No, the CRT cannot be scrapped that’s a golden ticket for the city in terms of big events or corporate companies moving here, if it did money should be put into it for Light rail for Wake and Durham counties again!!!
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Yeah- I mean, my preference is to make the commuter rail better. If we’re spending as much as $2b on commuter rail, we should be able to get usable all-day frequency out of it, probably even fit in electrification - not the hideous farce of 2 midday trains that they’ve talked about to date.
After careful consideration, I will go on the record, here and now, as both a huge train nerd and supporter of transit (seriously, look at my post history here, on urban planet, onTwitter, everywhere), that for $2 billion, a rail system that can’t even deliver hourly midday service, and requires for us to build a separate, exactly parallel BRT corridor to make up for that fact, JUST. ISN’T. WORTH. IT.
The only argument for spending that much to deliver so little, would be that it would siphon away money from other projects like I-40 managed lanes widening that would be openly harmful rather than just wasteful. So if it would, in fact, have the effect of slurping money away from highways, maybe I could hold my nose and go along with it.
For the record, I think that spending $2b on rail transit is a great idea, I just want to get our money’s worth out of it.
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I look at the rail they want to build as something similar to the VRE in Virginia to DC. It’s not the same light rail builds that are happening in Charlotte, the metro in DC, BART in San Francisco, or subway in NYC. The VRE does not have all day high frequency.
Looking at it the same way as VRE, it’s not a bad system. Looking at it otherwise makes it a poor system.
I just don’t like that this takes money from us having a good bus system (if that’s the case in which it may not be). I’m excited for the “Glenwood Package” if/when they roll it out.
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In the grand scheme of things, I think this is the point of the commuter rail proposal in the works now. I think the goal was never to have the perfect system from Day 1, but to have a minimum viable product so that we have a start.
Compromise is not about losing the battle; it’s about winning the war. After all, it’s easier for your average person to want all-day regional rail service in the Triangle if you have some kind of rail service.
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It’s not the idea of incrementalism that bothers me. Spending $2 billion on an increment that is considered only “minimum viable” just doesn’t square, to me.
Nashville spent something like $35 million to make a “minimum” commuter rail service.
Denver spent $1.2 billion to get a 23 mile electrified regional rail line with 15 minute all-day frequency.
Meanwhile we are planning to spend $2 billion on a 37 mile diesel rail line with 30 minute peak service and a train every 2 hours or so off-peak. Yes this is better than Nashville but it’s perhaps a quarter the total service in Denver, and with an inferior technology to boot.
We’re planning to spend $Denver and get service that’s closer to Nashville. For that kind of money we should be getting a Denver-level rail system.
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There’s no use in holding onto SFH-only zoning right along these corridors when there’s observably little demand to live on a major street.
Two examples of where this would’ve come in handy recently:
- 2321 New Bern Ave. Huge old home (6000 sq ft) on over an acre, which despite a very low price per foot just cannot sell. The neighboring properties have already been turned into some of the few non-SFH uses allowed under residential zoning, like day care centers and churches. (I think subdivision of this particular lot is impossible due to Longview’s openly racist restrictive covenants, but at the very least zoning shouldn’t stand in the way.)
- 5006+ Western Blvd. This corridor has seen a lot of teardown activity lately; these four lots were one or two old houses, and were torn down to build 5-BR houses… perhaps to be rented out individually to students. (Personally, I wouldn’t have done 5-BR houses, since the UDO defines “more than 4 unrelated persons” as a rooming/boarding-house.)
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I don’t know if this is relevant but if the commuter rail line does happen I believe the rolling stock should be this!!! This is what it’s like in Austin the A
Sadler GTW it look like it’s a light rail but it’s not believe or not and it’s eco friendly not like the diesel trains in Boston, and Northern Virginia (VRE)!!!
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That would include light rail right they have like 8 light rail lines!!!
whats “racist” about Longview?
Clarence Poe, owner/developer of Longview Gardens, was problematic. Even the NCDCR essay on him includes this:
Poe favored racial separation and remained to the end of his life an opponent of integration. In 1913 he unveiled his vision of a “great rural civilization,” wherein the races would be massed and separated by race, along the lines of the South African model.
When Poe subdivided his land starting in 1938, the original deeds included this covenant: “no land shall be sold, transferred, conveyed, mortgaged, devised, leased to, or occupied by any person who is not predominantly a descendant of those native North European national and racial stocks who comprise the bulk of North Carolina’s white population (English, Scotch, Welsh, Irish, French, German, Dutch, Swiss, Belgian, Scandinavian).” [Herbin-Triant, pg. 245]
Those covenants later expired in 1965 (and were legally unenforceable, but privately enforced, after a 1948 S.Ct. decision), but likely still remain in deeds to this day.
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The Metrorail in Austin is a perfect comparison for what we’re gonna do here in Raleigh because the operating hours/frequency is just as wack (no weekend service, last train leaves downtown at 7:18 PM)
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Well I’m just talking about the rolling stock, not the schedule my friend and to be honest… no daytime hours isn’t great either!!! And no weekend is nice either!!!
I’m working on a blog post that involves the 1965 State Capital Planning Commission report (the one with the highway through Oakwood) and in going through it in more detail, this map popped out at me. Seems we’ve known we needed mass transit since then and we’re now just getting it. Only took 60 years!? (assuming BRT is still rolling in ~2025)
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Was this supposed to be for rapid rail. Like the Marta in Atlanta!!! Cause there was no BRT or Light Rail back then!!!
For anyone else who’s curious, you can read the full thing here thanks to the state-run NC Digital Collections.
You really get major 60s vibes from reading this report, though! It really feels like you’re reading a fanfiction of future Raleigh written by old white dudes with a drafting table and some markers (rather than a legit plan with research and evidence) 
As for what’s now the BRT proposals, it’s tempting to think the authors predicted BRT 60 years ago. That sounds wrong, though, if you closely read the only paragraph where it mentions non-car transit:
Now, American planners know that mass transit is not about just shuttling people between central employment centers and suburban neighborhoods. But I couldn’t find specific transit proposals that were older than the 2003 Wake County Transit Plan that took that idea seriously. So in that light, it’s also neat to see how far we’ve come!
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But the 2003 plan was focused mostly on road corridors and road expansions!!! Including most of the same stuff that’s in the plan now!!!
FTA just announced $35 million in CIG funds for the New Bern BRT. That’s nearly half of the $71.5 million price tag. I believe the rest is being covered by state and local funds. You love to see it.
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Sweet 
For context, though:
…so this doesn’t mean the New Bern BRT can start digging up New Bern Av. right away. But it does mean that we “won” the competitive part of the Small Starts program earlier than we’re “supposed” to. Thanks to that, there shouldn’t be much of a hangup on the federal side of things once all the design and engineering work is finished late next year.
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Thanks for clarifying this. I was having trouble figuring out what all the implications were. I’m assuming GoRaleigh will be dropping a press release that explains in some form of detail what’s left to be done before breaking ground. I do know 60% design is slotted to drop next month, and a branding release is expected in February. Exciting stuff!
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FTA announced Raleigh’s BRT is 1 of 7 project recipients for the CIG fund, in the amount of $35M.
" Raleigh, NC: Wake Bus Rapid Transit New Bern Avenue Project
The Wake Bus Rapid Transit New Bern Avenue Project is a 5-mile BRT line to be constructed by the City of Raleigh that will improve access and mobility along the New Bern Avenue corridor, connecting the Raleigh central business district and communities eastward to North New Hope Road. FTA is allocating $35 million in CIG funds to the project."
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