that this doesn't mean that they will be switching to a credit card only system, but that credit cards may be able to be used. Judging from the article it seems to me that they are probably working on a new smart card that will replace SmarTrip for when their supply of the old cards runs out.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cubic_Transportation_Systems,_Inc.#Proprietary_Go_Card_Technology

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ISO/IEC_14443

by MLD on Oct 1, 2010 11:24 am • link • report

@Eric
affordability typically makes people live in such places in the first place

I have to object to this point, not because I really disagree with your comment, but because I often hear this argument used to justify living in auto-dependent suburbia. In the DC area there is plenty of affordable housing in areas that are well served by metro and buses. People choose to live in the burbs because they value other things over walk-ability.

by renegade09 on Oct 1, 2010 11:50 am • link • report

Will having credit cards work in place of SmarTrip mean an end to long lines of tourists fumbling with paper farecards? I hope so.

by Anonymous on Oct 1, 2010 11:56 am • link • report

@MLD: Charmcard is just a smartrip card with different livery. Functionally, it's the same as Smartrip.

by Michael Perkins on Oct 1, 2010 11:59 am • link • report

@renegade09
They value things such as...safety.

Sure, I could find an affordable place in DC. I'd just never come or go when it was dark outside.. or a funeral nearby.

by Angela on Oct 1, 2010 11:59 am • link • report

Special express bus service isn't transit? Coulda fooled me. Guess that makes most of DC a slum also. Oh wait, already is.

by MPC on Oct 1, 2010 11:59 am • link • report

@MPC - I humbly suggest to you Dale Carnegies "How to Win Friends and Influence People".

by Tina on Oct 1, 2010 12:09 pm • link • report

@Angela

haha! I'm not going to argue that there is no crime in DC, but unless your business is drug-dealing, you probably have more chance being killed in an auto accident commuting around Tyson's than you do of being murdered in the city.

Where I live in DC used to be the front line of the crack wars. Now it's all yoga studios and fro-yo mixers (plus some good stuff). I guess that is thanks to the people who, several years ago, decided to stop whining about their commute in the burbs, and instead concentrated on making a pleasant, walkable inner city 'hood.

by renegade09 on Oct 1, 2010 12:17 pm • link • report

@MPC - point taken re: REX on Route 1. And my apologies to anyone who I may have offended with my "slum" comment. I do worry about the long-term sustainability of isolated townhome communities in the suburbs, but I realize that they are providing low-cost housing to people who need it.

by jimble on Oct 1, 2010 12:18 pm • link • report

@MPC -I humbly suggest to you Dale Carnegies "How to Win Friends and Influence People".

You obviously don't know me that well.

by MPC on Oct 1, 2010 3:02 pm • link • report