Street cars? Yes, please!
Minneapolis officials are investigating the possibility of rebuilding some of the street car system.
All I can say to this is: yes, please!
Also, I wouldn't be so quick to dismiss the "ding-ding historic trolley". Restoring some vintage street cars and running on the line would be great for the character of the city and for tourism. People love street cars!
posted by Luke Francl @ 10:57 PM |
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10 Comments:
I'll second that. (And St. Paul should follow!)
Please tell me how these would differ from buses and quantify your answer in terms of a better deal for taxpayers who subsidize the service and how the service would reduce traffic within the city.
Also explain to me why we need buses AND streetcars at the same time.
Also explain to me why we should dump money into streetcar lines to serve destinations that aren't even built yet (Twins stadium) and may never be built in our lifetime (southwest rail corridor).
Thank you.
PS - I'm not holding my breath and "they will improve the character of our neighborhoods" is not an acceptable answer.
Streetcars are cheaper to run than busses are, because it's more efficient to run steel wheels on steel rails and you can couple them together in a train driven by a single driver.
Busses are only a winning bet if you're betting that people won't ride mass transit.
We have one line of street cars which run from Fisherman's Wharf to Upper Market, these cars are slow, cold, noisy, and uncomfortable. Sure, there is something charming about seeing an orange street car from Milan crawling in front of the Ferry Building and the SF Bay, but they "work" only because the cars enhance proven tourist areas (Union Square, Embarcadaro, etc). I love Minneapolis, but really, is RT going to propose a line connecting Block E to the MOA?
-lj
Uh, Block E is already connected to the Mall of America via the Hiawatha Line.
Anyway, the way some other cities deal with this is that they use modern cars most of the time and only bring out the vintage ones on weekends for the tourists.
The old Milano Peter Witt cars are pretty nasty to ride in; the rebuilt PCCs that San Francisco also uses on the F-Market line are much nicer to ride in (the only thing wrong with them is they have the 50s-era overstuffed seat cousins.) And if you want modern cars, the Skoda Astra's (and the Inekon equivalent car that is now being sold in the USA) that are running in Tacoma and Portland are pretty nice.
The biggest advantage street cars have over buses is that by virtue of their fixed nature, they reassure people of their permanence. They create development which buses don't.
The other is that "regular people" feel comfortable riding rails. For the most part, only the transit dependent will ride buses.
Fixed is not an advantage.
Government doesn't create development.
-Censored
Hey Swiftee- do you only drive on toll roads?
Hey Andy -
I find it kind of funny that you make the mistake of assuming there are only a handful of clear thinking people in the world. There's lots of us (you can tell by election results.) Not as many in MN, but its growing.
Anyway, when you pay taxes - all roads are toll roads. I'm not sure that a net-tax burden would get that distinction, but I'll risk it.
The objective for good gov't in this case should be for the road development to be responsive to demand, not to make demand. Leave that to markets.
-Censored
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