These are not questions I've been asked by others, but questions I've asked myself about this thing:
How can you really justify spending a quarter of a billion dollars (or more) on this thing?
Well, it's hard. But I truly believe that if Flint is ever going to redevelop we're going to have to spend a lot of money on projects that make it a more attractive place to live. Flint's got a bad reputation (unfairly, I think) now, people don't want to live there. If it could be made into a trailblazer of 21st Century small-city public transit, wouldn't that be the best way to change that?
So why not just buy more buses and run them more often for 1/10th the price?
There would be more buses to go with FAST. But I believe that there's a mindset change that goes with investing the money and laying the tracks. It brings permanence.
Okay, where do we get this money?
How the heck should I know? This is conceptual at this point and if there's support, I have no doubt we can find the money somewhere.
Why does the route go where it goes? Why does it not serve the North End or Eastside?
A very fair question and the answer is complicated. In short, I believe that the project as it is now is on a buildable scale. Light rail costs somewhere between $20 and $50 million per mile. Personally, I think the FAST system would come in on the low end of that range, but even at $20 million/mile the cost is huge. So, with that said, I chose a route that, I believe, would do the most good for Flint. New bus lines from areas not served directly by FAST would pick up the slack. And if it were successful, the first expansion I have in mind would be a line straight up Sagniaw St. to Pierson Rd. and and an extension from East Village out to Courtland Center.
In addition, the western portion of the route from Genesee Valley to Chevrolet Ave. utilizes an existing abandoned railroad grade, which will make construction there a breeze and keep costs down.
Streetcars go in the street, no? How would this be faster than a bus where it shares the road with cars?
I have something different in mind. I'm not an engineer, but I want FAST to act like a rapid-transit outfit, not a traditional streetcar. Therefore, I'm noodling around ways to keep the FAST's right-of-way as separate as possible from traffic where it shares the street with cars. I will write more about this, and hopefully have some very simple sketches to show you, but basically the idea is that the roads will be reconstructed so that the train has its own lane, and traditional traffic lights protect it when it crosses another street at grade. Thus, it can go faster than traffic and drivers don't have to worry about getting run into by streetcars.
One track or two?
One, in most places. Comptuers can do wonderful things, and most of the line will be single tracked with passing tracks at necessary intervals. As I said, I'm not an engineer, that'll be a detail that would be hammered out some time on.
Why the Downtown Loop? Why drop another $50 million to add two stations?
They're two important stations. The Farmer's Market and Cultural Center are touchstones of Flint's civic life. They need to be directly served. And the downtown loop will allow for people to get around downtown more easily. The idea is that someone could take FAST in on a Saturday morning and spend the day downtown, riding FAST to get around. There would be a train that only ran around the Downtown Loop, which would operate in a circular fashion. This is to say, eastbound FAST trains would go south around the loop (down Saginaw St.), while westbounds would go north (to the Cultural Center).
The Downtown Loop is optional, however. I would advocate for it to be built with the rest of the system, but it could be built later.
What would these trains/streetcars/light rail vehicles look like?
You can get a good general idea from this website.
I'll have more FAQs as I think of them or as people ask me. Please feel free to do so.
Next: A station-by-station examination of the route!
Tuesday, February 24, 2009
Friday, February 20, 2009
The Basics
The idea behind Flint Area Speedy Transit (hereinafter FAST) is not mine per se. I’d heard the idea of some sort of light-rail style mass transit in Flint bandied about before, though when and by whom I can’t now say. So this is not my idea. Nor do I ever really expect it to get built. Consider this to be a thought experiment, if you will, my own effort to put a vision out there, to see what people think of it.
Though I do not live in Flint anymore, my close family still does. It’s home, and I love it. I believe that something like FAST, a big, far-reaching project that, frankly, would take a lot of guts, speculation and money to accomplish, is the only thing that will allow Flint to prosper in the 21st Century.
You see, there is no shortage of postindustrial cities out there with wonderful potential for redevelopment. Nor is there a shortage of such cities with colleges, frankly. To distinguish itself, Flint must do something big, bold and new.
Now, I can hear the protestations now: “That sounds like AutoWorld, Will!” And, yes, at first it does. Except that AutoWorld was an attraction, and a very cool one, at that. But once you’d seen it, you’d seen it. This plan is fundamentally different because the FAST would be an engine for growth. By itself, FAST would not make money. It would provide quite a few well-paying jobs, of course, but it would require subsidy to survive. What it would do, though, is bring a paradigm shift, an attitude change, if you will, to Flint.
Just imagine: A seven mile long corridor in the City of Flint (and Flint Township) where it would be possible to live one’s daily life without a car! It’s hard to fathom, especially to us Flintstones. But it’s done elsewhere, and people love it! There are places not so very far from here, Chicago to name one, where public transportation is not just a half-assed concession to the unpleasant fact that there are poor people who can’t afford cars out there. People of all races, religions, ethnicities and incomes live, work and play with an efficient, safe, fast public transportation system under their feet. It’s a wonderful thing to experience.
The Carless Corridor
I lived for some time in Washington, DC, another of those places. At first glance, DC appears to be a carless city, and for many people it is. But in fact, it is a series of corridors. Generally speaking, a 10 minute walk (i.e. ~1/2 mile) to a metro stop is about the maximum people will tolerate regularly. If you overlay half mile radius circles over a map of DC with that center on a metro stop, you see very quickly that there are large swaths of the city that are outside this area, hence my concept of a “carless corridor.” Couldn’t Flint have one as well?
That’s the idea behind FAST. Bringing a comprehensive light rail to the entire city would be expensive beyond reason. So, let’s run 7 miles (or 8.65, depending) of light rail from the Genesee Valley Mall in the east, through Downtown and out to Mott Community College, passing UofM-Flint and Kettering in the process. These three schools enroll something like 20,000 students and there is a lot of underutilized housing stock ripe for renovation or redevelopment on the line, with the twin uncut diamonds being the University Avenue corridor and the former site of Chevy in the Hole.
So there, those are the basics. Keep an eye on the blog for more detailed info!
Though I do not live in Flint anymore, my close family still does. It’s home, and I love it. I believe that something like FAST, a big, far-reaching project that, frankly, would take a lot of guts, speculation and money to accomplish, is the only thing that will allow Flint to prosper in the 21st Century.
You see, there is no shortage of postindustrial cities out there with wonderful potential for redevelopment. Nor is there a shortage of such cities with colleges, frankly. To distinguish itself, Flint must do something big, bold and new.
Now, I can hear the protestations now: “That sounds like AutoWorld, Will!” And, yes, at first it does. Except that AutoWorld was an attraction, and a very cool one, at that. But once you’d seen it, you’d seen it. This plan is fundamentally different because the FAST would be an engine for growth. By itself, FAST would not make money. It would provide quite a few well-paying jobs, of course, but it would require subsidy to survive. What it would do, though, is bring a paradigm shift, an attitude change, if you will, to Flint.
Just imagine: A seven mile long corridor in the City of Flint (and Flint Township) where it would be possible to live one’s daily life without a car! It’s hard to fathom, especially to us Flintstones. But it’s done elsewhere, and people love it! There are places not so very far from here, Chicago to name one, where public transportation is not just a half-assed concession to the unpleasant fact that there are poor people who can’t afford cars out there. People of all races, religions, ethnicities and incomes live, work and play with an efficient, safe, fast public transportation system under their feet. It’s a wonderful thing to experience.
The Carless Corridor
I lived for some time in Washington, DC, another of those places. At first glance, DC appears to be a carless city, and for many people it is. But in fact, it is a series of corridors. Generally speaking, a 10 minute walk (i.e. ~1/2 mile) to a metro stop is about the maximum people will tolerate regularly. If you overlay half mile radius circles over a map of DC with that center on a metro stop, you see very quickly that there are large swaths of the city that are outside this area, hence my concept of a “carless corridor.” Couldn’t Flint have one as well?
That’s the idea behind FAST. Bringing a comprehensive light rail to the entire city would be expensive beyond reason. So, let’s run 7 miles (or 8.65, depending) of light rail from the Genesee Valley Mall in the east, through Downtown and out to Mott Community College, passing UofM-Flint and Kettering in the process. These three schools enroll something like 20,000 students and there is a lot of underutilized housing stock ripe for renovation or redevelopment on the line, with the twin uncut diamonds being the University Avenue corridor and the former site of Chevy in the Hole.
So there, those are the basics. Keep an eye on the blog for more detailed info!
Thursday, February 19, 2009
Greeting and Disclaimer
Hello, I'm glad you've stopped in to look around. If you have, hopefully it's because you find the possibility of a light rail system in Flint intriguing. Let's talk about it.
With that said, this is a vision. I don't have any hard data. The numbers I use are ballpark figures that seem applicable I've dug up through casual research. If this were to ever get moving, there would need to be massive research done about the routing, ridership, construction and cost. What I've got here seems like a good idea to me and is intended to get a discussion going.
Thanks, let me know what you think.
Will
With that said, this is a vision. I don't have any hard data. The numbers I use are ballpark figures that seem applicable I've dug up through casual research. If this were to ever get moving, there would need to be massive research done about the routing, ridership, construction and cost. What I've got here seems like a good idea to me and is intended to get a discussion going.
Thanks, let me know what you think.
Will
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