Intermodality

Last week, I noted that the Federal Transit Administration was refusing to let METRO use any stimulus money to start work on the North and Southeast lines. That picture seems to have changed: Sheila Jackson Lee is saying that she has convinced the FTA to let METRO use the money. As I noted in my [...]

So what’s the difference between highways and transit?
No, it’s not that transit gets subsidies. Highways do, too. In fact, every mode of transportation but pipelines and freight rail does. Federal and state highways are funded by gas tax. But freeways, expressways, and major arterials — the kinds of roads which are federal and state highways [...]

Intermodality isn’t the only place I write. I’ve been on the editorial committee of Cite magazine for 9 years, and we’ve been talking about getting Cite onto the internet for nearly that long. Now, at long last, we have a Cite blog, which can cover architecture and design news much faster than a quarterly magazine [...]

U.S. Secretary of Transportation Ray LaHood visited Houston on Friday. He took the chance to talk up the stimulus bill, signed into law a month ago. Stimulus money has started flowing to transportation projects. While transportation makes up only 6% of the $787 million bill, that $45 billion will make a significant impact: it’s nearly [...]

(pdf file)
METRO’s 2012 map is settling down. This update to CTC’s transit map shows only a few changes since my last update in April 2008:

The University Line got realigned in the Third Ward. This is unfortunate; Texas Southern University now has no stop alongside campus. There is a station called “TSU,” but it’s three blocks [...]

(TUSSAM)
The METRO blog offers more details on the new light rail cars:
“This is a 100 %, low-floor model. And this is the first time it will be in the United States,” said Jitendra S. Tomar, vice president of marketing and business development at CAF USA Inc. “Other cars, you have 70 percent low floor. This [...]

The Chronicle figures they didn’t quite finish their first story on the METRO light rail contract, so here’s part two:
Metro’s newly-approved $1.46 billion contract to build four new light rail lines does not include a couple of things: $830 million and the controversial University line.
Both of these things were annnounced by METRO on Wednesday and [...]

(http://flickr.com/photos/torchondo/489927544/, via Wikipedia)
Today, the METRO board approved a design-build-operate contract for 4 of the 5 new light rail lines. At the same time, the board gave its chosen contractor, a group lead by Parsons, notice to proceed on the first part of that contract: the East End Line, 29 light rail vehicles, and preparatory work [...]