Work A Year Away On River Transit Tunnels
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette (Pennsylvania)
May 22, 2004
By this time next year, construction is supposed to be under way on twin tunnels beneath the Allegheny River to carry an extension of the light-rail system to the North Shore.
The contract to mark the start of the $363 million project could be awarded by late fall, said Henry Nutbrown, the Port Authority’s engineering and construction manager. Meetings have already been held to qualify potential bidders for the highly specialized work.
“We want contractors who know what they’re doing and can hit the ground running,” he told authority board members yesterday. “Boston was good training” for the candidates, referring to the $13 billion “Big Dig” that involved building state-of-the-art tunnels in Boston.
He estimated the cost of boring the twin tunnels will range from $50 million to $60 million. That’s less than the state spent for Fort Pitt Bridge and Tunnel improvements and repairs.
Nine more contracts are to be awarded next year for other parts of the Port Authority’s 1.6-mile project, including four stations, a separate extension from Steel Plaza Station to the David L. Lawrence Convention Center and power, signal and communications work. The authority has an option with the firm manufacturing 28 light rail vehicles for the South Hills system to supply eight more LRVs for the expanded system.
The tunneling contract will cover a stretch between Penn Avenue on the Downtown side and General Robinson Street on the North Shore. Basically, the line will be extended from a new Gateway Center station north under Stanwix Street and then the Allegheny River. It’ll emerge from underground at a point northwest of PNC Park.
A 300-ton tunnel boring machine will cut through earth and rock and worm its way 66 feet below the river surface. It will be the first tunnel in Pennsylvania built underwater for transit or motor vehicles.
Authority officials are working out details of a “full-funding agreement” by which the Federal Transit Administration will pay up to 80 percent of project costs. They are counting on a $55 million allocation next year to start construction, with an eye toward opening everything in mid-2008.
Funding for capital improvements comes through a separate program whose money can’t be used to help bail the authority out of problems in its operating budget, such as the estimated $30 million deficit it foresees for the 2004-05 fiscal year.
Nutbrown said that while the North Shore line and convention center spur, once finished, will generate up to 10,000 new rides a day, they’ll require subsidies just like all public transit systems here and around the nation.
An in-house study projects that in 2009, the first full year, the North Shore Connector Project will take in $2.7 million in fares but cost $5.3 million to operate for everything from operator wages to lights and power bills, resulting in a $2.6 million deficit. By 2019, the annual deficit is projected to drop to $1.4 million.
Nutbrown said the deficits are in a range “we can handle” based on economies the project also gives the agency, including more efficient operations through Downtown, where the Gateway Center Station’s inability to handle more than one LRV at a time adversely impacts the rest of the system.
In other business at yesterday’s Port Authority board committee meetings:
- Tentative approval was given to extend an agreement with DMJM+Harris Inc., a consultant consortium, to continue with final design, preparation and award of bids and other duties related to the North Shore T project. The $2.1 million addendum, covering through the end of the year, increases the maximum agreement to $23.6 million.
- Members also recommended raising the amount of an agreement with another consultant, URS Corp., by up to $1.3 million, to a figure not to exceed $19.6 million, for its work on the Stage II Light Rail Project.
Two new park-and-ride lots have already been opened, and the Library line has been upgraded as part of Stage II. The 6-mile-long Overbrook line will open for regular service June 2, and the first new T cars will go into operation, marking the finish of the latest phase of improvements
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Reports of N.J. rail lines being videotaped are probed; Homeland security receives a spate of ‘suspicious activities’ tips
Newark Star Ledger
May 22, 2004
New Jersey homeland security officials said yesterday they are investigating reports of people seen filming or videotaping rail lines and stations between New York and Philadelphia in recent weeks.
“Over the past month, there have been several instances of what we would term ‘suspicious conduct’ that triggered our interest and our investigative resources,” Attorney General Peter Harvey said in an interview.
Such tips from the public aren’t unheard of, but Harvey said it was unusual to receive so many tips — about a half dozen — in a such short span.
Roger Shatzkin, a spokesman for the New Jersey Office of Counter- Terrorism, declined yesterday to discuss the details of the reports. But the office sent an advisory to local police agencies urging them to keep an eye out for such activity, he said. “The Office of Counter-Terrorism is looking into, as it always does, suspicious incident reports that have to do with surveillance of or near railroad facilities,” said Shatzkin. “There’s no specific threat.”
Federal authorities said state officials had alerted them to the suspicious activity along the tracks, but they declined to elaborate. They noted that such reports occur routinely, and sometimes surge after high-profile incidents or warnings. “People are reporting anything that looks vaguely suspicious and we’re following up on it,” said FBI spokesman Steve Kodak.
The nation has been on elevated alert level — code yellow — since the beginning of the year. In the past, the Department of Homeland Security has raised the alert level before key national holidays, peak travel times and notable events. Some officials expect the terror level to increase again in the coming months, as the presidential election heats up and the parties hold their national conventions.
The March 11 terror bombing at Madrid train stations has also prompted counter-terrorism officials to intensify their scrutiny of rail security. NJ Transit recently raised the ire of railroad buffs and civil libertarians by requiring permits to take photographs of agency property, including trains.
On Thursday night, Amtrak stopped and searched three trains, including a pair of Acela Express high-speed trains traveling from New York to Washington, D.C. Amtrak spokesman Dan Stessel said the trains were searched “as a precaution” based on an anonymous threat called into Baltimore police. Nothing was found.
And earlier this month, commuter rail officials in Philadelphia found a motion-detector device in a rail yard and turned it over to the FBI. Although the device is sold in stores, its presence in a rail yard made FBI agents suspicious, FBI spokeswoman Jerri Williams said. She said the device was being tested for fingerprints. “We know that it’s a commercial motion detector,” Williams said Friday. “We’re attempting to find out what the device is, why it was there and who put it there.”
NJ Transit spokeswoman Penny Bassett Hackett said that agency has increased its uniformed police force by more than 60 percent since the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. Four police canine units also have been added.
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N.Y. Mayor Balks at Subway Camera Ban
New York Times
May 22, 2004
NEW YORK (AP) — A proposed ban on cameras in subways to prevent terrorism was overzealous and would affect mostly tourists, Mayor Michael Bloomberg said.
``If somebody’s there with a high-powered camera at the front of the train trying to photograph switches and signal boxes, maybe there is something going on,’’ Bloomberg said Friday on his weekly radio show. ``But if there are some tourists and they want to take pictures of each other on the subway train — come on, get real,’’ he said.
NYC Transit, a division of the Metropolitan Transportation Authority, proposed the ban Thursday to deter terrorists from conducting surveillance of the nation’s largest mass transit system.
The proposal would be subject to amendment following public hearings this summer, transit agency spokeswoman Deirdre Parker said.
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All aboard the Luas, at last; The Sandyford Luas line is due to open at the end of June
The Irish Times
May 22, 2004
Travelling by tram from Sandyford to St Stephen’s Green gives a completely new perspective on Dublin, just like everyone’s first trip on the M50. Unlike the motorway’s exploded landscape, however the tramway is very contained, usually by the numerous back gardens along its route.
It’s a fascinating, even voyeuristic, experience. Boundaries are marked by a mish-mash of chain-link fences, old granite walls, palisades and breeze block, and new reinforced concrete walls for those who shouted loudest. At least one is faced in granite on its inner side.
For anyone living along the old Harcourt Street line, getting used to the “clang clang” sound of tram bells must be a big change. Much of the route had been a linear wildlife refuge, or simply incorporated into people’s gardens, since it was closed down more than 40 years ago.
The tram we board at Sandyford, on the edge of the industrial and business zone where 30,000 people work, clangs its bell as we depart and clangs it again arriving at and leaving every other stop along the 9km route. Altogether, there are 13 stops.
One is immediately taken with the length of the Sandyford trams; at 40 metres, they’re 10 metres longer than the trams on the Tallaght line, which is due to open this autumn. They all come in the same purple and yellow livery — the Wexford GAA colours — and have the same kitsch upholstery.
There’s a park-and-ride site at Sandyford, and two more at Stillorgan and Balally. But will there be feeder bus services to convey people to and from work in the various business parks? That, like the integration of Luas and bus services, has yet to be worked out with Dublin Bus.
Extensive landscaping was carried out as part of the project. The park-and-ride sites all have rows of mountain ash, while prickly mahonia is the predominant shrub along the line itself, which is laid on a heavy-duty concrete trackbed until it hits the city’s streets at Peter Place.
Kilmacud, the third stop, comes as a bit of a shock. Its white concrete lift shaft, overbridge and backing wall are all covered in graffiti — as bad as Kilbarrack DART station was in its worst days. Local gurriers also throw eggs at the trams, which are washed every night at the Sandyford depot. The swivelling security cameras at Luas stops have not proved a deterrent.
The tram moves along at a fair clip between stops, and much less noisily than diesel trains or even the DART. At Balally, the stop is located right underneath an apartment block being built by developer Gerry Gannon. The arrival of Luas was also a planning plus for the nearby shopping centre.
Dundrum’s Luas stop is appropriately located in front of the old railway station, which served for years as the offices of Carr Communications. No new use has yet been found for the turquoise-coloured neo-classical building; the Luas people think a restaurant would be ideal.
Crossing the bridge over the Taney Road junction is less dramatic than the perspective from ground level. An urban design plan for the bridge, where its undercroft would be filled in as an extension of Dundrum Main Street, was drawn up in 1997 but remains to be realised.
There are marvellous views over the Dodder from Milltown viaduct, the huge masonry bridge that survived the closure of the old Harcourt Street line. Unlike the smaller bridges at Dunville Avenue, Ranelagh, Northbrook Road and the Grand Canal, it would have been expensive to demolish.
Every stop will have two German-made ticket machines that should prove robust, plus a digital information panel that gives the arrival times of the next three trams. There is also an intercom from the Luas control centre, off the M50’s Red Cow roundabout, to inform passengers of any delays.
Our test tram is held up interminably at the Beechwood stop, off Dunville Avenue, because of a problem with the traffic lights. We can’t move until it is sorted out, and the queues of cars don’t seem to want to move either — until Vincent Eaves, of Luas operator Connex, did some unofficial point duty.
For situations like Dunville Avenue, each Luas tram can make a loud “beep, beep” noise, like an irritated car-horn, to warn of its imminent crossing. But it takes just seven seconds for the 40-metre-long Sandyford trams to clear the junction, thus minimising the disruption to traffic.
The Beechwood stop includes the only new building on the line — an ugly kiosk that’s likely to be a convenience store. Crudely built, with chunky brown PVC windows and its roof sloping down to a canopy with a large hole in it, this is not the way to make a “modern statement”.
Each stop has its own electricity sub-station, a large metallic box. People living close to the Cowper stop are still offended by the insensitive placing of its sub-station in the foreground of a much-loved leafy walk. And when you see it, it’s easy to understand why.
The stainless steel handrails at the Ranelagh and Charlemont stops strike precisely the right contemporary note, as do the glazed shelters at every other stop. Some glass panels have already been shattered by vandals, such is their contempt for the new tramway.
After crossing the Grand Canal, the tram snakes through a narrow opening and then downwards into Peter Place. A pair of tight curves here generate a lot of groaning and screeching before we reach the box junction on Adelaide Road and potential conflict with other traffic.
Safety is a major concern, of course. Wherever Luas crosses the path of other traffic, there are black and yellow warning signs with tram symbols and the warning “Look both ways” (as Gaeilge, too). A Luas official said he saw a cyclist “nearly getting creamed the other day” at the end of Harcourt Street.
There is historic justice in the location of the Luas stop right in front of the old station. The “wirescape” over the street, which some feared would be visually obtrusive, is so minimalist that it’s barely noticeable. The catenary is suspended from buildings on either side, thus avoiding a proliferation of poles.
High-quality paving and street furniture was promised at the outset of the Luas project. This has been delivered, but only in part. There’s even evidence of discrimination in favour of the southside, with real stone setts being laid in Harcourt Street, while Abbey Street was dressed in concrete.
All the motorists queuing in the traffic jam alongside are looking at the Luas, as if in disbelief that it has finally arrived, while our tram glides down Harcourt Street, clanging its bells almost continuously. One woman suggested that the trams should play loud classical music instead.
We finally come to a stop at the west side of St Stephen’s Green, where there are a lot of poles to support the Luas power supply. This is the end of the line, as the original plan to proceed via Dawson Street and College Green to O’Connell Street was scrapped by the Government in 1998.
Tickets, please: the low-down on Luas
The Sandyford Luas line is due to open on June 30th. Trams will run from 5.30 a.m. to 12.30 a.m. Monday to Friday, from 6.30 a.m. to 12.30 a.m. Saturday and from 7.30 a.m. to 12.30 a.m. Sunday. Morning and evening peak-time frequency will be one tram every five minutes, reducing to every seven and a half minutes between 10 a.m. and 4 p.m., and every 10 minutes after 7 p.m.
The first weekend is likely to be free. Approved fares include 2 (one-way), 3.80 (return) 1.30 (minimum) and 80 cent (children aged 3 to 15). Children under three will travel free, as will OAPs. Peak-time restrictions for OAPs are under discussion.
Connex, the French multinational that will operate Luas, will employ at least 40 “customer service officers” to prevent fare evasion by ticket-checking one in every six passengers.
Each of the trams on the Sandyford line has 80 seats and a capacity of 300, with most passengers standing.
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Tracking the future of Yokohama
The Daily Yomiuri (Tokyo)
May 22, 2004
Passengers on trains pulling into Motomachi-Chukagai Station in Yokohama could be forgiven for thinking they had arrived in a different era rather than simply another transportation hub. The station walls of this innovative urban space are covered in white porcelain tiles bearing images of historical buildings, local vendors and other nostalgic scenes that evoke the neighborhood’s bygone days.
“I aimed to design a station that would give people the impression they were at a space station like the one depicted in (Kenji Miyazawa’s novel) Night on the Milky Way Railway,” said Toyo Ito, an internationally acclaimed architect who designed the station on the Minato Mirai Line, launched on Feb. 1 to carry passengers into the heart of downtown Yokohama.
Stations, of course, are not just places to board trains, but public spaces that reflect local culture, history and a particular identity. The Minato Mirai Line illustrates how architects can successfully explore new possibilities with stations, making them civic landmarks designed with both beauty and efficiency in mind.
The 4.1-kilometer line has six stations, each of which is a showcase of distinctive design. Usually, railway architects focus on a station’s durability, utility and convenience without giving serious consideration to designs that create a friendly, relaxed atmosphere or an impressive appearance.
The subway line connects the Kannai and Yokohama station areas, which have long been somewhat detached due to the absence of convenient public transportation.
The construction of the subway system was part of the Yokohama city government’s Minato Mirai 21 project, an ambitious bid to create a new port town covering about 186 hectares by large-scale redevelopment of the city’s shipbuilding docks. Yokohama, which opened what is now the nation’s largest port with the signing of the Harris Treaty in 1858, has characterized the development as the launch of an additional transportation hub or “second” port that will pave the way for future prosperity — hence the name Minato (port) Mirai (future).
In 1993, the Yokohama Minatomirai Railway Co., a quasi-governmental firm operating the subway system, set up a design committee comprising urban developers, town planners, architects and important local figures. The committee was given the task of building unique stations incorporating cultural and artistic features in an urban context.
This idea was reportedly the brainchild of former company President Fumio Takagi, who also served as the eighth president of the former Japanese National Railways. Takagi sought to build stations that would be appreciated for the forseeable future as social assets.
Four architects — Masahiko Yamashita, Kunihiko Hayakawa, Hiroshi Naito and Ito — were selected to design Shin-Takashima, Minato Mirai, Bashamichi and Motomachi-Chukagai stations, respectively. The four had all been publicly honored for their architectural work, but none of them was known for producing designs for the public transport industry.
“We came up with the idea of asking noted architects to use their experience and expertise to design underground spaces,” said Hiroo Onishi, a division chief of the railway company, who was in charge of building the stations at the time.
For technical reasons, Tokyu Corp. and the Japan Railway Construction, Transport and Technology Agency — a public corporation to facilitate transportation systems — were commissioned to design the other two stations: Yokohama and Nihon Odori stations, Onishi added.
Although the architects were encouraged to make full use of their imaginations, they were also required to respect several design concepts that were to be common to all the stations. According to Junichi Onishi, chief of the company’s construction division, one of the main concepts drawn up during the committee’s discussions called for the creation of an “urban gallery” atmosphere. This gallery concept seeks to make use of localized features to better reflect the setting of each station and distinguish them from one another. Other design requirements stipulated that the stations had to be barrier-free and easy to maintain.
Following these parameters, the architects appear to have succeeded in incorporating fascinating original ideas into station designs that convincingly blend into their respective environments.
One of the biggest challenges the architects had to tackle was how to overcome the negative aspects peculiar to subway stations, such as poor lighting, excessive noise, bewildering signs and confusion over the location of exits. Such factors typically make subway stations depressing, stressful and disorientating environments.
The Minato Mirai Line, in particular, faced these problems to a far greater extent because its platforms needed to be built about 20 to 30 meters below three rivers.
The architects dealt with these problems by making greater use of arched and domed structures with open ceilings that create massive spaces illuminated by specially designed lightning. Benches, glass elevators and other decorative elements designed by the architects, help add a stylish accent to the station interiors.
Hiroshi Honda, a 75-year-old frequent user of the subway line, said: “As a local resident, I’m proud that such magnificent stations have been built in Yokohama, given that station design is usually so bad.”
But Honda, who has lived in Yokohama for about 40 years, also has a critical view of the subway line. “I’m kind of worried that construction of the subway has placed an enormous financial burden on the city,” he said.
The architectural features the company sought, however, have helped keep down construction costs, enabling the project to continue with its design-oriented focus intact. “Many people think this subway costs a fortune because of its sophisticated design. But, actually, the arched and domed structures helped us cut back on the cost of filling up the cavernous spaces created by the digging,” Onishi said.
With a budget limited to 260 billion yen, the railway company also curbed construction costs by merging the station buildings into the existing infrastructure. This is especially true for Minato Mirai Station, which was designed by Hayakawa. The station designed on the motif of a ship is connected to Queen’s Square Yokohama, a shopping, business and amusement complex. One of the station’s most notable features is a 23-meter-high three-story shaft that allows natural light to reach the platform.
“The station functions as a link between what is aboveground and what is underground, providing some kind of continuity rather than a separation of these places,” Hayakawa said, adding that by using a clearly recognizable color scheme and removing walls and other obstacles, the station design also helped keep people orientated and better accommodated sudden surges in the number of passengers.
In Bashamichi Station, designed by Naito, modernity and history are harmonized. The station’s walls are finished with brick and relics from the Bank of Yokohama’s old main office, thereby infusing an element of local history in the contemporary design, which is more apparent in the futuristic style of the station’s acrylic chairs and its reinforced-glass handrails.
Under a grandiose central dome situated above the ticket gate, passengers are even likely to forget that they are underground.
The design of Shin-Takashima Station proved challenging because the reclaimed area under development around it provides quite a barren landscape, offering few distinctive features that can be reflected in its design. This probably explains why the station boasts the most futuristic feel among the six. “Unlike the other stations, this one didn’t have any existing infrastructure or town nearby. So I tried to envisage the future of the area and design a station that could establish a look for the development,” Yamashita said during a workshop on station design held early this year.
Taking advantage of its waterfront location, the station was built based on an ocean theme. Its glass-roof entrance allows natural light into the station building underground, and the reflection of light is designed to make people think of the swell of the sea.
The last stop on the line, Motomachi-Chukagai Station, offers a fresh perspective on the integration of art into public spaces. Using the rich history of the surrounding district, Ito came up with his own design concept, the “station as a book,” that aims to make stations function like guidebooks orientating passengers in areas with ample sightseeing spots. The walls of the station are decorated with about 3,500 white tiles and 194 enlarged postcard images, featuring old images of local vendors and historic stores and eateries.
“People generally think of Yokohama as a city paved with brick, but that’s not the only feature. I wanted to explore architectural possibilities by integrating other cultural elements closely connected to the lives of local people into an urban space,” Ito said.
What makes a good station is a collaboration between architects and local people, Ito said. “It’s a challenge for architects to express local features in their architecture without just copying them superficially. A dialogue with local people is therefore important to create a station with which they can feel an affinity,” he said.Access Information
— The Minato Mirai Line connects Motomachi-Chukagai Station and Tokyo’s Shibuya Station on the Toyoko Line in 35 minutes by express train. A one-day pass — allowing unlimited rides on the Minato Mirai Line — costs 450 yen for adults and 230 yen for children.
— The Yamashita Rinkosen Promenade offers a nice waterfront view connecting Yamashita Park with Minato Mirai 21 and consists of office and residential space, hotels, shopping centers, restaurants and convention centers. The 296-meter-high Landmark Tower in the futuristic area houses the Sky Garden, an observatory deck on the 69th floor, from which Mt. Fuji can be seen under good weather conditions.
— A few steps from Motomachi-Chukagai Station, the Motomachi Shopping Street lined with fashionable boutiques and eateries retains the feel of days of yore when it used to serve the foreign community based in the nearby Yamate area.
— Yokohama Port holds a festival every year in commemoration of the opening of the port on June 2. This year’s commemorative events, including live music performances, fireworks and boat races, will be held May 29-30 and June 2 at Rinko Park. The venue is a seven-minute-walk from Minato Mirai Station.
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Rail Transit Access To Airports Catches On
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette (Pennsylvania
May 23, 2004
At the conclusion of a conference with architects and planners not long ago, I was in an ozone-saving mood. The easy way to catch my 5:30 p.m. shuttle back to Boston was to jump in a taxi, but no, I decided, New York’s transit system could surely get me to the airport.
Three hours later, my shoulder aching from a garment bag that seemed filled with bricks, I added an entry to the mental checklist: Don’t try that again.
In Europe, taking a train to the plane is a given. The train from Amsterdam pulls right underneath the terminal at Schiphol, and rapid transit is just as easy to catch from Charles de Gaulle to the stellar Metro system in Paris. The same is true at Heathrow, Hamburg, Copenhagen and Zurich.
The United States has been slow to embrace direct transit access to airport terminals. But that is changing.
In San Francisco, the BART (Bay Area Rapid Transit) extension to the airport opened last June to rave reviews, joining the Red Line in Portland, Ore., and the Green Line in Los Angeles in car-free efficiency.
On the East Coast, trains leave every five minutes from Penn Station in Manhattan to the Jamaica Center-JFK station, a nice mirror image for the 15-minute ride on Amtrak or New Jersey Transit to Newark International.
Chicago, Philadelphia, Atlanta, and Washington, D.C., figured out the beauty of this system many years ago. Taking a train to the plane is also possible in Oakland, St. Louis and Cleveland.
But the LaGuardia example is a reminder of how most airports are still accessible only by car, taxi, bus, or limousine — and how alternative modes of travel are actually discouraged.
A number of cities and airports are working to make that typically circuitous, demoralizing trip a thing of the past.
Rule number one: One mode of travel is best, straight to the terminals without a transfer. This is what transportation planners call the “one-seat ride,” and it’s especially important for people with luggage. If the transit cannot go to the direct vicinity of the airline counters, people-movers or circulators on fixed rail or in guideways are a must.
The other key factor is whether the airport connection is a subway or commuter rail, or its equivalent. There’s a huge difference between trains that leave every hour and a subway that comes around every 10 minutes — the frequency of service that planners call “headways.” If you have to sit down and puzzle over a schedule, chances are you will hop in a car or cab — especially as the time crunch intensifies in the current era of preflight security screening.
So what are U.S. cities doing? The undisputed leader at the moment is San Francisco. Rider reviews have been very positive on the half-hour trip on the Dublin/Pleasanton line, part of an ambitious four-station extension by BART. The airport station is at the departure level of the international terminal. Access to other terminals is available via an extensive people-mover system. For a region notorious for traffic jams, the rail link is already well-loved.
Farther north in the Pacific Northwest, the city of Portland, Ore., which relies heavily on a light-rail system to get people around a dense metropolitan area ringed by an urban growth boundary, also made sure that there was a swift connection to Portland International Airport. The Red Line extension, which features low-slung trolley cars that make it easy to roll luggage on board, is now part of an extensive light-rail network in this region considered to be the cradle of smart growth.
In Los Angeles, meanwhile, the new Green Line doesn’t go to Los Angeles International Airport, exactly; just when it could head straight for the terminals, it inexplicably veers south to Redondo Beach. But you have to give Angelenos credit for having the Green Line at all, in a region ruled by the automobile. The tedious part comes at Aviation station, where passengers must descend to a lower level and catch a shuttle bus to the terminal.
New York is also making strides, with the exception of LaGuardia. After decades of false starts and bad planning, the AirTrain to JFK on Long Island Railroad tracks is a blessing. The key difference here is what happens when passengers reach the Jamaica Center-JFK station — instead of the cumbersome terminal bus, they can make an easy crossplatform transfer to a new light-rail circulator to terminals. The AirTrain links to the city subway system (the A train at Howard Beach, the E, J, and Z trains at the Jamaica station), and is a project of the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, which also runs the AirTrain to Newark International Airport.
Newark is a model train-to-the-plane system, taking all of 14 minutes and making full use of an extensive people-mover system.
A few places on the East Coast established the transit connection long ago. Step off your plane at Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport, cross a walkway, and go up an escalator, and the Yellow and Blue lines are there to whisk you into the District. There are lesser transit connections to Dulles (Orange Line to West Falls Church and then the Washington Flyer shuttle, which claims to run every 30 minutes) and Baltimore-Washington International (Green Line to Greenbelt Metro Rail station and then the B30 express bus, every 40 minutes). But the way those Metro tracks cozy up close to the terminals at Washington National — it’s irresistible, even with D.C. cab fares as cheap as they are.
Other metropolitan areas love their airport transit so much, they can’t get enough of it.
O’Hare is a classic on-the-outskirts airport, but hopping on the Blue Line to Chicago’s Loop has long been an attractive option. The Chicago Transit Authority has long attracted riders who don’t want to risk the infamous expressway backups; now Metra, the regional transportation authority’s commuter rail service in the Chicago area, wants to launch a $1 billion expansion to establish rail service that would link 100 suburbs with O’Hare.
Atlanta is another fine example of airport transit in what is otherwise a sea of sprawl. The Metropolitan Atlanta Rapid Transit Authority boasts of an “efficient, no-hassle connection” to Hartsfield on the South Line, with a train station in the main terminal building near baggage claim.
Philadelphia has commuter rail at the airport — you walk right over the tracks on your way in from many gates. The service is pretty much every hour, and although slightly more frequent at rush hour, it’s not quite as attractive as a subway. Another small complaint: the Southeastern Pennsylvania Transportation Authority makes it hard to figure out schedules, where to go, where to pay for a ticket. Spell it out, and they will ride, many transportation planners believe.
Distance from terminals and not mode of travel is the problem at Boston’s Logan International Airport. The Blue Line stops a half-mile northwest of the terminals, requiring a schlep onto a pokey terminal bus. The proposed Silver Line, a bus rapid-transit system, will make it possible to get on a vehicle at South Station and go to terminals, but until then, it’s a classic case of so close and yet so far.
Beware: In most places, if you ask about rail transit from the airport to downtown, they look at you as though you’re from Mars, or worse, from Europe.
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Media Isn’t The Problem
Dayton Daily News (Ohio
May 23, 2004
You’d think that Dayton’s RTA board meetings would be all about, say, public transportation.
No chance. At their last meeting, trustees devoted more time and emotional energy to the topic of controlling the media than controlling spiraling cost overruns or their over-the-top director.
In the May 9 Dayton Daily News story, “What’s Wrong at the Wright Stop,” the building’s leasing agent, Gary Yagley, made the rather self-evident statement that crowds congregating outside the building at RTA bus stops are hampering efforts to lease space. In a rebuttal letter to the trustees, Yagley blasted The Dayton Daily Disappointment for not quoting more of his positive remarks. “I was hoping that the P.R. would go a long way toward bringing attention to the project, something I could photocopy and use in my promotion of the leasing,” Yagley wrote.
Well, that’s our job, isn’t it? To provide fodder for promotional brochures? Surely not to ask the tough questions — questions this board still seems loath to ask its director, Minnie Fells Johnson.
Yagley’s letter prompted much indignant clucking around the boardroom. “Is there anything we can do about this?” sniffed Trustee Cheri Ohmer. “Do we have any recourse?”
She wasn’t referring to the $19 million — and mounting — price tag on a building originally estimated at $10.8 million. She wasn’t referring to the fact that the building has yet to attract a single office tenant since its September 2001 opening. She wasn’t talking about the fact that state transportation officials have announced their intention to scrutinize the way RTA spends grant money from the state.
Ohmer wasn’t talking about any of the urgent issues facing the RTA. She was talking about the Media. The Messenger.
In a similar vein, Johnson — who repeatedly refuses interviews — refuted the newspaper’s findings in a letter to patrons point by point as “absurd,” “false” and “unsubstantiated.” She denies any cost overruns and lays the blame for any delays at the feet of the “the print media over the sensationalizing of the boardroom.”
Ah, there we go, the all-powerful media, acting up again.
In the interest of fair and balanced journalism, here are a couple of facts to chew on:
- Fact: The projected cost for the Wright Stop Plaza downtown bus hub and adjacent Market Street bus turnaround by 2030 is estimated at $39.5 million — nearly twice what it cost to bring baseball to downtown Dayton.
- Fact: Minnie Fells Johnson is among the highest-paid public employees in the county, earning more than $150,000 a year plus benefits and potential bonuses. That compares with $132,091 for Ohio Gov. Bob Taft.
- Fact: The renovation of Wright Stop Plaza, while attractive, continues to attract unruly, abusive crowds and raise questions about the board that oversaw the construction and its management of the 0.5 percent in sales taxes it receives from us every time we make a trip to the store.
After much nattering about “slash and burn journalism” and “if it bleeds, it leads,” a couple of trustees reluctantly allowed as how things might be less than perfect with the RTA. Board member Jerome Brunswick acknowledged that Wright Stop Plaza has been “a mixed success” and that “Wright Stop Plaza is something the board should continue talking about.”
When it isn’t too busy killing the messenger.
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Bombardier lagging in two U.S. transit contracts; faces heavy penalties
The Canadian Press (CP)
May 23, 2004
MONTREAL (CP) _ Bombardier Inc. is bleeding $85,000 US a day in late-delivery fees for a monorail transit system it is building in Las Vegas, already four months behind schedule.
The Montreal-based company also faces penalties for late deliveries of light rail cars for a new transit system in Minneapolis, Minn.
Bombardier’s transportation division says hitches are a normal part of complex public transportation projects. But the timing is bad as the division, the world’s largest maker of rail equipment, is under the gun from chief executive Paul Tellier to improve margins.
Delays of several months on the two showcase projects, on the heels of problems on high-speed trains delivered to U.S. passenger service Amtrak, are just the sort of profit-eating travails that irk Tellier.
After a major restructuring at Bombardier Aerospace last year, Tellier announced in March that he plans to lay off 6,600 employees at the underperforming rail division and will close seven plants in Europe. Bombardier Inc. will report first-quarter results this week and investors will be looking for signs that the restructuring initiatives are starting to pay off on the industrial giant’s bottom line.
The Las Vegas project, worth $891 million Cdn, features the company’s monorail technology, similar to the monorail at Walt Disney World in Florida, but the Vegas one is entirely automated _ without drivers or human ticket sellers.
The daily late penalties of $118,000 Cdn kicked in 45 days after the deadline of Jan. 20, explained spokeswoman Helene Gagnon. Bombardier now estimates it won’t turn over the keys until “sometime this summer.’’ “We’re late, but we’re not far from the date,’’ said Gagnon, noting that the deadline was set four years ago. “We want to make sure it’s fully reliable before we open it.’’
Las Vegas Monorail Co., described as the first modern public transportation system in the world totally funded by the private sector, expects to attract 19 million passengers in its first year. It is connected to eight major resorts, 24,700 hotel rooms and nine convention facilities.
Planned extensions up to 29 kilometres would require public funds, said Todd Walker, spokesman for Las Vegas Monorail. “Typical transportation projects can be years behind schedule,’’ said Walker. “Here we are building a $650-million (US) project, and they’re within a few months, so that’s not bad.’’
The nine computerized trains of four cars each, rolling at up to 80 kilometres per hour along the 6.4-kilometre line, are undergoing tests on their track adjacent to the Las Vegas Strip. They have to run 30 consecutive days without a glitch before being declared ready for passengers.
Meanwhile the Hiawatha light rail project in Minneapolis-St. Paul, Minn., is on track to meet a June 26 opening date for the first 13-kilometre phase, but again Bombardier will incur penalties for delivering the cars late. The project, valued at $982 million Cdn, will be the first in North America to showcase a low-floor rail system. Bombardier’s share was to provide 24 cars for $154 million Cdn.
Bob Gibbons, director of customer services for Metro Transit, said Bombardier will face fines for late delivery of between one and two months for the cars, but the system should meet its opening deadline anyway because it was put off twice.
First called to open last October, the date was delayed until April 3 when the State of Minnesota ran out of funds, Gibbons explained. This was later reset to June 26 because of a strike by the transit authority’s drivers. “The important thing for us is we have received the cars in accordance with the needs of our project,’’ Gibbons said, although he said Bombardier won’t escape the penalties.
The cars, made in Mexico with final assembly in Plattsburgh, N.Y., had a number of time-consuming defects, which Bombardier’s Gagnon described as “normal and routine anomalies.’’
Bombardier’s popular stock (TSX:BBD.B), which surpassed $26 in September 2000 and fell under $3 in March 2003, closed Friday off a cent at $5.58.
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TSA security measures for U.S. rail go into effect
Metro
May 24, 2004
Federal mandates for increased security on the nation’s subway and rail systems went into effect Sunday.
Protective measures include using bomb-sniffing dogs and removing or replacing trash cans. “Travelers may not see any difference, but they should feel a greater confidence that there are minimum security standards in place,” said Asa Hutchison, undersecretary for border and transportation security at the Department of Homeland Security.
The new security mandates, announced last Thursday, are a response to the Madrid commuter train bombings.
Other new security requirements for light rail systems, inter-city passenger rail systems such as Amtrak, commuter rail operations, as well as subway systems nationwide include:
- Training for all rail personnel in preventing and responding to potential terrorists events.
- Check rail cars for unattended packages, and using bomb-sniffing dogs as needed.
- Remove trash cans, or replace with clear plastic or bomb-resistant containers.
- Increase staffing during heightened security alerts.
The security directives will be administered by the Transportation Security Administration.
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SEPTA: Terror Alert Triggered by Goldbricking Employee
News Radio — Philadelphia
24 May 2994
Authorities say the electronic motion detector found in the Powellton railyard on May 5th — setting off a flurry of investigation by anti-terrorism experts — was placed there by a SEPTA employee for his own personal use.
SEPTA received word from the FBI that it was a SEPTA worker on the midnight shift that placed the device in the railyard near 30th Street Station (right), to alert him when his supervisor approached.
SEPTA director of security James Jordan: “We have not completed our investigation, so we cannot say with certainty, but what we know now is consistent with him sleeping on the job, and setting up this device to be awakened as his supervisor approached.”
Jordan says the worker also worked part-time for a security firm, which is how he came into possession of the motion detector.
The incident is still being investigated by the SEPTA office of inspector general, who is also looking into why it took SEPTA a week to turn the device over to law enforcement authorities. But, Jordan says, they are now treating the incident as an employee misconduct matter — not a terrorism threat.
The worker, who was not identified, is still on the job but faces disciplinary actions that could include losing his job.
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Hobbyist or Terrorist?
Time magazine
May 24, 2004
Admiring trains has been a refuge for generations of men. Now it can get you a visit from the police
Every lunch hour, computer programmer John Almeida leaves his cubicle at an insurance company outside Philadelphia and chases trains. He sets up four video cameras on tripods beside the tracks and waits, listening to his scanner. “I come out every day because history happens every day,” he says. Almeida, a father of three, is a railfan — a hobbyist who watches trains with the fastidiousness of a lab researcher. Over the past 15 years, he has shot hundreds of hours of video and tens of thousands of pictures. Call it what you will, it is hard to think of a more benign hobby.
So it is all the more jarring when Almeida gets mistaken for a terrorist — which happens about once a month, sometimes more. Since 9/11, he says, he has been followed by an Amtrak helicopter, questioned by police and rail workers and described to 911 dispatch as a “suspicious Middle Eastern male.” Almeida is of Irish Catholic descent.
Many hobbies, when considered closely, make no sense (spoon collecting, anyone?). But then there is railfanning, which even its disciples are hard put to explain. There are about 175,000 U.S. railfans, almost all men, estimates Kevin Keefe of Trains magazine. They have clubs, websites and vacation excursions. They are, like all hobbyists, consumed by the cataloging of minutiae. “They’re just attracted to trains,” says John Bromley, spokesman for Union Pacific Railroad, who admits halfway through our conversation that he too is a railfan.
But the postindustrial age has been tough on railfans. First the majestic steam locomotives disappeared. Then juries started giving huge awards to people hurt on the tracks, and railroads grew hostile toward trespassers. Now comes terrorism. Railroads upped security after 9/11, but since the March bombing of four trains in Madrid, commuters have been more worried. “Anyone seen taking photographs is going to be questioned,” laments Richard Maloney, spokesman for SEPTA, Philadelphia’s public-transit authority. “The wide-open spaces and the freedom we have enjoyed to meander almost anywhere is gone.” Urban train buffs report being surrounded by police cars and customs agents.
A Haverford College student of South Asian descent was detained last year by SEPTA police after he photographed a station — homework for an urban-history class, as it turned out.
Most railfans find ways to adapt. Some substitute business-casual attire for the usual Slayer T shirt to appear less threatening. Others carry the Diesel Spotters Guide — or their kids — to establish their innocence. As for Almeida, “I make a lot more eye contact,” he says. Then he offers his card, which lists his railfan-club affiliations. He estimates that he has given out 500 cards since 9/11. Usually, the matter is quickly resolved. “I have a little A.C.L.U. in me,” he admits. “So I say, ‘Why can’t I stay?’ But the cop is the one with the gun.”
Railfans have never been well understood.� Rail employees call them trolley jollies, or foamers — for those who foam at the mouth at the sight of trains.� Worst of all are FLMs: fans living with mothers. Almeida is aware of the snickering.� But the history of the trains — not to mention the sheer thrill of a massive contraption hurtling down the tracks — is stronger than peer pressure. Earlier this spring, Almeida, 42, spent five hours in the cold, hoping to videotape the Ringling Bros. circus train, which never came. While waiting, he lovingly pointed out the faded markings of long-defunct railroads on passing trains. “Railroads built this country, and people seem to forget that,” he said, raindrops coating his oversize glasses. Almeida tries to find humor in the new age of scrutiny. Says Bob Weiler, a fellow railfan: “John’s got four cameras. No terrorist would do that.” “Unless,” says Almeida, “I was brilliant.”
Hearing a horn in the distance, the men abandon their graham-cracker snacks and scurry off to man the cameras. A hush falls over the fans as a trash train, hauling a wall of Dumpsters to New York City, rumbles by. Almeida smiles and afterward offers his best defense yet: “I could find better things to do. It’s just that, uh, I’m doing this.”
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TriMet ridership hits new peak in April; 308,100 rides each weekday, an all-time record
TriMet News & Info
May 25, 2004
Ridership on TriMet’s MAX and buses reached an all-time record average of 308,100 trips each weekday in April, up 3 percent from the same month last year.
The new record is 4,000 daily rides higher than TriMet’s previous record of 304,000 trips set in October 2000. TriMet weekday ridership has only surpassed 300,000 one other time, in October 2003. April’s weekend ridership on MAX climbed 9 percent, while weekend bus trips grew 5 percent.
Three reasons account for TriMet’s ridership gains:
Frequent Service — TriMet continues to increase the number of Frequent Service bus lines, which resulted in 11 percent ridership growth since adding Frequent Service to the Line 4-Division in October 2003. Frequent Service lines offer 15-minute service, every day, and account for 50 percent of all bus trips.
Regional job growth — Recent surveys show the Portland area economy is on the mend and new jobs are being created.
Record gas prices — Means more people are looking to transit as a cheaper alternative for their commute and for getting around the region.
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Photo ban sparks controversy
Newsday
May 25, 2004
Call it the case of the snapshot snafu. Less than a week after the MTA introduced a moratorium on photography in subways and buses, a picture of who supports the ban and who doesn’t is getting increasingly blurry.
NYC Transit officials said yesterday the proposal originated in the Police Department’s Transit Bureau, which feared would-be terrorists might photograph sensitive areas for possible attack.
But the bureau’s executive officer, Henry Cronin III, denied through a spokesman that he ever pushed the measure. “He never made such a recommendation,” the spokesman said, adding that the Metropolitan Transportation Authority made the request. Asked if the police support the ban, he said: “No comment.”
Meanwhile, Mayor Michael Bloomberg yesterday backpedaled from comments he made last week on his radio show that ridiculed the measure. “Get real,” Bloomberg sighed at one point on 1010 WINS, musing about the ban’s potential to disrupt a tourist from taking a souvenir picture of a New York institution.
But yesterday, a spokesman maintained that the mayor hadn’t formed an opinion. “We’ll await the conclusion of the public hearing,” said spokesman Jordan Barowitz, referring to a required 45-day comment period before the measure is enacted.
Even so, at an MTA board meeting yesterday, one of the mayor’s four representatives signaled that they might vote against the measure.
It seems unlikely the ban could become official before September. MTA and NYC Transit officials, including Chairman Peter Kalikow, say they support it. But they want to give the police wide discretion in enforcement, akin to the city’s response to jaywalking. “It’s a discretionary thing with the cops,” said one high-ranking transit official. “The cops are going to be the ones enforcing it.”
Meanwhile, in what critics of the proposed ban say points to MTA’s short- sightedness, the authority continued soliciting on its Web site yesterday for amateur photographs of the transit system.
The site, run by the NYC Transit Museum, aims to share “original ideas and works on transit-related themes.” One showed the platform at the Metropolitan Avenue station on the G line where, according to the caption, the photographer recently reconnected with a grade school teacher. Asked about the site, MTA spokesman John McCarthy pointed out that it is still technically legal to photograph the subway system.
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RailWorks Corporation Recapitalizes Company, Strengthens Senior Management Team
Business Wire
May 25, 2004
RailWorks Corporation, a leading provider of construction, maintenance and material solutions for the rail and rail-transit industries, announced today that engineering and construction industry veterans Raymond E. List and Ken Campbell have joined the company.
List will serve as president and chief executive officer. Campbell will serve as chief financial officer.
Campbell succeeds Ken Bauer, formerly RailWorks Corporation’s chief financial officer. Bauer was previously president of the Long Island Rail Road and will serve RailWorks as president of the National Transit Group. Ben D’Alessandro will continue as president of the New York City Transit Group. Bill Donley will continue in his role as president of the Track Products & Services Group.
RailWorks’ realignment and senior management additions were made in conjunction with successful efforts to recapitalize the company and with the support of its principal shareholder, MatlinPatterson Global Opportunities Partners. The recapitalization eliminated $64 million of debt, postponed for two years interest on $81 million of debt, and added a new working capital facility for up to $30 million.
“The financial investment and management changes completed at RailWorks will allow the company to successfully pursue the attractive growth opportunities we see in this sector,” says David Matlin, CEO of MatlinPatterson Global Advisers LLC.
“RailWorks’ positioning and the commitment of its financial partners, together with its 100-year project heritage, give us a wonderful foundation to build a successful enterprise for our clients, lenders, shareholders, employees and other business partners,” adds List, RailWorks’ president and CEO.
Over the past 25 years, List has been a senior manager and management consultant in many successful growth and transitional businesses. He served as president/CEO of the following enterprises: GVG Inc., Cohr Inc., ICF Kaiser Engineers, Kaiser Engineers, ICF Technology, and The Venture Fund of Washington. He also has operated his own management consulting business, served as an officer of Arthur D. Little, and appeared on the cover of Engineering News Record for his leadership in the successful turnaround of Kaiser Engineers.
Campbell joins RailWorks after helping the company to complete its recent restructuring. Over the past seven years, Campbell has played an integral role in a number of successful business turnarounds. Prior to that, he was the chief financial officer for Kaiser Engineers, where he worked with List on its successful turnaround in the late 1980s.
Bauer joined RailWorks in 2003 following a 30-plus-year career with the Metropolitan Transportation Authority, a regional mass transit network serving 2.3 billion commuters annually in the greater New York metropolitan area. During his tenure as president of the Long Island Rail Road, the nation’s largest commuter railroad, he led the organization to new standards in operational performance, safety and customer satisfaction. He won favor with commuters and employees for listening to their concerns and responding with needed changes.
About RailWorks Corporation
Founded in 1998, RailWorks Corporation provides reliable construction, maintenance, and material solutions for the rail and rail-transit industries. With revenues of approximately $450 million, RailWorks is a leading provider of integrated rail systems services and products in the United States and Canada. RailWorks is now a privately held company.
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BUSINESS: EU Gets Tough Over Alstom
Birmingham Post
May 25, 2004
EU leaders took a tough line with France yesterday -warning the government it would not approve a state bail-out of Alstom unless the troubled French engineering firm finds major industrial partners to ensure its survival.
The EU executive, which regulates competition and state aid, is effectively making Paris choose between letting the maker of France’s prized high speed TGV trains go bust or accepting it must form partnerships with foreign firms that could lead to its break-up.
The take-it-or-leave-it offer is a blow to French efforts to find a national solution for the cash-starved firm, coming three weeks before European elections where the government is expected to get a drubbing from an electorate disgruntled with high unemployment and economic reforms.
It could also embarrass France’s new Finance Minister Nicolas Sarkozy, who has vowed to safeguard the firm’s independence and made protecting industry ‘national champions’ a key tenet of his political strategy. The EU executive said it would only give the green light for a state-backed bail-out of Alstom if the company, which is closing its train manufacturing operation at Washwood Heath, Birmingham with the loss of more than 1,000 jobs, agreed to find one or more industrial partners for a major part of its business within a fixed time period.
‘These commitments to industrial partnerships are essential elements for the Commission’s agreement, since they are a necessary condition both to ensure the viability of Alstom and a necessary compensation to remedy competition distortions created by the state aid,’ the Commission said in a statement. Alstom would be free to choose its partners as long as they were not state-owned, although a source close to the company said Commission restrictions were aimed at pushing Alstom into the arms of Germany’s Siemens, which is interested in parts of its energy business -but not, apparently, the trains side.
Alstom could form industrial partnerships with companies like Siemens, Japan’s Mitsubishi or General Electric, but would be banned from linking up with state-owned firms like France’s Areva, which had been touted as another possible partner, a source said.
Analysts also tip Canadian group Bombardier as a possible suitor for Alstom’s transport business, although France and Germany have spoken in favour of creating ‘European industrial champions’. The European Commission said it had hammered out the basis for an agreement with France earlier this month, but that the ball was now in France’s court.
Competition Commissioner Mario Monti had felt the need to ‘set the record straight’ on certain aspects of this provisional agreement, spokesman Tilman Lueder said yesterday.
The French Finance Ministry yesterday said it would make no comment regarding Alstom, although a source close to the company said an accord with Brussels was still possible before Alstom posts its full-year results tomorrow.
The Commission says that Alstom, which has already sold major chunks of its business to raise cash, must also agree to slim down, a standard requirement in state aid cases.
If France accepts Brussels’ ultimatum, the planned bail-out would be worth at least two billion euros and would include a government debtfor-equity swap that would give Paris almost a third of Alstom’s share capital. It would also include a capital increase, probably backed by Alstom’s banks, pumping at least two billion euros into its balance sheet.
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Investment curbs stall work on billion-dollar rail projects
South China Morning Post
May 25, 2004
Two major transport projects appear to have fallen victim to the mainland’s campaign to slow investment, according to state media.
Reports said Suzhou had postponed work on a light railway network and Guangzhou was delaying plans to start construction of its fifth subway line.
Officials in both cities yesterday declined to confirm the reports. But the two transport projects could be among the most high-profile victims to date of Beijing’s drive to slow an overheating economy. An official of the Shanghai Metro Construction Corporation said some railway projects in the city might also be delayed.
The mainland began to slow investment in fixed assets last month as the central government tried to reassert control over spending by local governments amid fears of an overheating economy.
The China Daily said yesterday that Guangzhou had decided to delay the start of work on the 16 billion yuan metro line, originally scheduled for late this month, under pressure from local lawmakers worried about debt. A spokeswoman for the Guangdong Province Planning and Development Commission, which is overseeing the project, declined to comment.
Late last week, Gan Xin , director of the Guangzhou Development and Reform Office, said the city would stick to its schedule to complete 200km of subway lines by 2010. His remarks came in response to calls by municipal People’s Congress deputies for the government to consider slowing down the project.
Guangzhou had already started construction on metro lines three and four and the city had incurred debts of 7.6 billion yuan on subway construction, the newspaper said. The 42km subway, with 29 stations, had been scheduled to start operation in 2007. Under the original plan, the line would stretch from Guangzhou’s western Fangcun district to the eastern Huangpu district.
Meanwhile, Suzhou had “temporarily” postponed work on a massive rail network after starting construction on an experimental section last December, Shanghai’s Oriental Morning Post reported at the weekend.
A Suzhou spokesman declined to comment, but a source close to the government confirmed the report. Suzhou’s official stance is that the project is still in the approval process, but the source said the delay was indefinite.
As envisioned by the local government, the light railway network would include 540km of tracks both above and below ground. The project, expected to cost as much as 136 billion yuan, was originally scheduled for completion by 2015.
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Capital Metro in donation dilemma; Talk of keeping cash for possible rail project riles usual beneficiaries
Austin American-Statesman (Texas)
May 26, 2004
Capital Metro, for more than a decade the rich uncle that its nephew governments have counted on for millions of dollars annually, might need to keep most or all of that money if voters approve commuter rail this fall.
The prospect of that blow to local budgets, particularly the City of Austin’s, roiled the normally tranquil Capital Metro board for a time Monday.
That board, which includes five members in the unique position of being both donors and donees of Capital Metro dollars, faces a ticklish choice: Make sure it has plenty of money to build and operate a passenger rail system, risking the loss of some political support with a critical referendum looming, or make sure its civic partners remain happy.
John Trevino, a former Austin mayor and now an at-large appointee to the agency’s governing board, suggested at the meeting that it might be time for the transit agency to discontinue Build Greater Austin, an 11-year-old program under which Capital Metro has funneled almost $85 million to Austin and the nine other governments in its service area.
Under the policy, Capital Metro has given Austin an average of $6.6 million a year since 1994 and about $1.1 million annually to the other city and county governments.
The board’s agenda Monday had a late addition, a resolution extending the program for two more years. And the resolution included instructions to Capital Metro staff members to talk to their counterparts at the City of Austin about a multiyear Build Greater Austin agreement with the city.
Trevino, who said he had talked to Austin City Manager Toby Futrell about an extension of one year at the most, was disturbed to see the final draft given to the board. “I thought we were finally going to be able to use that money for our needs,” Trevino said. “We’re talking about two years, and I don’t know if there will be an ending to it.”
Trevino at one point turned to Fred Gilliam, Capital Metro’s president and chief executive officer, and said, “Let me ask you: What could you do with an additional $8 million?” “You mean personally?” Gilliam said, generating a roomful of guffaws.
But the potential loss of that money is no laughing matter to the elected officials, who have grown used to building it into their annual budgets. If the board, as expected, calls the rail election, and voters say yes, Capital Metro would probably spend about $60 million on passenger trains, stations, equipment and improvements on the Austin-to-Leander track it already owns.
To pay for all that, Capital Metro almost certainly would cease handing out $26 million a year to Austin and other governments from a second fund. That means the current beneficiaries would at best get only the Build Greater Austin money.
The board’s two suburban members, Lago Vista Alderman Fred Harless and Anderson Mill Municipal Utility District President David Harper, made it clear that those dollars need to keep coming.
Harper made an overt connection between the money and the probable referendum. “I would say you would probably lose a great deal of support in Williamson County,” he said. “I can tell you that right up front.”
When Trevino reiterated that he wasn’t willing to make a two-year commitment, Harless had a quick answer. “Then don’t,” he snapped.
Austin City Council Member Daryl Slusher, also a Capital Metro board member, acknowledged the complicated politics of the situation. But he said Austin and the other small cities, coming out of a recession, genuinely need the money. “This whole thing started out (in 1994) as how the buses damage the city streets, and that’s still relevant,” Slusher said Tuesday. “So I would be open to extending it more than two years. And if we are going to cut it off, I would say we should scale it back gradually.”
Ultimately, the Capital Metro board voted 5-2 to extend Build Greater Austin for at least two years. Austin will also be able, for the first time, to spend some of that money on “traffic management” — police. Travis County Commissioner Margaret Gomez joined Trevino in opposition.
Austin’s support is crucial for the commuter rail referendum. When Capital Metro tried to get voter approval for a light-rail-based passenger rail system in 2000, it lost by just 2,000 votes, with overwhelming support in Central Austin. The agency will need those voters again.
Futrell said that Austin officials requested the commitment of two years or longer — about $12.5 million — but understand that Capital Metro’s ability to share money may be changing. “The city is a partner for Cap Metro’s plan for moving ahead,” she said. “We’re not going to be doing anything that will be damaging to either entity’s financial plans.”
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City seeks consultant for AirTrain Corridor
Real Estate Weekly
May 26, 2004
The New York City Economic Development Corporation is seeking consultants to identify and make recommendations regarding industry segments for business development along the AirTrain Corridor in Jamaica, Queens. EDC issued a request for proposals last week.
“Jamaica is one of the most diverse communities in the country,” said Andrew M. Alper, EDC President. “It is also one of the City’s main transportation hubs served by 49 bus lines, several commuter van operators, four subway lines and the Long Island Rail Road, as well as the City’s airports. This study will help us capitalize on these assets and successfully develop the AirTrain and its surrounding area by quantitatively identifying the industry sectors that should be targeted by a business attraction campaign.”
The consultants will analyze the area’s potential as a business center and the benefits it can derive from its proximity to John F. Kennedy International Airport and other transportation assets. The analysis will include industry trends, real estate and infrastructure requirements, as well as an examination of comparable areas within the City’s regional market and other national and international metropolitan markets.
During the first part of the 20th Century, Jamaica played a prominent role as a commercial and transportation center. In recent years, efforts have been made to stabilize and improve the neighborhood. These include extending subway lines to improve commuting conditions, locating courthouses and public institutions in the core downtown area, developing a major entertainment and retail project — One Jamaica Center — and a large residential and small office project. In addition, neighborhoods to the east and west of JFK Airport have experienced airport-related development, including air cargo facilities in Springfield Gardens and hotels and conference centers in Ozone Park.
The city is considering a number of critical public actions to foster long-term area improvements, including additional police officers at key locations and a community clean-up program to address safety and beautification issues.
The primary focus of the study will be the section of Downtown Jamaica near the AirTrain Station centered on Sutphin Boulevard between Jamaica and Liberty Avenues, including the station and a number of blocks that might be attractive for commercial development.
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Overbrook Light Rail Service Back On Track After 11 Years/ Port Authority To Open Rebuilt Line Next Week
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette (Pennsylvania
May 26, 2004
Mechanically improved. Futuristic. Faster and more reliable.
That’s what light rail transit riders will experience on new “Pittsburgh high-tech” trolleys and the new 5.2-mile Overbrook line starting next Wednesday when the Port Authority begins regular service through the Route 51-88 corridor.
Several officials took a test ride yesterday. At the end, Chief Executive Officer Paul Skoutelas was all smiles.
The debut of the vehicles and rebuilt Overbrook line, replacing the streetcar line closed in 1993 because it was falling apart, is the latest milestone in the $386 million Stage II light rail improvement program.
For now, 42L Library service will be renamed 47L and operate via Overbrook. This fall, South Hills Village service will be rerouted there, cutting an average 10 minutes off trips, while Beechview, Dormont and Mt. Lebanon riders will get their own new route, the 42C Castle Shannon via Beechview.
Although it’s the Overbrook line that will open next week, all riders along the 25-mile T system have been promised quicker travel times, increased capacity and better seat availability within the next five months as a result of the project funded jointly by federal, state and county governments.
Yesterday’s test ride showcased three elements — an expanded Operations Control Center, the rebuilt Overbrook line and an LRV with a silver exterior, reflective metallic trim and red, blue, green, white and yellow LED lights that made it look like a big Christmas tree going through the Downtown subway.
Perhaps the most impressive part of the ride was speeding up to 50 mph on a straight section of track, something not possible elsewhere in the system for various reasons. On the Overbrook line, the authority has replaced 22 stops with eight stations, so there’s room to roll.
Pulley weights provide tension for the 650-volt overhead electric lines from which LRVs draw their power, as opposed to fixed lines on the old system cluttered with I-beams, poles and extra wires to secure them.
“In the summer, the [old] lines droop and in the winter, they’re tight as banjo strings,” authority Operations Manager Steve Banta said. He could have added that the copper lines erected in such a manner break easily and have often disrupted service and inconvenienced riders, especially in winter.
Banta pointed out improvements and amenities in the new $2.3 million LRVs being bought from a Spain-based manufacturer and assembled in Elmira, N.Y., putting them a generation ahead of 55 cars bought from a German-based company in the early 1980s.
The new cars have smaller, more efficient motors to individually power each wheel rather than single motors, called “monomotors,” that power entire axles on the present LRVs. Because the wheels of the latter can’t turn at different speeds for curves, the authority has spent millions of dollars to repair gearboxes, wheels and tracks and has missed thousands of scheduled trips over the years when vehicles were out of service.
“These [motors] are more efficient to operate, easier to maintain and enable the steel wheels to perform like differentials and automatic braking systems on automobiles,” Banta said.
As for creature comforts, riders will find stiffer but more ergonomically correct seats, 62 to a car like the present LRVs; more hip-to-knee room; unobstructed, large and more darkly tinted windows; modern destination signs; convenient emergency call boxes; improved heating and air conditioning; automated station announcements; and heated thresholds to melt snow and ice from the folding doors.
For the time being, the new cars will operate exclusively on the Library-Overbrook line, but they eventually will be used systemwide.
Forty of the 20-year-old LRVs are being rebuilt from the wheels up — only the bodies will stay the same — as part of a $151.3 million vehicle contract. The Port Authority has not yet found enough funds to rebuild the remaining 15 LRVs.
Because the new LRVs should be mechanically more reliable, schedules should be more dependable.
The authority spent $13 million to improve the system control center, where operations personnel have more ability to oversee, monitor and control LRV routing and operations. “This system gives us a better understanding of where cars are,” Banta said. “If we have too many cars too close to each other, the Operations Control Center can throw up a red signal and hold up a car to improve the spacing.”
A ribbon-cutting ceremony will be held at 10 a.m. Tuesday where the Overbrook and existing lines meet at Castle Shannon. Regular service will start on the Overbrook line on Wednesday morning.
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Beach Considers A Bus Alternative To Light Rail
The Virginian-Pilot(Norfolk, Va.)
May 26, 2004
City leaders are considering a $33 million transportation system known as “bus rapid transit “ for the resort area.
The proposed system would serve the city’s new $202.5 million convention center and the Oceanfront. The sleek, modern-looking buses, which will use special lanes, are touted as having greater capacity and being a more affordable alternative to light-rail systems. “It’s cool, it’s got great appeal and it could be used in many other places of the city,” said Beach District Councilman Richard A. Maddox .
Virginia Beach is currently negotiating to buy an 11-mile stretch of the Norfolk Southern Railway right of way.
The path runs from the city’s border at Newtown Road east to Lake Holly, near the resort strip. Earlier talk of using the corridor for a light-rail line has been quieted by the bus proposal.
The resort-area project would include 29 stops over almost six miles : north/south along Atlantic and Pacific avenues and east/west on 19th Street, where the convention center is located.
Stops along as many as three separate routes would have ticket kiosks and feature at-grade boarding . Some of the buses have up to four wide-opening doors, similar to subway cars. “You could get anywhere in the Oceanfront in 12 minutes ,” Maddox said.
Maddox recently attended a mass-transit convention in Las Vegas, which is launching a similar system.
Beach officials, Hampton Roads Transit and a private consultant have created a draft of a feasibility study, which Maddox highlighted for the council Tuesday.
Maddox said a more comprehensive report is due in about four months. He said the final report will include detailed costs, possible funding sources and how costs could be shared among the city, state and federal government.
Each of the 20 new buses costs roughly $1 million and can carry as many as 120 seated and standing passengers. A resort trolley costs $300,000 and carries 25 passengers ; an HRT city bus costs $350,000 and carries 40 people .
The new system would replace the city’s fleet of 19 trolleys that currently serve the resort area. Those vehicles have a typical “useful life” of around seven years, and most of the city’s trolleys are near or beyond that age, said HRT’s Jane Whitney.
Ridership estimates are for 835,300 annual riders in 2007, when the new convention center opens, and more than a million by 2026 . The current trolley system serves roughly 500,000 riders a year.
Maddox said the bus network would provide a better way for convention visitors to travel to and from their hotels. “We need to move about 5,000 delegates per hour,” he said. “This essentially makes every hotel in the Oceanfront a headquarters hotel.”
Bus rapid transit systems are being increasingly favored over light rail for their lower start-up cost and flexibility. They also can use surface streets without being confined to rail lines.
The proposed resort bus network would cost roughly $5 million per mile to build. The Las Vegas project has 10 vehicles and covers 7.8 miles at a cost of $2.4 million per mile. The typical light-rail system costs more than $24 million per mile.
Still, the technology faces a bit of an image problem. “I hate the words bus rapid transit,” Maddox said. “It conjures up the wrong image. This is not a big, square city bus.”
Norfolk is pursuing its own light-rail system, which could be made to connect passengers at Newtown Road if the Beach opts for the new buses.
On Tuesday , the council appeared intrigued by the proposal, but there was no show of hands to measure support. “Sounds like an exciting idea to me,” said Vice Mayor Louis R. Jones . If the council pursues the plan, the project could be completed by 2007 , in time for the convention center’s opening.
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NJ Transit’s Gestapo-like moves annoy
Trenton Times
May 26, 2004
You’ve got to give NJ Transit credit for keen thinking when it comes to Homeland Security.
With the mere stroke of a pen, NJT’s brass made the state oh, so much safer.
No longer will NJT have to worry about us pernicious railfans skulking around and taking photographs at “strategic places” on the River Line or, even worse, catching photos of trains and locomotives that are supposed to be “working” for New Jerseyans but which are somewhere in Pennsylvania.
It’s bad enough several privately owned railroads have animosity toward railfans. Like any hobby, railfanning has some rotten apples who don’t know when to stop. That hurts all of us.
Norfolk Southern (NS) is a notorious “railfan hater.” Our consolation is that NS has ugly, black locomotives. But I haven’t heard of NS threatening to arrest people for taking pictures of those ugly black locomotives unless the photographer is trespassing.
NJ Transit has taken a more Gestapo-like approach. In the name of “security,” NJT threatens to arrest anyone who takes photos of “their” trains, stations, etc.
Sure, ever since those madmen hijacked those airliners and crashed them into the World Trade Center, there has been lots of talk about making America less vulnerable to such attacks.
Banning railfans seems like a Band-Aid approach to terrorism. Is this the best the heavy thinkers at NJT can do? Apparently they think a guy (most railfans seem to be male) wearing a goofy “engineer’s” cap with all the railroad name patches might actually be planning to blow up a train.
We can’t expect much sympathy from the judges if we’re arrested and dragged into court on some kind of trumped up charge. Except for the judges who have their own TV shows, they seem intent upon keeping anyone not in the courtroom from seeing what’s going on. Walk into a court house just about anywhere, and you’ll be asked if you have a camera-phone. If you do, you must surrender it.
Newspaper management has to practically beg the courts for permission to send photographers into the courtrooms. In a “the public be damned” approach to justice, the judicial system considers cameras the enemy.
But back to railfanning. The most perplexing part of NJT’s threat to punish those of us taking photos of their equipment without their “permission” is the ban seems to apply everywhere — even if you’re standing on the street — which the railroad DOES NOT own. I’d call it Nazi-like, except that the Nazis would shoot the violator (maybe that’s next).
Who gave NJT control over the sidewalks, streets, highways and bridges? And, since the NJT brass has this high opinion of their own power, I’d like to know how they plan to enforce their dictum in Pennsylvania.
In the mid-1800s, the Camden & Amboy Railroad had such a stranglehold on politics and business in New Jersey that outsiders referred to New Jersey as “The State of Camden and Amboy.” Most of the power really was held by the famous Princetonian Robert F. Stockton and his powerful friends who controlled the company that simply rolled in wealth. At least they were doing it with their own money, and they weren’t trying to tell other states what to do.
Today, railroads lack such power. NJT and its cousin, “SEPTA,” and its big brother, Amtrak, survive only on huge, year-to-year handouts — money taken from the taxpayers (a few of whom are railfans).
That being so, where does the NJT brass find the gall to threaten people who merely enjoy watching and photographing trains?
And if this is the best they can do to provide security, heaven help us.
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Riders bear brunt of trains’ rehab
Boston Globe
May 26, 2004
Massachusetts commuter-rail riders have been packed in like sardines amid sometimes stifling heat in recent weeks, as the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority struggles to correct a shortage of rail cars and broken air-conditioning systems.
The reason for the overcrowding, which riders said goes far beyond the usual crush at rush hour, is a shortage of trains as cars are outfitted with new wheels and rebuilt air-conditioning systems, said the MBTA’s general manager, Michael H. Mulhern.
The T has fined the contractor that operates commuter rail for the agency, the Massachusetts Bay Commuter Railroad Co., a total of $250,000 since January, for shortcomings in service. About 75 percent of the fines were for late trains and a lack of cars on popular lines at peak times, T officials said.
“It was so packed that people were screaming to people in the middle of the train to move in,” said Tara Gibbs of Grafton, a passenger on the 4:58 train to Worcester out of South Station, which normally has five double-decker cars but Monday night had only three, a loss of about 245 seats. “It’s unbelievable.”
Fixing the overcrowding problem has taken on new urgency for the region’s aging commuter rail fleet, because thousands of new riders are expected to try riding the rails the last week of July, when the Democratic National Convention triggers massive roadway closures. But Mulhern insisted the shortfall in cars and the mechanical problems would be fully addressed before July. “There won’t be any fumbles,” Mulhern said.
Mulhern blamed the shortfall on late delivery of new wheel sets for some cars as well as the need to pull rail cars from service to repair faulty air conditioning systems. While the wheel replacement project was recently completed, T spokesman Joe Pesaturo said, the air-conditioning repairs continue to take cars off the tracks.
The Massachusetts Bay Commuter Railroad Co., which took over operations for commuter rail from Amtrak in July, operated 321 rail cars systemwide yesterday, 14 cars short of the T’s minimum operating requirements, according to Pesaturo. The system was five cars short on the north side (trains bound for North Station) and nine short on the south side (trains going to South Station). The T requires a minimum of 122 rail cars on northside lines and 213 on the south, for a total of 335. On average, T officials said, single-level commuter rail cars have seating for 125, while double-decker cars have seating for 185. At its worst, the rail provider had 25 cars out of service in April, a minimum loss of 3,125 seats.
The consortium will challenge the penalties levied by the T, said spokeswoman Tara Frier She said the wheel repairs remain “99 percent resolved” while the air-conditioning repairs continue.
“I would love to say to you that all of our air conditioning is in 100 percent great shape, but the true test of any air-conditioning system is after we’ve had a heat wave for several days,” Frier said. “I don’t want to guarantee that we’re not going to have any air conditioning problems. . . . I can’t predict the future.”
The consortium, she added, has an on-time record of between 96 and 97 percent and has logged 1,000 more miles between breakdowns than Amtrak. Service will be first-rate for year-round passengers and for the heightened expectations for commuter rail during convention week, she said. North Station will be closed, forcing some 24,000 passengers to transfer to buses and the subway just north of the city, but all other lines should be operating normally.
Passengers interviewed this week, however, were dubious. To make matters worse, fares for commuter rail were recently boosted 25 percent, amid promises of better service. “A crowded train at rush hour is one thing. This situation is a serious problem,” says commuter Todd Glickman of Burlington, who normally takes the Lowell line to North Station, but during the convention week plans to drive to the Route 128 station in Dedham and catch a northbound train to South Station. That way he can avoid being transferred to a bus.
On the Lowell Line’s No. 308 train arriving at 7:44 a.m. yesterday at the Anderson Regional Transportation Center in Woburn, the six-car train offered enough room for everyone to get a seat. At West Medford, however — the inbound train’s last stop before North Station � boarding passengers were forced to stand, an act that had become the norm, according to passengers, even with six cars.
“It’s guaranteed that I stand up,” said Heidi Davis of West Medford as she rode into North Station for her job at the state Department of Environmental Protection.
Overcrowding has become enough of a problem on the Attleboro line that Roberta DeDonato of North Easton said she will wait at Canton Junction for the less-crowded train from Stoughton, which uses the same stop.
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“Terrorism” Hysteria Sweeps Transit Industry
Public Transport Progress
May 26, 2004
Alarm is rising among many public transit and rail transport professionals, advocates, and enthusiasts in response to the draconian “security” measures now being enacted by the US federal government and several major North American public transportation systems, ostensibly to safeguard against possible terrorist acts.� These measures include:
- Prohibitions against construction of new US rail transit access to some airport terminals and major central-city office buildings
- New US federal security requirements for transit agencies, imposed without concomitant federal funding — in effect, more “unfunded mandates”
- Criminalization of railway and rail transit photography, and harassment, detention, interrogation, and intimidation of photographers, including on public streets and in other public areas
- Arbitrarily stopping transit passengers and demanding personal information
- Totally shutting down rail transit (and, in at least one case, all urban transportation) access to activity centers to “protect” high-profile events (e.g., political conventions)
Some of these measures invoke serious concerns, ranging from the implications for civil liberties and free speech, to the impact on public transport ridership and the future planning of rail facilities.
For transportation professionals, the criminalization of freely performed, rail-related photography represents a serious threat to essential photographic documentation of current systems, technology, and operations. It also impedes the traditional ongoing historic documentation of rail transit operations, performed by both public transport professionals and rail enthusiasts — a threat to the consistent, ongoing development of an historical legacy.
Furthermore, there appears to be no compelling evidence that prohibiting or rationing the performance of open photography has ever provided any meaningful deterrent to a terrorist act (or, conversely, that such photography ever played a significant or indispensable role in any such act). Obviously, clandestine photographic technology and other surveillance techniques are readily available to potential terrorists.
By suppressing the activities of rail enthusiasts and professionals, the criminalization of photography may actually be counter-productive.� This was summed up well by the posting of one contributor to a online European tramways discussion list, who commented that
This kind of action is totally pointless and unproductive as, apart from anything else, it will alienate the very section of the population that is best placed to help safeguard against terrorism.� It will do nothing at all to stop any potential terrorist taking photos as such people will completely ignore any anti-photography law and use a small hidden camera which is now very easy to do.
The “unfunded mandates” imposed by new US federal security rules place additional financial demands on already stressed public transport budgets, and almost surely will result in some degradation of transport service and quality. Measures which restrict or impair access to rail transit and its operations, including intense passenger-screening and interrogation activities, could pose a serious setback to mobility and a degradation of ridership. The effects of policy decisions impacting the location and construction of rail alignments and facilities could potentially endure for many years to come.
These damaging and controversial impacts need to be weighed against any proven, verifiable effectiveness of such measures. While all public transport is certainly vulnerable to terrorist attack, it is highly debatable whether these recently imposed draconian restrictions on photography, passenger access, and the location of rail transit alignments will have any significant effects other than to harm the innocent and degrade the general quality of life in North America. As ‘Mass Transit’ Contributing Editor Van Wilkins observes in a commentary on this topic in the current (May) issue of the magazine, “In times like these, common sense can become a scarce commodity.”
As usual, Public Transport Progress will continue to disseminate news and other informational items related to this important and troubling issue. Because of the extraordinary volume of news suddenly emerging on this issue, PTP will disseminate it in several separate mailings.
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Another Blow for Tollway Bonds; Moody’s lowers San Joaquin Hills to junk status. The 16-mile road is beset by light traffic.
Los Angeles Times
May 26, 2004
The last of three Wall Street ratings agencies on Tuesday downgraded to junk status $1.9 billion in bonds sold to build the faltering San Joaquin Hills toll road through western Orange County.
Moody’s Investors Service lowered its rating from Baa3 — the lowest investment grade — to Ba2, a non-investment grade. Moody’s also announced that it would keep the San Joaquin Hills tollway on its watch list for possible additional downgrades.
Over the last year, Wall Street rating agencies Standard & Poor’s and Fitch IBCA have lowered their ratings of San Joaquin Hills bonds to junk status.
The 16-mile tollway between Newport Beach and San Juan Capistrano has been plagued for years by lower-than-expected traffic and revenue. In 2006, the tollway is expected to violate a pact with bondholders to take in $1.30 in revenue for every $1 of expenses. Forecasts predict that by 2014, the road will be unable to pay interest to investors.
The San Joaquin Hills is part of a 51-mile network of highways operated by the Transportation Corridor Agencies, a joint-powers authority based in Irvine. The Foothill-Eastern toll road and a stretch of California 133 are other sections.
Ratings are an important gauge of risk to investors because they indicate the ability of the issuing company or government agency to pay interest and principal. Aaa is the best Moody’s rating; C is the lowest. Financial experts say that downgrades to speculative ratings, or so-called junk status, can hurt individual investors and institutions, such as mutual funds, by lowering the market value of their bonds.
Moody’s analysts said they lowered the San Joaquin’s rating because of weak economic performance, the 2007 expiration of a federal $240-million line of credit, and the road’s potential inability to meet debt payments that increase over time. Analysts also noted that TCA board members have not reached a clear consensus on how to deal with the highway’s financial problems.
Two weeks ago, board members killed a plan to merge highway operations and refinance their combined debt with a $4-billion bond issue. Moody’s views consolidation as one way to save the San Joaquin Hills. Instead, board members agreed to consider a proposal by Supervisor Bill Campbell to bail out the San Joaquin Hills with loans and cash transfers from the successful Foothill-Eastern.
The proposal is scheduled for TCA committee discussions next week. Board members want to explore how Campbell’s plan can prevent a default for the San Joaquin Hills.
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Congressman drops objection to Gold Line extension
Pasadena Star-News (Pasadena, CA)
May 26, 2004
An Oklahoma congressman who could have blocked $490 million in federal funding for a Gold Line project dropped his opposition Wednesday to the six-mile East Los Angeles light rail.
The Metro Gold Line Eastside Extension appears to have averted a major setback now that Rep. Ernest Istook Jr., R- Okla., has had a change of heart about the project. The MTA must award construction contracts before the bids expire Wednesday.
Istook is chairman of a congressional committee that oversees federal funding of transportation systems. Last week he stated the $898.8 million Eastside Extension was too expensive.
But on Wednesday, Istook sent a letter to the Federal Transit Administration, withdrawing his objections to the pact that would give MTA $490 million for the Eastside Extension. “This is a sigh of relief for everybody,’ said Rick Thorpe, MTA’s head of construction.
“There are four different committees in Congress that review [requests for a] ‘full funding grant agreement.’ No one had expressed concern, except for Chairman Istook,’ said Thorpe, who is overseeing the Gold Line’s East L.A. segment.
The Eastside Extension, planned to open in 2009, would run between Union Station in downtown Los Angeles and Atlantic and Pomona boulevards in East L.A. The inaugural segment of the Gold Line, which opened last July, stretches 13.7 miles from Union Station to eastern Pasadena.
Thorpe will take Istook on a tour of the East L.A. route on Friday. Typically with large transit projects, the federal government does not give an agency the entire sum up front, but rather in annual installments.
Istook “was concerned about how much funds he had available,’ Thorpe said. “So we did some cash-flow analysis and determined that … instead of $80 million in the first year, we could take $60 million … as long as they made up the difference in latter years.’
Wednesday’s development clears the way for Transportation Secretary Norman Mineta to sign the full funding grant agreement. “He made the commitment to us when we were back in Washington, D.C., that he’s ready to sign it at 12:01 a.m. on June 1,’ Thorpe said. “Once we have that commitment, then we can sign the construction contract,’ he said.
Last month, the MTA board of directors authorized agency CEO Roger Snoble to award the contract to a Washington Group International, Obayashi Corp. and Shimmick Construction Corp. The partnership submitted a $600.4 million bid to build the stations, trackwork, systems and twin 1.8-mile tunnels.
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Monorail car slams into fallen tree branch
New Straits Times (Malaysia)
2004/05/27
A KL monorail passenger car slammed into a large tree branch that had fallen on the track along Jalan Sultan Ismail tonight.
No one was injured and operations along the 8.6km route was brought to a standstill for two hours after the collision at 7.10pm.
But it could have been worse, if not for quick-thinking taxi driver E.B. James. “I was in my taxi waiting for customers outside Concorde Hotel when I saw the branch fall. I ran inside the hotel to tell the car jockey what had happened and he told me to run to the nearby Bukit Nanas Monorail station to warn them of the danger. “When I got there, I told some of the KL Monorail employees about the branch and they, in turn, warned the driver of the passenger car which was heading straight for the branch,” he said.
The driver slammed the emergency brakes about 20 metres from the fallen branch and managed to slow down the vehicle.
If the car was travelling at its usual speed, the accident could have been a disaster. The impact of the crash sent parts of the tree branch crashing down on three cars which were travelling along Jalan Sultan Ismail.
Roger Siow was one of 60 people in the passenger car when the accident happened. “All of a sudden, we were thrown forward. People were screaming and we were all unaware of what was going on and afraid for our lives. “We felt the car tilt to one side and thought we were going to tip over, so we all ran to the other side to try to balance it out. Then we felt the car hit something and we were thrown forward again,” he said.
The car ground to a halt after hitting the branch and stayed there for about 40 minutes. During that time, the passengers were in the dark as to what happened. Siow used his mobile phone and called his friends who work nearby to find out what had happened. After learning that the car had hit a branch, he pacified other passengers. The passenger car reversed and returned to the Wisma Genting station where the passengers were allowed to alight and were given a refund.
Fourteen firemen took about 90 minutes to clear the debris from the track and the road.
A spokesman from the KL Monorail operation control centre said the incident was the first since the service was launched in Aug 31 last year. KL Monorail runs along an 8.6km route from KL Sentral in Brickfields to Jalan Tun Razak and passes through shopping districts .
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MTA Solicits Photos Even as It Proposes a Ban
The New York Sun
May 27, 2004
As the Metropolitan Transportation Authority considers banning photography on subways and buses for security, the authority’s Web site is encouraging riders to submit pictures of public transportation to its online museum.
The award-winning virtual museum, called “Community Crossing,” asks commuters and transit junkies to “share your own photographs, poetry, and stories” about their experiences riding the rails and buses.
Among the photos featured are a train streaking through the Bowling Green subway station in Lower Manhattan, another of the Howard Beach station in Brooklyn and its connection to John F. Kennedy International Airport, and one of the platform at the Metropolitan Avenue station in Queens.
The MTA is also sponsoring an exhibition at Grand Central Terminal of photos taken of life in the subways over the decades to celebrate the centennial of the subway.
Gene Russianoff, staff attorney for the New York Public Interest Research Group’s Straphangers Campaign, a commuter advocacy group opposed to the proposed ban, noted the apparent policy contradiction in a press release.
The group was alerted to the MTA project by transit hounds who were discussing it on the Straphangers’ Web site message board. “Picture-taking contributes to a feeling of safety and security,” Mr. Russianoff said. “The MTA is right on its Web site and wrong on its proposed rules.”
Authority spokesman Tom Kelly characterized the press release as a cheap shot at the MTA, and said the Web site photos were neither a security risk nor hypocritical. He added that the Web site would continue to solicit and accept submissions as long as snapping photos is legal, and would not remove the posted photos should the ban be approved.
“They’re harmless,” Mr. Kelly said of the posted photos. “It’s ludicrous for people to start ranting and raving about something that has been banned in the past and is once again being brought to everyone’s attention.”
Transit officials last week proposed reinstituting the ban that had been part of the rules for more than 7 million daily riders until 1994, to deter terrorists from conducting surveillance of the nation’s largest mass transit system.
Mr. Kelly said the proposal was done at the request of the Police Department, which has paid increasing attention to transit security as the Republican National Convention approaches and following the March 11 train bombing in Madrid, which killed 191 people.
Emergency officials last week staged a mock explosion at the Bowling Green subway station.
Transit officials have said they would use discretion in issuing the summonses to shutterbugs. But violators could be questioned and have their film confiscated. “If someone named Columbus wants to take a picture of himself at the Columbus Circle station, I don’t see a problem with that,” Mr. Kelly said. “But if someone is standing at the end of a platform taking a picture of an empty tunnel, you have to wonder what anyone would want with a picture like that.”
The proposed prohibition would not apply to journalists with valid credentials or to people with written permission
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Win or lose, Lightning fans toot praise on streetcar service
St. Petersburg Times
May 27, 2004
TAMPA — With two hours and 10 minutes to game time, Connie Cosme took a break from the levers. A few regulars had already jumped off her streetcar Tuesday at the St. Pete Times Forum. But she expected the worst ahead.
Win or lose, the throngs emerging from the Tampa Bay Lightning game hours later were bound to swarm the 18-month-old streetcar service. “On Saturday, we had a nice, happy load,” she said about the night the Lightning won the Eastern Conference. “I let two guys come up and toot the whistle,” she said, sitting down on one of the honey-brown wooden seats. “They all went nuts. Everyone went crazy.”
Hundreds of people have been taking advantage of the streetcars run by HARTline to find cheaper parking in Ybor City and escape the snarl of traffic around the St. Pete Times Forum.
The streetcars offered an extra hour of service after Tuesday’s game and will do so again tonight. On Tuesday, ridership jumped to 910, up 300 from an average Tuesday, officials said.
Cosme, sporting a black top hat, black vest and short sleeves, stepped outside to switch the direction of the electric cable above the train, yellow and bright as a sunburst. The seats inside its air-conditioned bubble swiveled to face east instead of west.
First stop, the Marriott. Some people wanted to move away from the action. “We thought the only people that would be here would be disaster managers,” said Bob Swan of Orlando, who was in town to attend the Governor’s Hurricane Conference at the Tampa Convention Center on behalf of an engineering firm.
Swan and colleague Teresa Carter of Raleigh, N.C., hitched a ride on the streetcar to catch dinner in Ybor City and return to the Marriott before the game let out.
Cosme turned the car around in Ybor City and picked up more Lightning fans. “I didn’t want to have to deal with the parking,” said Donna Ippolito, who lives at Camden Apartments in Ybor City. “The last time I valet parked, they wrecked my car.”
Cosme dropped them off and picked up some rowdy hurricane conference attendees heading back toward Ybor, one of whom insisted repeatedly on blowing the train’s whistle.
Cosme and her colleagues have seen it all: bachelorette parties, Gasparilla partiers, drunks lying across the tracks. The streetcars have even been chartered by wedding parties.
The mood after a hockey game can vary. Several hours later, Cosme started taking trickles of fans away from the St. Pete Times Forum back to their cars. It was only the third period, but Tampa Bay was already losing badly. “Be advised, the game is letting out now,” the streetcar dispatch radio squawked. As Cosme rounded the bend at the Florida Aquarium, the crowds appeared. “They are not going to be happy,” Cosme said. Cars pulled on the tracks and sat still. Cosme honked the whistle until they moved.
Near the Times Forum, Cosme stopped as her whole car filled up with subdued fans. Many were happy to attend a Stanley Cup game, though disappointed at the outcome. Still, they liked the streetcar. “It’s really relaxing, and you don’t have to fight the mess that you get out there,” said Scott Maxwell of Plant City, riding with his three friends.
Mike and Michelle Concannon of Dover sat quietly up front. While not giving up hope on the Lightning, they were happy to put the night behind them. And Cosme was happy to oblige.
The streetcar, like the hockey games, would keep on rolling.
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Light-rail trains set to begin service; 6.9-mile extension from I-880 to Alum Rock Avenue will open in late June
Milpitas Post [San Jose area]
May 27, 2004
Light-rail trains will begin running through Milpitas June 24. Interested Milpitans will not have to pay a dime, though, on June 23, when light-rail service will be free all day on the line.
June 23 also marks the scheduled dedication ceremony of the eight stops from GreatMall to Alum Rock Avenue. The ceremony will occur at 11:30 a.m. at the GreatMall/Main Street station. The opening ends more than three years of construction on the Tasman East and Capitol light-rail projects.
Milpitas Vice Mayor Trish Dixon, who sits on the Valley Transportation Authority Board of Directors, was pleased with the opening. “I’m excited. We’ve been working on it for three years and I think the people will love it,” Dixon said.
A special tour of the line from the Interstate 880 station to the end of the line at Alum Rock Avenue was provided by VTA workers to Dixon and invited guests May 21. The passengers were treated with a unique perspective of Milpitas while on the 7,200-foot elevated structure between the I-880 and Cropley Road stations. Touring passengers saw overhead views of GreatMall and the rest of Milpitas, as well as public art projects at the stations throughout the line.
Many stations along the Capitol Light Rail line feature paintings of colorful flowers on the ceilings of station shelters, as well as paving designs, artistic entry railings and mosaic-like entry markers.
The Great Mall/Main Street station features public art projects. A section of cement in the plaza below the station features numerous shoeprints from a variety of Milpitas residents some without any shoes at all. Also, sculptural seating, created by Ries Niemi, provides benches for weary travelers in the shape of items with historic significance to the GreatMall site (formerly a Ford assembly plant): a camshaft and a hubcap.
The project was constructed in two portions from I-880 to Hostetter Road in San Jose and from Hostetter Road to Alum Rock Avenue. The 6.9-mile extension, plus a 1.9-mile extension from North First Street in San Jose to I-880 which is included as part of the Tasman East Light Rail project, was budgeted at a cost of $448 million. Expected daily ridership along the Capitol extension is 3,000 to 4,000 riders. The total travel time from Alum Rock to Mountain View the end of the Tasman West line is approximately 51 minutes.
Construction on the Capitol Light Rail project began in June 2001. It is on schedule, according to VTA officials.
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LIRR PROJECT; Their three-track mind; Groups say addition to railroad’s main line would expand service, reverse-commuting options at peak times
Newsday (New York)
May 27, 2004
A third track on the Long Island Rail Road’s main line would boost service and provide greater reverse-commuting options, a new coalition of business, environmental and transit advocates said yesterday.
In a news conference at the Mineola train station, The Coalition for the LIRR Third Track announced its formation to push the project through. The project seeks to construct another track on the main line from Bellerose to Hicksville, improve roadway crossings and make other infrastructural improvements to the corridor.
“Long Island will only keep itself moving amid population and economic growth if it develops a more robust transit system,” said Jon Orcutt, executive director of the Tri-State Transportation Campaign, who along with the Long Island Progressive Coalition, the LIRR Commuter’s Council and the Long Island Association announced support of the project.
LIRR spokesman Brian Dolan said the railroad is about to hire an engineering consultant to start an environmental review of the project. Although total exact costs have not been determined, it is likely to be in the multimillions. The LIRR plans to submit the project for consideration to the Metropolitan Transportation Authority to be included in the 2005-2009 capital program.
Jon Schneider, spokesman for Rep. Tim Bishop (D-Southampton), said authorization for $210 million for the rail portion of the project has been included in a House transportation bill. “The congressman realizes this is an important project for all of Long Island,” he said.
The $275-billion bill, however, is being held up by President George W. Bush, who said he would veto any bill in excess of $256 billion. “We remain hopeful that this deadlock is going to get broken,” Schneider said.
In addition to adding the track and more service on the Main, Oyster Bay and Port Jefferson branches, the project also would mean the elimination of five grade crossings in Mineola, New Hyde Park and Westbury and substantial station rehabilitation.
Mitchell Pally, vice president of government affairs for the Long Island Association, the region’s largest business group, said the project is one of the most important to Long Island. It would greatly expand reverse-commuting options for travelers who head east in the morning and west in the evening, he said. Currently, both tracks are occupied by westbound trains for 90 minutes of the morning rush. An additional track would provide eastbound service at that time and others.
The group also said a third track would provide for more freight train use of the LIRR network, reducing shipping costs and truck congestion.
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Short Trains Just Part Of T Shortcomings
The Boston Globe
May 27, 2004
After our last column, in which we reported that the Massachusetts Bay Commuter Rail Co. was still running a peak-hour train out of Mansfield short of cars despite having been fined $1,000 a pop by the MBTA for the practice, we received mail from a reader questioning whether MBCR would pay up.
“Thanks for the comedic interlude,” wrote Rock , of Needham . “Do you know that MBCR is owned and controlled by former MBTA managers? Do you really think MBCR is going to pay a fine? Let’s print a copy of the canceled check in the Globe. Now that is really an amusing thought.”
We’ll get back to Rock’s rocket in a minute.
What we thought really amusing was, soon after receiving Rock’s note, we got word from the T saying it has fined MBCR $250,000 in the first four months of this year.
Joe Pesaturo, the T spokesman who gave us the figure in an e-mail, was not available to discuss the fines, said to be for various wrongs on the part of the commuter railroad.
But MBCR spokeswoman Tara Frier said her company is disputing many of the penalties.
Frier said the fines were imposed for shortcomings including on-time performance, consist compliance (trains short of consists, or cars), station cleaning, incident management, and employee performance (a train conductor not wearing his hat, for example). About 75 percent of the fines were for late or short trains, she said. (Those of you who ride the rush-hour commuter trains, especially the chronically crowded 7:40 a.m. express to Back Bay from Mansfield, will understand.
MBCR was given a six-month grace period beginning last July, when it took over commuter rail operations for the T in a heralded $1 billion, five-year contract. But now the penalty clock is ticking, and the company, if not crying foul, is asking for more consideration from the MBTA and more patience from its customers.
Frier said MBCR’s problem with short trains in large part stems from aging equipment on which maintenance had been put off by Amtrak, the previous commuter rail operator. Maintenance on some of the older cars had been deferred six to eight years, she said, and getting to the work now means that some trains are going to run short of the contracted number of cars. Compounding the problem, Frier said, is having to wait on a supplier for such replacement equipment as wheels for the older-model cars.
“It’s kind of a difficult position for us to be in,” she said. “But, should we be penalized for existing conditions that we’re asked to correct?”
MBCR runs 465 trains each weekday, 172 on Saturday, and 142 on Sunday. Between 96 percent and 97 percent of the trains run “on time,” she said. The company is penalized for any train that is late by 4 minutes 59 seconds or more. Under the previous contract, the on-time threshold for Amtrak was 5 minutes, 59 seconds, according to Frier. “They had a whole extra minute,” she said. “It may not seem much, but over the course of running 465 weekday trains a day, it adds up.”
Frier said MBCR has the right to review the penalties and appeal, and it will. “It’s not like we’re at war with the T we’re not,” she said, acknowledging that former MBTA general manager James F. O’Leary is a partner in MBCR, an international consortium based in Boston. “We have a good working relationship it’s just that we have to hammer this issue out with them.”
We’ll keep track of the nail.
And, to Rock: We’ll keep an eye out for that check.
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City, CSX Near Deal To Insure Railroad, Streetcar Crossing
Tampa Tribune
May 28, 2004
TAMPA — After months of negotiations, a streetcar crossing over railroad tracks may not require a driver, a supervisor, a flagman and four cameras.
The redundant safety process could end soon under an insurance deal between the city and CSX Transportation — a deal that leaves taxpayers responsible for what’s essentially a $2 million deductible.
Negotiations began after communication breakdowns last summer threatened to bring trolleys and trains too close. A solution seemed close last fall, then fell short.
City officials said this week that CSX, which operates the rails, has agreed to accept a proposal for $100 million instead of $500 million in insurance to cover the intersection in the event of an accident.
The first $2 million in coverage would be self-insured by the streetcar line, potentially with help from the city. The deal could go to the Tampa City Council as early as next week, Assistant City Attorney Morris Massey said.
Once approved, the deal would remove the streetcar supervisor, who stands beside the intersection, and the CSX flagman, positioned nearby in an air-conditioned trailer, from the safety equation.
Streetcar drivers, working with a dispatcher monitoring the intersection with cameras, would be left to decide whether it’s safe to cross the tracks. ``We believe at this point we have done everything we can do to make the process as safe as it could possibly be made,’’ said Ed Crawford, spokesman for Hillsborough Area Regional Transit, known as HARTline, which operates the streetcar line.
CSX officials wouldn’t comment on the insurance proposal specifically. ``We’re working cooperatively with the city of Tampa to make sure that all safety and financial obligations are met,’’ spokesman Gary Sease said.
How It All Started
Tampa’s $56 million streetcar system started running in October 2002. The 2.5-mile line connects the Ybor City and Channel District entertainment areas.
CSX’s $500 million insurance request almost derailed the streetcar plans before trolleys began rolling. The insurance could have cost more than $1 million a year, almost as much as the streetcar system’s yearly budget.
In a compromise to keep trolleys running, streetcar officials agreed to pay about $300,000 a year for CSX to post a flagman at the intersection to help verify that streetcar drivers checked for trains before crossing.
Communication mix-ups last summer led to the requirement for a supervisor to ride with streetcar drivers passing through the intersection. On July 14, a trolley driver reported he had the flagman’s OK to cross the tracks, but an Amtrak train was backing slowly toward the intersection and had to make an emergency stop. Four days later, a streetcar operator reported he had the OK to cross but decided to wait — and watched a train roll by.
After those incidents, a procedure was begun that requires trolleys to stop at the intersection to let a supervisor climb aboard. The supervisor and conductor then radio the nearby flagman. Once all of them agree no trains are coming, and a signal light indicates it’s safe to proceed, the trolley crosses. It stops on the other side and lets the supervisor off to wait for the next trolley.
HARTline has added a fourth set of eyes by paying $35,000 for cameras and monitoring equipment, which began working last month, that allow a streetcar dispatcher to check for trains.
Closing The Deal
In November, city officials thought they were close to an insurance deal with CSX, but they couldn’t come up with more than $98 million of the $100 million in required coverage.
The law firm the city uses to lobby in Washington, the Salem Law Group, helped broker the current deal to let the streetcar line self-insure the first $2 million of coverage, Massey said.
The city could be required to help Tampa Historic Streetcar Inc., a nonprofit group that manages trolley operations, cover the $2 million insurance cost in the event of an accident, Massey said. In addition to city council approval, the HARTline and streetcar boards still have to sign off on the deal.
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Light-rail practice run
THE JOURNAL NEWS (NYC area)
May 28, 2004
HOBOKEN, N.J. — A group of state and local officials got a firsthand look at a light-rail system yesterday in New Jersey, where economic development has boomed in a blighted area since the service began four years ago.
Elected officials, transportation and planning experts wanted a ride on the Hudson-Bergen Light Rail because it is similar to one of the options being considered as a public transit solution for the Tappan Zee Bridge corridor.
“It’s important to see how the service really works,” said Orangetown Supervisor Thom Kleiner, who joined Spring Valley Mayor George Darden as the elected officials on the trip. “You can’t get that from looking at a slide show or reading a report.”
The New York State Thruway Authority and Metro-North Railroad are evaluating whether light rail can relieve pressure on the Interstate 287 corridor, a 30-mile stretch from Suffern to Port Chester that faces growing traffic volumes and congestion.
No detailed route possibilities have been created, but if light rail crossed the entire I-287 corridor, it is likely there would be at least a dozen stops spread across the two counties, including at Metro-North stations in Suffern, Spring Valley, Tarrytown, White Plains and Port Chester.
There are 26 light-rail systems nationwide, with 15 approved projects in the pipeline for funding from the Federal Transit Administration. The system is popular with developers because of the opportunities presented by light-rail stations.
A final decision on repairing the Tappan Zee Bridge or replacing it with a new bridge, a tunnel or a combination of the two is expected to be made in December 2005. As part of that study, officials are considering if the new crossing would carry commuter or light rail, dedicated bus lanes or some other form of public transportation.
The general reaction yesterday was that the gleaming new trains — quieter and smaller than commuter rail — were impressive, but might fit an area ripe for redevelopment like the New Jersey waterfront better than the Thruway’s right of way. “We’re already fairly built up,” Kleiner said. “This was an area that was open space and dilapidated buildings.”
The Hudson-Bergen Light Rail cost $1.7 billion and includes the latest technology in vehicle maintenance and train control. It took 42 months to put in the 10 miles of track that serve Hoboken, Jersey City, Bayonne and, by the end of the summer, Weehawken.
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