Lesson in Transit (part II)
Update on Sunday’s post:
Chuck Kuffner links to a Chronicle article (Published, fittingly, the same day I was getting off the trolley at SDSU) with some comments on the possible Universities Line alignment through TSU:
“Fifteen years ago, it was agreed to close Wheeler Street to through-traffic on the campus. Now Metro wants to run a rail straight through the middle of the thing. The rail is not an option that Third Ward residents are going to put up with. This is not just me talking.”
It makes sense to me to exclude through traffic from a campus — on a typical through street pedestrians will see a “walk” signal maybe 25% of the time and “don’t walk” 75% of the time. Light rail isn’t nearly that disruptive — at 30 mph, a train will take less than 5 seconds to cross a crosswalk; even with trains every 3 minutes that allows pedestrians to cross unhindered 75% of the time. (Next time someone tells you about light rail trains creating a barrier across neighborhoods, consider that traffic on a cross street will have a green light well under 50% of the time. It’s cars, not trains, that divide neighborhoods.)
It also makes sense to shelter universities (and neighborhoods) from traffic that is simply passing through. But that’s not the case here. We want light rail to serve campus, not avoid it. To do that, you need a convenient station. And that station needs tracks and trains.
The discussion continues in the forums. And here’s a view of a trolley leaving SDSU with the freeway far below. The viaduct and the retaining wall give a good idea of the effort required to put the train where the people are, not where the cars are.
