Transit line potential discussed

[Horrified In Harford]

In the rhetorical question, above. What's hard to understand? The city wants all the benefits, even to the point of the luxury of 'transit options'(so called). It wants everyone else to pay the bills, the greater majority of whom receive no benefits...

BRAC? Don't fall for that! Little, if anything, documents where new workers want to do anything but relocate into convenient suburban communities...

(The 'North End' part of it likely will result in many new arrivees with adopted PA and DE addresses.)

Or, restated. What we have here is rather a sticky dilemma. It is doubtful to think it may be solved by build of solutions based on a model of a very different city of many decades back...

s/ Horrified

[Ticked Off in Towson]

Why is a expanded subway system never considered?! There's already one considerably limited subway line going downtown, so it's obviously doable. How hard is it to dig more tunnels for lines going east-west, from downtown-south, northwest-southeast, etc? DC has an awesome metro system that we could use as a model. It is a quick, efficient, and easy way to get around DC w/o having to drive within city limits, and it operates at almost all hours of the day. Why can't Baltimore have something similar since it's obvious that this is what is needed? Another ridiculously slow lightrail line that must go with the flow of street traffic is not the answer, nor is two lanes of expanded bus service. Another question- why don't any of the lines connect w/one another? Who would want to walk 2 blocks to make a connection from one line to the next? Was any common sense used when these plans were being proposed? You want to reduce traffic by taking cars off the road, while reducing harmful emissions from automobiles? The answer is a underground subway/heavy rail system, not more buses. With the BRAC looming in the distance, the problem is only going to get worse and it won't be solved by more buses and lightrail lines.

[Sobo Bob]

I have a novel idea. How about we build a mass transit system that connects a few of the most affluent areas of the city. Lets see, it could have stops in Federal Hill, at UMMC, Harborplace, Harbor East/Little Italy and Canton. After all, the residents of these areas, myself included, provide the majority of property tax related revenue for the city and use the leaset amount of resources.

The Red Line, are you serious? Let me pose a hypothetical: you just bought a $500k house in Canton/Fells Pt, within walking distance of the water... why in God's name would you want to have a mode of mass transit that services West Baltimore, arguably that most dangerous area of the city, run to your neighborhood? Exactly, you wouldn't. Call me close minded, but I don't think this proposal is a very good idea. And to all of you criticizing Sheila, keep it up. Oh wait, we can't honour our two cent reduction in the property tax because I have to provide more handouts for all of the poor folks in this fine city, giving them more of a disincentive to work... what a crock!

[Neil]

Here's a message to people opposed to servicing all of Baltimore, even the bad areas....

STOP BEING SO RACIST!!!!!

[James Harkins]

The light rail experience world wide is very successfull especially when used with "green" electricity generation such as wind power in Calgary Canada, solar power in Karlsrhue Germany and many more.
There are no dependancies on expensive polluting oil as use with bus transit. The evidence also shows that you will get on average 30% modal switch to a light rail vehicle, the best a modal switch a bus has ever done is around 11%.
Think of the generations to come, light rail in Germany has been going for 140yrs plus

[James Harkins]

Sobo Bob wrote:

I have a novel idea. How about we build a mass transit system that connects a few of the most affluent areas of the city. Lets see, it could have stops in Federal Hill, at UMMC, Harborplace, Harbor East/Little Italy and Canton. After all, the residents of these areas, myself included, provide the majority of property tax related revenue for the city and use the leaset amount of resources.
The Red Line, are you serious? Let me pose a hypothetical: you just bought a $500k house in Canton/Fells Pt, within walking distance of the water... why in God's name would you want to have a mode of mass transit that services West Baltimore, arguably that most dangerous area of the city, run to your neighborhood? Exactly, you wouldn't. Call me close minded, but I don't think this proposal is a very good idea. And to all of you criticizing Sheila, keep it up. Oh wait, we can't honour our two cent reduction in the property tax because I have to provide more handouts for all of the poor folks in this fine city, giving them more of a disincentive to work... what a crock!

Dublin Eire, built two light rail lines, the rich people were fearfullon one line that the poor people would use the trams to rob them, so they insistead in two separate lines with no collection, now five years later they are having to pay through the nose to connect them through the city centre - the robberies did not happen

[Baltimoron]

If they built it like they built the current Light Rail, it will be just as useless. Instead of running next to actual busy streets and neighborhoods, it was built wherever it was politically expedient.

This thing will be another boondoggle with more political than practical value; a monument to O'Malley and Dixon, just as the last projects were a monuments to Schaefer and Mandel.

[Level Headed]

Let's separate fact from fiction. 1) this is not a city run project. THIS IS A STATE PROJECT! Dixon, and O'Malley before her, just want to have some say in how it will effect Baltimore City. 2) The project is paid for out of the State Transportation Fund NOT FROM YOUR PROPERTY TAX! The Trans fund is mostly made up of Gas tax. The more you drive, the more your paying for it. 3) The notion that poor people will use it to come to my community and rob/rape/kill me. Doesn't happen. This is not and will not be the last mass transit project in the world. Do some research on past mass transit projects in other cities and countries. You won't find a whole lot of poor people ruining life for rich people.

[Level Headed]

This project needs to connect to other forms of mass transit. Currently it will connect to MARC at the West MARC Station and with METRO at the Downtown Charles Center Stop. It would be nice if other connections were being considered.
As for the extremely high $1billion price tag; An underground (METRO)system typically cost 2.5 to 3 times as much as a surface system. The project currently calls for some tunnels along the route, but a price tag of over $3 billion isn't doable by 2012. You can thank the former Gov. for that. The $3.2 BILLION spent for the ICC dried up most of the Transportation Funds. And with gas prices the way they are, squezzing more pennies from a gas tax is out of the question.

[Mitch]

In regards to all those scary west Baltimoreans taking the Red Line to Canton to rob the yuppies, evidence from other cities suggests it is unlikely to happen. Here is one study:

http://www.slp2.org/documents/crimefs04.pdf

If people from west Baltimore really want to head to Canton on public transit to commit crime, they can do so today. It's called the # 20 bus.

https://www.mtamaryland.com/services/bus/rout... (2).pdf

[Mitch]

Let's try the link again, but I bet it doesn't work:

https://www.mtamaryland.com/services/bus/rout... (2).pdf

[Gina]

I think bring this to Baltimore would ruin the parts that have been rehabed. Let's face it west baltimore is nothing, but crime and drugs and I feel that bringing the red line would ruin the neighborhoods that have been fixed up in the past years.

[Bob]

They should expand the current Metro to Aberdean and BWI with a stop at the Inner Harbor? Towson? Maybe the government would pay for it?

[MCG]

Theo wrote:

This is just another example of liberals gone wild, using our tax money for their social engineering follies.

Wasn't it the Ehrlich administration who proposed making both the Red Line and Montgomery County's "Purple Line" Bus Rapid Transit lines (which is an oxymoron). Light rail might not be perfect (I would prefer heavy underground rail), but BRT is a bigger waste of taxpayer money. Using your logic, wouldn't this make Bobby Haircut a liberal too?

[MCG]

Gina wrote:

I think bring this to Baltimore would ruin the parts that have been rehabed. Let's face it west baltimore is nothing, but crime and drugs and I feel that bringing the red line would ruin the neighborhoods that have been fixed up in the past years.

Yeah, that's the same logic that the NIMBY's used when DC Metro officials proposed building the Red Line through Georgetown. Thirty years later, they're now demanding that a new subway line be built through their neighborhood.

Ask the people who sold their two bedroom, 1 bath bungalows in Arlington and Falls Church for $750,000 if building Metrorail through their neighborhoods ruined their property values.

[Sun Critic]

New subject
. T he Sun displays a perfectly good picture at the top of the column but never uses it as an aide to show where the proposed line might be constructed.
. One picture here could replace a million words and 35 comments as well.

[Darryl]

Regardless of what you think about east-west transit, I'm tired of hearing the myth of supposedly "once-stable" neighborhoods on the west side that were ripped up.

[Mark]

A lot of people's comments are off the mark. This is a state project, and the majority of Red Line funding will come from Federal and state sources. There are requirements that Federal transit projects be cost effective and that alignments benefit communities to the greatest extent possible. A heavy rail/subway option is too expensive and would make the project less competitive when compared to other proposed federal transit projects.

I suggest doing research on world-class, livable, vibrant cities around the world. Almost all of them have effective transit systems. This is the future, and it's about time Baltimore offers its residents more mobility options. Why would anyone want to be tied to their car with $4.00/gal+ gas?

[DundalkSteve]

I grew up in a city that has a well developed public transport system. Baltimore has the most ridiculous, pathetic 'transport system' I have ever seen. For those who say that this is 'liberalism gone wild', you need to get your heads straight. If the powers that be don't start planning something now, Baltimore will be even more gridlocked in 10 years time. The provincial mentality of some of the locals in this city needs to change.Public transport is the future. Your big fat automobiles will cost you more and more money as gas prices rise. You will have to get your butts out of your ridiculously large SUV's (so pathetic) and start getting on the bus/train. I will be leaving Baltimore soon, and it won't be soon enough for me.

[Neil]

DundalkSteve wrote:

I grew up in a city that has a well developed public transport system. Baltimore has the most ridiculous, pathetic 'transport system' I have ever seen. For those who say that this is 'liberalism gone wild', you need to get your heads straight. If the powers that be don't start planning something now, Baltimore will be even more gridlocked in 10 years time. The provincial mentality of some of the locals in this city needs to change.Public transport is the future. Your big fat automobiles will cost you more and more money as gas prices rise. You will have to get your butts out of your ridiculously large SUV's (so pathetic) and start getting on the bus/train. I will be leaving Baltimore soon, and it won't be soon enough for me.

Like I said earlier, they don't like the giver, so the shoot the gift.