Metro approves initial takeover of B-Cycle
I'm optimistic about this.
The Metro board approved a six-to-nine month transition period where operations now overseen by the nonprofit Houston Bike Share will move into the transit agency. Officials said rolling the bike borrowing system into the transit made sense both to address linking people with available transit and shift bike sharing to more areas of the city.
"It is just impossible for the bus service and light rail on its own to operate and provide total coverage," said Kristina Ronneberg, policy and advocacy director for BikeHouston, which encourages improved cycling access in the city.
Ronneberg called merging transit and cycling planning a "natural fit" to leverage not only increased bike lane building in Houston, but also add bike sharing in neighborhoods where people are interested in avoiding car trips.
"These two services need to be coordinated and seamless," she said.
In a letter of support, Harris County Precinct One Commissioner Rodney Ellis agreed, noting the investment bike sharing made in areas around Texas Southern University, Houston Community College and University of Houston.
"Houston BCycle offers a unique opportunity for Metro to expand access to public transit service in both urban and suburban areas with access to safe bicycle infrastructure," Ellis wrote.
Though the board only approved a temporary transition, and $500,000 to allow bike sharing to continue to operate about half of the BCycle system, the intent is for Metro to keep operations going past 2023, CEO Tom Lambert said.
See here for the background. I don't know what specific plans Metro has in mind, but as noted before integrating B-Cycle more into the transit system, with the goal of making various stops and stations easily accessible to more people, is and should be the priority. I look forward to seeing a report in nine months or so to see how it's going and hope that it is viable for the long term. Here's a letter from the B-Cycle board chair explaining their actions, and Houston Public Media has more.
Will Metro take over B-Cycle?
I like the idea and hope Metro can really run with it.
The Houston area's biggest bus operator is considering getting in the bike business, infusing up to $500,000 into the city's network of docked two-wheelers.
Under the proposal, scheduled for a vote by the Metropolitan Transit Authority board next week, Metro would take over bike sharing in the area and integrate it into its own plans for encouraging bus and train riders to access stops.
"Anything that is engaged in moving people, we need to be part of that," Metro CEO Tom Lambert said Wednesday.
The proposed partnership is welcomed by Houston Bike Share, the nonprofit created in 2012 to develop the bike sharing system in Houston, using BCycle's kiosk-based bikes.
"Metro recognizes the value of bike share as a safe, affordable and logical element in the city's mobility plan," said Maya Ford, chairwoman of the nonprofit, in a statement. "They're exploring ways to help us sustain an operating network by providing us with more transit-oriented and business resources."
What remains unclear, as officials sort out how to absorb bike sharing into the transit agency, is what the system will look like under Metro. Half of the local BCycle stations closed in November as part of a "temporary cost-saving measure," and Lambert said the next few months will be used to transition the system into Metro and evaluate what provides the best options for travelers.
"There might be some locations we do not bring back," Lambert said.
Starting in 2012 with only three stations and fewer than 20 bikes, the BCycle system ballooned in the past decade to 153 stations spread around neighborhoods within Loop 610 and nearly 1,000 bikes, some with electric motors. Houston, Harris County and others poured money into the system to add stations and support operations.
That growth has meant explosive use of the bikes, but also has posed a challenge for the nonprofit to maintain the costly and growing system. George Fotinos, Metro's chief financial officer, said the current system, when fully operational, costs about $80,000 a month, with only a fraction of that coming from the rental costs or annual memberships.
To trim costs, 75 of the 153 kiosks were turned off in November, largely reducing the system to its core around downtown, Midtown and Montrose.
Transit taking more oversight of bike sharing in cities is not uncommon. Austin's Capitol Metro operates bike sharing around transit stops, while systems in Los Angeles and New York also fall under the authority of transit or municipal transportation departments. In each of those cities, however, multiple bike sharing or scooter sharing systems exist, unlike Houston, which only has BCycle.
Whatever form the system takes will include some shift in its focus. The existing system is used mostly recreationally, bike sharing officials have said, with locations such as Herman Park and Buffalo Bayou Park along Sabine Street as the most heavily-used stations. Those in areas outside downtown and away from popular local biking trails are some of the least-used.
Metro officials, meanwhile, said their aim is for a bike sharing system that helps people make local trips or connect them to buses and trains.
"Metro's role is a lot broader," Metro Chairman Sanjay Ramabhadran said. "Our job is to provide mobility and this is a form of getting us that."
Known as "first-mile/last-mile," the distance someone has to travel to a bus stop or train station can be some of the most vexing challenges for transit agencies, leading some to partner or absorb bike sharing systems so people can easily find bikes, drop them off nearby transit stops and then hop a train or bus.
I hadn't heard about the cutback in B-Cycle kiosks; I assume this is another bit of fallout from the pandemic, though the story doesn't say. I made my heaviest use of B-Cycle when I worked downtown, where it was great for trips that are a bit too long to walk and too much hassle to get the car out of the garage. Now that I work from home and an office park off I-10, I just had no need for it.
I have been an advocate for better integration of our bicycle infrastructure in general and B-Cycle in particular with Metro for a long time. I hadn't considered this possibility before, but it makes all kinds of sense. I agree that the focus of B-Cycle would need to shift a bit from being primarily for recreational use to more transit-oriented use. That doesn't mean that recreational use should go away, just that kiosk access to bus and rail stops would be more of a priority. The good news is that there's a lot more bike-friendly passage around town now, so that should help. Assuming the Metro board votes for this, which I think it will, they will have six to nine months to figure out how to best make this work. I'm confident they can, and I'm sure they will be able to get plenty of input from the local bike community. I look forward to seeing how this plays out.
So what's the deal with that I-45 deal?
Still to be determined.
Houston, Harris County and the Texas Department of Transportation have an agreed path forward for rebuilding Interstate 45, and a lot of steps to get there.
Details big and small remain works in progress and a federal pause looms as the last big hurdle, for now, as officials move ahead after last month's agreements.
"We are doing everything we can to move this project forward," James Koch, director of transportation planning and development for TxDOT in Houston, told a North Houston Association luncheon on Wednesday.
The group, focused on economic development north of the city, is a vocal supporter of the widening project because of its potential to improve access to downtown and revitalize sagging areas along the I-45 freeway corridor.
To get some of those benefits, officials first have to iron out technical issue that not only affect the $10 billion rebuild of I-45 and the downtown freeway system, but numerous other mobility projects that cross it. Among them:
How TxDOT will rebuild Interstate 69 beneath Metropolitan Transit Authority's Red Line light rail in Midtown while keeping the trains moving as much as possible.
Addressing changes sought by the Harris County Flood Control District that improve drainage for neighborhoods north and south of the Loop 610 interchange with I-45.
Design specifics of the future I-45 interchange with Interstate 10 that accommodate Metro's planned Inner Katy bus rapid transit line along I-10 and proposed managed lanes access to downtown streets.
Adding sidewalks and bike amenities to areas where TxDOT has committed to trying to reduce the number of properties it will take.
Determining how a proposed downtown connection for the Hardy Toll Road will enter the area near Buffalo Bayou and cross a remade I-10.
Reconsidering how the project will incorporate Metro's plans for bus rapid transit into its overall design.
"I think the next steps are sitting down in a room and working out all the details," Metro board Chairman Sanjay Ramabhadran said of the work ahead.
Those details are not the only obstacles to construction, which officials will consider moving from 2024 to 2027 later this month in the region's four-year transportation plan. TxDOT still must acquire some property, Koch said, and the pending Federal Highway Administration review that the local agreements do not affect must be resolved.
Hailed by elected officials as a breakthrough that salvaged a desperately-needed freeway rebuild, the deals surprised critics of the initial design. They noted many of the details give TxDOT room to renege while others fall short of the changes some neighborhood advocates had sought.
In a statement, Air Alliance Houston said the agreements "will do very little to protect Houston communities from the harms posed by this project," specifically related to air pollution caused by the larger freeway in many neighborhoods around the central business district.
"It would be difficult to overstate our disappointment in the contents of these two (agreements), the closed-door manner in which they were created and signed, the lack of sufficient time for the public to read and respond to them, and the tone with which they were presented," the group said.
Officials have defended the deals as the best way to change the project but still maintain the benefits that will come with it, including faster and safer commutes and the creation of two-way managed lanes that can improve transit in the I-45 corridor.
See here for the background. I believe that's the first I've heard of the construction timeline being pushed back to 2027, which is a modest benefit no matter what else happens. We still need to know what all these details are, and I definitely agree that there is room for TxDOT to weasel out on a lot of promises. But I have always believed that one way or another this was going to happen, so any improvements or modifications to the original plan have to be considered with that in mind. Metro is probably as eager as anyone to get this going, as their MetroNext plans depend on various items in the I-45 rebuild. I hope that as long as things are still being worked out there's still room to get assurances and confirmations about the things that Metro has agreed to.
Shepherd/Durham construction update
Good long story in the Chron.
When the workers clear — still months away — Shepherd and Durham, along with some major side streets, will be remade, and in many ways reformed. The streets, dual thoroughfares that funnel traffic between Memorial Drive and Loop 610, will remain major commuting corridors, but with wider sidewalks, bike lanes and spruced-up trees and intersections.
"It certainly could look a lot better," Heights resident Christie Aycock said. "As it is, there is all this building going on, but you cannot get to it without a car."
Lack of viable options beyond automobiles is a constant in many Houston neighborhoods, to which the city, various management districts, Harris County and other entities are taking a piecemeal approach to correcting. Some projects, including the $120 million plan for Shepherd within Loop 610, also have federal funding attached.
When completed in sections between 2024 and 2028, the work along Shepherd and Durham will have added sidewalks and a separated bike lane to both streets. The sidewalk redo also will bring the entire route up to Americans with Disabilities Act standards, a huge improvement for those who use wheelchairs or other assistance.
To make room for cyclists and walkers in the same right of way, the four-lane streets will be trimmed to three lanes, with some dedicated turn lanes at major intersections.
Analyses showed traffic congestion on both streets was due to turns, so losing a lane but gaining turn areas should help drivers proceed more efficiently.
"Both our study and the city's show it improves congestion," said Sherry Weesner, president of the redevelopment authority.
South of Washington Avenue to Memorial Drive, Houston Public Works is more than halfway through a rebuild of Shepherd and Durham that resurfaces both the streets atop new drainage pipes, along with rebuilding six smaller streets between the two thoroughfares. The $12 million project also is adding lighting and bike lanes, and like the northern segment, will trim vehicle lanes from four to three to make room for bicyclists and pedestrians.
"While the contractor has faced supply and staffing issues due to the pandemic, they have a plan in place to finish in the spring," said Erin Jones, spokeswoman for Houston Public Works.
Farther south, between Westheimer and Richmond, a $27 million rebuild of Shepherd has frustrated businesses and travelers for months, but promises better drainage for the western Montrose and Upper Kirby neighborhoods nearby. Shepherd, meanwhile, will get similar sidewalks and rebuilt intersections aimed at making the street less chaotic, but with the same two lanes in each direction for drivers.
Once the Shepherd work moves to the next phase south of 15th, the bike lanes will connect with bike lanes being developed along 11th Street through the Heights.
Though controversial with some residents, the 11th Street lanes form an east-west route from Shepherd that feed into other trails closer to downtown Houston.
Another east-west route, meanwhile, could carry many more commuters into downtown. Metropolitan Transit Authority's planned Inner Katy bus rapid transit line includes a proposed stop at Shepherd-Durham on the south side of Interstate 10. As Metro creates the line, it has said connectivity by bike and on foot is crucial, along with improved bus service along the entire Shepherd corridor so residents as far north as Acres Homes have access.
See here and here for more on this project; the 11th Street makeover and the Inner Katy BRT line are also mentioned. As noted before, I'm driving this stretch of road pretty regularly now as part of school pickup duties. It's not been too bad so far, and I'm excited to see what the finished product looks like. That area is so much more residential now than it was 20 years ago, it just makes sense to redo those roads in a way that fits in with a neighborhood. We need to do this in more parts of the city.
The slow but steady march of Houston's non-car transportation infrastructure
Good story.
When he arrived in Houston two years ago, what David Fields saw belied what he had heard.
The nation's fourth-largest city has long been known as car-centric and geared toward commuting, with a web of wide freeways that stretch from the heart of town to the far-flung suburbs. Driving, and fighting rush-hour traffic, could be considered part of Houston's culture.
But Fields, a native New Yorker who also worked in the San Francisco area before taking a job as Houston's chief transportation planner, saw a city in flux in terms of how its residents get around. Public transit options have expanded in recent years, and so has Houston's network of sidewalks and hike-and-bike trails.
Fields, who has lived in the Heights and Montrose areas and works downtown, said last week he has yet to drive to his office, instead relying on buses and occasionally his bicycle.
"I think Houston has a reputation because it grew up around the car for many years, but the reality on the ground is not the historic reputation," he said. "I did not realize how much was going on here until I got to spend some time."
Although highway expansion continues in the region and driving remains the primary mode of transportation for most Houston-area residents, the city continues to inch away from its reliance on personal cars and trucks while expanding its infrastructure for cyclists, pedestrians and mass transit users. The idea, according to Fields, is to make the city safer, to more adequately accommodate more residents and their preferred transportation options and also to combat climate change.
The city recently was awarded a $21 million federal grant for a transformative project on a 3-mile stretch of Telephone Road in the southeast part of town, where vehicle lanes will be reduced while bike lanes, wider sidewalks and improved connections with METRO – the region's public transit provider – will be added. Similar projects have been completed in recent years on Austin Street in the Midtown area and Kelley Street on the north side, and many more are underway or in the pipeline.
A federal grant also is buoying an infrastructure project along Shepherd and Durham drives in the Heights area that calls for fewer vehicle lanes and an expanded pedestrian realm, and the city is doing much the same on a stretch of West 11th Street. Among the projects in the works at METRO, for which voters approved a $3.5 billion bond in 2019, is a 25-mile University Line that will stretch across the southern and eastern parts of town while connecting three universities.
Many of those projects have come to light under the administration of Houston Mayor Sylvester Turner, who was elected in 2015. Fields said the city has added 400 miles of bike lanes under the Houston Bike Plan, adopted by the city council in 2017, and meeting the needs of non-drivers is now part of the planning for every infrastructure initiative.
"The mayor has said over and over again we are in a transportation paradigm shift, which means moving people by all the different modes, making it safer for all the different modes and really rethinking our right-of-way space," Fields said. "I can't imagine any project the city is leading that is not looked at through a multimodal lens."
Houston also is grappling with long-held perceptions and attitudes about how to get around the city and how its transportation resources should be invested. Fields said residents have expressed reservations about projects that will increase drive times and require prolonged construction – even if the tradeoff is improved safety – while Cutrufo said opponents of expanded cycling infrastructure often point to the city's low number of bike riders compared to car drivers.
But [Joe] Cutrufo, whose BikeHouston organization has about 12,000 members, said Houston is "overbuilt for car traffic" and doesn't require the lane capacity that exists on its roads. So there is plenty of space, he said, to accommodate those who prefer alternative modes of transportation.
"Nobody's taking away your option to drive," Cutrufo said of lane-reduction projects such as the ones in the Heights and on Telephone Road. "We're gaining so much more than we're losing. We're not just gaining some space on a specific corridor that had to be quote-unquote taken away from drivers. We're gaining a significant transportation option that we didn't have before without losing the option to drive."
It's a long story, so go read the rest. Among other things, it name-checks the new bike bridges story, with the West 11th Street project implicitly included. Couple points to mention here. One is that the increased density of the greater Heights/Washington/Rice Military/Memorial areas is really only feasible with this kind of increased bike-and-pedestrian infrastructure. Both in terms of street traffic and parking space, you really want to encourage people who can get around these areas via walking or biking to do so, because there just isn't the literal space for everyone to drive everywhere. This is a subject I've talked about before, in the context of increasing parking for bikes. Again, the key thing here is that making it easier for those who can walk or bike to get places really benefits those who have no choice but to drive.
The other thing to note, which gets only a passing mention in this story, is how much Metro has done lately in this space as well, from the big bus route redesign to more bike racks on buses, integrating with B-Cycle, and working to improve sidewalks around bus stops. The redesign of the local bus routes made a huge difference for me when I was working downtown and carpooling with my wife. It was much easier for me to get to and from work when our schedules didn't overlap, and it was much easier to get to other places as well thanks to the frequent routes. I go downtown less frequently now that I don't work there, but I rarely drive there when I do need to go. For those of you who rarely if ever take Metro, remember that every time I do, it's one less car clogging up I-10 or I-45. You're welcome.
More on the planning for the University BRT line
Aug 1st, 2022
Yes, Metro has to make some predictions about where transit will be needed. Building a line that goes through some of the densest parts of town probably helps with that.
Metropolitan Transit Authority officials told voters in 2019 "we have a plan for traffic," and more than two-thirds of those who cast ballots bought in.
Now that the plan is coming into focus, agency officials will need more than just good ideas to make the lines they have drawn on a map a reality.
The challenge for Metro is picking routes and lines for the future when travel patterns constantly change and economic factors can upend commutes. Even with $7.5 billion in local and federal funding plotted, Metro can only do one or two major projects at a time. Picking the first steps in some ways influences whether the agency can avoid lingering concerns about transit leaders' ability to deliver big projects.
Officials admit much of their plan is an educated guess, but still a guess about how Houstonians will want to get around in the years to come.
"It is not possible for us to be future-proof, but it is possible to be future-ready," Metro board chair Sanjay Ramabhadran said.
The long-range plan for transit in Houston, estimated to cost $7.5 billion, spans the entire region, including 75 miles of bus rapid transit, two-way HOV or HOT lanes for park and ride buses along all major freeways and plans for extending light rail to Hobby Airport.
While things such as shelters at hundreds of Metro's 8,900 bus stops and improved sidewalks along major routes already are in progress, the first big-ticket project on Metro's list is the University Line. It is among the longest bus rapid transit lines planned in the nation, connecting a dozen of the region's major transit hubs and roughly 20 neighborhoods, using large buses that stop at stations and act more like light rail than conventional bus service.
The buses use their own lanes along major streets, in some cases taking lanes now open to car and truck drivers, to avoid traffic and offer access to about 40 stops along the 25.3 mile route. It is about one-third of the dedicated lanes Metro wants to build, and along with a planned BRT line along Interstate 10 forms the two east-west transit backbones that join the light rail system downtown and the Silver Line BRT through Uptown.
Transit advocates have called the line critical to linking Houston neighborhoods clamoring for better, faster transit to the job centers and educational opportunities abounding in the region.
"If we can get 5 to 10 percent of the region using transit, that is going to make life better for the 90-95 percent," Ramabhadran said.
See here for some background, and look for a detailed description of the route embedded in the story. This BRT route will connect with all of the existing light rail lines as well as the Uptown BRT line, and will later connect with the Energy Corridor BRT line that's also on the drawing board (see page 2). I will never get over the fact that we could right now already have an operational Universities light rail line, but there's nothing to be done about that. I do see the same old critics making their same old tired arguments in this story, and all I can say is that I hope they have a lot less influence this time around. We're still a long way out from a ribbon-cutting, and I know I'll be worried about things that can go wrong until we get to that. In the meantime, learn what you can about this and show your support. We're going to need all the good transit options we can get.
Time to meet the University Line BRT plans
A big step forward, but there are many miles yet to go.
The biggest of Metro's big bus offerings is about to turn from lines on a map to a full-fledged discussion for Houston residents, as transit officials prepare for the first round of public meetings over the planned University Line.
Just don't expect fast action on what could be the spine of Metro's east-west mass transit system. A host of hurdles remain for the bus rapid transit planned between northeast Houston and Westchase, including segments similar to those proposed 15 years ago that ran into a buzzsaw of opposition in some Houston neighborhoods. Elected officials at the time took that opposition and clamped off funding for the project.
Public meetings start Tuesday, with two evening events planned. Nine more meetings follow, where residents can look at display boards of where the Metropolitan Transit Authority proposes widening local streets to allow for bus-only lanes and dedicated stations similar to rail where passengers will enter and exit the 60-foot buses that operate the line.
The meetings are not detailed designs, but a chance for the community to evaluate the plans and offer suggestions of where and what Metro should build to best serve riders, who might not hop onto the buses for a decade or more in some spots. Construction is not likely to happen before 2025, if then, with opening day in 2029 at a cost of $2 billion or more.
"This is a complicated engineering project. It's going to take some time," Metro chairman Sanjay Ramabhadran said.
The line, likely built in five phases, would be among the largest BRT lines in the nation, stretching more than 25 miles from the Tidwell Transit Center near Loop 610 and Interstate 69 to Westchase. Metro's preferred route uses Lockwood to travel through Denver Harbor and Fifth Ward to the Eastwood Transit Center, then jogs through Third Ward with stops at the University of Houston and Texas Southern University. Following Alabama and Wheeler, the line crosses Midtown at the Wheeler Transit Center using Richmond before turning south at Edloe. From there, the buses would use their own lanes along Westpark Drive to Westchase.
The length, combined with the complexity of building practically anything in the densest parts of the Houston region, makes the project monumental to plan but also critical to tying together a growing but gap-riddled reliable bus network across an area built for the automobile.
"There are multiple pieces to the puzzle," Ramabhadran said. "We are going to be crossing every highway in the region with the exception of (U.S.) 290."
Information about the public meetings can be found here. The goal is to submit a proposal for funding to the Federal Transit Administration by August to get in line for funding. After that, we'll see. Just remember as you look at all this, if we lived in a world where John Culberson never existed, we might already have a light rail line in this corridor right now. We can't turn back the clock, but we can at least get this project on track, as it were. Attend a meeting if you can, and show your support for making it a little easier to get around town.
Turns out it's not great debuting a transit service in a pandemic
The future of Houston transportation is not moving many people, even as traffic rebounds to pre-pandemic levels and ridership returns to many Metropolitan Transit Authority lines. The Silver Line, billed as a viable alternative to light rail using its own lanes and stations along Post Oak through the heart of Uptown, carried fewer riders in January than 40 of Metro's bus routes. The line, which comes every 12 minutes and avoids Galleria-area congestion, is a vital route for those using it, but carrying less than 10 percent of the riders it was built for on opening day.
"Every bus that goes by, it's empty," said Mike Riley, 61, who lives and works in Uptown. "After all that work, you see maybe three people waiting for a bus."
Despite stark use of the Silver Line — Houston's first bus rapid transit project — transit officials are not pushing the panic button, on Post Oak or any of the other 75 miles of bus rapid transit planned in the region.
"These are 50-year projects," Metro CEO Tom Lambert said, acknowledging the line has lower-than-projected ridership but has faced near-constant headwinds since opening in August 2020.
After Uptown officials spent $192 million rebuilding the street to develop the line, operated by Metro, to carry 12,000 riders per day, bus drivers are ferrying fewer than 800 on many work days.
The 60-foot vehicles use a dedicated busway along Loop 610 and their own lanes along a 2.3-mile stretch of Post Oak to deliver bus service more like light rail, stopping only at stations between the Northwest Transit Center near Interstate 10 and Loop 610 and then Westpark Lower Uptown Transit Center near Interstate 69 along Westpark Drive.
Every expectation of Houston transit in the coming years makes those two transit centers major transfer points for buses within the urban core. The Silver Line, built to connect them, is projected to carry more than 30,000 trips daily in 2030 — more than the Red Line light rail does today.
Currently, however, it does a fraction of that, even as the routes around it see a resurgence of use.
The first few months of Silver Line service have been unprecedented, with a combination of factors hurting transit ridership in general and the Silver Line in particular. COVID dropped transit use, along with most driving, by half in the Houston area. Riders were advised to stay off transit at the exact time Metro otherwise would have offered free rides and a blitz of advertising. Park and ride service, which was expected to be a big lure for commuters into Uptown to hop the Silver Line, dropped from 33,000 trips on a typical day in the region to fewer than 4,000 when the BRT began operating on on Post Oak.
In many cases, those park and ride commuters still are not back. Kastle, a building security data firm that has been tracking office use, estimates only 51.3 percent of office workers in the Houston area have returned to their pre-pandemic desks. In Uptown, where park and ride use long has been tied to tight parking limits in office garages, fewer workers and staggered shifts make it more convenient for some to drive, at least until traffic turns terrible again or plentiful parking dries up.
Not really a whole lot to say here – those last two paragraphs really sum it up. Let's see what the numbers look like when the park and ride is back to something like full strength. The Silver Line, which will always be the Uptown Line to me, will eventually connect with the Universities and Inner Katy lines, and that should be a boost as well. The timing of its debut could not have been more unfortunate. All we can do is wait it out.
Get ready for more construction in 2022
Happy New Year! Here are the places you'll want to avoid driving in 2022.
Flush with green, Houston area transportation officials have a whiteboard full of highway and transit projects poised to start in 2022, but rolling out all that blacktop will mean drivers see many more orange cones and construction zones, leaving some feeling blue.
Texas Department of Transportation construction spending is expected to top $2.2 billion for the Houston region for fiscal 2022, which began Sept. 1, nearly double the 2021 total. The projects that money pays for are spread across the region, said James Koch, director of transportation planning and development for TxDOT in Houston, during a discussion with local transportation officials.
"(2022) is going to be a very big year for our region, for the contractors and whatnot," Koch told members of the Houston-Galveston Council's transportation advisory committee on Dec. 9. "You will see a lot of barrels and cones out."
Among the major projects set to break ground in the year are new bridges across Texas 288 to remove many at-grade crossings from the highway and transition more of it to a freeway-like form. Across five different projects, TxDOT has teed up $135.6 million worth of work on overpasses in Brazoria County, along with a $70.9 million planned widening of Texas 36.
Upcoming construction, meanwhile, does not reflect work spurred by the recently approved federal infrastructure bill. The federal framework, which continues many of the same methods for funding highways and transit, is likely to jump-start a litany of other projects, officials said. Tapping those federal dollars, however, will mean as drivers see more construction zones, local and state officials — along with the engineering and planning firms they hire — will be preparing for even more work.
Much of that work is already planned for Metro, which received voter approval for $7.5 billion in new projects and upgrades in 2019, weeks before COVID changed commuting patterns worldwide. Since, Metro officials have prepped for many of the projects to proceed, with some of the earliest work likely unveiled this year.
Metro is likely to choose a preferred route and potential station locations for a planned busway along Interstate 10 in the next two or three months, allowing transit officials to get in line for federal transit money by mid-2022 as they continue design.
The project is the linchpin in Metro's expansion of rapid transit from downtown west into Uptown, which is crucial to park-and-ride service in western and northwestern parts of Harris County, officials said.
"The benefits extend beyond those seven miles," said Amma Cobbinah, a senior transit planner with Metro overseeing the project, noting how the lanes connect downtown to the Northwest Transit Center at I-10 and Loop 610, a major stop for park and buses.
Now past the transit center, those commuter routes crawl along I-10 with car and truck traffic to and from downtown, making them far less efficient and timely.
Provided the project stays on pace, officials said they hope to begin construction by late 2023 and start service in 2027.
Work on the so-called Inner Katy is just one of two major bus rapid transit projects Metro is moving forward on in 2022. Transit officials in December unveiled an online open house outlining plans for the University Corridor project, a 25-mile BRT line planned from the Tidwell Transit Center north of Kashmere Gardens, south through Fifth Ward and the Eastside. The line then turns west through Third Ward and Midtown and then through Greenway Plaza and south of Uptown where it connects to the Silver Line that runs along Post Oak.
Eventually, the University Corridor will connect to the Westchase Park and Ride near Westpark and Beltway 8.
And all this also includes the ongoing projects like the 610/59 interchange and I-10 widening out west around Brookshire, not to mention some non-freeway zones. I'm excited about the two BRT projects, both of which will be with us for a couple of years. If we can live through it all, the end results should be well worth it. Drive safe, y'all.
Here comes that Universities BRT map
Show me the route!
The largest and most-sought segment of Metro's planned bus rapid transit expansion in Houston is poised next week to officially move from being just lines on a map to the starting line — even if construction remains years away.
Metropolitan Transit Authority board members are scheduled Thursday to approve a preferred alternative for the 25-mile University Line, the mammoth route that acts somewhat as an east-west spine of the region's future transit plans. Setting the preferred route does not lock the agency into that exact path, but instead acts as the goal as design continues, leading to eventual public response to a proposal.
Though preliminary, officials said the approval is a major step for luring federal funding, as well as building the route as soon as possible.
"This is the crown jewel of MetroNext," Metro board member Jim Robinson said of the line, referring to the agency's $7.5 billion long-range plan.
Central portions of the line, mostly along Richmond and Westpark, represent the most sought-after but controversial connections in the Metro system. When voters approved Metro's long-range plan and $3.5 billion in bond authority in November 2019, Metro chairwoman Carrin Patman said closing the gap in frequent, fast transit between downtown and Uptown was the "most logical" major project in the plan.
Construction, however, likely would not begin until 2024 at the earliest, after community meetings and Federal Transit Administration approval. Work likely will happen in sections.
See here for the previous update. I reiterate everything I said then about my mixed feelings, but I remain excited about finally getting this off the ground. We've needed this for a long time.
Metro moving forward on new BRT line
As they should.
Even with fewer riders hopping aboard and a more dour financial outlook, Metro officials say the agency is full steam ahead on a host of projects aimed at adding buses to scores of routes and neighborhoods.
That includes an approval scheduled for Thursday by the Metropolitan Transit Authority board to commit $40 million to development of a planned bus rapid transit line from around Tidwell and Interstate 69 to Westchase, via Denver Harbor, downtown, Midtown, Greenway Plaza and Uptown.
The project, similar to the Silver Line along Post Oak that opened a year ago and uses dedicated bus lanes to deliver service to stations akin to light rail, is one of dozens in Metro's $7.5 billion long-range plan. That plan, approved by voters in November 2019, relies heavily on federal grants, which could come quickly if Washington lawmakers approve budget and infrastructure bills in the coming weeks or months.
"If we can get our ducks in a row on as many corridors as we can, that is good for the agency," said Metro board member Sanjay Ramabhadran.
Metro submitted a preliminary application for funding related to the so-called University Line bus rapid transit project to the Federal Transit Administration in late July. Houston transit officials heard back from their federal counterparts in one week, a quick turnaround for a first series of questions, said Shri Reddy, executive vice-president of planning, engineering, and construction at Metro. Among the issues raised by federal officials was more assurance that Metro had committed money for developing the project, prompting Thursday's vote.
That story was published on Wednesday; on Thursday, the board approved the money as planned, while giving me a bizarre sense of deja vu.
METRO will commit $40 million for two years to start developing the project. Board Member @sanjayram2000 says the agency's request to the @FTA_DOT was "well-received"
— Gail Delaughter (@Gail_HPM) 11:08 AM – 26 August 2021
Seriously, Afton Oaks? After all this time? I mean, it's all residential on that stretch of Richmond, so I doubt any stops there would be busy, but geez. Anyway, Metro is projecting less revenue now than it had originally planned for and that could lead to some uncomfortable decisions about service levels down the line if actual revenue is in line with that, but that's a concern for later. For now, this is a good start.
Can you tell me how to get (safely) to Memorial Park?
Safety is nice.
A $200 million-plus plan to improve [Memorial Park] is aimed at making it a signature destination for all Houstonians. With that success, though, will come the same challenges anything popular in Houston faces: How will people get there, where will they park and what can be done to give them an option other than driving?
A variety of projects are planned or proposed to offer safer or additional options, including new bike paths, wider sidewalks, even a possible Metropolitan Transit Authority hub to rapid buses. All of the ideas, however, are years away and still face some public scrutiny that could alter the plans.
Efforts to create or expand trails follow what has been the largest park investment in a generation — a $70 million land bridge that creates a hillside through which Memorial Drive passes, connecting the park's north and south sides.
One of the biggest challenges to improving access to Memorial is the big roads that border it: Loop 610 and Interstate 10. Running along the west and north edges of the park, the freeways are a barrier where the freeway intersections with Washington Avenue to the northeast and Memorial and Woodway to the west can be chaotic for cyclists and pedestrians.
"What we want is a safe, easy, biking solution," said Bob Ethington, director of research and economic development for the Uptown Houston District.
Ethington said along Loop 610, officials are considering how best to get runners and cyclists as far away from cars as practical. Those plans include a connection from the south, parallel to the Union Pacific Railroad tracks as far south as San Felipe.
The trail skirts a rail line south of the park, in the River Oaks area dotted with some of the most expensive homes within Loop 610. Other projects could follow, taking the trail as far as Brays Bayou and creating what could become a freeway of sorts for bicyclists between two popular bayou routes.
The key connection to the heart of Uptown, on the other side of Loop 610, is a planned trail running near the top of Uptown Park Boulevard, where it curves into the southbound frontage road, that will follow Buffalo Bayou beneath the clatter of 16 lanes of traffic above.
That connection, which could include a new bridge strictly for the trail across the bayou, would eliminate a stress-inducing street crossing for cyclists and runners at Woodway.
"The corner is terrible and the (Loop 610) underpass is not great," said Randy Odinet, vice president of capital projects and facilities for the Memorial Park Conservancy.
The Uptown work, which follows Briar Hollow in the neighborhood south of Buffalo Bayou, recently received a boost, when $4 million of the $5.3 million price tag was included in the House version of a federal infrastructure bill at the request of Rep. Lizzie Fletcher, D-Houston, who represents the area.
For travelers headed to the park from the east, two planned projects could help. Construction is set to start in about 20 months on a new bike lane spliced through a narrow piece of public land on the south side of Interstate 10. The Texas Department of Transportation project would eliminate a broken link between the Heights and Shepherd corridors and Memorial Park, caused by I-10.
Now, cyclists can use the Heights Hike and Bike Trail and White Oak Trail to access the Cottage Grove neighborhood north of I-10, then a pedestrian bridge atop I-10 at Cohn. About a half-mile from the park at the end of the Cohn crossing, however, is where the easy access stops. The Union Pacific Railroad tracks and nearby streets force runners back to TC Jester, which many avoid because of the heavy traffic and truck volumes and high speeds.
Design of the TxDOT project is not finalized, but the work likely will include a trail along the south side of I-10 from Cohn to Washington, through a slice of state-owned right of way and beneath the UP tracks. At Washington, it is expected to cross at the intersection and into the park.
The project also will replace the Cohn bridge with a wider span and assorted street-level improvements north of I-10 along the frontage road.
Most Houston residents and travelers, however, cannot simply hop on a bike and get to the park. Current transit offerings are limited to three bus routes, two of which come every 30 minutes. The third, the Route 85 Antoine/Washington that skirts the eastern edge of the park, is the only frequent route, coming every 15 minutes. More than a dozen bus routes pull into the Northwest Transit Center less than 2,500 feet away from the park, but those 2,500 feet are impassable because of the I-10 interchange with Loop 610.
A planned bus rapid transit route along I-10, however, could radically improve access if Metro were to include a stop at the park. Metro officials, while not committing, said they are considering a possible stop at Washington on the park's boundary.
The idea of a Memorial Park station has drawn interest from transit riders and officials. Often, transit is built and discussed in terms of moving people solely to jobs and schools, Metro board member Sanjay Ramabhadran said.
"It is also about getting us to recreation facilities, parks," Ramabhadran said.
Plans for the BRT line include an elevated busway along I-10 so large buses can move in their own lanes from the Northwest Transit Center to downtown Houston. Transit officials plan various public meetings before any station decision is made.
"You cannot order a BRT corridor on Amazon and have it delivered next week," Ramabhadran said.
It all sounds good to me, and you can see each of the planned items in the embedded image. Years ago, when it was still possible to dream about more light rail lines being built in Houston, I proposed a rail line that was a combination of Inner Katy/Washington Avenue and the current Uptown BRT line, which would have included a Memorial Drive segment. That was included for the purpose of making it easier for more people to get to one of Houston's biggest parks and premier destinations. That idea will never happen, but seeing a proposal for a Memorial Park-accessible stop on the now-proposed Inner Katy BRT line makes me smile. It really is kind of crazy that the only way to get to Memorial Park for nearly everyone is to drive there, especially considering how impossible it used to be to park. There's more parking now, but we could get a lot more people into Memorial Park if they didn't have to drive to get there. I very much look forward to seeing these projects take shape.
Get ready for your first Universities Line BRT map
Jun 21st, 2021
Feel the excitement! No, seriously, we've waited a long time for this.
Planning and technical work alone could take the next two years, with Metro set to approve a consulting agreement with engineering firm AECOM, paying it $1 million to start the initial designs. The total cost of the University Line is likely to exceed $1 billion.
As noted before, Metro is moving quickly to try to get federal funds so that design and construction can begin on the timeline indicated above. I support that and hope they're successful, but I have to admit this all leaves me feeling bittersweet. Remember, the original Metro referendum passed in 2001. The Main Street line opened in 2004. We were talking about designs for what would have been the Universities light rail line in 2005. A combination of some cranky Afton Oaks residents, former Congressman John Culberson, the former Metro board's incompetence, and the 2008 economic crash have all led to this, where we're trying again to build something that in another universe might be celebrating its ten year anniversary by now. I feel pretty good about the current plan coming to fruition maybe five years or so from now, but the amount of time that was wasted with nothing to show for it is staggering and nauseating. Let's please never do that again.
Let's try and get those federal transit funds now
Transit officials, sensing the timing may be right to tap federal funds for major projects, are moving quickly on portions of a planned bus rapid transit line viewed by some as the backbone of Houston's future movement.
The segment of the planned University Line between Hillcroft Transit Center in Gulfton and the Wheeler Transit Center in Midtown is one of the most highly sought but historically controversial routes in the Metropolitan Transit Authority system.
Envisioned as bus rapid transit that uses some dedicated lanes to stop at key stations, delivering service similar to rail without the expense or design complexity, the project was included in the long-range Metro plan voters approved in November 2019. With a new federal government in place, proposing massive investment in transit, Metro officials said speeding up at least central portions of the line makes sense.
"Getting it in line for potential federal funding is critical," Metro board member Sanjay Ramabhadran said. "The sooner we do it, the better."
Accelerating the project means beginning discussions with the Federal Transit Administration around September, pending Metro board approval next month. From there, planners would spend about two years designing the project and holding public meetings to gauge community preferences.
That timeline would allow for the project to gain federal approvals — and perhaps money from Washington — by September 2023. Construction would take months or potentially years, depending on what exactly Metro builds.
"There is some risk to go with it," Metro Deputy CEO Tom Jasien said of the acceleration. "We are going to have to work our way through this project development process very quickly."
The reward, however, is federal clearance for a long-sought link, along with funding for it.
"It is our best chance to get in line for the federal funding we keep hearing that is likely to come," Jasien said.
Having projects in the planning stages for construction three-to-five years away is warranted, Metro officials said, noting the agency's $7.5 billion long-range plan means transit planners will need to juggle numerous projects simultaneously so all of them are poised to proceed to design or construction when money is available.
Those aims align with indications from federal officials, including Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg, who has said projects that add transit options are needed to revive America's cities.
See here for some background. Metro is also seeking funds for the Hobby Airport light rail extension, though that may require the infrastructure bill to happen. I'm in favor of anything that will make this happen in as timely a fashion as possible, but looking at the dates in this story made me realize that if everything goes well, we might be able to have this project completed in time to celebrate the 25th anniversary of the 2001 Metro referendum that authorized a Universities Line in the first place. I am now going to get myself a beer, write John Culberson's name on a piece of paper, go out into the back yard, and light that piece of paper on fire. Feel free to celebrate along with me.
The I-45 effect on Metro
There will be a lot of disruption to mass transit as a result of the I-45 project.
Metro's board on Thursday approved hiring design and engineering firm STV Incorporated for services related to the controversial Interstate 45 project. Though the bulk of the project will widen I-45, it includes a near-total redesign of the downtown freeway system, starting with work along Interstate 69 at Spur 527, putting Wheeler — where Texas Department of Transportation officials plan to bury the freeway below local streets — in the first phases.
The contract with STV, valued at up to $9.6 million for the next five years, allows Metro to consult the company as it plans for transit operations during construction and how what is built will affect its own upcoming projects.
The goal, officials said, is to limit disruptions to bus and rail service and preserve the space Metro will need for future transit lanes and stations, so adding them later does not become a costly and complicated challenge.
"It is absolutely imperative we understand the impacts of the (I-45 rebuild) on the Wheeler site," said Clint Harbert, vice-president of system and capital planning for Metro. "That includes all of the stakeholder activity around us and the loss of property at the Wheeler site, as well as how is BRT going to go through."
The transit center, which at times has had safety concerns because of its isolated location practically beneath the freeway between Fannin and Main, is rapidly getting new neighbors and more visibility. The former Sears property in Midtown is the centerpiece of a planned "innovation hub" and redevelopment is occurring on many nearby blocks.
Though TxDOT has halted development of many segments, the portion along I-69 from Spur 527 to Texas 288 — which includes Wheeler — remains on pace for construction to start next year. Widening I-45 and redoing the downtown system is spread across many distinct but connected projects, and TxDOT had approvals and design ready for the first segments, but has halted development of the others until a lawsuit filed by Harris County and the federal review are settled.
That work could affect Wheeler and the Red Line early on, as burying the freeway through Midtown and rebuilding city streets could mean months of detours and delays for transit in the area.
The Wheeler work and potential to have the Red Line, the most-used transit line in Texas, cut in half by construction is not the only impact Metro is weighing with the I-45 work. In 2017, Metro estimated reconstruction of I-45 could cost transit officials an additional $24 million annually simply in employee time and fuel related to detours.
Wheeler already is a major stop in the Metro system, but its importance is set to increase, based on the agency's long-range transit plan. Riders will use Wheeler to transfer to and from the Red Line light rail, the spine of the train network, and the longest planned bus rapid transit line serving northeast Houston, Midtown and Westchase.
See here, here, and here for some background. The thought of the Red Line being interrupted for months because of freeway construction blows my mind – the amount of chaos that will cause is enormous. I won't relitigate the question of if it's all worth it or not – if nothing else, we can wait and see what the Harris County lawsuit brings. There is the potential here for federal money to pick up some of the cost of the BRT line that is now the Universities Line plus a northeast extension, and that would be sweet. And who knows, maybe some of this construction chaos doesn't happen, or at least isn't as bad as we now fear. There's still hope. Some of this work would be done regardless anyway. Whatever happens, I wish all the best to everyone who's going to have to deal with it for however long.
Are you ready for some I-10 construction?
Well, ready or not…
State highways officials set out in 2004 to develop a plan to remake Interstate 45 and add managed lanes, only to face increasingly stiff opposition in the past three years from elected officials and community activists that its plan was out of step with future travel needs.
New plans to add managed lanes along Interstate 10 along a corridor inside Loop 610 took only days to get that same response.
The Texas Department of Transportation and the Metropolitan Transit Authority are jointly presenting plans for a so-called Inner Katy Corridor, a project to remake the 10-lane freeway — five lanes in each direction supported by frontage roads and entrance and exit ramps — by building dedicated bus lanes, adding two managed lanes in each direction and upgrading drainage along depressed portions of the freeway.
"The commitment remains to moving the same number of single-occupant vehicles at high speed," said Neal Ehardt, a freeway critic who advocates a more urban-focused approach that includes downsizing major highways. "We are keeping the same number of single-occupant car lanes and we are adding managed lanes. This is not the mode transition we want. It is more like mode bloat."
Officials counter that it is a necessary step — and an unconventional one for TxDOT — to stay within the existing freeway footprint as much as possible but meet demand. They understand there are some that believe no additional lanes are needed, said James Koch, director of transportation planning and development for TxDOT's Houston office.
"That is a nice goal to have, but where we are today, we are not there," Koch said. "We still have traffic and congestion today and we are dealing with those things. I understand the passion those folks have, but not everybody wants to get on the bus."
Comments for this phase can be submitted to TxDOT or Metro until March 31. Because of the COVID-19 pandemic, officials created a virtual meeting room, also available until March 31.
Planners have three objectives for the eventual project along the I-10 corridor:
Building dedicated bus lanes along the freeway to extend Metro's bus rapid transit from the Northwest Transit Center near Loop 610 to downtown Houston.
Improving drainage along the segment where I-10 is below local streets, from Patterson to Loop 610.
Adding two managed lanes in each direction and improving carpool access by eliminating any gaps where HOV drivers mingle with general traffic.
Those objectives would be broken up into multiple projects, likely with different timelines.
Metro's bus lanes, for example, already are funded via the transit agency's capital budget and money controlled by the Houston-Galveston Area Council, which distributes some federal highway funding. Provided Metro is ready to proceed, construction of the $227.5 million bus lane project is set to begin in 2023 and open in 2025, according to H-GAC's five-year plan.
TxDOT's managed lanes are not included in upcoming spending plans, with officials saying the current timeline would be to start construction in 2027. The goal, Koch said, is for TxDOT to have some idea of what people prefer so the Metro bus lanes can be built without interfering with what the state constructs in the future.
The transit lanes have a chance to radically improve the quality of bus rides in the corridor and the region, said Christof Spieler, an urban planner and former Metro board member.
Relative to past freeway discussions, he said, TxDOT is part of a larger conversation about how various projects are coming together, ultimately to determine how Houston grows.
"There are signs in there of TxDOT being more creative than in the past," Spieler said.
I'm going to wait and see on this one, based on Spieler's comments. The Metro bus lanes, which were part of the 2019 Metro referendum, are a must-have. I think everyone would like to see drainage improved for this stretch of highway. It's adding the managed lanes that are going to cause the heartburn, since that either means widening I-10 (which would take up to 115 more feet of right-of-way, according to the story), or adding elevated lanes (which would still need 45 feet) and adding concerns about noise and visual blight. My advice is to attend any public meetings and give your input while you can, because it's going to be time to start building before you know it.
Metro moving forward with its construction plans
As well they should.
Carrin Patman greeted the supporter by grabbing both of his hands in a packed downtown Houston event space above a bustling sports bar. The buffet laid out for Metro's 2019 election night watch party was thoroughly picked through and waiters and waitresses were bringing out more.
"I don't want to jinx it, but everything is looking great. It's going to pass," Patman, chairwoman of the Metropolitan Transit Authority board, told the man among a throng of celebrants clinking glasses and talking about the big win for buses and trains. As she let go, Patman said she was looking forward to starting the "real work" of building Houston's future transit system.
A year later, Metro has to work its way through a pandemic that took away more than half its ridership and still is roiling its financial outlook before it can tackle more than a decade of rail, street and transit stop construction.
Nonetheless, transit officials are moving ahead with millions of dollars in engineering and design of new lines and services, confident they can plan now for major projects that riders eventually will demand.
"We don't want to lose that time," said Roberto Treviño, Metro's executive vice president for planning, engineering and construction. "We don't want to wait. Now is the time to plan."
After months of discussion, contracts for design oversight and preparation of the lengthy federal environmental process for a major bus rapid transit line could be solicited by the end of the year, as Metro starts the work Patman predicted.
You can read the rest. Some projects have been de-prioritized for now, which is fine. The people voted for doing this work, and it would be a dereliction of duty to not do it. Unless you think we're never going to get back to the level of activity and traffic we had before, there's no reason to put this off. Keep moving forward.
Uptown BRT officially opens
Meet the Silver Line.
T.J. Buttons is used to a bus ride in Houston giving him plenty of time to check his phone. On that front, Houston's first bus rapid transit route failed miserably.
"It's so fast," Buttons said as he bumped along on opening day Sunday of the Silver Line, operated by Metropolitan Transit Authority through Uptown.
More than four years of work — some a source of frustration for critics who called the project unnecessary along the car-centric corridor — preceded the opening, muted by COVID's constraints on travel in the area. Nonetheless, officials and transit supporters said the opening was cause of celebration, and an indication of the changes coming as Metro plots 75 more miles of bus rapid transit in the region.
For Buttons and other riders, it means a much faster trip than the Route 33 buses it replaces along Post Oak, with fewer stops and less competing with traffic.
"It's really like the train," Buttons said.
That's exactly what officials wanted with the project designed by Metro and the Uptown Houston Management District, which rebuilt the street and sidewalks as part of a $192.5 million project. Fourteen 60-foot buses will operate the route, traveling along an elevated busway along Loop 610 and then in dedicated transit lanes in the center of Post Oak.
The Silver Line operates between the Northwest Transit Center near Interstate 10 and Loop 610 through Uptown mostly along Post Oak to the new Westpark Lower Uptown Transit Center south of Interstate 69 near Bellaire. Fifteen bus routes connect directly to the service, via the two transit centers.
Metro and Uptown officials have said the buses will deliver service similar to light rail with boardings via platforms in the middle of the street. Trips will be faster, transit officials said, because the buses are not inching along in regular traffic. Compared to Houston's light rail system, the buses might outpace trains because traffic is not in front of them or turning from the same lanes, improving both speed of trips and safety.
"If we don't have shared left turn lanes, that knocks a lot of our issues out," said Andrew Skabowski, chief operations officer for Metro.
Getting the timing right in Uptown, especially at key intersections such as Richmond, is critical to not having the buses obstruct others. In downtown Houston, shortly after the Green and Purple lines opened in 2015, Houston Public Works and Metro spent months tweaking the traffic signal timing to find the right routine.
Skabowski said if there is a silver lining to opening the Silver Line during a pandemic, it is that lower traffic demand because of fewer commutes and shopping trips gives officials a grace period to get things right.
"We still don't have normal conditions, so that gives us a little window to get there," he said. "We have the perfect time period to tweak it."
See here for the previous update, and here for a good Twitter thread showing what the ride experience looks like. As far as that goes, it looks really good, and the service will be frequent (every ten minutes during the day) and reliable. Everything we know about transit ridership says that a comfortable and convenient experience will draw riders, so we'll see what we get here, especially once people start returning to something like a normal routine. And as Christof Spieler pointed out, this line will connect to multiple high-frequency east-west bus lines, thus really expanding the network in Houston. Later on, this will be extended to connect to the Texas Central station. It's an exciting development, and next up should be the BRT replacement for the Universities light rail line.
Time for your regularly scheduled announcement that the Uptown BRT line opening has been pushed back
Maybe for the last time, though. We hope.
Rapid bus service is coming to Uptown next month, a couple weeks later than Metro first said this summer and two years later than expected when construction began in 2016.
Service will start along the Silver Line on Aug. 23, along with other bus route changes planned by Metropolitan Transit Authority, CEO Tom Lambert said. Officials pushed back opening day a couple weeks from an earlier estimate to make all the changes at once.
"This allows us to be consistent," Lambert said.
"There are four critical traffic signals to getting this done," said Roberto Trevino, Metro's executive vice president for planning, engineering and construction, outlining the remaining work.
City officials, Trevino said, pledged to have the signals in place by the end of the week. The lights are vital to giving buses their own signal to enter and exit the lanes at key such intersections as Westpark and the Loop 610 southbound frontage road.
See here for the previous update, when July was the target month. I will say, this time we have an actual date, which is a step forward. Also, if the term "Silver Line" has been used elsewhere, I've missed it. I look forward to a day when the virus is under control and I can feel free to take what would be a joyride for myself on this new line. I hope the date for that doesn't have to keep being rescheduled.
Bike lanes coming to Shepherd/Durham corridor
Houston officials with some regional help have nearly solved funding a $100 million rebuild of Shepherd and Durham that adds bike lanes, wider sidewalks, improved drainage and new concrete to one of the most car-centric corridors within Loop 610. Regional officials Friday approved committing $40 million of the cost, using locally controlled federal highway funds.
All those additions, however, come with the loss of a driving lane on each street, reducing them to three lanes each.
Work is scheduled to start on the northern segment in fiscal 2022, from Loop 610 to 15th Street. Construction is expected to move south of 15th about a year later to Interstate 10.
It is the latest major effort by city officials to add cycling amenities along bustling and traffic-logged corridors that officials said will not significantly choke drivers and offer others crucial links to trails and upcoming transit projects.
"It is critical we have inter-modal transportation," said Houston District C Councilwoman Abbie Kamin.
She said the rebuilds of Shepherd and Durham — planned since 2013 — were among her priority projects when she took office in January because of the rapid redevelopment happening along the two streets. Car sales lots, warehouses and other businesses are being replaced by mid-rise apartment buildings and new commercial centers between I-10 and Loop 610.
"We have so many great places coming in but people can't walk or ride to get there," Kamin said.
The southern segment is vital because I-10 at Shepherd/Durham is also where Metropolitan Transit Authority plans a new stop on a future bus rapid transit line along the freeway from its Northwest Transit Center near Uptown to downtown. A completed bike lane would provide a direct link so someone could bike to a bus depot where they could hop on transit that would connect them to the two largest clusters of jobs in the region.
"It gives people a way to get to transit without driving their cars," said Maureen Crocker, deputy director of transportation planning in the Transportation and Drainage Operations Department of Houston Public Works.
Support for funding the street redesign came from a wide swath of elected officials. Texas Republicans Sen. John Cornyn and Rep. Dan Crenshaw, whose zig-zagged district includes the Shepherd-Durham corridor as well as Kingwood, wrote letters of support along with Houston-area Democrats led by Mayor Sylvester Turner and Harris County Precinct One Commissioner Rodney Ellis.
"It just shows the importance of this project," Kamin said.
Aside from the bike benefits, officials said the rebuild restores streets that have waited years for repairs, including cross streets such as 20th that are riddled with chipped-away pothole patches. By eliminating the fourth lane of traffic, federal officials said in their grant award last year, the street project also improves safety by shortening the distance drivers and pedestrians must travel to safely cross the streets.
With phase two funded, Kamin said that leaves a small segment from I-10 south to Washington unpaid for, but she said officials are optimistic they can work to get the final pieces in place.
I'm glad to see this. CM Kamin is exactly right about the changing nature of this corridor. Among other things, there are a lot of new restaurants in that area, which should draw customers from the immediate area. Ideally, those folks would be able to walk or bike there, as they would in other neighborhoods that don't have what are basically four-lane freeways running through them. This is a big step towards making that happen, and that will be a real boon for the area. It's also important to remember that even in Houston there are a lot of folks who don't have cars, and a project like this is going to make how they travel, whether by foot or bike or bus, safer as well.
I feel compelled at this point to confess that fifteen years or so ago, during an earlier phase of the "rebuild and expand I-45 south of Beltway 8" project, I advocated for turning this corridor into a better and faster automotive alternative to I-45 – basically, using the Shepherd/Durham corridor as extra capacity for I-45, so we could maybe get away with adding less capacity to that freeway. I'm sure there's a blog post to that effect somewhere in my archives, because I definitely remember writing something along those lines, but I don't feel like spelunking for it. Point is, that was a bad idea that I'm glad no one took seriously. I was myopically concerned about one thing, and didn't consider how it would affect other people and places. It's crazy to think what this area might look like now if Shepherd and Durham had been modified to be even more highway-like. What we have now is so much better and about to be even more so. It's good to remind myself sometimes that I'm as big an idiot as anyone else.
Metro slows its roll on system improvements
Not a surprise.
Houston-area transit officials will wait out a little more of the coronavirus crisis before soliciting bids on five of the first projects in their $7 billion construction bonanza for bus and rail upgrades.
"Moving this by a month does not hurt anything at all," said Sanjay Ramabhadran, a Metropolitan Transit Authority board member.
Board members on Tuesday delayed approval of the procedure for selecting engineering, architecture and design firms for what could be more than $1 billion in bus and rail projects along key routes. The projects are the first in the agency's long-range transportation plan, which voters approved in November, authorizing Metro to borrow up to $3.5 billion. The remaining costs for the program, called MetroNext, will be covered by federal grants and unspent local money Metro set aside for future budgets.
Instead, officials said the requests for proposals are set for approval in April for:
an extension of the Green and Purple light-rail lines to the Houston Municipal Courthouse
bus rapid transit and a dedicated lane along Interstate 10 from Loop 610 to downtown Houston
rapid bus service and use of managed lanes along Interstate 45
a new Missouri City Park and Ride
enhanced bus corridors along the Westheimer and Lockwood bus routes
The time will allow Metro officials to review the specifics of the agreements, Chairwoman Carrin Patman said.
See here and here for some background. No mention of the Uptown BRT line, whose target opening date is now July, though Lord knows what anything means at this time. Metro has suspended fare collection for now, in part because people need all the help they can get during this crisis, and in part because ridership numbers have plummeted during the crisis. Neither of those will have much effect on Metro's cash flow in the short term, but the concurrent decline in local sales tax revenue will. We'll know more about that in May when the Comptroller disburses the March tax revenues.
Uptown BRT pushed back to July
Opening day for Houston's first bus rapid transit line has been pushed back to mid-summer as construction enters the final steps along most of the route before reaching a three-month testing period.
Service is expected to start no earlier than July, said Tom Lambert, CEO of Metropolitan Transit Authority. That is four months later than the March opening officials predicted in mid-2019, the result of some construction delays and the desire to test more of the system at once.
"Until you get the whole corridor lined up, you really can't deliver the service the way it is intended," Lambert said.
Though riders will experience the bus service as a single rapid transit route from Metro's Northwest Transit Center north of Interstate 10 to a new transit center along Westpark Drive — primarily along bus-only lanes along Loop 610 and in the center of Post Oak — the path involves five different projects, built by different public entities.
That includes the new transit center taking shape along Westpark, now expected to finish in March, that Uptown and transit officials view as a major hub for buses.
Work on the Post Oak lanes mostly is complete, according to John Breeding, executive director of the Uptown Houston Management District, which rebuilt the road and led efforts to add transit to the area.
Construction continues, however, on the elevated busway that will carry the BRT service from Post Oak north along Loop 610 before reconnecting the buses with North Post Oak. Work on the $58 million busway, developed by the Texas Department of Transportation, is expected to finish by the end of March, TxDOT spokeswoman Emily Black said.
Testing in earnest can only happen along the line with the Post Oak and busway portions complete, Lambert said.
The previous update, which did note that there were these other parts that weren't done yet, still had March for the grand opening. So much for that. If this means it will all open at once and not in a piecemeal fashion, I suppose that makes more sense. But as with all construction projects, you just want it to be over with.
Uptown BRT line update
It's coming, it's coming. Hold your horses.
The new year will come with a new sight in Houston: Big gray buses bounding along a dedicated lane on Post Oak through Uptown.
For the first few weeks, however, people will not hop aboard, as transit officials test the new buses and routes to ready it for a March 2020 opening.
Testing could start sooner, but Christmastime in Uptown means a slight wait for the debut of bus rapid transit in the region.
"Because of all the activity surrounding the Christmas decorations going up in that area, we can't begin testing now," said Tracy Jackson, spokeswoman for Metropolitan Transit Authority. Testing, she said, will start in January.
Getting full use out of the BRT service along Post Oak, however, requires a handful of other projects that will not be finished when buses start rolling. That will lead to detours on the north and south ends of the service for months.
Where the Post Oak lanes end near Loop 610, the Texas Department of Transportation will take over with an elevated busway that rises in the middle of the freeway and then swings over to the southbound side along its own overpass.
The busway, expected to cost $58.4 million, will give the large buses continuous dedicated lanes from Richmond to North Post Oak. It remains on track to open along with the Post Oak lanes because it has not faced the lengthy delays of the street-level work.
Meanwhile, Metro last month approved a $10.9 million project to connect the end of TxDOT's busway with the Northwest Transit Center, which also is being rebuilt.
The 1.4 mile extension of the dedicated bus lane along North Post Oak is expected to be completed in about a year, around the same time as the new transit center, said Roberto Trevino, Metro's executive vice president for planning, engineering and construction.
The new lanes will replace the existing median along North Post Oak on the bridge spanning Interstate 10, then continue south. To fit the lanes on the existing bridge, Metro would take up some of the space now used for a bike lane along the span.
"We are going to come back with a separate structure for that use," Trevino said, noting TxDOT is still assessing plans for the new pedestrian bridge.
See here for the previous update, in which we were introduced to the term "MetroRapid". Note that the expected opening date then was also March of 2020, so everything remains on track, as it were. I had a training class in the Galleria area a few weeks ago and got a good up-close look at the stations at Post Oak and Westheimer. I wish I'd taken a picture of it. If this had been in operation, I'd have had more lunch options readily available to me, I'll say that much. Getting those extensions built will be nice, but I think the big deal will be when the BRT line that is the successor to the Universities light rail line gets built. That will be the connection of this line to the Main Street line, and will finally provide something like what the 2003 referendum once promised, before cost concerns and John Culberson got in the way. I don't know what the time frame is for that yet – Metro Chair Carrin Patman is quoted saying this is a priority, but that's all we know right now – but I can't wait to see it happen. Not having to drive into the Galleria would be awesome.
Endorsement watch: For the Metro bond
Oct 22nd, 2019
All of the candidate endorsements have been done by the Chron, but there remain the endorsements for ballot propositions. Which is to say, the Metro referendum and the constitutional amendments. I'll address the latter tomorrow, but for now here's the Chron recommending a Yes vote on the Metro bond.
Houston Metro is asking voters' permission to borrow a busload of bucks to add a robust bus rapid transit network, new rail service to Hobby airport and badly needed bus improvements.
It's a big ask, and if voters agree, the agency will add up to $3.5 billion in debt to its balance sheet.
But Houston needs a better set of transit options. Metro has promised to add the borrowed billions to a giant plan for the future, dubbed MetroNext, and all together the $7.5 billion spending plan is an enormous step forward for the agency and for the city. We strongly urge Houston voters to support this first step, by voting yes on the ballot proposition to give Metro permission to issue the bonds it needs.
Voters should know that the proposal won't add a dime to the taxes all of us already pay for Metro. Our penny in sales tax is already committed, and the additional borrowing won't change that. Metro simply wants to sell bonds so it can leverage its future sales taxes to pay for projects right now, rather than wait for the accumulation of annual revenues to grow large enough to finally pay for them. By pooling future revenues, it can fast-track improvements for which users in Houston would otherwise have to wait years, or even decades.
It's a reasonable argument — so long as the plan to spend the money is sound. We've looked at the details of the proposal and heard from those who support it and from those who loathe it. On balance, we think voters should readily support it.
See here for more details about the referendum, and give a listen if you haven't already to my interview with Carrin Patman, in which we explored many aspects of the plan as well as broader transit topics. You know that I'm all in on this, and the one piece of polling data we have looks good. Either we want more and better transportation choices in the greater Houston area, or we want everyone to be stuck in traffic forever. Your call.
Someone is opposing the Metro referendum
I suppose it was too optimistic to hope that the Metro referendum would not get any organized opposition.
Opponents of Metro's $3.5 billion bond referendum have formed a political action committee to lead a grass-roots campaign to curtail what they say is wasteful spending by the regional transit agency.
"To ask for $3.5 billion is irresponsible," said Bill Frazer, one of the organizers of the Responsible Houston PAC and a former Houston city controller candidate.
Opponents used the Post Oak project as the backdrop for their announcement Tuesday, noting that Metro is asking for money to build 75 miles of bus rapid transit in the region despite having nothing to show Houstonians are eager to hop aboard. Critics also noted Metro's newest light rail lines have never delivered the ridership officials promised when they started construction and failed to build many of the things promised voters in 2003 — as they used the $640 million voters approved to build three rail lines and did not add the park and ride locations and increased bus service promised by the ballot item.
"Before we do another blank check, someone needs to hold someone accountable for the past," said Wayne Dolcefino, a media consultant that helped organize Tuesday's announcement.
With so many areas in need of improved street drainage, Frazer said transit officials should invest their money there — something he said is possible because Metro's agreement with cities promises 25 percent of the transit sales tax for street and drainage projects. Nothing, Frazer said, prohibits Metro from spending more than a quarter of the money for streets.
Note that "organized" does not mean "coherent", or "logical", or "sensible". Last I checked, Houston already had a funding system in place for street and drainage improvement, which as I recall from his campaigns for Controller Bill Frazer opposed. Drainage is certainly a vital thing, but it doesn't improve mobility. I'm also old enough to remember the 2012 election, in which there was a referendum that not only reaffirmed Metro's one quarter share of the transit sales tax, it granted Metro a full share of the revenue growth on top of what was then being collected. The rest of this is largely unsupported claptrap, which will appeal to the kind of person who thinks any of this makes sense, and nobody else. I'll be sure to look for their 30-day and 8-day finance reports.
Meet MetroRapid
Jul 21st, 2019
That's the new, official name for the Uptown BRT line.
Station names along the Post Oak dedicated bus lanes will have a familiar ring for riders, transit and Uptown officials decided, as they inch toward opening the region's first foray into BRT in the coming months.
Eight stations along Post Oak will have mostly non-commercial names, aimed at helping travelers navigate the new bus line. Uptown Houston Management District is building the $192 million project, which started work in 2016 to add a dedicated bus lane in each direction in the center of Post Oak from Loop 610 to south of Richmond.
The southern end of the project will be a new transit center, which will re-route buses from the existing Bellaire Transit Center. The new site, which Metropolitan Transit Authority officials are likely to approve July 31, along with the station names, will be called the Uptown/Westpark Transit Center. It is located at Westpark Drive, just west of Loop 610 where a new ramp is under construction along Interstate 69 as part of the total rebuild of the freeway interchange.
Officials also said they have settled on MetroRapid as the name of the service, which will use large buses but offer trip times and frequencies similar to rail. The Post Oak line will not have all the elements of bus rapid transit, such as priority at all traffic lights, but will be, for most purposes, rapid service.
Though the bus project was devised and supported by officials with the management district, the board of which are major landowners or work for developers along Post Oak, station names largely avoided commercial ties.
"Where possible, the street is the major defining characteristic of a station name," said John Breeding, president of the management district.
As a result, the stations mirror the names of cross-streets, such as San Felipe, Westheimer and Richmond.
Tentative plans call for the Westheimer and Alabama stops to have "Galleria" as part of their names, as both are within walking distance of the mall. Breeding said Uptown officials also are working with The Galleria to enhance pedestrian access from the stations to various entrances.
Service is now expected to begin in March of 2020, which is a year later than it was expected to begin the last time an opening date was announced. The HOV lane part of this project is also moving along, also with a 2020 start date. I'm ready to see what it all looks like.
HOV for Uptown BRT update
Checking in on this long-time project.
Uptown's bet on buses is getting a lift from TxDOT in a first-of-its-kind venture that has state highway dollars going to a mass transit project along one of Houston's most clogged freeways.
Come next year, buses traveling in their own lanes will ascend to the middle of the West Loop 610 for traffic-light trips between Post Oak and Metro's Northwest Transit Center via a busway that will swing over the southbound freeway and then parallel to it.
Making all the pieces fit along what by many measures is the busiest freeway segment in the state has taken some engineering creativity, as well as a change in policy for the Texas Department of Transportation that many critics say remains too focused on being the "highway department" in a Houston area that is increasingly urbanizing.
"It is a tremendous recognition of how mobility in this region is changing," said Tom Lambert, CEO of Metropolitan Transit Authority.
The $58 million project, which is becoming more visible along the Loop by the day, adds two lanes in each direction specifically for buses. Though other projects around Houston have benefited buses in the past three decades, such as the Katy Managed Lanes along Interstate 10, this will be the first Houston-area transit-only project using highway money since TxDOT was created in 1991 by merging the aviation and highway departments with the Texas Motor Vehicle Commission.
Just for some background, it was six years ago that City Council voted to approve the Uptown TIRZ plan that included the BRT lane construction on Post Oak as well as the HOV construction on 610. A bit more than a year later came the no-light-rail-conversion conditions, which still chap my rear end. The Post Oak construction started in 2015. If we're really on track to have everything done by next year (woo hoo!), then among other things that would prove how prescient Uptown Management District President and CEO John Breeding was when he told me in a 2010 interview that it would take five to ten years to finish the project. Based on that timeline, we're more or less on schedule. Have patience, y'all.
Metro's challenge
It's all about BRT.
Houston transit officials are betting on bus rapid transit as a big part of the region's long-term plans, at times going as far as calling it the "wave of the future."
If seeing is believing, however, voters in the region will go into the election booth blind when it comes to bus rapid transit, or BRT. Houston has local buses, MetroLift buses, commuter buses and even articulated buses on major routes, but BRT is MIA.
"(Light) rail seems to be very well maintained and it has a high degree of reliability," said Lex Frieden, a Metropolitan Transit Authority board member. "BRT, since we have not experienced that, we can only imagine how a bus can be as stable as the sense you have on a train. How can it be as reliable as a train? Part of the issue is familiarity."
Growing transit, specifically via BRT, is a major component of the $7.5 billion plan Metro developed over the past 18 months. The agency is expected to ask voters for authority to borrow money in November, with the specifics of the projects still under review. Plans include 20 more miles of light rail, two-way HOT lanes along most freeways and about 75 miles of BRT.
Bus rapid transit uses large buses to operate mostly along dedicated lanes, offering service similar to light rail without the cost or construction of train tracks. It has proven successful in communities such as Cleveland and Los Angeles.
The first foray into BRT in the region will be along Post Oak Boulevard in the Uptown area. Drivers already have felt the construction pain, but riders will not hop aboard until next March, months later than initially scheduled when construction began in 2016.
In the interim, Metro will try to convince people to support something most have never seen. Part of that will mean getting people to reconsider their own biases.
"The second people hear bus, they have an image in their mind," said Metro board member Sanjay Ramabhadran.
If voters approve, BRT could become a big part of regional transit. Metro plans BRT along five major corridors, at an estimated cost of $3.15 billion. The routes mostly mirror where Metro previously proposed rail, most notably between the University of Houston and Uptown and from downtown to Bush Intercontinental Airport.
The former, once dubbed the University Line, long has been a point of contention. Voters in 2003 narrowly approved the Metro Solutions plan that included light rail from UH, through downtown and on to Uptown, but the project sputtered under intense opposition from residents along Richmond Avenue.
Now resurrected as a bus rapid transit project, the pains of the previous rail fight linger. Transit critics still question Metro's ability to execute a major project that does not disrupt traffic, noting the Post Oak project has taken longer than expected and derailed driving along the street.
Rail backers, meanwhile, insist trains are superior, with some opposed to any Metro plan that does not include trains to and from downtown and Uptown.
I mean, we don't have BRT now, but we almost had it for the Green and Purple lines back when Frank Wilson and David Wolff were screwing things up at Metro. There were questions about the funding for those lines, which were eventually resolved in Metro's favor. (I wrote about this stuff at the time, but I'm too lazy to look up the links right now. Please take my word for it.) The concept isn't completely new to Houston, is what I'm saying.
Be that as it may, I'm not too worried about BRT being a negative for Metro in the referendum. The question, as is usually the case with referenda, is who will oppose this, and how much money they will put into opposing it. Will John Culberson rise like a white walker and raise a bunch of untraceable PAC money to block the issue? (We still don't know who funded the anti-Metro effort from 2003, by the way.) How will the Mayor's race affect this? We know Bill King is anti-rail, but I don't know what (or if) Tony Buzbee thinks about it. It's too early to say how this will play out. Metro does have to come up with a good marketing plan for its referendum, once it is finalized – they've been busy running a bunch of generic feel-good spots during the NBA playoffs – but get back to me when and if organized opposition arises.
The Harris County poll you didn't really need
Mar 23rd, 2019
From the inbox:
Sponsored by HRBC, a survey was released today that reveals many insights into Harris County voters and their feelings towards political leaders and important issues facing Harris County.
"While Harris County voters feel very differently about various leaders and issues, they overwhelmingly believe that our home is a leader in job creation because of its low taxes and regulations," said HRBC Chairman Alan Hassenflu. "HRBC looks forward to its continued work with state and local leaders to ensure our region and state remains an economic powerhouse," continued Hassenflu.
The survey was conducted by Ragnar Research Partners, February 24 through February 26, 2019 by telephone, including landlines (28%) and cell phones (72%). Interviews included 400 Likely Voters (LVs) across Harris County. Quotas on age, gender, education, ethnicity, and region were used to ensure a representative distribution. The study's margin of error is ±5%.
"Generally, we see that voters have a positive outlook for Harris County which is reflected in the optimistic attitudes towards the County's continued economic prosperity. The voters believe that Texas continues to head in the right direction, but they have a differing opinion on the state of the Nation," said Chris Perkins, Partner at Ragnar Research.
Click link to review full survey results:
https://houstonrealty.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/HRBC_Harris-Co_Memo_vF_190320.pdf
HRBC is the Houston Realty Business Coalition, a group that tends to endorse conservative candidates in city elections; Bill King, Bill Frazer, and Mike Knox were among their preferred candidates in 2015. I'd not heard of Ragnar Research Partners before, but Chris Perkins is a longtime Republican operative who's shown up on this blog before. He was once part of Wilson Perkins Associates, now known as WPA Intelligence. I tell you all this not to convince you that their data is junk, just to let you know who you're dealing with.
As for the poll results, I'd take them with a modest amount of salt. Greg Abbott has a 52-36 favorable split in the county, which didn't stop him from losing the county to Lupe Valdez 52-46 in 2018, while County Judge Lina Hidalgo was largely unknown to respondents. (That didn't stop 65% of them from disagreeing with Hidalgo hiring some New York-based consultants, with her campaign's money (not mentioned in the question, by the way) after the election, even though I'd bet my annual salary against Chris Perkins' that basically nobody had even heard of that before being asked the question.) Donald Trump, on the other hand, was at 39-60 in favorability, which let's just say is not good and does not bode well for Republicans in the county in 2020. And even though they did their best to tilt the question by associating it with Nancy Pelosi, more respondents preferred Pelosi's position on the border wall.
Earlier in this post I said I wasn't trying to convince you that this pollster is shady. Well, let's revisit that. Here, from the full results page, is one of their "local issues" questions:
Bus Services Are Preferred
Likely voters are split initially on whether building an additional twenty miles of light rail is the best use of $2.45 billion dollars. However, when given the choice, a majority of voters are more likely to agree prefer BRT and providing more express commuter bus service over building more light rail tracks.
Seems straightforward enough, right? Now here are the questions they actually asked:
Question Asked:
20 mi Light Rail: Do you agree or disagree that building an additional twenty miles of light rail is the best use of two point four five billion dollars to help address Houston's transportation needs?
BRT vs Light Rail: Please tell me which point of view you agree with the most. Some people say, Metro should build more light rail. Other people say, Metro should make fares free and provide more express commuter bus service to job centers other than downtown.
Emphasis mine. That's not the same choice as they presented it above. I'm not some fancy professional pollster, but it seems to me that if one of your choices is something for free, it's going to get more support than it would have without the free stuff, and more support than something else that isn't free.
Anyway. I don't know what motivated a poll of the county this far out from any election, but more data is better than less data. Even questionable data from questionable sources has some value.
There is no longer a ban on federal funds for rail on Richmond
This is about as bittersweet as it gets.
Rep. Lizzie Fletcher
There are no plans to build light rail on Richmond, but for the first time in a long time there is nothing stopping Metro from asking for federal funds to help pay for it.
The federal spending bill signed Friday by President Donald Trump, averting a government shutdown, lacks a provision in previous funding plans barring the Federal Transit Administration from funding any part of light rail on Richmond or Post Oak.
The provision was added at least eight years ago by former Rep. John Culberson, R-Houston, a fervent opponent of rail plans in the 7th District. Culberson, a member of the House Appropriations Committee that set up the spending bills, added language forbidding use of federal money to "advance in any way a new light or heavy rail project … if the proposed capital project is constructed on or planned to be constructed on Richmond Avenue west of South Shepherd Drive or on Post Oak Boulevard north of Richmond Avenue."
He was defeated in November by Rep. Lizzie Fletcher, who said last month she aimed to be an advocate for transit.
Friday, she said in a statement she worked with lawmakers "to remove language in the bill that created unnecessary barriers and limited federal funding from coming to Houston for much-needed transportation improvements. Removal of this language will put the power to make decisions about our transit back in the hands of Houstonians."
This is great, and it's quite an achievement for Rep. Fletcher to get this done in only her second month in office. It's just that in a more fair and just universe, we'd already have the Universities line built and would maybe be talking about extending it as part of the 2019 MetroNext referendum, while eagerly looking forward to the forthcoming Uptown BRT line as the completion of the original system. I know, it's fashionable now to say that we should be wary about investing large sums of money into fixed infrastructure projects like this because driverless cars are coming and will solve all of our problems. My point is we could be celebrating the ten-year anniversary of this line – the Main Street line just turned 15 years old, in case you forgot to send it a birthday card – with millions of passengers having ridden it over that span. People often talk about how the time to have built rail in Houston was years ago. Well, we were on the verge of doing just that following the 2003 election, but politics, shortsightedness, NIMBYism, and the incompetence and mismanagement of the Metro CEO and Board following that election killed this key part of it off. I salute and thank Rep. Fletcher for keeping her word. I just mourn that it comes too late to deliver what had once been promised to us.
More details on the Metro referendum
Still a work in progress.
A planned 110 miles of two-way HOV along major freeways with eight new park and ride stations is expected to cost $1.37 billion, with another $383 million in improvements to operate 25 percent more bus trips across the region.
The projects promote new services within Metro's core area and on the fringes of its sprawling 1,200-square-mile territory. Inside the Sam Houston Tollway where buses travel most major streets and are more commonly used by residents, officials want to increase how often those buses come. Outside the beltway where more than 2 million of Harris County's residents live, park and ride lots will be expanded and commuter buses will go to more places more often.
Big-ticket items in the plan are directed at faster commutes and more frequent service in transit-heavy parts of Metro's area. As officials prepare for eight new or expanded park and ride lots and two-way service even farther out most freeways, 14 core local bus routes are primed for development into so-called BOOST corridors aimed at making bus trips along city streets faster by sequencing traffic lights to give approaching buses priority and increasing the frequency of buses.
"From the outset, we are very pleased with where they are putting the investment," said Oni Blair, executive director of LINK Houston, which advocates for equity in transportation planning.
Still, Blair said the agency is hoping for more specifics on how Metro prioritizes projects, both in terms of funding and the timing with which initiatives are tackled.
"People want to know what they are getting and when," she said.
Another aspect of the plan will be about getting to bus stops. Officials say they plan to coordinate with city planners and developers to make sure sidewalks lead to accessible and comfortable stops, something many riders say is transit's biggest obstacle in Houston.
As a reminder, you can always go to MetroNext.org for information about the plan and public meetings to discuss it. In a better world, we'd be starting off with a transit system that already included a Universities light rail line, and would be seeking to build on that. In this world, we hope to build a BRT line that covers much of the same turf west of downtown, and turns north from its eastern end. Which will still be a fine addition and in conjunction with the Uptown BRT line will finally enable the main urban core job centers to be truly connected. The focus on sidewalks, which I've emphasized before, is very welcome. We need to get this approved by the voters, and we need to ensure we have a Mayor that won't screw up what Metro is trying to do. I know we're already obsessing about 2020 and the Presidential race – I'm guilty, too – but there's important business to take care of in 2019 as well.
Metro moving forward on 2019 referendum
I'm ready for it.
The Metropolitan Transit Authority is expected to ask voters next fall for more than $3 billion in borrowing authority to implement its next wave of transit projects.
The 20-year plan laid out by Metro officials includes roughly 20 more miles of light rail, 75 miles of bus rapid transit and 110 miles of two-way HOV lanes along area freeways.
The plan, based on studies and public feedback, focuses on beefing up service in core areas where buses and trains already are drawing riders and connecting suburban residents and jobs in those areas.
"We are making sure what we are doing here in the metro service area blends into the region," Metro CEO Tom Lambert said. "How do we make sure we are putting together an environment and place that connects one mode of transportation to other modes of transportation."
The overall price tag for the plan is $7.5 billion, more than half of which would be funded via state and federal transportation monies.
Unlike previous Metro capital plans that spent roughly $1 billion in local money on the Red Line light rail, its northern extension and the Green and Purple lines, the current plan would spend more on buses — specifically bus rapid transit — along key routes where officials believe better service can connect to more places and, in turn, lure more riders. The estimated cost of about 75 miles of bus rapid transit is $3.15 billion.
Officials believe BRT, as it is called, delivers the same benefits as rail, but at less cost with more flexibility, giving Metro the ability to alter service to meet demand. For riders, it would be a rail-like experience and different from buses that operate on set timelines.
"If you can get a service people can bank on and count on, you don't need a schedule," Lambert said.
BRT operates similar to light rail with major station stops along dedicated lanes used only by the buses, though they may share some streets with automobile traffic. The region's first foray into bus rapid transit is under construction along Post Oak in the Uptown area. Service is scheduled to start in early- to mid-2020.
The MetroNext plan calls for at least five bus rapid transit projects:
Interstate 45 — which is poised for its own massive rebuild by TxDOT — from downtown to Bush Intercontinental Airport
Interstate 10 from downtown to the proposed Texas Bullet Train terminal at Loop 610 and U.S. 290
Gessner from Metro's West Little York park and ride to its Missouri City park and ride
Extending Uptown's planned rapid transit to the Gulfton Transit Center
A proposed fifth BRT is a revised version of the University Line light rail that Metro proposed and then shelved because of a lack of progress and intense opposition. The line, which some consider the most-needed major transit line in the region, would tie the University of Houston and Texas Southern University areas to downtown and then the Uptown area.
Since becoming chair of Metro in 2016, [Carrin] Patman has said the downtown-to-Uptown connection is the missing link in major transit investment within Loop 610. However, she has stressed that light rail may not be the best mode.
Though officials have pivoted from trains to buses with much of the plan, nearly $2.5 billion in new rail is being proposed, including the extension of both the Green Line along Harrisburg and the Purple Line in southeast Houston to Hobby Airport. The airport legs alone are estimated to cost close to $1.8 billion even though they are expected to draw fewer riders than any of the bus rapid transit routes.
All the details, which as Metro Chair Patman notes can and will change as the community dialogue continues, can be found at MetroNext.org. A press release with a link to Patman's "State of Metro" presentation last week is here. I will of course be keeping an eye on this, and I definitely plan to interview Patman about the referendum once we get a little farther into the year. And let's be clear, even if I didn't have other reasons to dislike Bill King, I don't want him to ever have any power over Metro. If we want to have any shot at having decent transit in this city, he's the last person we want as Mayor.