D Line - Chicago-Fremont/Emerson Rapid Bus

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Re: D Line - Chicago-Fremont/Emerson Rapid Bus

Postby Anondson » May 14th, 2019, 5:44 pm

This will be an amazing take to compare after it is built. Remember it.

http://www.startribune.com/counterpoint ... 509927842/

That the writer is a member of a business association against BRT makes me suspicious it’s written in good faith concern.

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Re: D Line - Chicago-Fremont/Emerson Rapid Bus

Postby mattaudio » May 14th, 2019, 6:41 pm

There are so many false claims presented as the basis for this argument.

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Re: D Line - Chicago-Fremont/Emerson Rapid Bus

Postby DanPatchToget » May 14th, 2019, 8:20 pm

I don't know about Chicago, but Emerson and Fremont are pretty narrow. I tried the 5 through North Minneapolis in the winter and it was a tight squeeze with all the snow we got, so my main concern is how the D Line will perform after heavy snowfall.

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Re: D Line - Chicago-Fremont/Emerson Rapid Bus

Postby karen nelson » May 21st, 2019, 11:30 am

This will be an amazing take to compare after it is built. Remember it.

http://www.startribune.com/counterpoint ... 509927842/

That the writer is a member of a business association against BRT makes me suspicious it’s written in good faith concern.
This is just trying to throw anything at aBRT to create fear and loathing.

As far as I'm concerned the aBRT is best for BRT and the suburban BRT with dedicated lanes is not my favorite. Running aBRT on highly used bus routes already is great incremental, virtuous cycle thing and A Line, tho slightly different type of streets, has already proven its a winner. Yes, each route will have its own issues, but fewer stations with quicker loading bus will likely be a push at the worst in terms of traffic congestion.

The funny thing is 10 years from now, if Met Transit proposed removing the 48th street station or whole BRT line altogether, businesses association will likely protest its removal. We are already seeing transit specific development along the A Line, people really like to ride these BRT buses, they will only get nicer as electric buses take over in coming years. Once all the A-E lines are in, along with Green and Blue LRT, there will be so many places to live and work along high quality, high frequency transit a few minute walk away, it will make a very appealing system.

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Re: D Line - Chicago-Fremont/Emerson Rapid Bus

Postby MNdible » May 21st, 2019, 11:36 am

I mean, he's not wrong about this.
The problem lies with the proposed construction of concrete cutouts or “curb-outs” at the stops for the planned D Line buses. The “curb-outs” are designed as concrete extensions of existing sidewalks into the driving lanes on the street, which would eliminate the parking spaces and block the bicycle lanes currently at those areas. The curbing would be raised to match the height of the D Line bus doors, making ingress and egress into the new buses easier. While this may be nice, what is notable is that the D Line buses would not be pulling over to the curb to pick up and drop off passengers, as is the case with the current Route 5 buses, but would stay in the existing traffic lane — and the only traffic lane — to do so. There would be no way for cars to get around the buses. No matter how “short” a stop by D Line buses is (15 seconds, 25 seconds, or whatever), the resulting delays would be extremely frustrating for the drivers of cars and other vehicles behind them.

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Re: D Line - Chicago-Fremont/Emerson Rapid Bus

Postby LakeCharles » May 21st, 2019, 12:05 pm

Well that is not true at all for the whole northern half of the line, nor the section south of 62, only for the part cutting through South Minneapolis between downtown and 62 (<40% of the line). And for that section, there is a pair of 3 lane one way roads 1/10th of a mile away for cars to drive on.

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Re: D Line - Chicago-Fremont/Emerson Rapid Bus

Postby amiller92 » May 21st, 2019, 12:42 pm

I mean, he's not wrong about this.
The problem lies with the proposed construction of concrete cutouts or “curb-outs” at the stops for the planned D Line buses. The “curb-outs” are designed as concrete extensions of existing sidewalks into the driving lanes on the street, which would eliminate the parking spaces and block the bicycle lanes currently at those areas. The curbing would be raised to match the height of the D Line bus doors, making ingress and egress into the new buses easier. While this may be nice, what is notable is that the D Line buses would not be pulling over to the curb to pick up and drop off passengers, as is the case with the current Route 5 buses, but would stay in the existing traffic lane — and the only traffic lane — to do so. There would be no way for cars to get around the buses. No matter how “short” a stop by D Line buses is (15 seconds, 25 seconds, or whatever), the resulting delays would be extremely frustrating for the drivers of cars and other vehicles behind them.
If drivers find Chicago to be too slow - it's already not exactly high speed through this stretch, thankfully - they will find other routes. There's plenty of alternative capacity in the nearby grid. As he notes, Park and Portland are not far away and it's not at all unreasonable to ask the people already in a car to divert a few blocks instead of those on the bus.

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Re: D Line - Chicago-Fremont/Emerson Rapid Bus

Postby MNdible » May 21st, 2019, 1:20 pm

You're right.

Still, you could design the street section in such a way that this wasn't the case. And I suspect that it's a detail that even those who've been paying attention may not have fully understood, and one that might make a lot of people (present company of course excluded) upset when they eventually come to understand it. Hence, you know, writing an opinion piece in the Strib.

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Re: D Line - Chicago-Fremont/Emerson Rapid Bus

Postby Tcmetro » May 21st, 2019, 1:30 pm

The design on Penn Ave is also like this. I've seen this stop design implemented in Seattle along their Rapid Ride lines as well.

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Re: D Line - Chicago-Fremont/Emerson Rapid Bus

Postby amiller92 » May 21st, 2019, 2:08 pm

If you've ever watched how people drive around buses, you might think that it's a good thing that people aren't going to be able to fail to yield to the bus or turn in front of it. I mean, if you think the speed of the bus and the safety of pedestrians are higher priorities than the speed of (mostly single-occupancy) cars.

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Re: D Line - Chicago-Fremont/Emerson Rapid Bus

Postby jtoemke » May 21st, 2019, 2:14 pm

You're right.

Still, you could design the street section in such a way that this wasn't the case. And I suspect that it's a detail that even those who've been paying attention may not have fully understood, and one that might make a lot of people (present company of course excluded) upset when they eventually come to understand it. Hence, you know, writing an opinion piece in the Strib.
I have to assume that they are doing this in order to ensure it is the case. Bus bulb outs speed up bus traffic. Yes its a trade off that lowers personal vehicle speeds, which I believe is all a package that is being intentionally planned.

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Re: D Line - Chicago-Fremont/Emerson Rapid Bus

Postby tmart » May 21st, 2019, 2:20 pm

You're right.

Still, you could design the street section in such a way that this wasn't the case. And I suspect that it's a detail that even those who've been paying attention may not have fully understood, and one that might make a lot of people (present company of course excluded) upset when they eventually come to understand it. Hence, you know, writing an opinion piece in the Strib.
I have to assume that they are doing this in order to ensure it is the case. Bus bulb outs speed up bus traffic. Yes its a trade off that lowers personal vehicle speeds, which I believe is all a package that is being intentionally planned.
Yup, the pattern the author identified is only a problem if your planning model is to maximize volume and speeds of private single-occupancy cars and then squeeze in some space for transit and people on foot/bikes/etc in whatever scraps are leftover. It's understandable to start with that perspective given this has been the dominant model in Minnesota (and most of the US) for decades, but look where it's gotten us.

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Re: D Line - Chicago-Fremont/Emerson Rapid Bus

Postby MNdible » May 21st, 2019, 3:14 pm

How surprising that everybody here sees this as a non-issue. I'm sure everybody else will agree.

Just a couple rando-thoughts:
1. Of the elements of the aBRT system that improve bus speed, the bumpouts are down the list, and their benefits could mostly be achieved by signal timing and far-side stops. So, lots of angst caused for little benefit gained.
2. We're not talking about reducing the speed of traffic from 35 to 25 or even 15. We're talking about a bus blocking all traffic for hopefully not very long, but potentially a while should a rider need extra attention, etc.
3. Right now, this is just Chicago. But eventually, the aBRT plan would extend this to essentially every N-S commercial avenue in South Minneapolis.

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Re: D Line - Chicago-Fremont/Emerson Rapid Bus

Postby Tiller » May 21st, 2019, 3:26 pm

I get the frustration of a bus stopping ahead of you when driving. It's also frustrating when your bus stops to pick up/drop off people, and cars don't let it back in, refusing to yield. Transit riders can't avoid those cars failing to yield, but cars can take an alternate route.

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Re: D Line - Chicago-Fremont/Emerson Rapid Bus

Postby Silophant » May 21st, 2019, 5:31 pm

3. Right now, this is just Chicago. But eventually, the aBRT plan would extend this to essentially every N-S commercial avenue in South Minneapolis.
How many of them are 2-lane, though? Even a 3-lane road, which is probably the best we can hope for for Hennepin, Lyndale, Cedar, etc, would negate the issue.
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Re: D Line - Chicago-Fremont/Emerson Rapid Bus

Postby Multimodal » May 21st, 2019, 9:41 pm

Optimizing our streets for cars is so last century.

It’s time everyone else gets priority.

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Re: D Line - Chicago-Fremont/Emerson Rapid Bus

Postby EOst » May 22nd, 2019, 7:18 am

This is one of those cases where "whether I am right" is less important than "how will people react to this, whether I am right or not". I'm with MNdible that there could be a significant backlash to this once it's built as planned.

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Re: D Line - Chicago-Fremont/Emerson Rapid Bus

Postby Multimodal » May 22nd, 2019, 8:02 am

Mother Nature’s backlash against climate change will be much bigger than any motorists’ backlash against a bus.

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Re: D Line - Chicago-Fremont/Emerson Rapid Bus

Postby mattaudio » May 22nd, 2019, 8:13 am

This is fine (for motorists). There's already delivery trucks stopped in the bike lane quite often, and motorists are able to get through just fine. One of the wonderful things about 48th and Chicago is how motorists genuinely feel encouraged to slow down well below 30 MPH. We could use that along the rest of the corridor.

Finally, if motorists are going to whine about getting stuck behind a bus every fourth block, why are they not excited to no longer have to slow down for buses going into and out of stops on the other three intervening blocks as they do today?

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Re: D Line - Chicago-Fremont/Emerson Rapid Bus

Postby twincitizen » May 23rd, 2019, 3:06 pm

Ummm...so is the D Line going to make the cut on the $500M bonding bill that Walz & the legislative leaders agreed to in concept? Keep your eyes peeled for that special session announcement. I assume MoveMN will plan a day of action or whatever it takes to ensure the D Line's inclusion in that bill.

Not getting funded this year likely pushes back the D Line construction start from 2020 to 2021. The opening date is already kinda fuzzy. Late 2021 opening is optimistic, but realistically probably June 2022, just like the A and C Lines opened 6 months late. I'm gonna be pissed if the opening date gets pushed back any later than June 2022. This needs to be fully funded, now.


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