Opening Arguments

With tomorrow being the day for official Opening Arguments on the ODOT Boulevard fiasco, in which ODOT wants to build an $80 million boulevard, the reason for the exorbitant cost being a large earthen ramp section of elevated freeway that will carry the boulevard over Reno, Classen, and Western avenues on the western edge of downtown. The mission of urbanists and government watchdogs is simple: To prevent this misuse of funds and redirect it instead to something that improves downtown, rather than damages it.

Downtown is important - it is where the majority of Oklahoma City's GDP is generated, it is the cultural and entertainment center of our metropolitan area, it is where young professionals moving to our city want to live, and it is the basis for the overwhelming majority of OKC's positive appearances in the national media. For fear of redundancy, allow me to stress that ODOT's earthen-ramp suburban freeways are not the basis for OKC's positive appearances in national media. Before I move on to the next point, here it is only fitting to conclude that ODOT must treat downtown uniquely from how it treats every other roadway in our state, which is shameful enough. This means that downtown, we do not need a new freeway where one was just removed, and those at-grade roadways need to be conducive to pedestrians, bicyclists, school children, Thunder/concert crowds, and just life in general. 

People live well downtown, and it shows - when you see people on a leisurely morning bike ride, or running an errand on the new OKC Spokies bike share system, walking their dog through Bricktown, or the throngs of people enjoying evening drinks on rooftops scattered across downtown. Whether or not these folks have a downtown address yet, these people are living their lives downtown - and that has been a very good thing for improving OKC's reputation over the last decade. These people do not need their lives disrupted by a new elevated, earthen-ramp freeway. Downtown's growth potential does not need to take a hit so that ODOT can move more cars than ever, faster than ever, during peak periods while the road sits empty all other times. Or more likely, downtown's future development does not need to be stunted just so that someone with ODOT ties can get a payoff as is common with their road projects. OKC's national reputation does not need to take a hit from building a misguided freeway downtown. All ODOT is doing is inducing traffic, rather than solving it, with their "our way or the highway" mentality of forcing highways on cities and refusing to even listen to other disciplines that have had considerably more success in combating traffic problems. 

This is why it is so important for a, urban planner, even if it's just one planner up against a cartel of public engineers, to have at least a say in major projects that will shape downtown for decades to come. That has not happened here. Not a single urban planner, or for that matter anyone not a public engineer, has been involved in this process.

Hello, this is ODOT, and we're going to build this highway

It all started back in 1998, when I was still a kid growing up in OKC, when City leaders first learned of ODOT's plans and tried to abate them then. Anyone wanting to know more about the timeline of how this came about, Steve Lackmeyer wrote an excellent context piece here complete with a flashback write-up that he did after ODOT chose the route in 1998, concluding with a tidbit on then-ODOT chief Neal McCaleb's disdain that the press would show up when he selected the route. McCaleb tried kicking Lackmeyer and his colleague, Jack Money, out of the meeting to no avail, and ended up settling for biting comments for public transparency. This is ironic because ODOT has predicated their insistence on the already-chosen route and proposal on "fulfilling a promise" (more like a threat) to OKC leaders back in the 90s. Even if their mumbojumbo was accurate about "fulfilling a promise," that still seeks to exclude all of downtown's growth, all of OKC's new residents, and all of OKC's <30 young professionals. When new residents and young professionals are so excluded from the public process, they are significantly likelier to move somewhere that they feel more appreciated. This is a fact backed up by studies. Yes, we should have known the boulevard would happen like this, however, we had a mayor who also lied to us when he told us the whole thing would be at-grade and conveniently excluded that Western/Classen/Reno intersections would not be. However this isn't about egos or getting the record right; This is about getting the finished product right.

Then there was the EIS. For those who don't understand public engineer jargon, the EIS is the environmental impact statement, which is required as a part of the FTA grant process (getting road projects funded federally). The EIS is supposed to outline the project scope and its impact on the surroundings, and is supposed to be finalized before the project may commence. Below is the text of the I-40 Crosstown Relocation EIS; Sections 3&5 are relevant to the Boulevard project:

3.0 ALTERNATIVES CONSIDERED"This chapter describes the alternatives and summarizes the evaluation process."3.4.1 Tier One Evaluation3.4.2 Short List of Build Alternatives RefinementAlternative D"A six-lane at-grade boulevard would be constructed in the existing I-40 right-of-way from east of the Union Pacific tracks at the I-235 interchange to west of Walker Avenue; however, from west of Walker Avenue to Western Avenue, the existing I-40 bridge structure would be rehabilitated. From Western to Agnew Avenues, the existing I-40 facility would be converted to a divided boulevard."3.4.6 Tier Two EvaluationProject Construction Time and Implementation Difficulty"Alternative D’s Phase I construction would achieve the full traffic flow benefits projected for Alternative D because only the boulevard construction would remain for Phase II."Access to Downtown"The proposed boulevard from I-235 to Agnew Avenue will provide improved access to Bricktown and the downtown area from eastbound and westbound traffic."3.5 Preferred Alternative"As a result of the Tier-Two evaluation, the ODOT selected Alternative D as the locally preferred alternative because this alternative provides a ten-lane facility approximately 2,200 feet south of the existing I-40 alignment and involves converting the existing I-40 facility to a downtown business route. This business route would maintain the current at-grade freeway from Agnew to Western Avenues and bridge structure from Western Avenue to west of Walker Avenue and reconstruct the existing I-40 facility from west of Walker to I-235 as an at-grade six-lane boulevard with at-grade intersections at the downtown cross streets."5.0 ENVIRONMENTAL CONSEQUENCES"This chapter presents potential beneficial and adverse social, economic, and environmental effects for the proposed relocation and construction of the I-40 Crosstown Expressway..."5.2 NOISE IMPACTS AND VIBRATION ANALYSIS5.2.a Traffic Noise"The FHWA has established the Noise Abatement Criteria (NAC) for various land use activity areas that are used as one of two means to determine when a traffic noise impact will occur.""When a traffic noise impact occurs, noise abatement measures must be considered. A noise measure is any positive action taken to reduce an activity area’s traffic noise impact""Alternative D’s boulevard alignment was modeled at 45 mph from Robinson Avenue to Classen Boulevard and at 60 mph from Classen Boulevard to Agnew Avenue.""As shown in Table 5-5, the projected noise levels with Alternative D would approach, equal, or exceed the receptor activity categories B and C’s NAC; therefore, this alternative would result in traffic noise impacts and mitigation measures must be considered in accordance with the 1996 ODOT Policy Directive, “Highway Noise Abatement.” This policy states that mitigation will not be considered for commercial or industrial areas or for those areas that are trending to commercial or industrial land use."5.2c Vibration Impact Analysis"There are no federal or state standards or regulations regarding traffic-induced vibration."5.3 LAND USE IMPACTS"The existing I-40 facility between the I-235/I-35 interchange and the Agnew/Villa interchange would be replaced under Alternative D with a boulevard. The current at-grade freeway would be converted to a boulevard from Agnew to Western Avenues. From Western Avenue to west of Walker Avenue, the existing I-40 bridge structure would be rehabilitated. From west of Walker Avenue to I-235, the boulevard would be a divided, multi-lane, grade-level facility with at-grade intersections with major cross streets and this is where land use impacts would occur.""The boulevard's north side for the first two blocks west of the Burlington Northern and Santa Fe railroad would front the new indoor sports arena. The first block on the south side fronts an Oklahoma Gas and Electric facility and that use is not expected to change. The remainder of the boulevard corridor frontage will consist of over six linear blocks of vacant land and approximately seven blocks of commercial, industrial, and some institutional development on either side of the facility, including parking lots. Of the vacant land, most is zoned industrial, but one block is zoned residential, and another is currently unzoned since it falls entirely within the existing ROW. Transforming the existing facility to a grade-level boulevard with at-grade access to cross streets, would provide the incentive for commercial development on vacant land and, commercial redevelopment of existing industrial properties along the boulevard would increase. The least impact would be no change in existing land use and, no requests for rezoning if market demand were to be stagnant. The greatest impact would be commercial development or mixed commercial and industrial development on all vacant lands and possible commercial redevelopment of existing industrial properties. This would require rezoning currently zoned residential and industrial properties. The current commercial zoning along the north side of the proposed boulevard between the sports arena site and Hudson Avenue is consistent with the ULI’s “Downtown Oklahoma City” plan. Those two blocks are within the plan’s designated downtown entertainment district. Similar development along the south side of the boulevard would also be consistent with the plan, given the area’s designation as a “flex” district, which is designed to capture expanded downtown development. North of the boulevard and west of Hudson Avenue, the ULI plan designates residential, loft apartment redevelopment of appropriate commercial warehouse structures. The land fronting the boulevard in this area includes vacant lots and is zoned for industrial uses. Market incentives and planning and development policies could guide new area development and redevelopment, rather than the expected commercial development. The overall effects of converting existing I-40 to a boulevard could have positive land use impacts on the downtown area."5.5 HISTORIC AND ARCHAEOLOGICAL PRESERVATION IMPACTS"Developing a grade-level boulevard serving the downtown area along the current I-40 alignment would change the SW 3rd Street Industrial District's visual setting. The change may bring the district closer to the original historic context, which included grade-level city streets. Therefore, this is anticipated to be a beneficial impact. Impacts to other historic resources would not be likely."5.14 JOINT DEVELOPMENT"ODOT recognizes the strategies identified in the City of Oklahoma City's land use and mitigation plan for implementing Alternative D. Alternative D would provide access to Bricktown's south end and downtown. Also, the urban boulevard would provide additional access to potential development sites between Walker and Western Avenues."5.15 CONSTRUCTION IMPACTS"For Alternative D, improving the existing alignment to a boulevard is scheduled after the new facility is completed. Vehicles crossing I-40 along this section would experience occasional delays or be directed to alternate crossings."5.18 VISUAL IMPACTS"Adding a street-level boulevard along the existing raised facility would also shorten the visual distance between the Riverside neighborhood and the downtown."5.19 PEDESTRIANS AND BICYCLISTS"The boulevards associated with Alternatives B-3 and D offer the opportunity for east-west bicycle and pedestrian travel, as well.""Alternative D would include converting the existing alignment to a landscaped boulevard. This proposed facility was analyzed for its impacts to non-motorist activities. Crossings, which would merit attention as possible bicycle routes, include the same facilities as for Alternative B-3 (Agnew, Pennsylvania, Western, Walker, and Robinson Avenues and Shields Boulevard), with the addition of Reno and Classen. The facility would cross the Bricktown Canal Trail, but would present no greater impact than the existing I-40 facility. Using the I-40 ROW as a boulevard would have slight or no impact upon non-motorist access to nearby public schools. The current alignment is a boundary feature for Capitol Hill, Wilson, and Shidler Elementary School feeder areas, which means that students attending these schools should not have to cross the boulevard. The boulevard alignment is a prominent feature in the Mark Twain Elementary School feeder area. Although changing existing I-40 to a boulevard would result in a less imposing physical barrier for non-motorists, a boulevard would present greater opportunities for non-motorist conflicts with motorists than the present limited-access configuration. These conflicts could be minimized by using signalized crosswalks to allow non-motorist crossings without vehicular turning movements. Other possible safety measures include bicycle lanes, intersection design with places for pedestrians to stand at street corners and on the median, all-way red lights for pedestrian crossings, and raised crosswalks where larger pedestrian crossing numbers are anticipated. Because other existing pedestrian and bicycle activity centers, including downtown, the Myriad Center, and the Bricktown District, are concentrated north of the existing I-40 alignment, using the present I-40 alignment as a boulevard would divert vehicular traffic away from these non-motorist activities and result in improved safety. The bicycle/pedestrian impacts of the proposed boulevard along the present I-40 alignment would likewise depend upon the ultimate facility design. While a boulevard potentially would represent more opportunities for non-motorist conflicts with vehicles than a controlled-access highway, abutting boulevard land uses and facility design would also be important considerations. Facilities that attract special-event, tourist, shopping, and cultural activities, would necessitate slower speeds and painted and signalized crosswalks. Additionally, where warranted by the pedestrian traffic levels, elevated crosswalks should be considered. Through traffic will be encouraged to use the new I-40 alignment."5.23c Economic Impacts"The property tax base in the affected study area could be enhanced by potential commercial development and redevelopment in available areas along the proposed boulevard under Alternative D."5.24 ADDITIONAL MITIGATION"Downtown access concerns have been addressed by identifying three boulevard options associated with Alternative D. These options included maintaining the existing I-40 facility; constructing the six-lane at-grade boulevard from I-235, east to Agnew Avenue; and providing a modified boulevard combining the other two options. The preferred option is the modified boulevard that provides a downtown business route. This option involves retaining the current at-grade freeway from Agnew to Western Avenues and bridge structure from Western to west of Walker Avenues and reconstructing the existing I-40 facility from west of Walker to I-235 as an at-grade six-lane boulevard with at-grade intersections at the downtown cross streets." USDOT - RECORD OF DECISION"The decision is to select the preferred alternative, Alternative D, as described in the FEIS.""The selected alternative will provide a six-lane at-grade boulevard in the existing I-40 right-of-way from east of the Union Pacific tracks at the I-235 interchange to west of Walker Avenue. From west of Walker Avenue to Western Avenue, the existing I-40 bridge structure will be rehabilitated. From Western Avenue, west to Agnew Avenue, the existing facility will be converted to a divided boulevard."

In case anyone is confused by all of this jargon, I highlighted the parts of the EIS that are incorrect and in need of updating. Why is this relevant? Why does any of this matter? Because ODOT is claiming that they can not do an at-grade boulevard all the way to Western because they have to fulfill their obligations in the EIS, not that this has ever mattered before for ODOT (they broke the hell out of the EIS for I-235 in their quest to demolish downtown's black community, Deep Deuce, in its entirety). So not only is the moral of the story that ODOT lies, but also that ODOT expects us to not read this stuff, to just go away eventually, and let them get back to their work. The most glaring omission is the fact that the old Crosstown viaduct no longer exists, and therefor it is not possible to "rehabilitate the existing bridge structure." The EIS needs to be redone anyway, and this is hardly an impediment specifically to changing the plans to make them more urban. If the EIS has to be redone, causing delays on the project that will be justified to get it right, it will not be because OKC demanded a Better Boulavard, but instead because the Feds decided to reign in ODOT which has a long, storied history of breaking these documents. But it's okay ODOT, Mick Cornett and Eric Wenger also have a habit of telling lies.

Furthermore, they conclude that the boulevard has little impact on schools because it is nowhere near any schools. This is inaccurate as well due to the construction that will begin next year on the new Downtown Elementary which will back-up to none other than the BOULEVARD. Nowhere near any schools, right.

Opportunity squashed
Due to the new I-40's only downtown exits being at either Shields/Robinson or a full exit at Western Avenue, where the majority of people entering from SW or NW OKC come into downtown, Western Avenue is now the front door to downtown. It is our less-than-grand entrance to downtown. Blighted for blocks, congested and jammed like no other city street at 5 o'clock, Western has traffic counts to make development happen - all of those downtown workers taking Western to get on the highway heading home will stare at whatever properties line the ROW, so they might as well stare at redevelopment.

The group, Friends for a Better Boulevard, of which I am certainly informally a part of, has envisioned a grand entrance to downtown where people currently sit in traffic along Western. They are proposing the Market Circle, along the Boulevard at the Reno/Classen/Western intersections, and the Thunder Circle, along the Boulevard in between the Chesapeake Arena and new MAPS3 Downtown Park. In the Market Circle the pro-bono architects have envisioned an arch way that gives OKC the opportunity to realize a turn-of-the-century plan by legendary architect Solomon Layton (State Capitol, Colcord, Skirvin, et al.) to have a Veterans Memorial Arch in the middle of Lincoln Boulevard. Those plans, along with the Capitol dome (a bad idea) were never realized. However, often the best new plans incorporate good old ideas, that came about for a reason. This traffic circle proposal will catalyze a boom of dense development west of downtown and generate significant economic development for OKC. Here is an excerpt from a recent article by Lackmeyer on Film Row and west downtown's development boom (this quote is Film Row redeveloper Chip Fudge talking about several building projects and predicting that south of Film Row will be a hot spot):

With all this activity, and Devon Energy Center in the foreground, friends are no longer mocking Fudge for plowing his money into “skid row.”
“Life is good,” Fudge said. “My friends who thought I was nuts for doing this initially now think I'm brilliant. Really, I'm just lucky. We're continuing to buy property in the area. And if the boulevard (planned along the alignment of the old Interstate 40) goes in at ground level as I expect, I think the area south of here will be the next hot spot.”

Read more here.

There is also the matter of the Farmer's Market, which is what lies south of Film Row, and concurrently the city and a group of citizens are trying to revitalize. Currently it has been repurposed as an events center taking advantage of its beautiful mission-style architecture, but there may be plans in the future to bring back a permanent outdoor market and engage historic redevelopment in this area. The Farmer's Market is an extremely historic center of commerce for OKC, and my own grandfather used to work there long ago. In fact, back then, the entire clan worked there selling produce which was not a bad living back before WWII. The Farmer's Market was a magnet of middle class life in Oklahoma City back then, just as the once-beautifully landscaped Canadian River waterfront was with Wheeler Park and Delmar Gardens. This market-area masterplan seeks to bring back both the tranquility and the commerce:

Unfortunately for ODOT, all of these are things we are not willing to sacrifice just so that ODOT can pay somebody off and move on more easily to the next project. All of these visions, especially the hope for a grand entrance into downtown, and also the hope to revitalize the areas south of downtown such as the market area and the riverside, are all endangered by this elevated freeway plan. This is also a plan that was most recently articulated by highway engineers who weren't aware that the streetcar would run on rails in the Boulevard. How do you get through to these people, as oblivious as they are, aside from political means? At the state level it is time to pursue correcting and reforming ODOT, but in the interim, at the civic level, we have to engage to protect our city and any other plans ODOT simply isn't aware of.

Those seem to include the Downtown Elementary, the Downtown Streetcar, Farmer's Market revitalization, Core2Shore revitalization, Film Row/Arts District redevelopment, and the very idea of downtown development on the whole. All of these ODOT is either ignorant or hostile to, and all of these kinds of projects have proven to be the essential ingredients in the recipe for an OKC reborn. What does OKC reborn mean and why is it important? Because too many of us remember a river that had to be mowed, too many of us remember wrestling and minor-league arena football being the main attraction in town, too many of us remember Wal-mart being the only place to shop, and too many of us remember an OKC that was essentially no more than an extended truck stop between LA and Chicago. Today those are merely insulting reminders of how far OKC has come in its quest to justify itself as a "big league city" and even cast itself in similar fashion to truly "world-class cities."

The ODOT earthen ramp is not world-class, hell, it's not even bush-league. It is embarrassing. ODOT has pushed OKC around too much for the last two decades, and it's time for OKC to take a stand. They bulldozed all of Deep Deuce, the downtown black community, and built a suburban depressed freeway (I-235) where there used to be a dense, urban neighborhood. They forced the I-40 Crosstown Relocation against the city's will. Then, they decimated the railyard behind Union Station which will add billions in cost when we get around to building the commuter rail that is planned, which the city idly watched them do, while a few enraged citizens went away kicking and screaming (Tom Elmore). Now they are taking our best site for urban redevelopment and giving us a highway mound of dirt and grass that will have to be mowed while it isn't dead and brown, like grass all over Oklahoma.

This isn't the revenge of Tom Elmore. This is the culmination of ODOT's years-long recent legacy in Downtown OKC, and a decision that needs to be made whether we want to hear only ideas that come from highway engineers or if urban planners should also be brought into the fold. Urban planners and design specialists, being the folks who gave us entertainment in Bricktown and large-scale gentrification in what was left standing of Deep Deuce, Automobile Alley, and Mid-town. Today these areas are surprisingly decent and growing better with each new development, despite the unfortunate past these areas have endured until now. The choice seems pretty simple.

Oh yeah, route is final!

One of the ironic things about the MAPS 3 drama from this week (in case you haven't heard, ADG came out with this "study"), is that lost in all this in-fighting on committees (and the transit project being forced to defend itself from an unwarranted attack piece) is that the route is FINAL! Yes indeed.

It came out a few weeks ago that the BNSF underpasses leading into Bricktown would in fact be conducive to to provide enough clearance for the streetcar, which makes it an easy, viable option for connecting Bricktown and Deep Deuce to points west of the BNSF viaduct, which has had significant implications for the streetcar route planning process, which had been leaving open the likely possibility that those underpasses were not conducive. As a result of this discovery, the route is now finished: Here is the link to the route map on OKC.gov.

Here is the finalized route with a few graphic upgrades to help some of you guys pinpoint the route.

Ever better than Muenster cheese...

I love this because it demonstrates that the main tenets of good planning, in this case multi-modal transportation, isn't just cool or trendy. It's strategic. It aims to create a better and more functional environment.

Transit Subcommittee Mtg

My apologies for how posting has slowed down so much, basically I am still adjusting to coming back from Europe, and I am also waiting on my camera to arrive by post (I left my nice camera over there). But I did manage to make it to the MAPS3 Transit/Streetcar subcommittee meeting today.

I can't say it was all that eventful of a meeting, honestly. They did accept a report, rather than receive it. Apparently there is a very important distinction here. This is the kind of mundane, mind-scraping technicalities that the real public servants have to go through. This is what makes it harder to really serve (effectively) on these committees rather than just sit on a blog and criticize every move.

Some details emerging so far:
The hub will be a 3-phase project, and in total, it will cost around $125 million. This is just for the hub facility alone. The building itself, the Santa Fe Depot, will cost $2.5 million, and then it will probably cost another $2 million to renovate, according to one of the consultants, when asked. The bulk of the cost is in Phase 2 which will ready the station for Amtrak and commuter rail service--Amtrak preparations will cost $50 million alone and it is unclear how much of this can be covered by other levels of government, but I would assume a lot of it.

Consultants also spoke of how keen Norman was on the idea of commuter rail. The thing is that Norman is perhaps the most progressive city in Central Oklahoma, and has been highly supportive of transit issues in the region for a long time. A few years ago they even wrote a resolution against the destruction of the Union Station railyard, and that was at the behest of Tom Elmore, who even OKC's most ardent transit enthusiasts have distanced themselves from--despite that he does know his stuff. Norman has its own nice downtown that transit can be a catalyst for.

Those who stuck around were shown a tour of the Santa Fe Depot after the meeting, which began right after most of the MAPS3 Transit Subcommittee had finished jay-walking across E.K. Gaylord. It goes without saying it is a beautiful old building. Jill Adler, one of the subcommittee members, had a really awesome idea of somehow commemorating the former black-only waiting room in a way that memorializes OKC's civil rights history. I hope that happens.

We are a state that leads in transportation

--According to Bobby Stern, the executive director of the Oklahoma Association of General Contractors. I kid you not, read his op-ed column published by the Oklahoman. Apparently Fallin, Inhofe, Langford, and Cole are leading our state in transportation similar to the 1992 USA Olympic team. I need to get in contact with him regarding whatever he is smoking.

FACT: Oklahoma has the 2nd-most miles of bad roads in the nation.
FACT: OKC has the worst public transit of any major U.S. city.
FACT: Oklahoma leads the nation in diverting transit funds to other places.
FACT: Oklahoma doesn't invest jack squat into public infrastructure.

Greetings from Tram-sterdam

Just got back from a 4-day weekend in Amsterdam, which was absolutely amazing. What an incredible city. What an incredible test tube for urbanism. It's hard not to be interested in the trams from an American standpoint at this point in time, with so many cities wanting to adopt modern streetcar, and it's so easy to be quickly overwhelmed by the size and scope of some of these European transit systems. Amsterdam's trams..just wow. Unfortunately my camera died on my second day, but here's one photo:

Keep in mind, that Amsterdam is possibly one of the world's most famous cities for transit, but it's not the trams that earned it that reputation: it's bicycles. The city is the most bicycle-friendly place in the world, and it goes without saying you haven't experiences Amsterdam until you've spent an entire day on bike.

The tram system actually reminds me of a significantly enhanced version of the Toronto streetcar, with an intense network of mostly linear tram lines:

[Might have to open the pic in a new window to get to see it] So it's amazing that a city of about 800,000 people has all of these tram lines (granted at any given time tourists clearly outnumber locals). It's also amazing that it supports this in addition to a highly-developed underground metro system, commuter trains to other close-in regional cities, elevated rail similar to Chicago (they call theirs "the tube"), the bicycle-centric focus, and even the canals and River Amstel serve a transit function. It's truly a transit city. Not to mention so many areas in the Centre Ring are pedestrian-only.

I think perhaps all of these modes of transit have grown up around each other. At first it might appear to be a lot of competition for ridership--are the Dutch really that "on the move"? But then you realize, the simple fact is that having a car in Amsterdam is a nightmare! I saw it first-hand several times in the Centre Ring, and never more than when I saw a taxi trying to squeeze in with the bicycles and pedestrians through a crowded bridge a block from a busy weekend market in De Jordaan. Cars in Amsterdam simply go against the laws of physics.

Now obviously, this is not the case in any American city except perhaps NYC, and even NYC is packed full of too many cars. But the point still stands: there is no competition for ridership in a true transit-centered environment, as long as the different modes of transit each serve a real purpose. If Amsterdam was not the bicycle haven that it is, would the tram system be as well-used? Probably not. Would the commuter trains or even the inter-city trains to Den Haag and Utrecht be as heavily-utilized? Probably not.

Lesson that OKC can take from Amsterdam: In order for big-time streetcar utilization to work successfully, grow as many different complementary modes at once. This is why Project 180 coinciding with the streetcar timeline is actually an enormous opportunity, not a duplication of efforts. The city needs to do a lot to expand basic walkability and human access, including a real bicycle strategy that doesn't just involve the system of scenic park trails. That's not really what we need...

I see no reason OKC couldn't use a system of bicycle roads. Bicycle-only intersections, even bicycle round-abouts. Special bicycle lights at each intersection, some busier intersections even with dedicated bicycle left-turn lanes. Or at the very least, sidewalks on every street, that are actually usable. That would be a good start, even if it's just in the inner city! Perhaps I'm getting ahead of myself here and forgetting just how many 100s of years OKC is behind other cities in terms of basic sidewalk infrastructure. It is beyond embarrassing.

One great phrase you will never hear in OKC: Lekker fietstocht!

My streetcar proposal

I just wanted to once again draw people's attention to what I'd propose for a starter streetcar system:


How would I expand this and turn this into a city-wide system, you ask?

(The wide lines represent double tracks, although also keep in mind several single tracks are spaced just a block apart, effectively forming a double track/transit mall.)

Like this. Mostly, something divided into a northside system with 23rd Street as the main drag, and a southside system with Robinson Ave as the main feeder, and all of it coming together downtown. It would be a system with 3 separate hubs, a main hub downtown for the downtown-area streetcar lines and for cross-town transfers, and a north and south side hub to separately run those systems as efficiently as possible.

That is how I'd turn OKC into a big streetcar city once again. The lines look funny. The system is pretty big and overbearing. But it is quite simple when you break it down into southside and northside, with downtown being the point of emphasis between the two.

The starter system alignments matter. The future expansion alignments don't matter that much. As long as certain districts get served, it is not worth debating as much as the starter lines. The reason for the difference is that how a Phase 2 or 3 district gets served doesn't effect how other districts get served in the same way that how Mid-town is served will have MAJOR effects for how Plaza and Paseo get served, and so on.

I also want to say one thing intended directly for the subcommittee: You can't focus too much on development potential, because all of OKC has that, even North Broadway. Don't let someone tell you that Broadway is difficult to develop or already mostly developed, because that's insanity, and you're not a development task force, you're an infrastructure task force. You guys are experts on infrastructure and have studied streetcar systems, not development, and I assure you there are experts on OKC development in their own right, and they all have differing opinions of their own. You guys need to worry about initial ridership numbers and making sure that the starter system is successful. That means it needs to go somewhere and appeal to existing districts. You guys need to focus on the Bricktown, Mid-town, Arts District, CBD, Deep Deuce, Automobile Alley, and other districts. You need to connect those districts to be successful, and that involves actually touching them, not throwing bones. Be pragmatic about where people go downtown right NOW, not where they could go 20 years from now, which unfortunately won't come soon enough for the starter system.

The #2 city for transit is..

This just in: The #2 city for public transit, in the U.S., is... Salt Lake City! The irony is off the charts.

Please, no "180" monkey wrench for streetcars

My latest concern about the stewardship of the voter-approved MAPS sales tax is the lack of urgency from COTPA and Alternatives Analysis in coming out with the streetcar route. The streetcar will probably end up being the second MAPS 3 project after the park, and if I had my druthers the streetcar would be first but I'm nobody. I will say that not putting the streetcar project first in succession will hurt the streetcar project more than it would hurt any other project, and we're talking about the issue that carried ballot and had the highest voter favorability. The streetcar needs to be the priority of MAPS 3 because voters simply did not respond as positively to the Core2Shore stuff, particularly the convention center. If they were separately voted on, streetcar might have been the only high-dollar initiative that passed, and as much as City Hall wants to pretend this was not the case, it should translate into leverage for streetcar backers. That alone is concerning.

What is most concerning however is that there seems to be no effort to publicly cooperate with the Project 180 construction, which could lead to the biggest fear of anyone looking for transparency, private cooperation. Let me rank in order the best outcomes for cooperation between MAPS streetcars and Project 180:

1. Public cooperation between the two
2. No cooperation at all between the two
3. Private cooperation between the two

Let me explain: I am afraid that COTPA's "Let's Talk Transit" and all their alleged due-diligence could be a complete farce if they don't come out with something soon. There will be major cost savings if they can figure out where the streetcar is going to go, and that's just obvious. What's less obvious is who's to say they don't know that? I would not be surprised if they don't decide to just let the city engineers behind Project 180 make the route decisions and then circle the wagon later by saying, "Well, we just didn't plan around it soon enough, because this is how the roads got built. Shucks, now we gotta put the route through here." Or however COTPA/MAPS 3 would come out and say that (probably by saying something to maintain more public confidence than "shucks" would).

There are private citizens backing this who are confident they will get the best route, and they're confident that they will be able to find common ground with COTPA and City Hall in getting a comprehensive streetcar system that pleases everyone, all the stakeholders involved. But one way COTPA can usurp the give and take process is if they use Project 180 to tie their own hands. For example: Most everyone wants Sheridan to be a transit corridor but it is impossible to lay tracks going one direction (I think west bound) down Sheridan because of the utilities underneath that side of the road. So that will not be in the route, whereas going the other way down Sheridan will work, so far as we know now. I don't think COTPA is manipulative so much as they're just a typical dumb government agency, but it is plain to see how this could throw a wrench in the planning phase. With its effect on the streetcar route, the people in charge of deciding where utilities will be buried NEED to have a talk with the streetcar route planners.

COTPA has had MORE than enough time to plan this route. They got a ton of feedback and surely it doesn't take them this long to figure out how to go against all of it. I also realize that ACOG is still doing the transit hub study. That was began at the beginning of this year, and I think COTPA is capable of talking to ACOG. I mean, they office in the exact same building (I think).

I would honestly rather there be no planning coincide between the two if it's not completely public, and have a transparent process where we get the best streetcar route even if a mistake is made and it ends up costing a few more million dollars. I'm not saying that this is what I think is happening or someone has told me something that has me jumping to a conclusion, because that has not happened. What has happened is everything you see in the news since the measure passed at the ballot box by a good margin. I just haven't seen a whole lot since then that has bolstered my confidence in this process, and over my lifespan COTPA hasn't exactly earned a great deal of good will either, and my pessimism and relentless over this is, in my opinion, entirely warranted until MAPS 3 gives more hope for transparency and COTPA gives more hope for competence.

As bad as COTPA has been throughout the last 10 years, let's face it. They're a helluva lot better than the city engineers behind Project 180..the people who refuse to let go of E.K. Gaylord (despite the Chamber's offer to "fix it" for us) and the NE 2nd Street "Sidewalkgate." I have absolutely no confidence in the ability of them to get it right, and at least COTPA is using consultants who vaguely know what this urbanism thingy is about.

Houston traffic...

Much has been made about Houston traffic coming into conflict with the Light Rail that runs for several miles up and down Main Street between downtown and Relient Stadium (and through areas like the Texas Medical Center, Museum District, and Midtown Houston). They even did a feature on it here at LightRailNow.org. In 2004 alone there were 63 collisions with the LRT, which means more than one per week, a collision rate that is more than 25 times the national average for public transit trains that operate in street right of ways. I'll quote from LRN:

While several other cities, such as San Jose, Portland, Boston, New Orleans, Denver, and Salt Lake City, all have street-running light rail and streetcar systems, drivers in those cities for the most part seem to be able to avoid crashing into their trains. Unfortunately, that's not the case in Houston. The propensity of local drivers to smack into the new train system has even become national news.

The collision rate between cars and cars in Houston also goes without saying..as being quite high. In 2002 Houston had 12.45 traffic fatalities per 100,000 people, far higher than say, New York City (4.39). These are BAD statistics.

According to the INRIX National Traffic Scorecard Houston traffic is also quite epic, and it is the thing that many people especially know Houston for, a shame. Houston ranks #6, and by comparison, OKC ranks #40 and Dallas ranks #5 (after LA, NYC, Chicago, DC). I am personally promoting Houston to #5 because in my opinion Dallas has the best traffic out of any big city due to its overblown freeway system.

Houston traffic was also spotlighted by Budweiser's Real Men of Genius:



On a side note, for anyone interested in checking out Houston's cosmopolitan and international flavor, check out this really awesome photo set on SSC. Just to balance out the negative coverage of a city I love.

So the point is, yes, there have been collisions with LRT in Houston. I've heard a lot made out of that fact. But..look at the surrounding context of HOUSTON TRAFFIC. Again, to quote from LRN:

Furthermore, the Texas Transportation institute (TTI), which was recently hired by METRO to assess safety along the METRORail corridor, found no fundamental design flaws in the rail system itself that would contribute to the high rate of car-train collisions. However, these facts are generally ignored by local rail critics. METRO built the train down Main Street, they argue, so therefore METRO, not the city's careless drivers, is to blame.

Check out this awesome video from the Houston Metro "Danger Train." (nobody was fatally injured in any of these accidents luckily)


Houston, we have a problem. (But not any other city)

Traffic circles, streetcars, pedestrian malls, oh my!

I just want to congratulate anyone and everyone who participated in one of the Let's Talk Transit public forums and took their beliefs public. It's often so easy to sit behind a computer screen and type and keep typing until you've written a how-to essay on what you want to happen in OKC, but it's harder to make the time to meet people in person and go before a group of strangers including city leaders and state your case. Those who participated did just that and left COTPA with the impression that the community is interested and is watching. I want to thank COTPA as well for giving us the chance to do this through the public forums, for paying attention to everything we said, and also for giving me the opportunity to be the guest blogger. Without much further ado I'll go into more detail on a few key points:

Routes: We're being told that any routes we may see mapped out are only preliminary. I want streetcar planners to realize that we know these maps will be the starting point for their system planning, so we ARE going to analyze the routes. Just because they are "preliminary" doesn't mean they're only preliminary. On the Let's Talk Transit website, Walter Jenny made the following comment on a previous blog entry of mine:

- Identify the purpose of the streetcar. It's not to move people from Edmond to downtown, for example. It's to move people around downtown once they're there.

This got me thinking. I myself, and others as well, have said a LOT about the importance of connecting the Oklahoma Health Center to downtown but since stressing that importance I've been waffling on the issue. Blair Humphreys made his case in an OKC Central guest post that given the track miles we have to work with, it is not worth connecting the Health Center to downtown for the purpose of the lunch rush. Given the frequency of having streetcars run every 15 minutes and carrying less than 100 people in each run, he has a good point. Is the lunch rush the purpose for connecting both sides of I-235? Of course not, but the point remains.

One of the things I'm hearing a lot about is the lack of simplicity in any of COTPA's preliminary routes. A lot of people have suggested that the routes indicate not listening to the people who have clearly expressed a desire to see Sheridan, Walker, and Broadway. I contend however that the routes show COTPA is listening to everybody and not just the majority and the experts and FAILING to commit to ONE alignment through an area, and the complex web of streetcar they've drawn up does seem to touch virtually every street for at least one-two blocks. Someone needs to tell them it doesn't work that way. For example, you can't describe to an out-of-towner where they can catch the streetcar and where it goes without turning blue in the face. You also do need to COMMIT to a corridor and stick to those corridors instead of interweaving in order to please every proponent of every corridor. While I'm not certain of this route and while I realize it misses key areas such as Deep Deuce (although some Deep Deuce residents have told me they are used to walking), here is my proposal for SIMPLICITY:



That would be within the 7 miles we have to work with and within the physical constraints that each corridor seems to have. For instance, Sheridan can't have a double track going in both directions due to the heavy underground utilities that exist underneath the south half of the street (eastbound lanes). Other constraints involve the traffic circles, and others also involve the underpasses underneath the elevated BNSF railroad (they lack the clearance for streetcar cables). Sheridan however is by far the most popular corridor thus it NEEDS a streetcar line and more than the 3-4 blocks COTPA has proposed.

Not that the COTPA routes are all that bad. I think that the red route could be really awesome if slightly tailored, as such:

All I changed about the red route was instead of southbound cutting west to Robinson on 4th, I kept the streetcar going down Hudson until Park where it turns west to Robinson. By touching Hudson/Park you've got Arts District coverage that the streetcar didn't before. I like the idea of CBD coverage as well--most people's routes seem to touch all of the periphery neighborhoods that make up downtown but NOT the downtown skyscraper core. Just because an area doesn't currently have mixed-uses doesn't mean it lacks potential for streetcar vibrancy.

Traffic circles: In the $835 million 2007 General Obligation Bond that the citizens passed by almost 90%, apparently there was funding for several more traffic circles. Traffic circles have been making their entry to the downtown area over the last few years, most notably in the Midtown area on both sides of St Anthony's--10th and Walker has a traffic circle and 10th and Dewey also has a traffic circle. I love these traffic circles and not only do they make the intersections very efficient but they also go a long way toward creating defined space and anchoring an area with an interesting street form and well-maintained streetscapes (intensive planting in the middle of the traffic circle). These traffic circles are GOOD things. They are also helping to extend Classen Drive which cuts diagonally (NW/SE) between Midtown and Heritage Hills. In the Classen Drive extension there are new traffic circles proposed to go in at 9th and Hudson, 8th and Harvey, and I think stopping at 7th and Robinson. You can view the 2007 GO Bond projects here at okc.gov. Getting to the point: These traffic circles are going to affect the route and we need to figure out what the deal is with these traffic circles SOON and before going any further.

There are surely some solutions to cutting through a traffic circle as well. The OKC traffic circles have too sharp of a turning radius for a streetcar to actually navigate the curve normally but perhaps a traffic signaling system similar to crosswalk lights (embedded street lights in the pavement that flash, stopping traffic when a pedestrian pushes a button) could be used and the streetcar route could just cut through the center pavers inside the traffic circle. Granted, you would still not be able to have a streetcar curve or intersection in the middle of a traffic circle, you just might be able to transect it evenly. Maybe.

Funding: A lot has been said about the funding ever since I brought up my concern that system expansion is not feasibly going to happen any time soon due to the funding mechanism, and especially considering COTPA has yet to identify a maintenance funding mechanism for this current starter system. The belief (or illusion) shared by many behind the streetcar initiative is that future expansions will be funded by the feds who have already begun issuing streetcar grants to cities. Let me just say this: Any city that is counting on the feds for any streetcar-related capital investment is deluding itself and needs to get off its arse and fund the damn thing itself. I don't want my taxes paying for streetcar in every city when we here in Oklahoma will likely NEVER see a dime for fixed guideway transit of our own. The reality is that the feds are very strict when they evaluate transit proposals and go for bang for the buck as well as FEASIBILITY. And they have strict determining factors for feasibility which take into account density, not the potential for density.

Also consider the people we send to Washington. These guys do everything they can to thwart transit funding and they're not going to go out of their way to secure transit funding for OKC, believe me. Remember in the 1990s when OKC was about to get a LIGHT RAIL grant from the feds to go with the original MAPS projects and disgraced Congressman Ernest "I-Took" Istook put the breaks on that? Let me state it again. Consider the people we send to Washington, these guys aren't on board with transit and will never go out of their way to secure funding so that their own community can have as decent transit as everyone else. These guys are obstructionist, self-defeatist, they do not believe in the greater good for the community and thus do not believe in the future of OKC and they're going to bring us down with 'em if we decide to rely on them for future expansions of this system. /end rant

Pedestrian malls: Another really cool idea that I think we ought to consider is integrating a streetcar corridor with a pedestrian mall. The result would be a street that incorporates numerous transit types, virtually everything except cars. It would have a bicycle lane, street vendors, a pedestrian mall, and a streetcar corridor connecting to other areas of downtown. Since Robinson is already such a screwed up one-way then two-way then one-way corridor why don't we just use Robinson for this? Between Park and Sheridan (adjacent to the Myriad Gardens) is where we could do this. An alternative is using Broadway between Sheridan and 4th, PROVIDED that SandRidge keep their buildings and builds up a Broadway streetwall.

Think about it:

We Talked Transit..apparently

Sorry I am just now getting around to writing up my recap for the Let's Talk Transit meeting waaaaay back on May 11. I've just been bogged down with work and of course, fighting SandRidge and now anti-preservation moron lawmakers--the topics that have very clearly preoccupied this blog lately.

But YES, there WAS a Let's Talk Transit streetcar public forum meeting on May 11..it was held at the usual time, 6 pm in the Hall of Mirrors, Civic Center 2nd floor.

Several points from other people first, and then I'll just finish with my own thoughts that I feel are relatively important to the subject. The format of this meeting was just open mic and attendants were encouraged to take the mic and voice their concerns for the streetcar system. In order to get us fired up, Mike McAnelly shared several potential streetcar alignments which I'm not even going to mention here because I think (hope) those were just to get us talking, and not something seriously being considered.

Jeff Bezdek: Jeff conveyed several great ideas, as usual, when he took the mic so I am going to start with him. The most important idea that he conveyed, as far as streetcar route alignment goes, is that there is a strong need to find a balance here and pick up people in destination areas in order for the streetcar to serve as an incubator for somewhere else. Put more simply, a streetcar with nobody riding on it does very little to actually invoke infill interest--it's the people that streetcar brings, not the streetcar itself. Jeff also publicly alluded to (for the first time I'm aware of) something that he privately mentioned to me at a previous meeting, so I'm going to assume it's okay to break the news: We may very possibly end up with more than $120 million for streetcar..and I don't think he is just talking about a fed contribution. I'm sure more details on this will be forthcoming when it's appropriate.

Dean Schirf: Dean, one of my co-transit bloggers, was quite possibly one of the foremost experts on rail in the room during the meeting. This, despite that he never officially headed up the campaign for streetcar nor is he the one getting paid by COTPA for consulting on streetcar. So it's with great respect and admiration when I preface this by saying that I actually have a disagreement with Dean when he said that it is important to start small and grow the system based on what we know works. He suggested that the wise thing to do would be to cautiously expand into 6 miles, in order to avoid any risks of going with a bad route. He also spoke up on the issue of the boulevard, which we can ALL agree with: The mythical boulevard still has not yet been funded, not by the city, not by the state, not by ODOT's 8-year plan, and not by the feds--and it is showing absolutely no signs of getting funded any time soon, either. So then why, on earth, is COTPA even suggesting that an E/W alignment share a route with the proposed boulevard? Yeah, it would be cool. Imagine it: A Paris-like street in the middle of OKC, lined with cafes and coffee shops and destination retail such as Nordstrom's, packed with pedestrians, super wide, with a streetcar going down it even. And then snap back to reality....

There was also a dude who showed up to argue for a $5 billion metro-wide light rail plan. He gave me a card, I lost it, forgot his name, forgot the name of his plan--but apparently he is serious about this. Personally I think he mislead a lot of people in the room into thinking that his private citizen initiative is a real deal like this streetcar project IS, but it was interesting nonetheless.

My own opinions: First, as for the "start small" concept, to me it's not a matter of the wisdom in the idea or being impatient to affect change. The bottom line is that if we do not have a system that is comprehensive and gets people everywhere they want to go, it will fail. So to that end, how does it help us to just gradually open a line that takes people up and down Sheridan and just Sheridan? When the ridership lags behind our hopeful wishes do we get to say, "Well, it's only the starter line, doesn't take people anywhere besides along Sheridan.." or is "Told ya so!" more appropriate?

I was speaking and Jennifer Eve, who was moderating, asked me to continue about how I feel about expansion..so I took a deep breath and this is what came out: The reality of this situation is really do or die for Oklahoma City. Here you have an infrastructure improvement that is so long overdue that it's easy to say just build the damn thing, whatever it is is we'll be happy with it. However, then it gets complicated. How much streetcar can $120 million buy us? That in my opinion is the MAIN QUESTION they should be asking, and NOT where can we stick 6 miles of streetcar? Because of the funding mechanism we are using for this project, any talk of expansion at the present is spurious--MAPS 4 will not even be a prospect until 2018 and a streetcar expansion can not be realized until 2025. We are committed to the overall MAPS 3 sales tax for the next 7-almost-8 years, and after that, we know the drill..voter approval, and then revenues must be collected BEFORE improvements begin. So yeah, don't even talk about expansion. What you have to do is design a system with the understanding that your hands are so tied by the funding mechanism that an expansion is not possible until 2025, or basically, a really long time.

Also my concern is with the project conception. Taking it like a scientific question, I think it asks the wrong question and has the control and variables inadvertently misplaced. The way COTPA has approached the question, the cost per mile is a constant and the route is the variable, the question being "How much can $120 million get us?" Instead I think that the route should be constant, the cost per mile should be the variable, and the question should be, "OK this is the route, now how much to spend per mile on it?"

See what I'm saying? There are certain things that make it more or less expensive per mile, and face it, the estimated $12-25 million per mile for modern streetcar systems is a HUGE range. If we come in closer to $12 million per mile, which would make me incredibly happy, then we could get 10 miles out of this system--and sure, we might not have some of the features that the $20 million/mile alternative would come with. But consider this: Which is going to attract more riders, a streetcar with bike racks and leather seats or a streetcar that connects Bricktown and Deep Deuce to the Oklahoma Health Center? We need to spend so much more focus on doing whatever we can to get slightly more than 6 miles. 8 miles would be great, and make a huge difference because in the current 6 mile system models I've seen, it is virtually impossible to do a good job connecting downtown districts and the medical district. I think that connecting the medical district is necessary due to the huge number of high-income jobs over there and the urban development growth that area is currently experiencing. But if you can't put a station in the middle of the medical district, don't even bother--there is no point in stopping at Lincoln and 8th because nobody is going to walk from 12th or 16th (OMRF) to get on the streetcar south of the medical district, basically.

Okay...so that's a LOT of issues, and a lot of debate, and a lot of respectful discourse. TOMORROW (Thursday) will mark the FINAL meeting of the Let's Talk Transit forum and it will basically consist of COTPA recounting back to us what we told them. It's a chance for us to see if they got our order right, basically. 11:30 am (lunchtime) and 6:30 pm, CITY HALL (not Civic Center).

Trying to understand how highways are funded..(key word: trying)

Forenote: This post is an educational process for me as much as it is for the reader, and the only "fact" one can be certain of reading the following post is that the process is very convoluted and opportunities for corruption abound. I am not expert on state transportation funding, so it won't hurt my feelings if I get corrected, in fact it's probably for the best, so don't just feel free, but feel obligated to do so!

On my post regarding ODOT's formal request for rail funding, Steve and I began debating the merits of including rail in what ODOT does, and so on. I was about to respond to his last comment when I realized it should probably illicit its own post..trying to understand how the Turnpike Authority and ODOT function, how they get funding, what they use it for, and so on. His comment was as follows:

"Auto transit is a great topic, but that turnpike you refer to is under a turnpike authority ... not directly a government program if I understand it correctly - more like a non-profit?

And I've always thought roads and the military are the best things for government to be involved in. And as conservative as I am, I'll defend government/authorities and their relationship with roads in Oklahoma. We have lots of land that need roads, but generally a small population to pay for it. If we want to have people travel through our great state (which is smack dab in the middle of the country) then 44, 35, and 40 need to be well maintained. Remember when the bridge at Weber Falls was destroyed by a wayward river boat?! The quickness that was repaired goes to show how important it is to keep our roads in tip-top shape."

I agree with Steve that auto transit is a great topic, and it's definitely one that is a lot more complex than it should be. The general idea of how the system is supposed to work makes perfect sense, but becomes a tangled web of contradictions, corruption, and incompetency when we're talking about reality. The formula for transit funding that ODOT uses goes like this: Federal $ + ODOT $ = Total budget; ODOT $ = maintenance expenses, Federal $ = new road construction. First of all, I think this formula speaks volumes to the massive maintenance cost of roads, second of all, the "formula" hardly describes how roads actually get funded. Oftentimes ODOT doesn't even have enough money to cover the costs of maintenance, and we must wait until a federal appropriation in order for a road to be repaired, and sometimes a federal appropriation doesn't quite cover the expense of a new road, and the Stimulus Package just further complicates the picture with additional overlaps in responsibility. With as many overlaps in responsibility for transit funding as there are, the finger of blame can be pointed at pretty much everyone. The feds, the State Legislature, ODOT, the corrupt bidding process, metropolitan coalitions like ACOG and INCOG that get ODOT funding, and so on.

As for the Oklahoma Turnpike Authority, far from being a non-profit was created in the 1950s, predating the Federal Highway System and even ODOT, which wasn't even created until 1976. OTA's sole purpose today is collecting tolls to supplement maintenance that we give the State Legislature tax dollars to do anyway. Their slogan on their website is, "PIKEPASS - Your life just got easier." But the irony is that if you're trying to understand why they exist, who funds them, and what they do.. then your life just got harder. OTA does not determine what projects need to be done, they are directed to act based on appropriations from the State Legislature that first go through ODOT. Studies are done by ODOT, whose responsibility it is to make sure projects are included in long-range transportation plans. The one and only way in which it is an independent arm of ODOT is that it's authorized to issue bonds to fund Turnpike projects, which aren't considered part of the State's debt. Tolls are collected to pay down on the bonds, which in 2005, tolls brought in $192 million. That year there was a $90 million debt payment, $60 million in operating expenses, and the remaining balance went to fund an $80 million Capital Plan. ODOT on the other hand has a $1.2 billion operating budget.

If you read OTA's website, they have an explanation of their funding that looks ridiculously incriminating of the powers that be in the State Capitol. ODOT gets around 5% of total appropriations, and according to the Federal Highway Administration, Oklahoma ranks 2nd in how much federal money we divert to non-transportation uses. In fact, we divert about one quarter of our total Motor Fuel Tax money that we receive from Washington to non-transportation uses. Supposedly, Kansas invests three times as much as Oklahoma does into transportation, making it a crying shame how transportation is funded in Oklahoma AND anyone whose driven all the way up to KC knows that their tolls are higher than ours.

There is no easy way to tell what "non-transportation" uses our Motor Fuel Tax money go towards. I'll keep digging and see what I can find.

Critical thoughts on COTPA's leadership of the Maps III transit initiative

Vs.







Everywhere I turn on the web, from Steve's blog, Blair Humphrey's blog, OkMet, OKC Talk, and everywhere else, I can't help but notice the consensus that a downtown transit system has been replaced by anything and everything else. For the last two years the mayor has been campaigning for light rail, using the issue as the centerpiece of his civic initiative to make OKC more pedestrian-friendly, even lamenting the issue of streets built for cars, not people. I always thought he was spot on, and many of us had thought he had been turned into a rail advocate.

Undoubtedly I think we were wrong.. it seems that Mayor Mick is a pragmatic politician after all. When the public current seemed to favor light rail above any other potential initiative, we saw the mayor talk about how badly OKC needs something different for its transit system. Now that the business community has gotten serious about the convention center and the river, there's a lot of suspicion that transit has been relegated to the bottom of the food chain.

In many ways, it has been. Mayor Mick and the Chamber folks didn't necessarily put together a list that pushed transit towards the bottom of priorities. Instead what they did, whether as an intentional slight or not, was put COTPA in charge of the initiative. This means that the same people who have been running every transit proposal into the ground for the last two decades are now inflicting their usual incompetence on another great idea.

Two decades ago when city leaders embarked to put together Maps I, Ron Norrick initially wanted the proposition to include a downtown fixed transit system (I'm not sure if it was streetcar or light rail, but I think light rail, if I remember right). I was probably in 1st grade in Galveston, TX back when Maps I was passed, but from what I've heard and read, it was a combination of bad project management and former Congressman Ernest Istook's hidden agenda that killed the idea of light rail in OKC during the 1990s. Just think..if someone had been a better project manager, or had Ernest Istook not been taking money from the Oklahoma highway lobby..OKC would have had light rail before many of the cities that are now light years ahead of us. Like Dallas. They've ran the city bus system into the ground. If you disagree, try to make sense of their website for routes and schedules, etc. They've wreaked havoc on the downtown streetscape with their unsightly public garages that have ruined the look and feel of much of downtown. Essentially, where there is failure in downtown OKC, COTPA has usually been right behind it.

Many other blogs have been reporting that COTPA's transit initiative has been underwhelming city leaders, at best. This at the same time as fabulous presentations on Mike Knopp's proposal for more Oklahoma River investment, the business community wholly behind the convention center proposal, the Bricktown community behind an extension of the canal, and the bio community behind the idea of a new bio research facility in the medical district. Everyone has proved without a doubt that their project is worthy of Maps III funding except COTPA. They've officially ran out of ideas, ran out of steam, ran the downtown streetcar intitiative into the ground, and now they need to be ran out of town.

COTPA needs to be replaced with something else. A temporary solution is for the City to recognize Jeff Bezdek's Modern Transit Project group as the leadership behind the transit issue. It seems like a no-brainer. This group has passion, is personally invested in the issue (as downtown residents), they have new blood and new ideas, and they have done an excellent job of marketing what they are all about. Nobody can say they have no idea what they're proposing. They've clearly defined their project as STREETCAR, not LIGHT RAIL. They've done research and proposed a cost, they've proposed a route, and they've also done a brilliant job of integrating the streetcar project with other sustainability goals, by proposing that locally-harvested wind power be used to power the system. They've defined environmental benefits, sustainable benefits, health benefits, transit benefits, and urban benefits. They've also defined benefits from a regional competition standpoint, by comparing OKC to every other NBA city. Almost all of which have fixed rail systems.

If this private group were given the chance to make presentations alongside Knopp and the convention center boosters, they would knock the socks off of attendees, and we would see a downtown streetcar system be a virtual guarantee as a part of Maps III. If we continue to let the "know-how" at COTPA dictate the transit initiative, we will end up with no fixed transit system, and merely some token bus upgrades. It is better in the short-term, and the long-term, if slowly COTPA's responsibilities get moved over to other more captivating entities and COTPA is phased out.

"Money Machine"

This should be pretty common sense. But believe it or not, streetcars are being hailed a "money machine" for building cities. Urban development follows the transportation investments, and in almost every instance of a city getting serious on putting in light rail (LRT), streetcars, commuter rail--whatever as long as it's not the cheapo scam known as bus rapid transit (BRT)--a major explosion in urban development has followed these transit lines. Whether the city is as big and hopelessly sprawled as Phoenix, AZ..or as small and quaint as Charlottesville, VA, this is is a trend that has proven true. Rail transit is the way to go, and the investment will be more than worth it in the end. There is no reason for OKC and Tulsa to not be BUILDING (not planning or intending to plan) a better transit system right now. We've been talking about this for years now. In OKC we've been trying to get light rail in downtown for over a decade now when it was originally included in MAPS 1 (and I bet we all wish we had gone ahead with light rail back then).

What you have here is a system being put in Charlottesville, VA, population 45,049. The orange is streetcar, which connects UVA to downtown Charlottesville all the way across town. Not even kidding here. So if a picturesque Appalachian college town can do light rail or streetcar, WHY CAN'T WE?? There are well over a million people in the Greater OKC Area. If we got serious about a full-fledged system and broke ground in a week on one, there would be at least 1.5 million in the Greater OKC Area by the time the starter lines were all finished. How many highway projects will we have spent billions of dollars on by then?

Not convinced? Then read this. Last month at a transit symposium in Dallas (and trust me, Dallas transit symposiums go the same way as ones in OKC go, where consultants start off by boldly telling them their city stinks) a writer for the Dallas Observer, Jim Schutze, wrote the following:

"Streetcars did come up. The former mayor of Charlottesville, Va., home of UVA, spoke and talked about how they are the smallest city in the country with a planned streetcar, apparently from the The University of Virginia campus to a downtown area. He said the streetcar won’t be on the ground for another seven years, but, because developers believe the city means business about it, the values and actual redevelopment along the planned route have gone through the roof, a point he illustrated with some amazing photos. Strictly from a development and tax base perspective, a well-placed streetcar line looks pretty much like a money machine."

IN a city with the famed DART system and the Trinity Railway, arguably a transit brightspot in the middle of the Sun Belt, they still realize they have a long ways to go. They have brought in some people who have done incredible things with transit. I think it's incredible for a city of 45,000 people to be doing streetcars. I think it's even more incredible that for this city of 45,000 it is still so true that density will follow the transit investments. There is no need to wait for an area to achieve a certain level of density before even reluctantly deciding to go forward with rail. You just pick an area that you want to see built up and you be proactive by shaping growth yourself AND not letting growth shape your transit network (that would be reactive planning).