Metro Transit Service Improvement Plan 2014

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twincitizen
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Metro Transit Service Improvement Plan 2014

Postby twincitizen » October 21st, 2014, 6:48 am

Meeting dates for Metro Transit's Service Improvement Plan:

http://metrocouncil.org/Council-Meeting ... 4_210.aspx
http://finance-commerce.com/transit/201 ... -upgrades/

http://www.metrotransit.org/sip

This is a big one folks. You gotta get involved, attend these meetings, and submit comment. These could be transformative improvements and upgrades to our backbone local bus service.

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The Service Improvement Plan (SIP) is a long-term plan to guide the expansion of the local and express bus route network. The draft SIP reflects the transit policy direction in Thrive MSP 2040 and the 2040 Transportation Policy Plan as well as significant public engagement and fundamental transit planning principles to identify the service improvements that best achieve regional goals. It is a specific and prioritized list of improvements that could be implemented if increased transit funding is available.
The SIP does not include any transitways eligible for CTIB funding. However, bus routes connecting
with these projects and unfunded bus rapid transit projects are included. Arterial BRT corridors will not be evaluated and prioritized in this project, since this was the purpose of the amendment that added enhanced bus services to the Transportation Policy Plan.

Projects were prioritized using these evaluation measures:
 Productivity (50%): Demonstrate the ridership potential of service improvements using land use, population, jobs, regional Job Concentrations served, passengers per in-service hour and subsidy per passenger.
 Social Equity (25%): Evaluate how well improvements serve people most reliant on transit, based on low-wage jobs, auto availability and the percentage of low-income, people of color and disabled populations.
 System Connectivity (25%): Establish how effectively projects improve access to transit service based on the number of connecting transit routes, persons served by a new route or extension of an existing route, key destinations, regional Educational Institutions served, and improvements to off-peak, span or reverse commute service.

There were a total of 166 projects initially identified. Only 123 projects (which ranked high and medium) are recommended for implementation. Those ranking low are included for reference. Implementation is recommended in three phases: 2015-2017, 2018-2020, and 2021-2030. These
projects represent nearly 29 million new annual rides, 161 additional peak buses, and $106 million in annual operating expenses. Arterial BRT projects are already included in TPP. As such, they were not ranked, but bus and operating resources are included in the total.

Public meetings:
 Wednesday, November 5th: Hennepin County Central Library (Minneapolis), 11:30 a.m.-1:00 p.m.
 Saturday, November 8th, North Community YMCA (Minneapolis), 1:00 p.m.-3:30 p.m.
 Thursday, November 13th, Hennepin County Southdale Library (Edina), 6:00 p.m.-7:30 p.m.
 Saturday, November 15th, Conway Recreation Center (St. Paul), 1:00 p.m.-3:30 p.m.
 Monday, November 17th, Anoka County Northtown Central Library (Blaine), 6:00 p.m.-7:30 p.m.
 Tuesday, November 18th, Metropolitan Council (St. Paul), 11:30 a.m.-1:00 p.m. (official public
hearing)

Tcmetro
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Re: Regional Service Improvement Plan

Postby Tcmetro » October 22nd, 2014, 5:24 pm

Metro Transit released their draft SIP today. I'll list the highly ranked projects, all the other ones are in the report:

Near-term (2015-2017):
3 - Add trips to meet the late night (12 and 1 am) and early morning (5 am) lineups in both downtowns daily.
4 - Separate the south and the north branches of the route. South of downtown would remain Route 4, north of downtown would become Route 15.
7 - Improve service to every 20 minutes during middays and Saturdays, add extra peak hour trips from North Loop to Franklin for a 15-min peak frequency in the main part of the route.
10 - Improve span of 10 minute service on Saturdays to 9 am - 6 pm. Add owl trips.
11 - Improve to 15 minutes from 46th St to Lowry Ave on weekdays and Saturdays.
12 - Extend weekday off-peak trips to Downtown Minneapolis.
17 - Extend all trips to NE Mpls on Weekdays. Add a 1 am trip to NE on Sundays.
18 - Add 1 SB Saturday trip to extend span of 7.5 min service, Expand span of 10 min Sunday service to begin at 9 am, add owl trips.
19 - Add 15 min frequencies on Sundays from 9 am - 3 pm.
22 - Improve trunk service to every 15 minutes daily.
30 - Add weekend service.
32 - Add weekend service at 30 minute frequencies. Improve weekdays to 20 minutes and extend service to 10pm.
54 - Extend to Maplewood Mall. Add owl trips.
61 - Improve peak service to 15 minutes, midday and Saturday to 30 minutes, new Sunday service every 30 minutes.
62 - Improve frequencies on Rice St to 15 minutes weekdays and Saturdays, every 20 minutes on Sundays. Improve Smith Ave service to 30 minutes on Saturdays.
63 - Improve to 15 minutes daily between Raymond Station and Sun Ray.
94 - Add service every 30-60 minutes on Saturdays and every 90 minutes on Sundays. Add evening/night service.
110 - New U of M - Longfellow peak hour route, similar to Route 9.
643 - Expanded to daily service to replace Route 9 on Cedar Lake Road in SLP.
721 - Improve Sunday service to 30 minutes.
724 - Improve peak service to 15 minutes.

Mid-term (2018-2020):

2 - Improve to 10 minute service between Hennepin/Franklin and Oak/Washington daily, improve Marcy-Holmes service to High Frequency standards.
3 - Extend weekday C trips to St Paul to improve branches to 20 minute weekday frequencies.
6 - Improve Downtown - Uptown service during peak hours to replace Route 12.
14 - Improve trunk service (W Broadway - Bloomington/38th) to 15 minutes daily.
21 - Extend to W Lake Stn every 20 minutes.
23 - Improve peak to 15 minutes, midday, Sat, Sun to 20 minutes, early morning/late evening to 30 minutes.
26 - Penn Ave SWLRT - Van White SWLRT - North Minneapolis, every 30 minutes. Potentially replacing 5F on 26th Av N.
33 - New Kasota Ave route between Minneapolis and Westgate LRT. Operates daily, replacing Route 3.

Long-term (2021-2030):

6 - Extend all trips to SE Mpls.

http://www.metrotransit.org/sip

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Nick
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Re: Regional Service Improvement Plan

Postby Nick » October 22nd, 2014, 5:44 pm

4 - Separate the south and the north branches of the route. South of downtown would remain Route 4, north of downtown would become Route 15.
THANK YOU.
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Re: Regional Service Improvement Plan

Postby MNdible » October 22nd, 2014, 10:03 pm

4 - Separate the south and the north branches of the route. South of downtown would remain Route 4, north of downtown would become Route 15.
THANK YOU.
Because? Does it's length impact reliability? And if you split them, seems like you should at least run the 4 a ways into Ye Olde St. Anthony, rather than just stopping it downtown.

I've got a soft spot for the full boat 4, because it's the descendant of the old Bryant-Johnson streetcar line.

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Nick
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Re: Regional Service Improvement Plan

Postby Nick » October 22nd, 2014, 10:05 pm

Winter dude, that shit is a disaster with more than a couple inches of snow.
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Re: Regional Service Improvement Plan

Postby MNdible » October 22nd, 2014, 10:06 pm

As opposed to the rest of the bus system during a snowstorm, which runs like Mussolini is in charge.

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Nick
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Re: Regional Service Improvement Plan

Postby Nick » October 22nd, 2014, 10:10 pm

The buses that terminate or begin downtown definitely run better than the ones where downtown is their halfway point.
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Re: Regional Service Improvement Plan

Postby MNdible » October 22nd, 2014, 10:17 pm

Yeah, I get that. But on the other hand, they're planning on extending all of the route 6 buses to the University, and there's a very deliberate choice to extend the LRT routes through town rather than forcing a transfer.

I'm sure they've punched the numbers and figured out that nobody is riding the 4 all the way from NE to SW (although I have made that trip on occasion). But I'm certain that there are people making the trip from LynLake to 'Near' Northeast.

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Re: Regional Service Improvement Plan

Postby Tcmetro » October 22nd, 2014, 10:26 pm

I used to be a regular rider of the 4 in middle school, and the bunching was horrible at rush hour. I'd imagine that part of the separation is due to reliability, and the other reason is because the trip times are quite long for a driver (New Brighton to Bloomington).

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As for the rest of the SIP, from what I've read it seems most of the high performing enhancements are on high-frequency inner city routes. NE Mpls seems to gain a lot in the plan, pretty much every route is seeing better frequencies and/or expanded hours. Another interesting proposal is the extension of the 54 bus out to Maplewood Mall. It's pretty much putting down the path for future BRT on the East Side of St. Paul and it ranks pretty well. A lot of the proposed express bus expansion is trying to capture riders who dont work the typical 9 to 5. Midday express buses would connect Minneapolis to Blaine, Maplewood, Woodbury, and Cottage Grove.

Some of the other proposals are just strange, like the 676 Minnetonka-Uptown Express, the 651 St. Paul-Ridgedale Reverse Commute or the 700 Robbinsdale-SLP-Edina Express. A lot of the other poorly performing projects are local circulator buses in SW Corridor, the far north metro and in the Gateway Corridor.

The real problem with the SIP is that it is a wishlist with no funding. Additionally, another garage would need to be built to handle the required amount of buses, and other things like layover facilities and transit center expansions were not taken into consideration. On the bright side, a lot of the off-peak improvements in the inner city network won't require purchasing new buses.

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Re: Regional Service Improvement Plan

Postby FISHMANPET » October 23rd, 2014, 12:07 am

/-I think one of the problems with routing buses through downtown rather than terminating them there is that demand usually isn't equal on both branches. The 19 was split up into the 19 and 22 for just that reason, so that frequencies could be increased North of downtown but stay the same South.

Maybe it would make sense to route the 4 all the way to St Anthony, but I still think there's a good case for splitting it.

LRT is OK in that regard because it's already running frequently enough. If we somehow had the money to run the 4 every 10 minutes on both sides of the river there'd be no problem, even if demand on one leg would be nowhere near deserving that level of frequency.

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Re: Regional Service Improvement Plan

Postby ECtransplant » October 23rd, 2014, 5:40 am

6 - Improve Downtown - Uptown service during peak hours to replace Route 12.
How is that an improvement? The biggest problems with the peak downtown-uptown service is 1) capacity and 2) the buses stop every. damn. block. Takes forever to get from downtown to uptown during the PM rush as a result. Needs more limited stop service, not less.

PS Obligatory 3C would have helped comment.

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Re: Metro Transit Service Improvement Plan 2014

Postby woofner » October 23rd, 2014, 10:22 am

The 4 is heinously unreliable and needs to be split. My gut would tend to feel that it would be better to split off the ends of the routes into suburban locals and keep the central segment intact as one through-running route. My understanding is that there is a documented ridership gain from interlining through downtowns. Yes, downtown itself causes reliability issues, but the city should be working towards dedicated transit lanes on major transit streets there anyway (which they're not because Public Works hates transit and the politicians don't care about it).

They are proposing a route 13 that would run on University between Columbia Heights and Stadium Village, which will be a great boon for trips between the U and NE. However, it will also great redundancy with the current 11 route, so I hope that's either truncated or moved to University. This route is only ranked medium, and I confess to not having read enough of the plan to know what impact that has on its chances of becoming reality. However, if the existence of this route (and a proposed Marshall route) allow the 11 to be truncated, then there is a potential source of service hours to cannibalize.

ps TCRT be damned, I ride transit in the 21st century, not the early 20th
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Re: Metro Transit Service Improvement Plan 2014

Postby FISHMANPET » October 23rd, 2014, 10:36 am

I like improving the 7 and the 14. In an ideal world I'd like to see them run on the same street through the North Loop, each at 15 minute headways, so you effectively get 7.5 minute headways from North Loop into downtown. Considering how much of an "Urban Neighborhood" NL is, it's a transit desert. It could fit almost as well in Edina as it does on the edge of Downtown.

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Re: Metro Transit Service Improvement Plan 2014

Postby Chava » October 23rd, 2014, 11:01 am

I like improving the 7 and the 14. In an ideal world I'd like to see them run on the same street through the North Loop, each at 15 minute headways, so you effectively get 7.5 minute headways from North Loop into downtown. Considering how much of an "Urban Neighborhood" NL is, it's a transit desert. It could fit almost as well in Edina as it does on the edge of Downtown.
I think the 7 and 14 at 15 minute head ways is a good idea. Sure Target Field station is in the NL, but it's not always the best option, and often the 7 can get you to Cedar Ave and S 3rd St(west bank station) way faster than the green line. Only drawback is frequency. For being so close to downtown, it can be tough to get in or out of NL via transit.

The idea about them both running on Washington is interesting, but I think it isolates people who live on the north/east side of Washington(1+2nd st) as it can be difficult to cut through to Washington from 1st or 2nd.

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Re: Metro Transit Service Improvement Plan 2014

Postby mattaudio » October 23rd, 2014, 11:06 am

I'd still love to see the E branch removed from the 14 so that the main 14 trunk could see increased headways south of 38th Street. #selfish

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Re: Metro Transit Service Improvement Plan 2014

Postby FISHMANPET » October 23rd, 2014, 11:08 am

Yeah, I wish the city had done more work to ensure pedestrian easements between Washington and 2nd st, because that is quite the megablock. I'm also not sure, even if there was an easy way to get to Washington from the North, that Washington would is close enough to 1st St and all those apartments there. But I have friends that live on the NW edge of NL, and it's quite the jaunt all the way to Target Field to catch a train. Right now with NextTrip you could figure out which bus is coming sooner, the 14 or the 7, and move to the right side of the street to catch it into downtown. But you should just be able to stand on a street (either Washington or 2nd) and catch the first bus that comes, since it will take you downtown one way or the other.

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Re: Metro Transit Service Improvement Plan 2014

Postby RailBaronYarr » October 23rd, 2014, 11:10 am

The 4 is heinously unreliable and needs to be split. My gut would tend to feel that it would be better to split off the ends of the routes into suburban locals and keep the central segment intact as one through-running route. My understanding is that there is a documented ridership gain from interlining through downtowns. Yes, downtown itself causes reliability issues, but the city should be working towards dedicated transit lanes on major transit streets there anyway (which they're not because Public Works hates transit and the politicians don't care about it).
Everything in this paragraph is what I was going to say. We need less buses that end downtown and more thru-running. If that means the suburban ends need to bolster downtown express commuter route frequencies, then fine.

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Re: Regional Service Improvement Plan

Postby xandrex » October 23rd, 2014, 1:11 pm

4 - Separate the south and the north branches of the route. South of downtown would remain Route 4, north of downtown would become Route 15.
THANK YOU.
Because? Does it's length impact reliability? And if you split them, seems like you should at least run the 4 a ways into Ye Olde St. Anthony, rather than just stopping it downtown.

I've got a soft spot for the full boat 4, because it's the descendant of the old Bryant-Johnson streetcar line.
I'm all about this change too. But a big part of it for me (other than some reliability) is the branding issue.

The 4 is currently a jumble of services that happen to have a common name. I can't even take a decent chunk of the 4 buses that go by when I'm heading out of downtown because they end downtown.

My ideal is to have a 4 that serves south Minneapolis into downtown, a 4X (whatever letter you want to add to denote) that runs from south Minneapolis through to at least Lowry or St. Anthony Pkwy, and then this new route 15 that only serves NE into downtown. That would also simplify the system for visitors or people who don't frequent the bus ("Oh, here comes the 4...but it has some letter. Does it cross the bridge?")
I like improving the 7 and the 14. In an ideal world I'd like to see them run on the same street through the North Loop, each at 15 minute headways, so you effectively get 7.5 minute headways from North Loop into downtown. Considering how much of an "Urban Neighborhood" NL is, it's a transit desert. It could fit almost as well in Edina as it does on the edge of Downtown.
It's really not bad if you're right on the bus route. I've taken my fair share of 7 and 14...and the ridership in the North Loop has always seemed pretty decent too. The frequency isn't as good as it should be, though. and I think lack of transit will eventually stifle the neighborhood (even if most people here can afford cars). I wonder if a Broadway streetcar might change that?

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woofner
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Re: Metro Transit Service Improvement Plan 2014

Postby woofner » October 23rd, 2014, 4:38 pm

I'm surprised there hasn't been comment here on the 26 "North Minneapolis circulator. Connects with both Penn Ave and Van White Green Line stations. 30‐minute service from 6 a.m. to 11 p.m. Possible elimination of Route 5F service on 26th Ave N." They project 1100 daily rides. It looks like it would basically go up Van White from the LRT station, cut over to Emerson/Fremont on Plymouth, then cut over to Penn at 26th, then return to Van White via 394. Not hard to guess the lion's share of the ridership will be on Penn accessing SWLRT. It'll be interesting to see exactly how much longer it'll take to get to Plymouth using this route as opposed to getting off at Royalston and transferring to a 5.
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Re: Regional Service Improvement Plan

Postby exiled_antipodean » October 23rd, 2014, 8:58 pm

94 - Add service every 30-60 minutes on Saturdays and every 90 minutes on Sundays. Add evening/night service.
I'm not sure I understand the market for a service on 90 minute headways on Sundays.


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