# The demise of the inter urban trolley



## Exvalley (Dec 4, 2021)

Detailed analysis here:


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## joelkfla (Dec 4, 2021)

But in 1917, those last 40 miles would have been a game stopper. You couldn't just dial up an Uber.


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## 87YJ (Dec 4, 2021)

I just remember my old family members talking about the Oregon Electric Line from Portland to Eugene. A few good stories!


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## Metra Electric Rider (Dec 4, 2021)

Horse and buggy or mainline rail? 

How long would that have taken, just for interests sake and would it have required overnights/long layovers?


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## Metra Electric Rider (Dec 4, 2021)

Ah, I see I should have gone straight to the Twittersphere - 53 hours and 400 dollars vs 20 hours and 50 dollars for mainline rail.


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## Willbridge (Dec 4, 2021)

Metra Electric Rider said:


> Ah, I see I should have gone straight to the Twittersphere - 53 hours and 400 dollars vs 20 hours and 50 dollars for mainline rail.


Areas where the steam railway network was not "complete" had some big networks of interurban lines. My 98-year-old father rode some of them and remembers seeing others that were abandoned before he was old enough to get that rare mileage.

Some of them, like the Oregon Electric and the Sacramento Northern had the potential to grow into long-distance operations but expansions came to an end with WWI and the infinite funding of highways.


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## VentureForth (Dec 6, 2021)

Metra Electric Rider said:


> Ah, I see I should have gone straight to the Twittersphere - 53 hours and 400 dollars vs 20 hours and 50 dollars for mainline rail.


I so would have wanted to do that, once.

A good chuck of commuter rail can be done between DC and Boston. I had it all plotted out once, noting the gaps. Now that I have opportunity, I have a wife. She's not a railfan. lol



Willbridge said:


> View attachment 25974


That's nearly European density of electrified track. What if.....


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## MARC Rider (Dec 6, 2021)

Metra Electric Rider said:


> Ah, I see I should have gone straight to the Twittersphere - 53 hours and 400 dollars vs 20 hours and 50 dollars for mainline rail.



No, it was 53 hours and $21.04 in 1917 dollars (~$400 in 2020 $) for the interurban vs. 20 hours and 50 dollars ($1,080 in current dollars) for the direct steam train. And that was just the rail fare. The pullman berth was another $10.

. #897 - Passenger traffic study. - Full View | HathiTrust Digital Library

I guess there's no point in complaining about a $500 roomette on the Lake Shore Limited.


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## jis (Dec 6, 2021)

MARC Rider said:


> No, it was 53 hours and $21.04 in 1917 dollars (~$400 in 2020 $) for the interurban vs. 20 hours and 50 dollars ($1,080 in current dollars) for the direct steam train. And that was just the rail fare. The pullman berth was another $10.
> 
> . #897 - Passenger traffic study. - Full View | HathiTrust Digital Library
> 
> I guess there's no point in complaining about a $500 roomette on the Lake Shore Limited.


Indeed. Especially if there were no cheaper and faster alternatives available


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## John from RI (Dec 31, 2021)

Perhaps as we move to battery operated buses we wlll see a revival of street cars operated with batteries which avoid the cost of installing and maintaining an overhead trolley wire.


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## Willbridge (Dec 31, 2021)

John from RI said:


> Perhaps as we move to battery operated buses, we will see a revival of street cars operated with batteries which avoid the cost of installing and maintaining an overhead trolley wire.


That would be truly ironic, as the transit industry first tried battery cars before overhead electrification proved more reliable.

I've had the experience of scheduling the early battery buses on the RTD Denver 16th Street Mall and they created hidden costs (i.e., operating costs that looked like normal expenses but were a consequence of the battery buses).

The next try were hybrids. One problem with them was a tendency to catch fire, but they could be scheduled easily. When I learned that the downtown firefighters had been issued keys to the battery boxes, I realized that more needed to be done.

Now my successors have Chinese-designed battery buses to schedule on the Mall. I like the interior layout and performance, but last that I heard they were back to the scheduling (range) issue. These buses are far better than their predecessors and now RTD will be trying some regular transit battery buses, as other cities have done.

Developments now include on-route recharging stations for trams or buses and so the scheduling issue should gradually fade away. In the meantime, several of the scheduling software companies are offering a battery-bus or tram option for urban transit, which is a clue that transportation providers are coping with this issue.

Hybrid shuttle back in the olden days (2011):


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## 87YJ (Dec 31, 2021)

Overhead power still was the best. JMHO


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## Willbridge (Jan 1, 2022)

87YJ said:


> Overhead power still was the best. JMHO


I agree, especially for systems that had it into the era when global warming and urban air pollution became issues: the Edmonton, Hamilton and Toronto trolley coach networks.

Elaborate steps are being taken to make battery operations do as well as Diesels; no mention of making them as efficient as overhead-supplied buses and trams.

This company is a leader in battery electrification for buses, but it would all apply to an interurban or urban rail vehicle.

CarMedialab: how smart charging helps PTO to scale up electric bus deployment. An interview with General Manager Heiko Bauer (sustainable-bus.com)


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## AmtrakMaineiac (Jan 3, 2022)

In Boston the MBTA plans to replace the last 3 trolleybus routes with electric buses. The reasoning is that the overhead infrastructure is in need of replacement and there is major construction in the area that will require rerouting of one or more routes for a few years anyway. I just hope this is not a short term fix to avoid a major capital investment, an investment that might be better in the long term.


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## SubwayNut (Jan 3, 2022)

AmtrakMaineiac said:


> In Boston the MBTA plans to replace the last 3 trolleybus routes with electric buses. The reasoning is that the overhead infrastructure is in need of replacement and there is major construction in the area that will require rerouting of one or more routes for a few years anyway. I just hope this is not a short term fix to avoid a major capital investment, an investment that might be better in the long term.



That's sad news, fully electric overhead wire trolley buses are such a unique part of the landscape in Boston.


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## Amtrak25 (Jan 4, 2022)

On the subject of interurban trolley, this is worth reading. I have it.

"The Longest Interurban Charter 1st Edition"







The Longest Interurban Charter: Larry Plachno: 9780933449084: Amazon.com: Books


The Longest Interurban Charter [Larry Plachno] on Amazon.com. *FREE* shipping on qualifying offers. The Longest Interurban Charter



www.amazon.com


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## cirdan (Jan 5, 2022)

John from RI said:


> Perhaps as we move to battery operated buses we wlll see a revival of street cars operated with batteries which avoid the cost of installing and maintaining an overhead trolley wire.



I understand the costs of electrification are insignificant compared to the costs of fighting NIMBYs and purchasing the ROW or digging the tunnels where a surface route would not be acceptable. In some situations the batteries alone cost more than catenary. This may change as economies of scale ramp up. But for now that's not the main problem when it comes to bringing back light rail.


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## dlagrua (Jan 5, 2022)

From what I have read the bus companies, at that time many were private and didn't want competition. They purchased many of the city trolley lines, closed them and pulled up the tracks.


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## MARC Rider (Jan 5, 2022)

John from RI said:


> Perhaps as we move to battery operated buses we wlll see a revival of street cars operated with batteries which avoid the cost of installing and maintaining an overhead trolley wire.


The streetcar in Milwaukee has batteries; there are a few short stretches of the route that don't have trolley wire for some reason, and the batteries power the streetcar through them.


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## joelkfla (Jan 5, 2022)

MARC Rider said:


> The streetcar in Milwaukee has batteries; there are a few short stretches of the route that don't have trolley wire for some reason, and the batteries power the streetcar through them.


There are several systems like that. The reason for no overhead is usually aesthetics in the downtown district.


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## Willbridge (Jan 7, 2022)

joelkfla said:


> There are several systems like that. The reason for no overhead is usually aesthetics in the downtown district.


In the late 1980's when the original battery shuttle buses on Denver's 16th Street Mall had proven to be mediocre there was some discussion about overhead electrification. As best as I know, there were only three of us in management who had experience with them. The main reason that we didn't get to the serious stage was the trees in the center of the Mall. Planning Director DIck Bauman said he didn't want to have us crucified for removing the trees from the center median, which otherwise would have blocked wrong-way running in emergencies.

The great irony is that after a years-long planning process it has been concluded that the center island in the Mall should be removed, so the sidewalk on the sunny side can be widened. Times change.


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## neroden (Jan 7, 2022)

On a smaller scale, rather than full battery operation, battery-overhead hybrid designs are becoming standard for both trolleybuses and trams; it avoids the complicated expense of specialwork for the wiring at tricky intersections. Drop the poles before the intersection, raise them afterwards, run through the intersection on battery.


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## MARC Rider (Jan 7, 2022)

neroden said:


> On a smaller scale, rather than full battery operation, battery-overhead hybrid designs are becoming standard for both trolleybuses and trams; it avoids the complicated expense of specialwork for the wiring at tricky intersections. Drop the poles before the intersection, raise them afterwards, run through the intersection on battery.


That seems to be my impression of what the Milwaukee streetcar does.


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## MARC Rider (Jan 7, 2022)

joelkfla said:


> There are several systems like that. The reason for no overhead is usually aesthetics in the downtown district.


There are also a number of "ground-level power supply" systems on the market. Apparently, as battery performance is being improved, they're looking less attractive, except maybe for short stretches to recharge batteries.


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## Metra Electric Rider (Jan 7, 2022)

One could always go with the more expensive solution (utilized by NYC and Washington DC - and possibly other cities - many moons ago, and more recently, in France - too lazy to look up which city) and have underground current pickup systems.


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## jis (Jan 7, 2022)

Metra Electric Rider said:


> One could always go with the more expensive solution (utilized by NYC and Washington DC - and possibly other cities - many moons ago, and more recently, in France - too lazy to look up which city) and have underground current pickup systems.


If one spends the money then might as well go with inductive pickup these days eliminating physical contact gear.


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## cirdan (Jan 7, 2022)

I think the ugliness of overhead lines is an often overstated argument. There are examples of very minimalist overhead that can be very elegant. Another alternative is to have trees. For example the Charles St Line in NOL is hidden under a tree canopy in many locations meaning you really can't see the overhead if you don't specifically look for it.

In my opinion things like batteries and ground contact are often introduced by opponents of the system in the hope that escalating the costs while pretending to be a supporter is the best way to wreck a project.


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## Metra Electric Rider (Jan 7, 2022)

jis said:


> If one spend the money then might as well go with inductive pickup these days eliminating physical contact gear.


That's probably a lot less problem/trouble prone (one assumes) than underground pickup.


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## Willbridge (Jan 8, 2022)

Metra Electric Rider said:


> That's probably a lot less problem/trouble prone (one assumes) than underground pickup.


Yes. Underground pick-up picks up crud off the streets.


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## Green Maned Lion (Jan 8, 2022)

John from RI said:


> Perhaps as we move to battery operated buses we wlll see a revival of street cars operated with batteries which avoid the cost of installing and maintaining an overhead trolley wire.



My opinion, based on observation, however unpopular with railfans, is that street-running rail vehicles that mix with traffic are functionally inferior to electric busses with at least backup battery capability. If a bus can go off wire even short distances, it can bypass a closed route; if it can’t go off wire the trolley poll can usually still provide enough latitude to allow it to pass a disabled vehicle or other blockage. One disabled vehicle (rail or car) on a rail route shuts down the entire system in that direction until it is cleared; this does not happen with a bus.

These disadvantages apply to all single-track and to some extent double track rail systems, but in the case of mixed traffic use, the rail provides very little advantage (larger vehicle size and slightly higher mechanical efficiency due to lower rolling resistance are the only ones I can think of). I am a fan of light rail systems that primarily or entirely operate on their own rights of way, and I think that if a substantial amount of the system is thus laid out, light rail is better than BRT. But I am not at all a fan of “street cars”. Busses simply work better operationally in that scenario.

I am aware of two operational interurbans in the US- the Trenton-Camden RiverLine and the Philadelphia-Norristown Norristown High Speed Line, although the former is a diesel operation. There could be others that qualify; the distinction is that they provide transit both within and between at least two places of substantial population. A commuter system only provides transit within one or less substantial area of population density on its route; a trolley/light rail provides service only within an area of substantial population density.


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## MARC Rider (Jan 8, 2022)

jis said:


> If one spend the money then might as well go with inductive pickup these days eliminating physical contact gear.


Inductive pickups can also be used to power/recharge electric cars. I think the Swedes are experimenting with such a system.


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## west point (Jan 8, 2022)

Dropping poles and raising them sounds good in theory but -------- Who lowers and raises them? I can think of possible designs to lower them. However, remember the need for quick retract systems to prevent poles from rising into electrical wires. Each time a quick retract activates the driver has to go out and rewind the retract spring then re attaches the trolly slide onto the contact wire. Combining pole tension on the contact wire, quick retract, and the lowering and raising systems that are at odds with each other will be a designers and equipment nightmare.

Multiply that with 2 contact wire systems just doubles the effort. So, IMO trolly pole systems are not really an option. will post later about PAN type systems.


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## jis (Jan 8, 2022)

west point said:


> Dropping poles and raising them sounds good in theory but -------- Who lowers and raises them? I can think of possible designs to lower them. However, remember the need for quick retract systems to prevent poles from rising into electrical wires. Each time a quick retract activates the driver has to go out and rewind the retract spring then re attaches the trolly slide onto the contact wire. Combining pole tension on the contact wire, quick retract, and the lowering and raising systems that are at odds with each other will be a designers and equipment nightmare.
> 
> Multiply that with 2 contact wire systems just doubles the effort. So, IMO trolly pole systems are not really an option. will post later about PAN type systems.


On LRTs they drop and raise pans for various reasons as do mainline and heavy rail trains. Poles are tough. I don't think there are too many examples of remotely operated pole raising. though there are a few involving elaborate Rube Goldberg contraptions.


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## MARC Rider (Jan 8, 2022)

west point said:


> Dropping poles and raising them sounds good in theory but -------- Who lowers and raises them? I can think of possible designs to lower them. However, remember the need for quick retract systems to prevent poles from rising into electrical wires. Each time a quick retract activates the driver has to go out and rewind the retract spring then re attaches the trolly slide onto the contact wire. Combining pole tension on the contact wire, quick retract, and the lowering and raising systems that are at odds with each other will be a designers and equipment nightmare.
> 
> Multiply that with 2 contact wire systems just doubles the effort. So, IMO trolly pole systems are not really an option. will post later about PAN type systems.


All of the new light rail and streetcars I've seen use pantographs, not poles. Even the SEPTA suburban trolleys, serving 69th St. and Media/Sharon Hill, which went into service over 100 years ago, use pantographs.


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## joelkfla (Jan 8, 2022)

MARC Rider said:


> All of the new light rail and streetcars I've seen use pantographs, not poles. Even the SEPTA suburban trolleys, serving 69th St. and Media/Sharon Hill, which went into service over 100 years ago, use pantographs.
> View attachment 26655


I think @west point's post was addressing @Green Maned Lion's advocacy for trolley buses.


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## MARC Rider (Jan 8, 2022)

Green Maned Lion said:


> I am aware of two operational interurbans in the US- the Trenton-Camden RiverLine and the Philadelphia-Norristown Norristown High Speed Line, although the former is a diesel operation. There could be others that qualify; the distinction is that they provide transit both within and between at least two places of substantial population. A commuter system only provides transit within one or less substantial area of population density on its route; a trolley/light rail provides service only within an area of substantial population density.



What about the South Shore Line? I would think that's the last remaining true interurban by your definition. The Norristown High Speed Line is a unique operation that can't be buttonholed, but its two terminals are both part of the greater Philadelphia area, as is the Trenton-Camden River Line. So the South Shore Line might be the only real interurban left by your definition. Of course, some might call it "commuter rail," as its equipment is fully compatible with the Metra Electric lines.


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## jis (Jan 8, 2022)

And then there are PATCO and PATH. Admittedly they do not stick strictly to the surface.


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## neroden (Jan 9, 2022)

And then there's whatever-the-heck the Boston Green Line is -- it certainly has aspects of most classifications of passenger rail.


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## Willbridge (Jan 9, 2022)

neroden said:


> And then there's whatever-the-heck the Boston Green Line is -- it certainly has aspects of most classifications of passenger rail.


The Green Line is often classed as Light Rail. Its operating manual was used as the basis for Edmonton's, which has then been used as the basis for other LRT lines. The South Shore is often classed as Commuter Rail to avoid having the additional interurban category.

The Seattle Tunnel buses had self-raising and lowering trolley poles, although they could be quirky. I was there for the last scheduled run. It was on a low ridership trip and the regular commuters were mystified by all the fuss. As the photos show, the poles missed the last rise and needed the operator to do it the old way.


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## Willbridge (Jan 9, 2022)

Green Maned Lion said:


> My opinion, based on observation, however unpopular with railfans, is that street-running rail vehicles that mix with traffic are functionally inferior to electric busses with at least backup battery capability. If a bus can go off wire even short distances, it can bypass a closed route; if it can’t go off wire the trolley poll can usually still provide enough latitude to allow it to pass a disabled vehicle or other blockage. One disabled vehicle (rail or car) on a rail route shuts down the entire system in that direction until it is cleared; this does not happen with a bus.
> 
> These disadvantages apply to all single-track and to some extent double track rail systems, but in the case of mixed traffic use, the rail provides very little advantage (larger vehicle size and slightly higher mechanical efficiency due to lower rolling resistance are the only ones I can think of). I am a fan of light rail systems that primarily or entirely operate on their own rights of way, and I think that if a substantial amount of the system is thus laid out, light rail is better than BRT. But I am not at all a fan of “street cars”. Busses simply work better operationally in that scenario.
> 
> I am aware of two operational interurbans in the US- the Trenton-Camden RiverLine and the Philadelphia-Norristown Norristown High Speed Line, although the former is a diesel operation. There could be others that qualify; the distinction is that they provide transit both within and between at least two places of substantial population. A commuter system only provides transit within one or less substantial area of population density on its route; a trolley/light rail provides service only within an area of substantial population density.


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## john h (Jan 9, 2022)

Willbridge said:


> View attachment 26671
> 
> 
> View attachment 26672



San Francisco has a lot of electric bus trolleys


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## daybeers (Jan 9, 2022)

neroden said:


> And then there's whatever-the-heck the Boston Green Line is -- it certainly has aspects of most classifications of passenger rail.


Bad is what it is...

Even recently constructed fully underground subways have been tending to go with overhead power.


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## toddinde (Jan 9, 2022)

Green Maned Lion said:


> My opinion, based on observation, however unpopular with railfans, is that street-running rail vehicles that mix with traffic are functionally inferior to electric busses with at least backup battery capability. If a bus can go off wire even short distances, it can bypass a closed route; if it can’t go off wire the trolley poll can usually still provide enough latitude to allow it to pass a disabled vehicle or other blockage. One disabled vehicle (rail or car) on a rail route shuts down the entire system in that direction until it is cleared; this does not happen with a bus.
> 
> These disadvantages apply to all single-track and to some extent double track rail systems, but in the case of mixed traffic use, the rail provides very little advantage (larger vehicle size and slightly higher mechanical efficiency due to lower rolling resistance are the only ones I can think of). I am a fan of light rail systems that primarily or entirely operate on their own rights of way, and I think that if a substantial amount of the system is thus laid out, light rail is better than BRT. But I am not at all a fan of “street cars”. Busses simply work better operationally in that scenario.
> 
> I am aware of two operational interurbans in the US- the Trenton-Camden RiverLine and the Philadelphia-Norristown Norristown High Speed Line, although the former is a diesel operation. There could be others that qualify; the distinction is that they provide transit both within and between at least two places of substantial population. A commuter system only provides transit within one or less substantial area of population density on its route; a trolley/light rail provides service only within an area of substantial population density.


One thing defeating about bus rapid transit is that it doesn’t attract the real estate development that light rail does. The fear is the bus can be easily rerouted or discontinued. Another problem in busy routes is that BRT doesn’t have the capacity of rail. Finally, the cost to build BRT is really not that much less than light rail. As a transit guy, BRT is better than nothing or just conventional bus. One would hope that BRT can lead to light rail and/or that planners would choose the right application for the right market.


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## John from RI (Jan 10, 2022)

I am a layman but from my layman's point of view here are a couple of observations. 
1. A real advantage of rail transit is that for guys like me who never drove to work was I could always depend on it. Yes, a problem could shut down the system but that problem would be be corrected. With a bus New Jersey Transit can abandon part of a bus route by simply giving 30 days notice. Then bus riders have to scramble to find another bus. If that is even possible. That happened to me a few times. For example, I lived in Waldwick, NJ and got a bus on the corner to ride to my job in Paterson. Then NJT abandoned the route beyond Ridgewood. I was lucky. I would walk a mile to the train station. 

2. The advantage of a battery operated bus or streetcar, from what I read, is that the overhead wire is expensive to install and to maintain. Batteries don't need an overhead wire or need them only for short distances.


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## Willbridge (Jan 10, 2022)

John from RI said:


> I am a layman but from my layman's point of view here are a couple of observations.
> 1. A real advantage of rail transit is that for guys like me who never drove to work was I could always depend on it. Yes, a problem could shut down the system but that problem would be be corrected. With a bus New Jersey Transit can abandon part of a bus route by simply giving 30 days notice. Then bus riders have to scramble to find another bus. If that is even possible. That happened to me a few times. For example, I lived in Waldwick, NJ and got a bus on the corner to ride to my job in Paterson. Then NJT abandoned the route beyond Ridgewood. I was lucky. I would walk a mile to the train station.
> 
> 2. The advantage of a battery operated bus or streetcar, from what I read, is that the overhead wire is expensive to install and to maintain. Batteries don't need an overhead wire or need them only for short distances.


I agree. The problem with batteries -- having worked in scheduling with battery buses -- is range. A lot of work has and is being done on that problem, but a clue that it has not been completely resolved is that the leading providers of scheduling software have added a battery bus option that also feeds data to the dispatch system. The same issues would apply to a streetcar.

In a big network a bus or tram might be an hour away from the garage/carbarn. Say it has a burned-out taillight. Another bus on the route might be due to pull in, so the dispatcher has the idea of swapping buses. The first bus was scheduled to have enough juice for the scheduled run, but what if the changeover keeps a replacement bus out past its battery capacity?

Tight-fisted Rose City Transit Co. used to keep GMC New Looks on runs that lasted 26 hours. They stopped doing that because the bus got so dirty and there were two "Train 1's" on the road at the same time, but it was feasible technically.

Similarly, trolley buses, trams, LRV's are limited by issues like cleaning, inspections, or train number logic problems rather than by power.


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## neroden (Jan 10, 2022)

Willbridge said:


> The Green Line is often classed as Light Rail. Its operating manual was used as the basis for Edmonton's, which has then been used as the basis for other LRT lines.



So, due to its history, the Boston Green Line:
-- has a street-running streetcar segment shared with traffic (the E branch) (plus several other non-revenue street-running tracks)
-- has substantial street-median sections derived from old streetcar exclusive ROW, with streetcar-type station spacing (these are the B and C branches)
-- has a branch with much longer station spacing which was converted from a former mainline railway and its former suburban stations... which were originally stations in entirely separate cities before the metropolitan area engulfed them, so it's arguably an interurban route (this is the D branch)
-- has the first subway tunnel and subway station in the United States (in downtown Boston)
-- has a substantial elevated section (on the bridge to Cambridge and the new construction there)
-- has two new branches which are grade-separated, next to old railroad mainlines, with urban-rail type station spacing (the GLX extension project)
-- has sections run on line-of-sight like buses (though this is going to change)
-- has sections run on full signalling

So it's got everything: streetcar, interurban, subway, elevated, depends on which part of the system you're on. You're right that when the LRT term was introduced, it was meant to describe this level of flexibility; I guess the Green Line really was the model for LRT.


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## Green Maned Lion (Jan 10, 2022)

toddinde said:


> One thing defeating about bus rapid transit is that it doesn’t attract the real estate development that light rail does. The fear is the bus can be easily rerouted or discontinued. Another problem in busy routes is that BRT doesn’t have the capacity of rail. Finally, the cost to build BRT is really not that much less than light rail. As a transit guy, BRT is better than nothing or just conventional bus. One would hope that BRT can lead to light rail and/or that planners would choose the right application for the right market.



I am not a fan of BRT; I am also not a fan of spurring real estate development, however.


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## AmtrakMaineiac (Jan 11, 2022)

neroden said:


> I guess the Green Line really was the model for LRT.


The D - Riverside line built in 1958 on a former Boston and Albany commuter railroad line, is often considered the first modern Light Rail line in North America, and a pioneer of the concept of using former railroad rights of way for light rail lines. Although ironically the first such conversion was elsewhere in Boston, when the NHRR Shawmut and Milton branches were converted to rapid transit and high speed trolley lines respectively in 1928, what is today the Red Line.


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## MARC Rider (Jan 19, 2022)

neroden said:


> And then there's whatever-the-heck the Boston Green Line is -- it certainly has aspects of most classifications of passenger rail.


Well, except that it's clearly not a long-distance train.


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## daybeers (Feb 1, 2022)

MARC Rider said:


> Well, except that it's clearly not a long-distance train.


Oh, it derails and has problems often enough that it could 



Green Maned Lion said:


> I am not a fan of BRT; I am also not a fan of spurring real estate development, however.


What? Why?


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## Green Maned Lion (Feb 1, 2022)

daybeers said:


> Oh, it derails and has problems often enough that it could
> 
> 
> What? Why?



it prices people out of cities. We are a country who talks about wanting to combat discrimination, then takes great joy in discriminating on social and economic status.


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## MARC Rider (Feb 1, 2022)

Green Maned Lion said:


> it prices people out of cities. We are a country who talks about wanting to combat discrimination, then takes great joy in discriminating on social and economic status.


BRT prices people out of cities? Or spurring real estate development? On the other hand, my hometown of Baltimore used to have almost a million residents, now it has less than 650,000. I would think there's room in the city for real estate development that could provide housing for 350,000 people at price points affordable by all classes. I'd like to see such real estate development instead of putting the affordable housing way out in the fringes far from any walkable neighborhoods or useful public transportation.


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## daybeers (Feb 1, 2022)

Green Maned Lion said:


> it prices people out of cities


No, MARC Rider is correct, the real estate does that. Transit-oriented development (or TOD) has been a buzzword in development for several years now, but it's difficult to get right and easy to do very wrong, ex. not changing parking requirements, thus having dozens more spaces needed when a housing development is adjacent to a transit station. It's also not building housing for different price points and the tons of "insider deals" with developers.

Definitely some of the blame can be put on transit agencies for not partnering correctly with developers and not inducing the correct development around transit, but the transit is not to blame.


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## neroden (Feb 1, 2022)

Ipso facto, residential real estate development in cities makes it *cheaper* for people to live in cities. (Well, unless they're knocking down apartment buildings to build single-family mansions, which has been a thing in Seattle.) But *commercial*, *office*, and *industrial* real estate development makes it more expensive for people to live in cities. Despite which, I think that's better than building the commercial space out in the wilderness where everyone has to drive to it.

There's a history in the US for the past 70 years of allowing completely out-of-proportion development with far more commercial/office development than residential development in cities: more jobs, but no more housing. This had predictable results. You have to build housing to match the jobs.


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## Green Maned Lion (Feb 2, 2022)

MARC Rider said:


> BRT prices people out of cities? Or spurring real estate development? On the other hand, my hometown of Baltimore used to have almost a million residents, now it has less than 650,000. I would think there's room in the city for real estate development that could provide housing for 350,000 people at price points affordable by all classes. I'd like to see such real estate development instead of putting the affordable housing way out in the fringes far from any walkable neighborhoods or useful public transportation.


 
Real estate development; I couldn’t imagine you were asking why I wasn’t a fan of BRT when I outlined that in great detail a few posts up. It’s not that there isn’t ‘room’ to put affordable housing in TOD projects; it’s that there is no business case for doing so. What earthly reason would a real estate developer put in houses at affordable per-square-foot prices when they could sell that same square footage for more? TOD projects tend to take place where there is already an acceptable levelof transit and affordable housing (read: slums). They remove this somewhat transit accessible housing through “urban renewal“ (read: eviction of undesirable people) and replace it with expensive housing and enhanced transit access for the chosen few who can afford it.

I am quite frankly terrified that somebody is going to TOD the river line and make the poor but very nice town I live in an enclave of rich bozos. I’m sure I could still afford it, but who wants to live in such a place?


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## MARC Rider (Feb 2, 2022)

Green Maned Lion said:


> What earthly reason would a real estate developer put in houses at affordable per-square-foot prices when they could sell that same square footage for more?


For one thing, there's a finite number of people who can afford to buy some of the ridiculously priced stuff that I've seen on the market recently (well, over the past 20 years). I don't know who's buying this stuff, unless it's Russian oligarchs parking their cash for nefarious purposes. So, free market fundamentalists believe the market will eventually sort this out. The rest of us may need to advocate government policies at all levels of government to make sure people aren't priced out of housing in semi-convenient locations. These could include building even more housing units to jack up the supply, price controls on housing units as a precondition for zoning approval, extra property taxes on non-residents, requirements for a minimum number of rental units at affordable prices, etc. We really need to do something, I drive through vast swaths of Baltimore City and it's depressing to see how perfectly good neighborhoods have turned into slums. Our cities are rotting in the cores, and people making normal incomes are increasingly required to drive long distances away from convenient parts of the city in order to find housing they can afford.


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## Joe from PA (Feb 2, 2022)

MARC Rider said:


> All of the new light rail and streetcars I've seen use pantographs, not poles. Even the SEPTA suburban trolleys, serving 69th St. and Media/Sharon Hill, which went into service over 100 years ago, use pantographs.
> View attachment 26655


I live in Media. This trolley goes from Media to West Philadelphia. If you want to go to center-city, you need to take the subway. Along the way, this trolley can drop you near a shopping mall, supermarkets, doctor offices, etc. Best of all, the ride is free for those over 65.


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## Bonser (Feb 2, 2022)

dlagrua said:


> From what I have read the bus companies, at that time many were private and didn't want competition. They purchased many of the city trolley lines, closed them and pulled up the tracks.


 GM bought the trolley lines in Los Angeles to boost sales of its cars and buses. This was in the late 1940's, I think.


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## Green Maned Lion (Feb 2, 2022)

MARC Rider said:


> For one thing, there's a finite number of people who can afford to buy some of the ridiculously priced stuff that I've seen on the market recently (well, over the past 20 years). I don't know who's buying this stuff, unless it's Russian oligarchs parking their cash for nefarious purposes. So, free market fundamentalists believe the market will eventually sort this out. The rest of us may need to advocate government policies at all levels of government to make sure people aren't priced out of housing in semi-convenient locations. These could include building even more housing units to jack up the supply, price controls on housing units as a precondition for zoning approval, extra property taxes on non-residents, requirements for a minimum number of rental units at affordable prices, etc. We really need to do something, I drive through vast swaths of Baltimore City and it's depressing to see how perfectly good neighborhoods have turned into slums. Our cities are rotting in the cores, and people making normal incomes are increasingly required to drive long distances away from convenient parts of the city in order to find housing they can afford.



I can appreciate your idealism, but I fear my, what most call, cynicism is closer to realism.


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## MARC Rider (Feb 2, 2022)

Joe from PA said:


> I live in Media. This trolley goes from Media to West Philadelphia. If you want to go to center-city, you need to take the subway. Along the way, this trolley can drop you near a shopping mall, supermarkets, doctor offices, etc. Best of all, the ride is free for those over 65.


This is true, except that 69th St. Terminal is not quite West Philadelphia, rather it's in Upper Darby Township. But the ride is free if you're over 65!


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## dwebarts (Feb 3, 2022)

Tom Booth said:


> GM bought the trolley lines in Los Angeles to boost sales of its cars and buses. This was in the late 1940's, I think.


The film "Who Framed Roger Rabbit" reveals some of this history. Hollywood has been pretty good about telling the history of Los Angeles over the years. "Chinatown" has a lot to say about water in that regard,


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## Willbridge (Feb 5, 2022)

Tom Booth said:


> GM bought the trolley lines in Los Angeles to boost sales of its cars and buses. This was in the late 1940's, I think.


It was a bit more subtle than that. They financed the new bus operators, in particular National City Lines. Portland Traction / Rose City Transit Co. did not buy a GM bus until 1961 because one of the GM-financed firms had fought to get the franchise in 1936.

I used to think it was a bit far-fetched when the president of the Dayton transit company claimed that GM provided prostitutes at transit industry conventions. Then an incident at a conference in 1990 made me reconsider my skepticism.


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## AmtrakMaineiac (Feb 5, 2022)

I have often thought the National City Lines / GM conspiracy theory of the demise of the trolley to be a bit overblown. Let's face it, trolley lines were in trouble anyway and were probably doomed in the postwar years:
1) Systems were totally worn out after depression followed by WW2 had deferred maintenance and equipment replacement.
2) Onerous requirements for companies to maintain streets, plow in winter etc.
3) Inability to raise fares to keep up with inflation.
4) Loss of off peak riders who preferred to drive, resulting in a system used primarily for peak hours only but required to run ~18 hours a day / 7 days a week.
5) Public infatuation with cars as the cool new thing and trolleys as old fashioned.


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## Metra Electric Rider (Feb 5, 2022)

My take is that conspiracy is probably an overblown and overused term - a friend and I decided after spending a weekend with a another friend who is big into conspiracy theories, after noticing on our way home that we are a country that effectively manage a Denny's, that running a national conspiracy with hundreds of moving parts (aka participants) and the chance of those moving parts not talking, well, it's just too much to effectively manage. 

I do think that there was an intentional move to buy up and replace streetcar systems - they had done their job for their original owners, which was to develop the property they owned. Once that was done, they were too expensive to run. I think there might be a lesson for Brightline in this somewhere. 

Another aspect that people forget (this is mainly my opinion, I haven't done extensively research on this) is that railroads were still seen at this time as being adjunct to the robber barons of the 19th century by a lot of people, hence there wasn't a great deal of support for railroad companies being taken over by municipalities - although they should have been. Plus there was too much competition from other transit providers such as bus companies. Had this been rationalized, i.e. a municipal owner running one line rather than three, on one competing route, the streetcars could have been effectively run and modernized. Obviously not everywhere, but in more places.


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## neroden (Feb 7, 2022)

Green Maned Lion said:


> I am quite frankly terrified that somebody is going to TOD the river line and make the poor but very nice town I live in an enclave of rich bozos. I’m sure I could still afford it, but who wants to live in such a place?



You don't understand the situation at ALL. Here's what happens when an area becomes desirable:

If you don't allow vertical high-density development, what happens is that your town becomes an enclave of rich bozos who are living in the exact same single-family lots, but building mansions on them. This is documented in Seattle.

If you also prohibit the mansions, you get rich bozos paying rich-bozo prices for dilapidated apartments. This is what happened in San Francisco.

In short, it has nothing to do with the developers. If the location is attractive, it'll get filled with rich people. Building denser development allows more people to live there and therefore might mean there's a chance for some of the non-rich people to stay.

In general, rich people will always take the most attractive locations. The only solution is to build a huge amount of housing, so that after the rich people have taken the most attractive locations, there are still attractive locations left for everyone else.

Only way to prevent the rich people from moving in is to make your location unattractive, which is a really stupid thing to do by any measure. It's the "Well, maybe if we have more shootouts we won't get gentrification" solution.

So what you have to do is try to *dilute* the rich people.

Anyway, the influx of rich people is going to either happen or not happen to the RiverLine regardless of what developers do. It comes first, before the developers. You've got cause and effect reversed.

I do think it's critical to fight against *displacement* -- when bigoted people try to force out established residents or businesses on the grounds that they're "unattractive" or "undesirable". You can't do anything about the inherent attractiveness of a location without sabotaging yourself. But you *can* make a location more attractive to decent people and less attractive to bigoted jackasses simultaneously...


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## MARC Rider (Feb 7, 2022)

neroden said:


> You don't understand the situation at ALL. Here's what happens when an area becomes desirable:
> 
> If you don't allow vertical high-density development, what happens is that your town becomes an enclave of rich bozos who are living in the exact same single-family lots, but building mansions on them. This is documented in Seattle.
> 
> ...


One thing you need to do is protect people of modest means who own a modestly priced house is to index property tax rates to income as well as the value of the property. One of the problems with gentrification is that if property values skyrocket, then people of modest means can't afford the taxes on their own homes and are thus displaced. Sure, they could sell the house and move to a cheaper one with taxes they could afford, but that's pretty disruptive, plus it leads to the area being entirely rich bozos. 

Indexing property tax rates to income is not hard to do. We have such a system in Maryland. It was great for me, because the first year I owned a home, they indexed to my previous year's income as a starving graduate school research assistant, and I didn't have to pay property taxes at all until the next year, when I definitely had the money to do so. Even now, I get a few hundred dollars a year tax credit on my property tax, even though I have close to a six-figure income. 

This, of course, doesn't deal with the problem of developers only building housing priced for rich bozos.


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## Green Maned Lion (Feb 7, 2022)

neroden said:


> You don't understand the situation at ALL. Here's what happens when an area becomes desirable:
> 
> If you don't allow vertical high-density development, what happens is that your town becomes an enclave of rich bozos who are living in the exact same single-family lots, but building mansions on them. This is documented in Seattle.
> 
> ...



Personally, I think San Francisco is an example of an exception to the rule; in fact I think it exists as an example of localized inflation, like Williston, ND.


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## neroden (Feb 7, 2022)

Green Maned Lion said:


> Personally, I think San Francisco is an example of an exception to the rule; in fact I think it exists as an example of localized inflation, like Williston, ND.


San Francisco is the most extreme case, but you can see the same phenomenon in New York City, LA, Minneapolis,... and even tiny Ithaca, NY. 

The children of Chinese billionaires, attending Cornell University, will sometimes simply buy single-family houses for use while attending college. All the "development restrictions" in the world won't stop them. The obscenely rich students can afford to simply buy out the "single-family" districts if they want to, and so they have been moving in on them.

Somewhat less rich people who want to retire here buy up "homes for people of modest means" and build their dream mansions. If it's a historic district, where they can't demolish the building (which it frequently is), they just build their expensive-rich-person house inside the existing house.

Meanwhile, other not-super-rich-but-still-rich students "slum it" in shoddy, decrepit apartments close to campus for which they pay higher rents than the Cornell staff can afford. It's been driving the lower-paid Cornell staff to live 30 or 60 minutes away in neighboring cities.

The only way to blunt the effects of this and make it possible for the staff to live in Ithaca, which they mostly want to do, is to build more apartment buildings. (Of course, that will empty out the housing demand in the neighboring cities; there's always an effect. I've suggested connecting the neighboring cities by passenger rail to make them more desirable relative to Ithaca, but it's so outside the thinking of current politicians it's got no traction so far.)

The underlying cause is a 1950s era zoning code which came very close to prohibiting new housing construction. As a result, there was basically nothing built in the City of Ithaca for 50 years. For part of that time, the Town of Ithaca sprawled ranch houses onto greenfields, but then they stopped too. During the entire period, the number of jobs and students has grown, and the housing simply hasn't kept up, because it was illegal for it to keep up.


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## Bob Dylan (Feb 8, 2022)

neroden said:


> San Francisco is the most extreme case, but you can see the same phenomenon in New York City, LA, Minneapolis,... and even tiny Ithaca, NY.
> 
> The children of Chinese billionaires, attending Cornell University, will sometimes simply buy single-family houses for use while attending college. All the "development restrictions" in the world won't stop them. The obscenely rich students can afford to simply buy out the "single-family" districts if they want to, and so they have been moving in on them.
> 
> ...


Good Post, this is happening everywhere that's growing as you said!


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