I felt like this particular survey’s designed to focus on destinations over origins, but the study itself seems pretty agnostic to that with how it focuses on activity centers like schools, shopping/dining areas, and religious establishments. (If you have insider knowledge that suggests otherwise, I think they’re missing out on potentially helpful insights there.) And I honestly think that’s a better approach anyways, since it prevents this study from becoming biased in favor of any particular commuting direction.
After all, a good regional transit system should be useful beyond your basic 9-to-5 commute crowds, too. So studies about mobilty shouldn’t be biased to that status quo.
As for how the Davis Drive alternative doesn’t connect with the McCrimmon commuter rail station, I think that’s a local challenge for Morrisville. They have an emerging local corridor that’s lacking a mobility solution, which is a very valid need. But I don’t think a regional service should cater to local whims and compromise its own goals just because it can.
I see your point, and I agree that the NC54 corridor is the best way to make up for weaknesses in diesel-based rail with limited frequency. This is where this study’s results become less practical and more political: if you don’t trust the commuter rail project to succeed and be practical, then Alternative 1 is the best move for the Triangle. But otherwise, I think there’s a solid case to be made for a Davis Dr. route?
There’s a little assumption (which I think CAMPO could be making this point much clearer) in this study that might take out some of your key assumptions, though: this project is not talking about actual BRT, but is instead looking into “rapid buses” that could have some BRT features (frequent service, traffic priority, better station access for pedestrians, maybe exclusive lanes?) but will not include certain others (like level boarding, off-vehicle fare payments, and distinct branding). The virtual open house had this poster board to imply the differences:
I’m no transportation expert by any means, but running a BRT route on the same corridor as commuter rail is just a waste of money IMO.
Commuter rail should be the spine of the system. Spend that BRT on money on bus (brt or otherwise) connecting areas not on the rail line to that spine. Create a network of transportation options for people not living directly near the commuter rail.
Running a BRT in the same corridor will just take ridership away from the rail. And then the detractors will use that as a reason to not further invest into the system because there are not enough riders.
It’s a very short sighted approach IMO. We should be increasing ridership numbers by creating a network of rail and buses that are all integrated and feed of each other. Rather then a competing system that will reduce numbers on both the BRT and commuter rail in the same corridor. If frequency is an issue, run more trains. Or run ‘express’ trains that skip more frequent stops, and local trains that stop at more stations.
To elaborate. Rather then running BRT on the same path, develop smaller BRT routes that conenct and feed into the rail. Carrboro,- Chapel Hill- Durham- North Durham. Brier Creek-RDU-Morrisville, Holly Springs-Apex-Cary-PNC-Midtown-Wake Forest, etc.
You’d have to convince two powerful, unwilling actors who don’t care about Wake County’s local mobility needs to change their minds:
Durham County’s residents are struggling to get by with their own local mobility needs, and can’t spare additional money (see here)
The rail company Norfolk Southern doesn’t want to -and they effectively have veto power over what trains can run along the Cary-Durham corridor
I think the Davis Dr. alignment is closer to that feeder-like service that you’re talking about, which is kind of why I prefer that over the NC54 alignment. It’s not perfect, but between that and the Cary-Apex BRT proposal in our region’s long-range transit plan (don’t forget to change the visible layers on the top right menu), I think we have the opportunity for making great, lasting changes to getting around Cary and Morrisville. While it’s clearly not great, I think there’s valid reasons to at least take the NC54-based route seriously as a stepping stone to reach a greater vision.
As a reminder, you can tell CAMPO about these thoughts, too, and that will actually be read by someone with power to inform and influence decision-makers (read: regional planners).
Something like bypassing a Method station because the residents complained will get flagged as a Civil Rights violation in record time. Ironic? Perhaps, but it’s a nonstarter.
I’d really like to stay away from the idea of trying to call things like nice shelters, arrival time displays, signal priority, and even queue jumpers as “BRT”. If it’s mostly in dedicated lanes, often separated by more than paint, then OK: BRT. Seems like the 4 main corridors in Raleigh meet these criteria.
But the other things are measures we should be rolling out strategically around the entire bus network, not necessarily picking a single corridor, and giving it the full treatment before even touching anywhere else.
Find the intersection in town with the greatest delay in terms of passenger-minutes, regardless of what route(s) it’s on, and install TSP and/or a queue jumper. Work your way down that list.
I think that corridors orthogonal to the commuter rail should be lumped together in this approach.
Which, if you look at it, the areas highlighted, especially south of Western Blvd, but really the entire area, are pretty heavily tilted towards minorities:
I think part of the idea of running parallel to the rail corridor is that the stops can be closer together. Since the corridor isn’t electrified (and probably won’t be for some time, if ever), it’s not practical to bunch rail stops close together. So if you’re trying to get to Walmart in Morrisville, you can hop off at the new Regional Transit Center and transfer to the bus for that last mile.
As much as I’d prefer having electrified rail that runs every fifteen minutes and stops every mile or so, that’s just not gonna happen any time soon. This fills the gaps.
Very good discussion here, especially about how the Rapid Bus could complement the Commuter Rail. Don’t forget to take the survey and add comments here: https://publicinput.com/BRTExtWest2
Also, all the discussion so far has been about the Western Extension. Any thoughts about the Southern Extension from Garner to Clayton? That survey can be found here: https://publicinput.com/BRTExtSouth2
I think the link you posted (which is closed) is for the older survey from last fall?
The Phase 2 survey for the western corridor (see my post above for the link) didn’t have any space for us to write in longer comments for anything other than the specific questions being asked. I tried to mention our debate about how commuter rail could impact this study’s results in the “evaluation criteria” section, but honestly that doesn’t feel like the right place to do it…
No clue about local specifics in the Garner/Clayton leg since I don’t go there anywhere near as often, but I think the same basic question still applies: how do you deal with that service redundancy with commuter rail?
Thanks keita, I’ve corrected the links and will see what I can do about getting space for comments. Even though this forum has some differing opinions on the alternatives, it’s clear that the group agrees that the alternatives should be evaluated as components of the network, not by themselves.
I biked over to check out the updates - no major changes, but funding was attached to the bike/ped projects, and they seem to be trying to get things going asap. 4 high priority Bike/ped projects and buses running in 12-16 months (which seems very unlikely imo, but that’s what they’d like). Zoning done by the end of the year, hopefully.
There’s also an awareness that the TOD zoning might not be enough to get ideal ridership, and that it really relies on developers taking advantage of the height bonuses and the missing middle text changes in the surrounding neighborhoods, rather than just building enormous single-family homes.
There was a nice map they had showing all the zoning proposals along with the sidewalk improvements. Once they post, we can share it here.
I was told that in the summer, most likely, is when they’ll go to council for the rezoning so it just might time for me to chime in and support this thing publicly.
I found interesting to see proposed bikeshare stations near the stations as well as some significant rezoning for the shopping centers down New Bern outside the beltline. There’s plenty of space over there in those dead shopping centers for some really nice, mixed-use districts connected by BRT to downtown.
