Robert Street Corridor Arterial BRT

[mulad]

Short short summary of last night's meeting: The candidate corridors are now Robert Street and Concord Street for ABRT and streetcar, and U.S. 52 for LRT and highway BRT (and possibly some other bus modes). Robert Street was the most popular option among meeting attendees, at least by the time I left.

[eluko]

I remember reading years ago that Mendota Heights wanted to develop the Mendakota golf coarse into its future town center. If that ever came to fruition, I could see a streetcar line working down Dodd Rd easily - especially with all the jobs in the Eagan corridor.
As for 52 though I think building an LRT down it, or any other freeway in general is a waste. Half the appeal of LRT is what it brings to its surroundings and in the middle of a freeway its pretty much all for nought.

[Tcmetro]

The folks working on the Robert St study have begun to evaluate the various routing options. Well no decisions have been made, there are some options that look very unlikely from the evaluation matrix. The main concerns with the Highway 52 LRT/BRT options is the high cost and low ridership potential, whereas with Concord St, the issues appear to be the position of Concord itself (between the river and a ridgeline) and ROW issues. Robert St streetcars or BRT look to be the most favorable, along with the Highway 52 bus-shoulder BRT option.

http://www.co.dakota.mn.us/Government/P ... %20pac.pdf (see page 36)

Personally, I imagine the study is going to recommend Robert St in the end. If it does end up being the streetcar proposal, hopefully they will dedicate lanes for it.

[Mdcastle]

Hopefully if something happens with Robert St. they can work out a deal to remove it from the trunk highway system and transfer it to the counties or cities.

[mattaudio]

It seems like we ought to take advantage of these aging commercial corridors that are adjacent to a freeway. This seems to be the perfect opportunity to try a hybrid solution.
1. De-stroad Robert Street
2. Put streetcar or aBRT on Robert Street
3. Place future P&Rs along the streetcar/aBRT corridor, but route express buses a half mile east and take 52 to Downtown.
4. Interline east-side buses with the 94 to provide one-seat rides between express P&Rs, Downtown St. Paul, and DT Mpls.
5. Use aBRT/streetcar to provide off-peak connectivity to P&Rs.

[woofner]

If I'm reading their half-circle system correctly, they project significantly more ridership for streetcar than for arterial BRT. I will be curious to read exactly what factor they use for rail bias and what if any basis they have for using it.

[eluko]

I have to wonder about the proposed Robert St. line south of 110. It follows Sunfish Lake down into farmland in an effort to please both cities, but completely ignores the job centers along 149. Having it extend further west on 110 then south at 149 would serve 10x the people.

[mattaudio]

Well, after developing a best-in-class Red Line, I have complete confidence in Dakota County.

[mattaudio]

This car sewer is being rebuilt for $22 million.
Instead of its existing 60's-era median-less design with a center turn lane, it will be rebuilt to a standard 1980s/90s stroad design with medians.

http://www.startribune.com/local/south/217236051.html

The goal is to eliminate commuter through-traffic from Robert by detouring it to Hwy. 52, said David Hutton of SRF Consulting Group, which is assisting the city with the project.

Not sure exactly how they think they will be accomplishing this. They are doubling down on the stroad profile at the expense of local business access.

Article also mentions that this project will NOT be implementing noise walls or a pedestrian bridge at Wentworth. I guess someone finally told them they were working on Robert Street, not the Highway 52 freeway.

[RailBaronYarr]

What's amazing to me is that they're (Met Council) investigating Robert St as a main corridor for aBRT improvements. This road profile will not be pleasant to pedestrians or transit users because it does nothing to encourage businesses to start facing the street and encouraging walking, biking, or transit as a natural choice. What a waste.

[Mdcastle]

It's too bad they had to lose the pedestrian bridge.

I'm questioning what commuter traffic is doing on Robert Street instead of US 52 in the first place, unless US 52 isn't wide enough, but I get the impression they were only talking about moving it temporarily during construction.

The article didn't say if this was part of an agreement to transfer Robert Street from Mn/DOT to the county or cities.

[Tcmetro]

The AA has narrowed the alternatives down to:

- Arterial BRT from Downtown St Paul to Mendota Rd via Robert St
- A streetcar line with the same route
- Hwy BRT along Hwy 52 to Inver Hills CC

http://www.co.dakota.mn.us/Government/P ... packet.pdf

[mattaudio]

From a corporate project management perspective, it could be said that these "alternatives analyses" are not correctly defining a business need and not successfully defining scope.

aBRT/streetcar on Robert serves a different purpose from BRT on 52.

In general, freeway BRT seems to be difficult because freeways are inherently hostile to walkable nodes that build transit ridership. The primary value proposition of freeway BRT is to connect strings of existing park and rides to allow for relatively fast service at off-peak times when it is not financially viable to provide downtown-to-station express services.

This travelshed is unique because the freeway (52) and local street with business nodes (Robert St) are only about a half mile apart. This means that we can take a holistic approach to local mobility and commuter transit and build a better solution.

Here's what I'd like to see:
- aBRT or streetcar along Robert Street. If aBRT, I could see it hopping on the freeway south of 494 to connect IHCC at 80th St.
- Transit stations with peak express buses. These would be located along the Robert corridor so the aBRT/streetcar could serve them inline. This could be Butler/Robert, Wentworth/Robert, Mendota/Robert, and maybe Blaine/80th. The express buses would travel a half mile on city streets before getting on 52 to downtown.
- Interline these express buses via St. Paul to downtown Mpls as expansion of the 94. I actually think this would be a good idea for most east metro express buses. Instead of having the 94, create a brand of service like "Downtown Shuttle" -- the buses can still have a different express number for eastbound beyond St. Paul, but it also keeps it simple for people using the bus between downtowns.

This would have at least three distinct advantages:
1. It would be more feasible to launch express service in the east metro because it could capture commuters to both downtowns with a one seat ride
2. It would afford a higher frequency on the 94/Downtown Shuttle service, since there would be more buses. Yet the load factors would still stay high.
3. Station to station service in the Robert Street corridor would connect the stations, so there's more choices for commuters with off-peak trips.

[NickP]

Hey folks. Here is a F and C update on the corridor. Its behind a paywall though. Is anyone able and willing to give us the gist of what is said? Cheers
http://finance-commerce.com/2013/09/rob ... e-options/

[talindsay]

No, but a ten-second Google search for "Dakota County Robert Street Corridor" turned up this:

http://www.robertstreettransit.com/

[Tcmetro]

Open houses coming up for Robert Street Alternatives Analysis:

Upcoming Meetings

Open House #3

Thursday, October 17, 2013
4:30 PM – 6:30 PM
Dakota County Northern Service Center
Room 110
1 Mendota Road West
West St. Paul, MN

Thursday, October 24, 2013
6:00 PM – 8:00 PM
Neighborhood House
Ferber Room
179 Robie Street East
St. Paul, MN

[Tcmetro]

I went to the open house last night. There were three options, the Streetcar and Arterial BRT from Downtown St. Paul to Mendota Road, and the Hwy 52 BRT to 80th Street. I talked to someone working on the project, he said that most of the input from the public has had a preference for a Robert Street option. I guess one of the biggest problems would be that CTIB doesn't fund Arterial BRT and Streetcar projects. So, in absence of the CTIB money, the cities and Dakota County would have to make up the rest of the funds. And because of that I am going to imagine that the Arterial BRT option will be the one that is chosen in the end.

They are moving along to the next phase of the study, which will look at costs and ridership and select an LPA. IIRC, the report should be finished early next year.

[RailBaronYarr]

And, as always, I'm sure land-use plans are a key component of a major investment to mobility enhancements, right? Reducing parking minimums, zoning changes, etc along the corridor? :/

[Tcmetro]

Open House Presentation (PPTX file): http://robertstreettransit.com/document ... ation.pptx

Display Boards: http://robertstreettransit.com/document ... Boards.pdf

Alignment Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u54mhMWuzIA&hd=1

[mulad]

I went to a meeting on this last week. The first thing I asked about was why the arterial bus option on Robert Street had a different stop spacing than the streetcar: The bus option shows 12 stops (often with 1/2-mile spacing), while the streetcar option has 17 (generally sticking to 1/4-mile spacing). The streetcar option would replace existing local bus service on Robert Street, while the arterial bus option would be an overlay service like with other corridors, retaining existing service (though I didn't ask what frequency it would be). All of the options (streetcar and arterial bus on Robert, highway BRT on US-52) have the transit vehicles make every stop, like the Blue and Red lines.

I think they could drop or consolidate a couple of the streetcar stops, but I'm not sure which ones are best. If you're going to be making every stop, even 1/4-mile still too close, in my opinion.

The highway BRT option has two sub-options at this point, one for heading into downtown across the Lafayette Bridge (staying on the highway), and another which would get off at Concord/Cesar Chavez and follow that before turning onto Robert to reach downtown. The on-highway stops are about 1 mile apart from each other, but they get much closer together along the on-street routing option for heading into downtown.

They seemed to be taking input on ideas for routing within downtown St. Paul. One interesting suggestion (for streetcar at least) was simply to keep it going north on Robert Street and have it interline briefly to reach the "Robert Street" Green Line station, though I'm a bit doubtful that the sharp curve at Robert and 12th would allow for the diamond required for a 2-track connection there. And if it got to the Robert Street LRT station, then it becomes a question where the best spot to do a crossover move would be -- There are crossovers on 12th, for the short distance that the Green Line parallels I-94/I-35E, but it might make more sense for an interlined streetcar to go up to the Capitol/Rice Street station and use the crossovers west of there to switch between tracks.

Some people at the meeting were adamant about getting the line (probably whether bus or streetcar) to end at SPUD, but I don't really see that as a good idea. It might be possible with a loop, but I don't really know how to get a loop to work well considering that there'd probably be a lot of transferring going on between the Robert Street line and Green Line. Considering that a Robert Street service would probably need to layover for a few minutes in downtown somewhere, many people doing transfers would get stuck on the loop somewhere during that layover period.

I'm not committed to an interlined setup, though. Having the northernmost stop on Robert between 5th and 6th or at the Securian complex would be fine, but it's best to be as close as possible to the Central station in order to facilitate transfers. Also, if other streetcar ideas get off the ground at all for St. Paul, it's probably more important to interline with those than the Green Line.