urbanMSP

Ahh.....just looked again at the aa.

Yeah, but if they can free ride a freeway BRT on a MnPASS lane (with inline stations, which aren't free), the economics change a lot. It would serve both local collector/distributor buses with a straight line to downtown and P&R trips at stations.

According to the Gateway Corridor documents I-94 East was one of the poorest performing MnPass corridors in a MnDOT study. Additionally, managed lanes are ineligible for FTA funding. Walk-up ridership should be promoted with the BRT line, which is best accomplished with a routing not along the freeway. The park and ride buses can continue to use the freeway for fast peak hour service to the downtowns.

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I was looking at the corridor in Google Maps, and it seems that this corridor should just go mixed traffic on Hudson Road with grade separations or bus lanes at the major intersections. Most of the roadway is really low traffic, so mixed traffic operations wouldn't cause any detriment to transit riders, and wouldn't have any ROW impacts on surrounding properties.

It looks like the big problem areas are going to be at Johnson Pkwy, Etna St, White Bear Ave, Ruth St, McKnight Rd, and Century Ave. Johnson and Etna are going to require some engineering of new bus roadways to cross the existing streets, White Bear and Ruth probably will need overpasses, and McKnight and Century have enough width to construct a bus only lane through those intersections. I think that a dedicated BRT ROW can pretty much be built from Ruth St to Manning Ave, with the possible exception of the segment by Tanners Lake.

Here's a quick Google Map I made that helps visualize my ideas:

https://maps.google.com/maps/ms?msid=20 ... 3,0.338173

Union Depot - Griffith St - Mixed Traffic, 1.9 miles
Giffith St - Birmingham St - Median Busway, .6 miles
Birmingham St - Hazel St - Mixed Traffic - 1 mile
Hazel St - Tanner Lake - Median Busway - 1.8 miles
Tanner Lake - Dellwood Ln - Mixed Traffic - .3 miles
Dellwood Ln - Manning Ave - Median Busway - 6.3 miles

Total Mixed Traffic: 3.2 miles
Total Median Busway : 8.7 miles

A map showing which portions should be mixed traffic and which ones should have a busway:

https://maps.google.com/maps/ms?msid=20 ... 4,0.338173

According to the Gateway Corridor documents I-94 East was one of the poorest performing MnPass corridors in a MnDOT study. Additionally, managed lanes are ineligible for FTA funding.

Managed lanes are be eligible for FTA funding under MAP-21 given certain requirements being met that I cannot quite remember(e.g., at least 50% lane capacity reserved for transit use). It's a large reason the Feds prompted Washington County staff to include looking at the managed lane option in the forthcoming DEIS.

I forget about CTIB money but can it be used for express bus facilities? Let's face it this project is about keeping Wash. Co in CTIB. Red Rock does not seem to be moving along too quickly either. If we build a suburban transit corridor (I'm looking at you Red Line!). Unless you change zoning and plan for a different kind of development you are just making expensive commuter lines. However if are goal is to sew together the greater region how do we find a middle that doesn't waste resources?

CTIB money can be used for park and ride expansions, buses, and operation costs for new service in "transitway corridors". Currently, CTIB money is used to operate the 467 (Lakeville/35W-Minneapolis) express, as well as the portion of the 475 between Minneapolis and Cedar Grove, and the 477F extension between Apple Valley and Lakeville/Cedar park and ride.

Because Washington County had so few transit projects, CTIB has allocated a portion of the money to essentially be used as the county sees fit. These funds were used to advance the planning of the Gateway Corridor, as well as construct the Newport Transit Station.

I would imagine that new express bus service that would operate along the Gateway Corridor alignment would be eligible for CTIB money.

Even if we want to stay in Washington County, I can think of other corridors that are much more valuable from a land user value per acre perspective, usually representative of the kind of walkable urbanism that is compatible with non-parking-lot transit:
- Red Rock, at least as BRT, connecting Dayton's Bluff / Highwood? / Newport / St. Paul Park / Hastings
- Payne-Phalen / East Side / North St. Paul / Stillwater / Bayport
- Payne-Phalen / Vadnais Heights / Maplewood / White Bear Lake

Even within the directive of "building transit service to Washington County" we can still choose to connect existing rather than hypothetical nodes.

Even if we want to stay in Washington County, I can think of other corridors that are much more valuable from a land user value per acre perspective, usually representative of the kind of walkable urbanism that is compatible with non-parking-lot transit:
- Red Rock, at least as BRT, connecting Dayton's Bluff / Highwood? / Newport / St. Paul Park / Hastings
- Payne-Phalen / East Side / North St. Paul / Stillwater / Bayport
- Payne-Phalen / Vadnais Heights / Maplewood / White Bear Lake

Even within the directive of "building transit service to Washington County" we can still choose to connect existing rather than hypothetical nodes.

How would a bus/train go to Vadnais Heights, then Maplewood, then WBL? Which corridor are you thinking of here?

Let's keep this on topic of Gateway, and direct any discussion of mattaudio's fantasies to the Rush Line (or Red Rock) threads. I'm fairly certain we have one for each, and probably a topic for fantasy maps even.

We need to keep our eye on this Gateway line, as it is a major disaster waiting to happen. I honestly think the best outcome at this point is for the Met Council and MNDOT to team up (and get FTA on their side) to support the managed lane option. A $500MM dedicated transitway to Lake Elmo is a bad deal for the region. It needs to be stopped. It's so bad that it makes me wish Washington County's 3-2 vote to stay in CTIB had gone the other way a few years ago. Keep in mind that Ramsey County extends all the way eastward to Century Avenue and would still be free to build whatever transitway to 3M they like as part of CTIB. Many Washington County cities are part of the regional transit taxing district (property tax, different than CTIB) and would continue to have express bus service as they do today, expanding as necessary.

CTIB is quickly becoming an unmitigated disaster as long as individual county commissioners are allowed to plan transit routes to their personal liking.

Agreed, I'm not going to get into details of other corridors or possibilities here. I didn't even have corridors in mind (other than Red Rock-ish) but I just wanted to point out that there are some valuable walkable places in Washington County that radiate out in general directions from St. Paul.

The point is to make more of a comparison, that Gateway as planned would suck even compared to the same amount of investment elsewhere in Washington County.

Gateway sounds like Red Line v2, but even worse. And the reason is because planners and politicians are addicted to planning corridors rather than connecting nodes.

Even within the directive of "building transit service to Washington County" we can still choose to connect existing rather than hypothetical nodes.

3M is an existing node, as is Woodbury. They might not be places that many people here go, but there are about 16,000 people who work at the 3M campus alone -- and I'd wager that half of them live in Woodbury.

How would a bus/train go to Vadnais Heights, then Maplewood, then WBL? Which corridor are you thinking of here?

That could easily be accomplished along the Bruce Vento trail ROW, which has enough space for train and trail to co-exist.

Yes, 3M is a relatively compact, walkable node.

Woodbury is not a node. There may be a walkable node in Woodbury, but I've never found it.

How would a bus/train go to Vadnais Heights, then Maplewood, then WBL? Which corridor are you thinking of here?

That could easily be accomplished along the Bruce Vento trail ROW, which has enough space for train and trail to co-exist.

That would go to Maplewood and then Vadnais Heights, while mattaudio said the other way around. I realize it might seem pedantic of me, but I thought maybe he had an idea of going up the west side of 35W somehow, then swinging southeast to Maplewood and up. I was just curious.

I sense a Facebook group -- Urbanists for Responsible Transitway Development.

Agreed, I'm not going to get into details of other corridors or possibilities here. I didn't even have corridors in mind (other than Red Rock-ish) but I just wanted to point out that there are some valuable walkable places in Washington County that radiate out in general directions from St. Paul.

The point is to make more of a comparison, that Gateway as planned would suck even compared to the same amount of investment elsewhere in Washington County.

Gateway sounds like Red Line v2, but even worse. And the reason is because planners and politicians are addicted to planning corridors rather than connecting nodes.

There is no way the Gateway proposal is worse than the Red Line. The Red Line doesn't come close to a core city. Gateway goes to Union Depot. The preferred alignment also looks like it will hit Metropolitan State University, Sun Ray, 3M as well as a number of St. Paul business/multi-family nodes along a fairly dense urban corridor. The built environment of the Red Line is purely suburban.

The eastern end is really bad, but the other half could be a solid urban transit line.

That's true, the Ramsey County portion has some promise. Too bad the lead agency (and seemingly the one really pushing it politically) is Washington County. It really should be the other way around. If Washington County wants to run all day express service from the Manning Avenue Park & Ride in Lake Elmo, then they should do that.

Public meeting on Tuesday at the Ramsey County Courthouse, they will be going over the preferred mode and alignment

Preferred mode: Private automobile. Preferred alignment: Added capacity on 94.

The Ramsey County Regional Rail Authority will host a public hearing Tuesday on the preferred mode and alignment for the Gateway Corridor between St. Paul and Woodbury.

This would've been good to add. http://finance-commerce.com/transit/201 ... r-tuesday/
It's not the people who are talking about the preferred way, it's the county