Midweek Roundup: first train ever
by Nathan Dickey from Seattle Transit Blog on (#6ZKKV)
Local Transit & Land Use:- Sea-Tac is testing an automated shuttle between the Seatac/Airport Link station and the airport terminals (The Seattle Times, $). Reportedly about 7% of the airport's daily passengers arrive and depart via Link.
- After Sound Transit gets the 2 Line running across the I-90 floating bridge, it may have difficulty running trains every 4 minutes through Seattle under real-world conditions (The Urbanist)
- The planned Link 4 Line between Issaquah and Kirkland will serve neither city's urban core, but a Bus Rapid Transit line would serve both cities and the Eastside better (The Urbanist). Stride S4?
- Why Shoreline's Vote to Erase Parking Mandates Is a Big Deal (The Urbanist)
- 20 years after Hurricane Katrina knocked out passenger rail along the Gulf Coast, Amtrak's Mardi Gras line has resumed service between Mobile and New Orleans (New York Times, gift link). I've just always wanted to ride Amtrak," said Pat Stancliff, 71, as she waited to board her first train ever.'
- A budget shortfall has led Philadelphia's transit authority (SEPTA) to cut its bus and rail services by 20 percent with fare increases and more cuts to come (New York Times, gift link)
- The Cross Bronx Expressway tore the South Bronx of NYC in half, and residents are concerned upcoming major repairs (and proposed traffic mitigations including new temporary bridges) will once again leave lasting impacts on the community (The New York Times, gift link). Parallels with WSDOT's I-5 maintenance?
- The FTA is looking to remove consideration of the social cost of carbon" from grant applications (Smart Cities Dive)
- The new NextGen Acela trains promise faster travel and more seats - but arrive as US rail faces an uncertain future (The Conversation)
- Bellingham ranks 4th least affordable housing market relative to income in the USA - Andrew Reding (Bellingham City Council Candidate) has some ideas how the city could solve its housing crisis (The Urbanist)
- There's no universal recipe to building a great city. So why are so many zoning and road design policies written like there is? (Streetsblog USA)
- Rental scooters and ebikes (aka micromobility") aren't a problem, but a solution for getting people out of their cars as they get around cities - cities just need to give them space (Jalopnik)
- Apparently following Federal directives, the Florida Dept. of Transportation blacked out a rainbow crosswalk in Orlando that was part of a memorial to the victims of the 2016 Pulse nightclub shooting (New York Times, gift link).
This is an Open Thread.