Posts about Paris

Ultimately, far-out extensions end up exacerbating Metro's dual and conflicting mandates to provide long-haul service and short-haul service on the same railroad. The argument for 4-minute rush-hour headways inside the Beltway is much stronger than the argument for 4-minute rush-hour headways all the way out to Frederick.

Modern rail systems like our Metro, San Francisco's BART, and Atlanta's MARTA try to combine long-haul and short-haul services into the same systems. Other cities have wisely divided the two.

New York has express subway trains, the Long Island Railroad, and Metro North for long-haul service and the regular subways for local service. These serve different markets with different service frequencies and provide better regional mobility.

Commuters from Long Island are spared the suffering of having to stop 100 times in Brooklyn and Queens just to get to business districts in Manhattan.

At the same time, residents in Brooklyn and Queens get decent service within their own boroughs and to Manhattan. This separation improves the practicality of transit for everyone.

If Metro lines were to extend to the far exurbs, the ride to the area's business districts would still be long and would discourage ridership. These areas are by definition only peripherally connected to the regional economy and residents would already have less reason to take jobs and commute 20 miles in the first place.

Our geography in Washington, however, is more like that of Paris than New York. Both Washington and Paris are interior cities that just happen to have a river or two running through them. We can expand in all directions, whereas New York, Chicago, LA, and San Francisco are bounded by harbors, bays, oceans, or lakes.

There are some interesting charts in Steve Belmont's book Cities in Full that illustrate how different cities' transit systems are spatially laid out.

Draw a circle with a 5-mile radius from Metro Center and the circle will more or less fit just inside the bounds of the DC-Arlington diamond. In that circle, we have 51 stations. Outside of that we have lines reaching as far as Shady Grove, a full 17 miles from Metro Center as the crow flies. The system will reach 26 miles to Loudoun County when the Silver Line is complete.

Now draw the same 5-mile circle for Paris with the Châtelet hub as the center point and you will notice that nearly the entire Métro system fits inside the circle. The RER commuter trains, not mapped, extend far beyond. Parisians enjoy 240 stations in that circle by Belmont's count.

The distance from Châtelet to Créteil-Préfecture, the farthest station, is only 7.5 miles as the crow flies. In contrast, the Silver Line extension merely begins 8.5 miles from Metro Center.

Not only that, the network they have built makes it practical to take the Métro anywhere in the circle since your travel journey will not stray too far off of a straight line drawn between two points.

Yes, Paris's densities are much higher than DC's, but our densities are rising since the population is rising. As we plan for the transit system we will need in 2040, we will need to think big.

Far out extensions provide a modicum of very high quality transit to a small population whereas strengthening transit within the existing circle, that is, to people who are more likely to use transit anyway and who are more likely to use it for non-commuting trips, should produce a greater return on the transit investment.

We have to prioritize because transportation funding, like funding for everything, is limited. Sure it would be nice to have Metro service to Gainesville. However, such extension fantasies should not come at the cost of providing service to areas closer in where people are more likely to use the service in the first place.

While enthusiasts and politicians tout outward expansion with a pioneer's zeal, they miss the better opportunities to strengthen the network and construct new lines in the core. Strengthening the core will provide a greater returns on our transportation investment.

He writes,

Yes, this is an absolute pipedream... hence the [title "DC 2100"]. While I laid these out to be at least somewhat technically feasible, everything shown would still require immense amounts of funding, right-of-way, and political will.

That's true, though this map also brings to mind another heavy rail system that does exist:

Paris has more lines than even thisisbossi's map, and in a smaller space, too. It's just that there, the political will exists to build some of the best transit in the world in a nation's capital city, while here, at least a significant part of one major political party would spend absolutely nothing on transit or the capital city.

Teams tied to place: Florida's argument, however, doesn't do much to dispute the common criticisms of LeBron's decision (including one from the Cavaliers owner) that it was selfish and about ego more than anything else. While professional athletes may be individuals free to chose between teams, the teams themselves are rooted in place. Teams profit from their connection and emotional bonds with local fans. It's no surprise that fans see this as a direct insult to their sense of place. In Richard Florida's context, they are the ones attempting to optimize their interests within given constraints.

The narrative that ties teams and cities together is extraordinarily strong. The recent passing of New York Yankees owner George Steinbrenner offered a chance to reflect on that complex connection between city, fans, team, and players:

The life of George Steinbrenner is a ramp across modern New York, a bridge that spans the whirlpool of one man's spinning psyche and the transformation of America's biggest, baddest city... He championed ordinary New Yorkers, then took them for every last penny...

He remembered the elation of the city when the Yankees won the World Series in 1978, a troubled time. "We put the trophy in the rotunda at City Hall," [former Mayor Ed] Koch said. "I knew, as the Romans knew, that the people require circuses and theatrics."

Economic impacts: Perhaps George Steinbrenner's crowning achievement as owner of the Yankees has been the creation of New Yankee Stadium, on the backs of substantial public subsidy. Plenty of economists consistently argue that stadium subsidies are not wise investments, but the emotional connection between team and city is difficult to quantify.

Likewise, there is a question of geography. Sports teams might not have an impact at the metropolitan scale, but many in Cleveland have seen a direct impact from LeBron James in the area immediately adjacent to the arena. A similar narrative exists for DC's Verizon Center and the subsequent revitalization of Chinatown.

However, accurately calculating all the costs and benefits of the intangible, emotional connection between a city and their team might be next to impossible.

There is no 'Next Big Thing': Aaron Renn uses LeBron's departure from the Midwest to take a long, hard look at the strategic decisions behind the move and the reaction:

In a sense though, Cleveland's disappointment was inevitable. LeBron James was never going to turn around the city. No one person or one thing can. Unfortunately, Cleveland has continually pinned its hopes on a never-ending cycle of "next big things" to reverse decline. This will never work. As local economic development guru Ed Morrison put it, "Overwhelmingly, the strategy is now driven by individual projects....This leads to the 'Big Thing Theory' of economic development: Prosperity results from building one more big thing."

The 'Big Thing' theory has usually been applied to things like sports stadiums and arenas, not the individual players that use them. Nevertheless, the comparison is illustrative. The push to keep a team or even a player by giving them a new stadium might not make economic sense, but losing that player can be painful. And even though a new stadium might not make economic sense for a metropolitan region, that doesn't mean the team itself—despite being deeply rooted in a single place—can't also migrate to greener pastures and better opportunities. Unfortunately for Cleveland, that's something they also know far too well.

There are a few other items of note, only semi sports-related:

LeBron likes bikes: One thing LeBron does like is bikes. He's a partial owner of Cannondale and hosts a bike-a-thon for kids in his hometown of Akron, OH. Given the negative reaction in Cleveland to his professional decision to play basketball in Miami, it's unclear what will happen to events like this.

New York and Barcelona are boring: Mayor Bloomberg and others were on hand to see the final push of the tunnel boring machine for New York's 7 line extension. Second Avenue Sagas notes the challenges of urban tunneling, even with the advanced technology available today. A few weeks ago, The Transport Politic took an in-depth look at Barcelona's massive subway expansion, also making extensive use of tunnel boring machines operating in dense urban environments.

Paris, automated: Jarret Walker, of the Human Transit blog, offers some observations from Line 1 of the Paris Metro. The line is in the midst of an upgrade to fully automatic, driverless operation. That's no small feat for a line initially built in 1900.

Cross-posted at City Block.

Launched in July of last year, the system is being run by ATAC, the transit agency that runs the buses and metro in Rome, and its its fare system works much like the Vélib system, being free to subscribers for the first half hour then charging 1 Euro for 30 minutes after. Stations are mostly clustered in the Centro Storico (Historic Center) of Rome, though there are a few around La Sapienza University and in Ostia Antica along the coast. On the Google map for the stations, you can even click on each station to see how many bikes are available at any given time.

The bikes are of a more sturdy and conventional design like most Dutch bikes as opposed to the aerodynamic Velib. Each has a rack in back and a basket in front, making them pretty convenient to take a few items. However this stolid design isn't dissuading the ever fashionable Italians from riding them or riding bikes of their own. The bikes I saw Rome, most of them very new, were ridden by ordinary looking Romans, dressed in street clothes or women in their necessary high heels. It seems the culture of bicycling is being seen to be just a normal part of life, even for the Romans.

Two years ago when I lived in Rome, I would not have dared ridden a bike in this city, so the transformation, albeit still very small, is remarkable. Judging by the experience of so many cities such as in Paris, New York and Copenhagen, where bicycling had for so long been seen as ridiculous or dangerous concept, but is now embraced proudly as part of the city's life, I think it's an encouraging sign to see such growth in such a short time.

The keystone of the plan is a narrowed Anacostia, slimmed by half to the Seine's width of around 500 feet. And just as at the Seine, fourteen-foot-tall stone embankments would allow streets to pass over the river at grade, with street level above potential floods. Away from the river, McMillan Two calls for the elimination – or at least burial – of all freeways and rail lines south of the Mall that disconnect River East from the Federal City. In place of these marginal spaces, marshlands, and rivers of concrete, the grid would extend out onto reclaimed land. The new real estate would allow for the construction of thousands of new apartments and offices without directly displacing any individuals. Passing through lots and streets, new avenues would meet at open squares for future monuments after the style of L'Enfant and Haussmann.

The largest public area would be a vast basin just north of what is now Poplar Point that would serve as a plaza with around water. Upstream, East Capitol Street would cross over an island modeled on Île de la Cité with the Blue and Orange Lines underground. At the southern end of the project, a gateway of two large pillars on quays would visually separate the Potomac from its tributary.

Most buildings would stand six to eight stories tall, with the last two minimized behind a sloped roof. Large tree-lined promenades (Buras believes DC can improve on Paris by adding more trees) would pass throughout the reclaimed area, with particularly verdant ones running along the upper level of the embankment. Spaces created in the embankment promenades would house boat clubs, restaurants accessible from a lower-level embankment. Alternatively, infrastructure such as a Chicago-style service road or commuter rail might fill in the space made by raising the ground level, but again, there is flexibility.

Additionally, the plan would improve the street infrastructure while also lessening the dominance of automobiles. The new avenues and side streets would support well more than the current freeways carry and pass over more bridges. An admirer of Hans Monderman, Buras emphasizes the importance of intuitive roads and shared space, citing the George Washington Parkway as a local example of both. In terms of transit infrastructure, Streetcars could also be added as needed, along with bus facilities, but Build DC have deliberately left transportation plans loose, open to long-term change.

This intentional vagueness contrasts with the programmatic specificity in the NCPC's 1997 Extending the Legacy plan and Comprehensive Plan program. These current successors to the McMillan Plan focus on adding large new public spaces for monuments. Because it sticks primarily to the grid and avenues, the McMillan Two Design appears much less grandiose, but also less green. For example, NCPC calls for East Capitol Street to pass under at an East Mall and then over the Anacostia. The McMillan Two plan would restore the boulevard straight across, with no new parkland. Considering the constant use of the athletic fields around the Mall, retaining the same acreage of useable parkland, or even increasing it, would be wise even if it departs from L'Enfant's vision. The Frenchman's genius notwithstanding, the outdoors interests of city dwellers have changed significantly from 1790 and even 1902. Accommodating more active recreation, uses that require substantial space, will enhance the quality of life of residents. Adding a few hundred thousand people while reducing recreation space would diminish the quality of city life and make urbanism less appealing to potential residents.

Of course, the trope is that the French don't exercise too much – so if people will soon be living in Point Peuplier, perhaps lifestyles will change as much as the built environment. But Paris is different than DC in many ways as well. Most importantly, the Seine had a similar, but not identical character. Until the 1700s, the Seine was a very small river except during rainfall, surrounded by mudflats and wetlands. The Anacostia, even in its current state is 1000 feet wide without any rain, even if it's very shallow in most parts. And even when builders channelized the Seine, its course was not as abstracted as the McMillan Two plan calls for. More generally, Washington's geology and climate do not totally resemble Paris's, and a respect for these characteristics of a region should be visible in a city based on the genius of place. In Paris and most of France, limestone is a local material and weather is more temperate; in DC, that material is brick and the humidity can be oppressive. The latter two differences are minor, so Buras argues that the form and style could be appropriately adapted to local needs.

However, Build DC needs to resolve several contentious issues before matters of style come up. First, they must clearly defend the need for such a bold, expensive undertaking. Currently, the area in question lacks important infrastructure, while other, unremarkable areas have access to those resources, but are themselves underdeveloped. Secondly, they need to prove that the environmental effects of eliminating wetlands and narrowing the channel will not adversely affect the river ecosystem or cause further innundation. The elimination of marshes and channelization in other cities has led to serious flooding and dangerous river conditions. Build DC needs to demonstrate that a scheme that remediates the habitat and adds density elsewhere would not work as well. As a secondary question, the known level of dioxin pollution in Anacostia sediment calls into question whether the dredged material could even be used for fill without risking serious contamination. Lastly, they need to settle the means of financing for such a project. Presently, the scheme calls for sale of townhouse-sized lots and the distribution of some lots to residents of Anacostia or other underprivileged groups. But the specifics are not yet set in stone, and Buras freely acknowledges this, even as he anticipates civic generosity from Congress.

That financial and political support will need to appear before any new Classical plan begins to guide the future of Washington. In regard to its lack of formal approval, the McMillan Two plan resembles the 1909 Plan of Chicago. Brought to the public realm by private figures, the Burnham Plan still guided planners and politicians. Some of the iconic structures never saw completion, but the beautiful parks along Lake Michigan, the transit infrastructure improvements, and the many bridges over the river would not have happened had Burnham and Bennett made only little plans. Unsurprisingly, Build DC is taking a long perspective for completion, one hundred years at least to really see major construction. But for now, the best thing to do with these plans is to debate them. The beauty of unsolicited architecture is that it encourages others react and form ideas in dialogue, so people have some centering when trying to imagine the future. McMillan Two is one such provocation, with brilliant and sound elements along side questionable and uncertain problems. What the region makes of it will depend on a serious consideration of its merits in public debate.

Cross-posted at цarьchitect.