Tag Archives: minneapolis

Minnesota’s First “Online” Bus Station Opens In Minneapolis

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This week, Metro Transit opened a new bus station at 46th Street and 35W in Minneapolis.  The design of the station, including boarding at freeway-level, is a first of its kind for Minnesota.  Local buses drop off passengers on 46th street, who then take an elevator or stairs down to the freeway level for boarding.

The idea is to increase the speed of buses: they no longer have to pick up passengers on freeway on- and off-ramps, but instead use special lanes in the center of 35W to enter the station area.  The station is part of a larger plan to improve Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) service between southern suburbs and Minneapolis.

However, one or two local routes in Minneapolis may have actually had their travel time increased during certain times of day since passengers now need to transfer at 35-W rather than local streets.  I’m getting most of this information anecdotally, but the Metro Transit overview of the changes seems to indicate the same (see Route 146).

Later this week, I hope to post a first-hand account of the using the new station from a regular bus rider in south Minneapolis.

A proposal to fund Minneapolis bike projects

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Parked Bicycle

The Minneapolis Bike Master Plan identifies many critical projects that lack maintenance funding, and the plan says these projects can’t go forward without it. Many potential maintenance funding sources are listed in the plan, such as bicycle registration, a special taxing district, a sales tax on bike products in the city, an endowment, advertising, and a number of others.  Some of these ideas may work and be palatable (like sponsorship), but many suffer from problems with enforcement or unintended consequences (bicycle registration, sales tax).

My humble proposal?  Increase parking meter rates and direct the additional revenue to bicycle capital and maintenance costs.  On-street parking and bicycle facilities often compete for space, and if the city is serious about encouraging more people to use bikes (and other non-auto modes) as transportation (as the Council goals, Greenprint and draft bike plan all state), increasing on-street parking rates would help.

Continue reading →

Minneapolis Bike Master Plan: What’s up with maintenance?

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One Less Bike Lane Pothole - Scholls Ferry Road, Washington County, Oregon

Minneapolis recently released a draft of a Bicycle Master Plan for the city.  It includes a list of projects with a summary of eligibility for funding based on a number of qualifying criteria.  As an astute commenter noticed, a surprising number of projects meet all the qualifying criteria except “Operations and Maintenance”.  The plan explains the Operations and Maintenance criteria this way:

Are the operations and maintenance responsibilities defined? Proposed projects must identify how a project will be maintained before it can be submitted. Projects must also demonstrate that the project can be maintained in a cost effective manner for the life of the project.

In Chapter 8 of the plan (page 8-5), we get a hint about why so many projects are not meeting the O&M criterion:

The [Minneapolis] Public Works operating budget has been stretched to the point where new outside funding sources must be identified in order to provide adequate maintenance for new bicycle related projects.

If the project doesn’t have outside funds for maintenance (not just capital), the city can’t build it.  That makes sense, because we don’t want brand new trails only to see them crumble in a few years.  The plan identifies a number of potential permanent funding sources for maintenance, including a maintenance endowment, a sales tax on bikes and equipment, bicycle registration fees, naming rights and advertising, and more.

This is an important issue.  Clearly this is one of the major barriers to getting new bicycle projects built in the city.  The plan proposes a dedicated funding stream for capital projects, but the answer for maintenance costs seems less certain.  What are your ideas for funding ongoing maintenance of bicycle facilities?  Would you support a sales tax on bikes and equipment?  What about a bicycle registration fee?

Minneapolis Bike Master Plan: “Tier 1″ Projects

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View Minneapolis Bike Master Plan in a larger map

The new Minneapolis Bike Master Plan has a long list of projects necessary to build out the system.  82, if I count correctly.  However, only 6 of these are considered “Tier 1″ in the plan, which I think means that they are high priority and meet criteria necessary to qualify for funding sources. These six are shown in the map above.  The Upper River Trails count as one project.

According to Don Pflaum, the project manager for the plan, much of the funding for these improvements will come from outside sources, such as SAFETEA-LU grants.  So each project must be evaluated based on a number of criteria, and must meet these criteria before being eligible for consideration by the City.  The criteria include the ability of the project to increase mode share, improve safety, and be cost effective, among others. The end of Chapter 7 contains a matrix of all the projects including their ability to meet each criterion.

This ranking doesn’t exactly prioritize projects, except to say what is and isn’t currently eligible for funding.  After speaking with Don, I know the city wants more input on cyclists priorities for the system. 

So what are your priorities?  Should the six projects above be first?  What projects do you think would bring the most benefit? You can add your top priorities right on the map. Click on the view larger link, then click on “save to my maps” and then you can draw right on the map. Ideally, you’ll want to check the project list in the plan to make sure your project is in there, but if you have something the plan doesn’t have, go ahead and add that too, just make a note so we all know it is something new. Also maybe add your name and a short description of the project so we know what it is.

Minneapolis Bicycle Master Plan out for public comment

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Calhoun Biking by flickr user meetminneapolis

Minneapolis has released the Bicycle Master Plan for public comment.  Get your comments in via phone, email or through the website until October 1st.  There will also be some open houses to collect comments I am told.

While I haven’t had time to read the entire document, the City has laid out some aggressive goals, such as increasing bicycle mode share (to work) to 15% by 2030, and increasing total bike trips by 10% each year.  They also aim to add 45 miles of on-street and 5 miles of off-street facilities by 2015.

The maps in the document are the most confusing to me, and I had a good conversation with Don Pflaum, the City’s contact for the plan, about making things more legible.  If you’ve got comments, submit them on the website, call or email Don or attend an open house.  This plan is the basis for prioritizing bikeway improvements in the city.

Minneapolis seeks funding for analysis of streetcar “starter” lines

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The City of Minneapolis is applying for TIGER II grant funding from the US DOT for an alternatives analysis for Central Avenue and Nicollet Avenue, two routes the city prefers for a new streetcar system.  How they can prefer streetcar as the mode without an alternatives analysis is puzzling to me since the previously completed streetcar study did not consider any other transit modes.  The Metropolitan Council also recommends arterial BRT, not streetcar, for the Nicollet and Central Avenue corridors in the 2030 Transportation Policy Plan.  As explained by a guest here at Net Density before, arterial BRT can offer significant travel time savings and increased ridership at a much lower cost than either LRT or streetcar.

According to the FTA, an alternatives analysis is supposed to answer some key questions: What are the problems in a corridor? What are their underlying causes? What are viable options for addressing these problems? What are their costs? What are their benefits?  If all of these questions are fairly explored and answered and streetcar turns out to be the best option, so be it.

Anna Flintoft, a transportation planner with the City of Minneapolis who is quoted in the Minnesota Daily article linked to above, told me in an email that the city does plan to evaluate multiple modes, including streetcar and “enhanced bus”.  This is a good sign, but the City Council seems to have already made up their mind about the mode without having seen any alternatives.

How Portland does buffered bike lanes

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On the Right Track from Mayor Sam Adams on Vimeo.

Here’s a great video from TC Streets For People on how Portland does buffered bike lanes.  I’ve previously complained about how Minneapolis’ first buffered bike lanes were poorly designed.  This video shows that successful buffered lanes (they call them cycletracks) have a good door buffer zone (hence, the word buffer).  Currently, the Minneapolis lanes on First have no buffer zone.

Now that Minneapolis is supposedly America’s most bike-friendly city, we need to work to keep our crown.  Let’s take a page from Portland and adjust the First Ave lanes so they have a chance of being safe and successful.

Minneapolis picks streetcars over busway improvements: spending more for less?

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The South Lake Union Streetcar Line in Seattle

Minneapolis is taking one more step toward putting street cars in major transit corridors in the city.  Friday the City Council voted to adopt the 30-year vision for these rail transit corridors. It also appears that the city is considering a “starter” corridor, and determining whether they should enter into the “federal project development process”.

Even though these corridors could certainly use transit improvements, and streetcars may in fact be appropriate for some of these corridors, more analysis of alternatives is called for before a streetcar is chosen as the best mode, especially along the transit-heavy corridors of Hennepin and Nicollet (which seem to be the favorites for selection as the “starter” corridor).

The long-term vision for these corridors is based on a 2007 Streetcar feasibility study, which seems to take as a given that streetcars are the preferred mode for bolstering transit in the corridors.  The study contains no alternatives analysis, but instead contains a few pages answering the question, “Why Streetcars?”  Many of the report’s conclusions about the advantages of streetcars (assumed over buses, and in the case of cost, over LRT) could also likely be said about enhanced bus service.  But the report never explores this, since it is dedicated to streetcars.

Potential "starter" corridors for Streetcars

Different vehicles, better signage (or some signage at all), real time arrival information, and higher amenity stations could all be said to achieve the benefits presented in the study, whether using a streetcar system or an enhanced bus system.  In a guest post by a Metro Transit planner here on Net Density, two examples of arterial Bus Rapid Transit, a form of enhanced bus service were highlighted.  These examples, from Kansas and LA, showed that ridership can be improved dramatically (60 and 40 percent, respectively), with a much smaller expenditure than streetcar or LRT would require.

Travel time savings of over 20% was also realized in both Kansas and LA.  A new streetcar system on Hennepin or Nicollet will likely have little or no travel time savings over existing bus service.  The study admits as much saying that buses are more flexible, being able to maneuver around parked or stalled vehicles, and that the only travel time savings with streetcars would be advance boarding, something that could easily be implemented with bus service.

One characteristic that we can compare is cost.  Minneapolis staff prepared a Funding Study, to explore potential options for funding a new streetcar system and looking at potential “starter” corridors.  According to this study, a Nicollet line would have a capital cost of $75 million, while a Hennepin line (only extending to the Walker Art Center) would cost $70 million.  A similar (but longer) line along Nicollet using enhanced bus service may be closer to $30 million.  Neither of these new streetcar lines would extend much beyond downtown initially, likely provide little or no travel time advantage over existing bus service and would likely cost double what a longer, faster enhanced bus service would cost.  The full Streetcar study also identifies a significant issue at Franklin Avenue for the Hennepin Avenue line, a grade over 6%.  Once the line was extended into Uptown, would the intersection need to be totally rebuilt?  This would likely bring costs even higher.

While it is clear that Minneapolis needs improved transit service, alternatives need to be studied.  Can we build a better, faster, more legible bus system for half the cost of a new streetcar network?  And one that will dramatically increase ridership and improve the experience for those who already ride?  If so, then this is the better option.  Building what basically seems like a downtown circulator, which moves people barely further than the distance of a comfortable walk, does not seem like the best investment of city or federal tax dollars.

NYC DOT Commissioner in Minneapolis March 30th

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New York City is becoming well known for it’s emphasis on improving pedestrian and bicycle mobility and accessibility, as well as innovative transit projects.  Just search Streetsblog.org for any transportation-related term, and you’ll find a wealth of projects and forward-looking thinking.

On March 30th, the Twin Cities will get some access to a decision-maker behind some of those improvements.  NYC DOT Commissioner Janette Sadik-Khan will be giving a presentation at Open Book at 3:30 pm on March 30th.  From the TLC website:

For Elected Officials, Transportation Professionals, and ULI Members:

Please accept our invitation to a presentation by New York City Department of Transportation Commissioner Janette Sadik-Khan.

NYC is increasing mobility and reinventing urban streetscape at express speed. Once car-clogged Times and Harold Squares are now interactive plazas. Innovative cycling designs traverse all boroughs and the goal is to double bicycle commuting by 2015. Bus shelters, bicycle parking, traffic calming, Summer Streets, new parking policies, bicycle wayfinding, bus rapid transit, Safe Streets for Seniors, the landmark Street Design Manual…NYC is on fire to improve the quality of life through sustainable streets.

Come to engage with Commissioner Janette Sadik-Khan and your local colleagues.

Co-sponsored by Transit for Livable Communities and the Urban Land Institute

Registration is required for the event.

NYC gets first separated busway, why not Southwest Minneapolis?

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Image: NYCDOT

Streetsblog seems pretty excited about the proposed new busway on 34th Street in New York City.  Rightly so as it is the city’s first separated busway, and would cut travel times across the city by 35%, according to the Transport Politic.  It’s not bus rapid transit (BRT), since it is still slow according to Freemark, but it does bring a number of welcome improvements.  Bus travel lanes are separated from normal traffic, pedestrians should be safer thanks to refuges and wider sidewalks, and the middle of the route includes a block-long pedestrian plaza.

I written here before and even entertained a guest who talked about what it would take to improve transit in the crowded Hennepin/Nicollet transit corridors of Minneapolis.  The key improvement of the NYC proposal, mode separation, would be a major boost to travel time, rider experience and a market signal on par with LRT or a streetcar.  So could it work?

Hennepin Ave with a crude busway model

There seems to be enough right of way.  Including parking, there are 6 lanes along most of Hennepin between Franklin and Lake Street.  This looks to be similar to the situation in New York City.  The key difference is that in NYC, the street is a one way.  Two lanes of traffic travel in the same direction, with a third lane mid block for parking and deliveries.  So if you kept Hennepin two-way, that would mean one lane of travel in each direction, with three lanes at the intersections (I suppose for turn lanes).  Much of the on-street parking would be lost, but some would be retained mid-block, perhaps one third of what currently exists.

So could Hennepin survive with a single travel lane in each direction?  The traffic engineers would have to weigh in on that.  If you highlighted Hennepin as a transit corridor, you could potentially reduce car trips and move cars to alternate routes.  This highlights a weakness of Minneapolis.  New York City is still a highly connected grid.  In Minneapolis, many of the connections to downtown and beyond have been severed by the I-94 corridor, so any attempt to reduce the access by car on one of the few remaining connections is bound to be met with much wailing and gnashing of teeth.

But that’s not to say it wouldn’t be possible.  Perhaps Lyndale becomes the main north-south car route through the area, and Hennepin is reconfigured to focus on transit and bicycles.  Car space would just be reduced, not eliminated, and the busway would only really need to go to Lake Street.  Drivers would soon adapt, and maybe even ride the bus a little bit more.