Congressman John Culberson blocks federal funding for rail on richmond and post oak FOREVER

da1 · Jun 15, 2014

ryan_98 said: ↑

can you expand on what this would mean for the richmond line, or is it too early to tell how this could go?
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Not sure hopefully it cancels out culberson's words

bigtexxx · Jun 15, 2014

SWTsig said: ↑

No one thinks that and those that do don't know ****. That said, rail down Richmond would provide a helluva alternative for folks moving between downtown and the galleria. I sure as hell know I would use it regularly on the weekends. A **** ton of people would.

But go on w your bad self, texxx.
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Hilarious response. So you concede that it won't help traffic congestion, and then you say that you want a very expensive street-grade train for you to take trips to the Galleria on the weekends. That's amazing logic.

SWTsig · Jun 15, 2014

bigtexxx said: ↑

Hilarious response. So you concede that it won't help traffic congestion, and then you say that you want a very expensive street-grade train for you to take trips to the Galleria on the weekends. That's amazing logic.
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At some point you need to encourage people to NOT use a car. Our roadway infrastructure, especially inside the loop, is completely maxed out. Light rail won't in and of itself completely alleviate traffic congestion but it can by an integral part of the solution.

The more urban parts of houston are approaching a real tipping point... People are moving here en mass, at some point you have to begin addressing this city's reliance on the automobile. Your idea of continuing with the status quo is laughable.

And f@ck you for making me waste my time responding to you. Jesus you're such a beatdown.

bigtexxx · Jun 15, 2014

SWTsig said: ↑

At some point you need to encourage people to NOT use a car. Our roadway infrastructure, especially inside the loop, is completely maxed out. Light rail won't in and of itself completely alleviate traffic congestion but it can by an integral part of the solution.

The more urban parts of houston are approaching a real tipping point... People are moving here en mass, at some point you have to begin addressing this city's reliance on the automobile. Your idea of continuing with the status quo is laughable.

And f@ck you for making me waste my time responding to you. Jesus you're such a beatdown.
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You're talking yourself in a circle. You just told me that anybody who says this light rail will relieve traffic congestion "doesn't know sh**", and then you proceed to talk about how the roadway infrastructure is maxed out and light rail is "an integral part of the solution". You didn't provide any idea what this magical "solution" is, but you claimed that light rail was an integral part of it.

We need to get people out of the simplistic mode of thinking that a train is the panacea that will solve Houston's problems. We need to think deeper on the topic, not default to a Northeast US or European one-size-fits-all solution that's not right for a city like Houston.

Dubious · Jun 15, 2014

Think deep Texx, give us your solution.

bigtexxx · Jun 15, 2014

Dubious said: ↑

Think deep Texx, give us your solution.
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I've long advocated a world-class bus rapid transit / park and ride, HOV/HOT with congestion pricing system. Far more economical than trying to force rail upon a sprawling city that was built up after the car-era took hold.

TheRealist137 · Jun 15, 2014

bigtexxx said: ↑

I've long advocated a world-class bus rapid transit / park and ride, HOV/HOT with congestion pricing system. Far more economical than trying to force rail upon a sprawling city that was built up after the car-era took hold.
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so spend money on that bus rapid transit system, with limited upside, and then STILL have to eventually move to a different alternative in the future when bus rapid transit is not enough anymore for the city.

bigtexxx · Jun 15, 2014

TheRealist137 said: ↑

so spend money on that bus rapid transit system, with limited upside, and then STILL have to eventually move to a different alternative in the future when bus rapid transit is not enough anymore for the city.
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logic fail on your part

how exactly do you know BRT's limit, and when it will be reached? Answer: you don't.

Also, if you would read carefully, BRT was only a piece of my proposed solution.

da1 · Jun 15, 2014

bigtexxx said: ↑

logic fail on your part

how exactly do you know BRT's limit, and when it will be reached? Answer: you don't.

Also, if you would read carefully, BRT was only a piece of my proposed solution.
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I've been to cities with maxed out BRT. It's a bad situation

bumperboy1 · Jun 16, 2014

Politicians are all puppets

bigtexxx · Jun 16, 2014

da1 said: ↑

I've been to cities with maxed out BRT. It's a bad situation
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mfastx · Jun 16, 2014

It's a shame, because a couple of rail lines in the right areas would improve transportation in Houston greatly. Although I must say I'd much prefer heavy rail over the current light rail proposal.

BRT is good as well, but historically ridership doesn't even come close to rail and it cost more to operate on a per passenger basis.

I think a few trunk rail lines combined with local and BRT bus lines feeding into those high capacity lines is the best solution for Houston. Something similar to Washington DC.

texanskan · Jun 16, 2014

We should just designate the lost concrete to rapid bus lanes it would be much cheaper and it would get you there just as quick.

There would still be platforms just no train tracks

ryan_98 · Jun 22, 2014

pretty interesting article on the differences between DART and METRO rail lines

http://www.houstonchronicle.com/new...on-follow-different-paths-on-rail-5567814.php

Dallas, Houston follow different paths on rail development
By Dug Begley

June 20, 2014 | Updated: June 21, 2014 8:23pm

Dallas and Houston are rarely content to confine their rivalries to the football field or the baseball diamond.

Their citizens debate which has the best restaurants, the most impressive skyline, the richest economic outlook. They're the big boys and fighting brothers of Texas, 240 miles apart.

When it comes to rail development, however, it's not just miles, but long-running philosophies dating back more than 30 years that divide Houston and Dallas as both open new rail lines this year.

The new Dallas Area Rapid Transit line links riders to the region's major airport. Houston's new Purple and Green lines, years in the making, come up far short of what's been laid in the Dallas area, but they open up rail to new parts of town.

Since 1983, and some argue even longer than that, the cities have been on vastly different trajectories when it comes to rail transit. Dallas has enjoyed a much less fractious political climate. That relative calm compared to Houston has given Dallas officials more latitude to invest and leverage local money to capture federal funds.

Officials in North Texas spent money on suburban routes rather than key urban connections. DART will soon have 90 miles serving 62 stations, while Houston later this year will have 22 miles of track and 38 major stops.

Houston's population is twice that of Dallas, though their respective metropolitan areas are similar in size.

Metropolitan Transit Authority officials decline to call the light rail lines competitors. But from time to time, as a sales pitch for more tracks, they compare DART's apparent ease of laying lines to Houston's perennial controversy.

"Dallas has almost 100 miles of light rail," Metro board chairman Gilbert Garcia once said at a business luncheon. "Certainly we can get to The Galleria."

Wide-open spaces

The race for more lines isn't much of a competition because many Gulf Coast area elected leaders don't want rail, or more specifically they don't want to spend the hundreds of millions of dollars associated with trains. As a result, Houston has taken a different tack, choosing politically palatable downtown city lines that in some respects are harder to build but carry many more riders per mile.

Which system is more successful, and which will be better off in the long run, is less clear.

The Houston and Dallas areas grew across acres of Texas prairie following World War II at similar times, similar paces, and for many of the same reasons. Jobs and opportunities were abundant, and those seeking work flocked to the cities and started putting down roots across wide regions where cars and trucks, rather than buses or trains, are the main mode of travel.

More cars, more traffic

Home builders and car dealers were happy to oblige newcomers and natives alike, and homes proliferated farther and farther from the city centers. Traffic worsened. More and wider freeways were the common solution.

By the 1980s, Greater Houston and the Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex were home to more than 3 million people each, and officials were looking to light rail as a possible next step. Both metro areas pitched massive plans in 1983 after previous defeats.

North Texas voters approved a 1-cent tax and a huge overhaul of transit that ultimately would make the new DART light rail system the nation's largest by mileage of track.

Houston voters, meanwhile, turned down a plan to spend $2.35 billion to double the region's bus fleet and build an 18-mile rail system.

Subsequent years of refining and executing the ideas laid out by officials have led Dallas and Houston to different realities. Once its new Orange Line station at Dallas-Fort Worth Airport opens in August, DART will have 90 miles of light rail, all laid within the last 18 years.

Houston will not have 22 miles open until a few months later. The development disparity hasn't been lost on officials for the past few years, as DART held ribbon-cuttings and Metro nearly lost its federal funding for rail projects.

Critics unconvinced

In February, two months after an extension of Metro's Red Line opened, Houston had a little more than one-seventh Dallas' track mileage but almost half as much ridership. In Dallas, with 85 miles of track, DART logged almost 2.2 million trips in February. Metro recorded 1.03 million trips on 12.8 miles.

Skeptics argue that no matter how the numbers are parsed, rail has yet to prove its worth anywhere in Texas. Barry Klein, a rail critic for decades, said Metro and local politicians might actually have an edge on Dallas when it comes to trains.

"We have invested less, and have not replaced as much of our system with something vastly more expensive than what a bus is already providing," Klein said.

Metro's first line connected downtown to the Texas Medical Center and the NRG Park area, serving three enormous job centers and destinations. Trains arrived every six to 12 minutes at efficient little station platforms.

Dallas, meanwhile, has a system that allows riders to hop on at its Parker Road Station - about 20 miles from downtown - and take a train every 15 to 20 minutes for most of the day.

It took Rod Bailey's car breaking down to persuade him to hop aboard.

"I would have been one of those people thinking it was a big waste of money, until I used it," said Bailey, of Plano.

When his car broke down three years ago, his wife suggested he take the train to get to his job near Parkland Hospital. When her car went kaput a few months later, they became a one-car household and he switched to the train.

"I tell people all the time they should switch," Bailey said.

Among the more successful stops along the line is Mockingbird Station, where passengers disembark an escalator ride from a new multistory shopping and entertainment center, including an eight-screen movie theater.

Park and ride has fans

In Houston, park and ride buses still make the kind of connection Bailey uses to ride in from Plano by rail. Houston's commuter bus system relies on the HOV network along major freeways, making it susceptible to traffic jams, unlike rail.

On the other hand, unlike fixed rail, bus routes can be adjusted as travel patterns and locations change.

Still, for the roughly 35,000 trips it handles, Metro's park and ride system is efficient, albeit spotted with some problems.

"It's not perfect, but it beats driving," Marie Sanderson said as she waited for her park and ride bus back to Spring.

No Mockingbird Station-sized development has emerged along Houston's tracks, though the rail extension places a stop in Downtown's Theater District. Instead, bars and restaurants have clustered nearby more organically at certain stops, like the two-platform Preston Street area in the central business district.

Tying in suburbs

DART provides slightly more than 100,000 trips on an average work day, compared to about 43,000 for Metro.

The difference is that the Dallas trips often take travelers much farther. North Texas was largely unified in its plan for rail lines snaking well outside the urban core. Suburbanites sought a way to avoid driving downtown.

"There was a vision in 1983 to truly build a regional system," said DART spokesman Morgan Lyons. "We had cities coming to us."

Like Houston over the years, DART proposed ambitious growth plans, only to scale them back because of political choices or finances. Gary Thomas, DART's executive director, said sticking to the plan - even as the design morphed - helped the agency win credibility with elected officials after some "passionate conversations."

"Our plan has always been a long-range plan and financial plan," Thomas said. "Then the board can say, 'This is what we can do and when we can do it.' "

Metro's financial analysis for the current fiscal year has it collecting about $200 million more than DART from its 1 percent sales tax, but 25 percent of the total pays for regional roads.

Taking one-quarter of the money, commonly called the general mobility payment, was a way to appease politicians skeptical of rail. Now many supporters consider it a deal that has limited Houston's train development.

While Dallas eked out wins, Houston transit officials usually racked up losses. Politicians stymied rail development, often citing Metro's tendency to spend more and deliver less, for roughly 20 years. Often, Metro would present a plan considered too pricey or too politically unpopular.

What's left is a rail system that, even when it's expanded later this year, is barely outside Loop 610 and remains one of the most contentious issues for local elected officials and those sent from Houston to Austin and Washington.

Metro's 2003 plan for more rail won voter support, but then slowed as officials couldn't get the federal money they needed. Officials vacillated between developing rail or dedicated, frequent bus service that would later be converted to rail.

Costs spiraled as Metro moved forward. The agency's $1.23 billion total cost for four new lines in 2003 is less than the $1.4 billion officials now think the proposed east-west University Line will cost.

Hempstead beckons

Metro officials, however, say looking back won't get them anywhere.

"I don't think it's fruitful," said Garcia, the Metro board chairman. "We're very close on the two new lines. What we've completed in a few short years with them is wonderful."

Rather than focus solely on rail, Metro CEO Tom Lambert said people should be looking at all the options travelers will have. Along with the rail lines, officials are considering sweeping changes to the bus system, and increasing commuter bus use by supporting HOV lanes.

For many years, even as bus usage dipped, much of the discussion was dominated by rail. In some circles it still is.

The old debates, too, linger. At a recent meeting of the Houston-Galveston Area Council's transportation council - the board that guides regional transportation planning - Metro board member Dwight Jefferson urged his fellow transportation council members to support commuter rail to the suburbs. In particular, a rail line along Hempstead Road has long been a regional priority, but so far the project has sat dormant.

Jefferson noted how successful Dallas has been, stoking the competitive flame.

"On commuter rail, they are kicking our butt," Jefferson said. "We don't have any system at all."

Harris County Judge Ed Emmett was quick to lay some of that blame on Metro.

"Frankly, Metro has turned its back on commuter rail its whole existence," Emmett said. "It is a little hard to plan if Metro is not part of it."

He noted Metro doesn't even have a major bus depot near tracks where the Hempstead line would tie into buses and trains.

"That commuter rail has got to tie to something," Emmett said. "The Hempstead line can't drop people in the abandoned Eureka Yards."
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Refman · Jun 22, 2014

bigtexxx said: ↑

lol at the people that think street grade rail is going to solve traffic congestion in Houston

simplistic thinking
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You post a response that contains no alternatives or analysis and then you accuse others of simplistic thinking. That is HILARIOUS!

da1 · Jun 22, 2014

bigtexxx said: ↑

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You've never been to Leon Mexico or Istanbul or bogota I'm sure

ryan_98 · May 18, 2015

maybe not forever -
http://www.chron.com/news/transport...son-announce-agreement-on-transit-6270486.php

Metro, Culberson announce agreement on transit
By Katherine Driessen | May 18, 2015 | Updated: May 18, 2015 11:05am

Metropolitan Transit Authority leaders and U.S. Rep. John Culberson on Monday announced details of a new agreement to help the agency move forward with transit projects. The Houston Republican, who has long been at odds with Metro over its plans for a rail line on Richmond, has agreed to help Metro obtain funds for a proposed commuter rail line on U.S. 90A and other projects. Rail on Richmond west of Shepherd Drive or on Post Oak Boulevard north of Richmond would be contingent on voter approval. Culberson lauded the agreement as a "historic breakthrough" in addressing Houston area traffic congestion and rebuilding his fractured relationship with Metro.

"Above all, what today symbolizes is a new era of cooperation between Metro, under Gilbert Garcia's leadership, and the Houston area congressional delegation," Culberson said. "We will all be working arm in arm to make sure that metro and the elected officials in the region solve our transportation problems by looking to every kind of transit and transportation available, beginning with commuter rail out 90A." Garcia, Metro's board chairman, said the potential for hundreds of millions in additional federal funds could also help to add back buses and improve the existing fleet, among other wish list projects.

"We know we've got to do something to ease mobility in the region and it has to be multimodal," Garcia said. Garcia said the agreement "might very well be the biggest, most important thing we've ever accomplished to improve mobility in this region." Culberson and Garcia signed a "letter to our fellow Houston area citizens" outlining the agreement. The text follows.

May 13, 2015

The Houston economy is so strong that we have created more jobs than any other city in Texas, and the Texas economy is so strong that more jobs have been created here
than in any other State in the Union. Our success is a great blessing and a testament to our devotion to the core principles that have made America so successful — hard work, self-reliance and thrift. Our success also inspires over 3,000 people a month to move into the Greater Houston area. As we continue to grow, it becomes increasingly important that we find ways to improve mobility.Today, we have both signed and are sending out this joint letter to announce our mutual commitment to work together to relieve traffic congestion so Houston Area citizens can spend more time with their families and on the job.

We have identified several areas we can work on right away that will help reduce traffic congestion, and we want this agreement to set the tone for our future cooperation.

First, Congressman Culberson supports METRO's proposed legislation pending in the State Legislature that expands the size of the METRO Board, increases the eligible
length of Board member service and allows the existing board to elect a chairman in October with an odd initial term. These changes will help ensure better regional
cooperation in designing and building successful transportation projects while smoothing the transition from the current board size to the larger board size that current law will require in the near future.

Second, Congressman Culberson will begin work right away to change federal law so that METRO can use all of the federal dollars not yet drawn down from the $900
million in previously approved federal transit grants for corridor specific transit projects, particularly the new North and Southeast rail lines as well as the 90A commuter rail line. These proposed changes will be consistent with the goals of the FTA in order to allow METRO to match these funds with credits from the original Main Street Line or other Transportation Development Credits so that local funds will be freed up for new projects to improve mobility in the Houston area.

Third, Congressman Culberson will begin work right away to change federal law so that METRO can count $587 Million in local funds spent on the East End Rail Line as the local matching credit for a commuter rail line along 90A, and secondarily for any non-rail capital project, or any other project included in the 2003 Referendum. Rail on Richmond Avenue west of Shepherd Drive or Post Oak Boulevard would only be eligible to utilize these credits once approved in a subsequent referendum.

Fourth, Congressman Culberson will begin work right away to help secure up to $100 million in federal funds for three consecutive years for bus purchases, park and ride expansion and HOV lane improvements. These funds will also facilitate METRO's expanded use of the 2012 referendum increment to pay down debt. All of these efforts
will enhance and improve the bus system that is already one of the best in the nation.

Fifth, METRO wants to eliminate confusion for property and business owners on Richmond Avenue west of Shepherd Drive and on Post Oak Boulevard. Therefore, the
METRO Board will adopt a resolution pledging not to use any federal or state funds to build rail on Richmond Avenue west of Shepherd Drive or on Post Oak Boulevard north of Richmond unless METRO service area voters approve it as part of a future METRO service area referendum. Likewise, no local funds can be spent on such a rail project without a referendum except expenditures of local funds necessary for the proper studies and engineering to present to the voters in the required referendum. Any such referendum will be part of a multi-modal transportation plan including reasonable cost estimates and a description of the project's pathway and end points, realizing that pathways could undergo minor adjustments as a result of unforeseen environmental problems.

Sixth, Congressman Culberson will begin work right away to memorialize this agreement in both federal and state law. Thus, METRO does not oppose Congressman Culberson's language amending Section 164 of the FY16 THUD appropriations bill to memorialize this agreement. And, Metro does not oppose his efforts to memorialize this agreement in state law.

Seventh, if METRO service area voters approve the referendum, Congressman Culberson pledges to support the will of the voters and he will work to secure the
maximum level of federal funding available for the transit projects described in the referendum.

We expect that this will be the first of many future examples of our commitment to find common ground and to work together to find transportation solutions that will give Houstonians more free time to spend with their families and on the job. As Houstonians have more free time to pursue happiness and prosperity, the Houston economy will grow even more than it has.

Sincerely,

Gilbert Andrew Garcia, CFA, METRO Board Chairman

John Culberson, member of Congress, Texas
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Mr. Clutch · May 18, 2015

We don't want to turn into SF

GanjaRocket · May 19, 2015

I'd love for the hillcroft blue line through west u to be built

Raven · May 19, 2015

Mr. Clutch said: ↑

We don't want to turn into SF
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What does that mean?

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Congressman John Culberson blocks federal funding for rail on richmond and post oak FOREVER

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