Comments on: Houston – Part 3

By: Arne

Arne — Thu, 19 Nov 2009 16:37:15 +0000

I like what I am reading here. Houston’s future depends on taking a leap forward in commuting. While cities like Chicago and New York have legacy systems they can refine and build on, Houston’s lack of a legacy infrastructure let’s the city adopt a clean sheet of paper approach.

If we as a city can bring 100,000+ people from 25-50 miles out into downtown in 15-30 minutes, we can become a city of choice for businesses to locate here and shift people out of cars on long commutes.

In studying elevated mag lev, it clearly appears to be a fit compared to ground level steel rail systems which require extensive right of way aquisition and limits speed because of safety issues because of ground level interaction with people and street vehicles.

I do suggest that any system should link both air ports with a central downtown terminal acting like metro center like in wash dc

By: Commuter rail and transit-oriented development – Off the Kuff

Commuter rail and transit-oriented development – Off the Kuff — Sat, 07 Nov 2009 13:45:43 +0000

[...] imagine the possibilities for Houston and the places that its proposed commuter rail may eventually go. Pretty exciting, isn’t it? Greg has more, including a picture of the area to be [...]

By: Texas High Speed Rail: The Brazos Corridor

Texas High Speed Rail: The Brazos Corridor — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 20:12:44 +0000

[...] Texas High-Speed Rail: Houston – Part 3 [...]

By: KP

KP — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 01:59:03 +0000

This is an interesting proposal, using the 249 as a northwest catch all. I am a proponent of this being below grade downtown. I think it would be very expensive but it would integrate with the tunnels quite well. I know we want street activity but once we get a comprehensive transit system in place, areas along the line will boom.

By: Alon Levy

Alon Levy — Fri, 23 Oct 2009 08:28:19 +0000

Maglev is quieter, sure. It’s also more expensive on average, and more prone to cost overruns. The US is a third world country when it comes to rail, and Texas is a fourth world backwater; until it lifts itself into the first world with busy subway, regional rail, and conventional HSR systems, all of which would be far better than what it already has, it shouldn’t be trying to reinvent the wheel.

As for private investment, it’s a waste of time. Private consortia underbuild to cut costs, whereas HSR works as a long-term investment – for example, Desert Xpress wants to build a diesel 150 mph rail line connecting Las Vegas to an LA exurb, rather than an electrified downtown-to-downtown service. They also have a harder time getting low-interest loans; it’s the high interest rates of the privately built Chunnel and Taiwan HSR that are crushing those systems financially.

By: Keep Houston Houston

Keep Houston Houston — Thu, 22 Oct 2009 11:51:59 +0000

Wait, so you have the MAGLEV going through the Heights on the old Katy ROW? Count me in! I want to buy an unrestricted lot on 7th and build a 3-story condo so I can watch the trains go by 40 feet from my window.

Kudos on admitting the superiority of the Northwest Mall site. Every planner I’ve talked to thinks this, but the consultants don’t put it in the official documents because they don’t want to drive the costs up.

I say it’s bull – Simon could GIVE AWAY half the land for a major rail terminal, and the resulting increase in value from their remaining parcel would easily exceed the previous value of the whole property.

By: august

august — Thu, 22 Oct 2009 05:11:21 +0000

This has been an interesting series, Andrew. Thank you for the time and effort you put into it.

A couple things to perhaps consider in planning transit in Houston. First, I’m not sure there are many significant points of density in the metro area, even inside the loop. Houston development is and has been very suburban in nature even dating back to the early and pre-auto days. But once transit lines are developed we should see, over time, density develop in reaction to the existing lines especially in the case of my second point which is that you should count on increasing gas prices to push commuter behavior towards transit. We saw just last year how prices pushing $4.00 a gallon created a lot of interest and burden on our existing commuter buses. After the recession is over we can expect those prices to creep up and put transit projects that are currently speculative on a fast track.