Toni Griffin says the Detroit area needs to rethink transportation

[illwill]

Maybe one day we'll be like the Jetson's. I think Detroit is soon to become the electric car capitol of the world. It would be nice to see all Metro Detroiters get serious tax breaks and discounted plans to support these new efforts. We're still the motor city.

The only thing that i have problems with is that the big 3 likes to promote their new products on the West Coast.

And it is funny that when I drive down many different streets in Chicago, It's not unlikely to see 50% of the block filled with Michigan license plates. That place has truly become the "new" Michigan.

[canuck]

When were you born, 1993?

It's been done. It failed. Miserably.

Detroiters go where they want, when they want. They don't wait for scheduled gadgets confined to limited rails.

The streetcars were taken out because nobody rode them.

And what is this 'if we want to grow' hooey? Detroit grew. It was huge. It used to be an industrial power. Those days are gone forever to places like Mumbai and Peking.

And the first things those cities did was build or rebuild their transit infrastructure.

[canuck]

Maybe one day we'll be like the Jetson's. I think Detroit is soon to become the electric car capitol of the world. It would be nice to see all Metro Detroiters get serious tax breaks and discounted plans to support these new efforts. We're still the motor city.

The only thing that i have problems with is that the big 3 likes to promote their new products on the West Coast.

And it is funny that when I drive down many different streets in Chicago, It's not unlikely to see 50% of the block filled with Michigan license plates. That place has truly become the "new" Michigan.

I think that that is a possible alternative.

I hope to see a day when the big 3 which call Motor City home can make commercials with Detroit as a backdrop.

[stasu1213]

When were you born, 1993?

It's been done. It failed. Miserably.

Detroiters go where they want, when they want. They don't wait for scheduled gadgets confined to limited rails.

The streetcars were taken out because nobody rode them.

And what is this 'if we want to grow' hooey? Detroit grew. It was huge. It used to be an industrial power. Those days are gone forever to places like Mumbai and Peking.

I have to disagree with you. Many Detroiters can't afford a vehicle any longer due to the loss of their jobs. No vehicle, limited mobility. The buses are not that reliable. Detroiters can't go where they want when they want to without reliable bus transportation and not having an automobile. That is why many residents resort to grocery shopping at the crappy middle eastern owned ghetto market on the corner of their block or the so called convenience store. More and more residents are waiting to catch those scheduled gadgets to move to and fro. I would understand if we had a reliable bus system and unused streets such as Hamilton, John R, Warren and Forest, and others set aside for express busses. That would even attract these yuppies and others to come to detroit

[dtowncitylover]

When were you born, 1993?

It's been done. It failed. Miserably.

Detroiters go where they want, when they want. They don't wait for scheduled gadgets confined to limited rails.

The streetcars were taken out because nobody rode them.

And what is this 'if we want to grow' hooey? Detroit grew. It was huge. It used to be an industrial power. Those days are gone forever to places like Mumbai and Peking.

So you don't want Detroit to grow again? You want Detroit to stay where it's at and continue to go downhill? Wow.

And no, people rode the streetcars. DSR was paid off from the Big 3 to dismantle them and replace them with buses.

And yes, I'm part of that new Michigan generation that looks around this state sees nothing a moves out ASAP to Chicago, NYC, or LA.

And exactly what failed? Mass transit? Cause last time I checked the best cities were the cities with reliable mass transit. Your ideas have failed Detroit.

However there is an idiom called a New York minute, but New Yorkers still wait for their subway. If Detroiters "go where they want, when they want", why is it not called a Detroit minute.

Your post is utter bullschitt.

[lilpup]

I'm part of that new Michigan generation that looks around this state sees nothing a moves out ASAP to Chicago, NYC, or LA.

And improved mass transit is going to change that how, exactly?

[dtowncitylover]

And improved mass transit is going to change that how, exactly?

The development of businesses, which means the creation of jobs, and housing, along transit lines...oh my God something called TRANSIT ORIENTED DEVELOPMENT [[TOD). A reason why successful cities are successful cities.

[Eric]

Mass transit does NOT create investment. It follows demand.

Woodward has more than enough demand for light rail.

So let me guess...the first train routes were stabs in the dark? And the first subway routes? And the first airplane routes?

Having a light rail line down Woodward is hardly a stab in the dark. The combined ridership of the SMART and DDOT routes along Woodward is greater than many light rail routes in other cities.

[lilpup]

The development of businesses, which means the creation of jobs, and housing, along transit lines...oh my God something called TRANSIT ORIENTED DEVELOPMENT [[TOD). A reason why successful cities are successful cities.

There's absolutely no reason to believe businesses would develop in areas they already left just because of improved transit. It works for areas of new development, but not infill.

[lilpup]

The combined ridership of the SMART and DDOT routes along Woodward is greater than many light rail routes in other cities.

Yet Detroit's said to have no mass transit and people want to put beaucoup bucks into rail when buses already carrying a large load can't even support themselves.

[ghettopalmetto]

There's absolutely no reason to believe businesses would develop in areas they already left just because of improved transit. It works for areas of new development, but not infill.

Come again?

http://maps.google.com/maps?f=q&sour...52314&t=h&z=15

[Novine]

'There's absolutely no reason to believe businesses would develop in areas they already left just because of improved transit. It works for areas of new development, but not infill."

There's absolutely no reason to believe that you have the first clue what you are talking about when you made that statement. Not only is it wrong, it's so easily proven wrong that one wonders how you managed to convince yourself that what you said is true.

[lilpup]

Try again? I'm not seeing any specifics given from anyone.

And by infill in this case I specifically mean revitalization of a Detroit-like area caused purely by the introduction or major improvement of mass transit.

[ghettopalmetto]

There's a PICTURE in the link I posted, lilpup.

More: http://www.treehugger.com/files/2010...evelopment.php

In a recent interview, Leinberger told TreeHugger that 20 years ago, there were only two neighborhoods in the DC area that could truly be described as "walkable urban": Georgetown in DC and Old Town in Alexandria, Virginia.

The expansion of the metro system in the 1980s and 1990s, he explains, led to a development boom. Now, there are 39 walkable urban areas in the region, including areas within the city limits like Dupont Circle, China Town, and the Capitol Waterfront, and those in the suburbs like Reston Town Center and Arlington in Virginia, and Downtown Silver Spring in Maryland.

Of course, this is simply proof of a long-held axiom of real estate development: "Investment follows infrastructure."

http://blog.smartgrowthamerica.org/2...wth-the-movie/

Today, that corridor, marked roughly by the black lines, holds about 7.6 % of the County’s land, yet is responsible for 33% of their real estate tax revenues. And from 1970-2000, 15 million square feet of office space and 15,000 units of housing were built on just 2 square miles of land in a county that was considered at the time to be “built-out.” [[Source – Reconnecting America, 2003)

One would think that growing from 160,000 people in 1960 to about 206,000 today would bring a huge spike in traffic.

Yet Arlington managed to add thousands of new people, shops, offices, and other destinations into this corridor, and actually reduced traffic on Wilson Boulevard at the same time. The average daily traffic on Wilson Boulevard shrank, from 19,785 in 1980, to 18,873 in the year 2000. 73% of the trips to Metro in this corridor are on foot, and almost half of the residents in the corridor take Metro to work each day.

[mwilbert]

I have no idea where else you would find a "Detroit-like area", so I don't know how to deal with that part of your claim, nor do I know how you could tell that there was only one cause, but I disagree that transit only spurs new development, not infill.

I can give you a couple of examples off the top of my head. The area around the U-street/Cardozo station in DC has had a lot of new development since the subway was opened there, and much of it is clearly there because there is transit there.

Davis Square in Somerville MA has been transformed since the Red Line extension opened.

Those are just two places I've seen personally.

[dtowncitylover]

Yet Detroit's said to have no mass transit and people want to put beaucoup bucks into rail when buses already carrying a large load can't even support themselves.

Buses don't support themselves because people prefer to ride rail over buses. Buses shouldn't be used as the major mode of transportation in a mass transit system. A subway or light rail should be. Buses should be used for feeder usages. There's nothing "mass" about 2 competing systems that use buses 10+ year old buses.

[Bearinabox]

Yet Detroit's said to have no mass transit and people want to put beaucoup bucks into rail when buses already carrying a large load can't even support themselves.

The purpose of transportation infrastructure is not to "support itself," it's to move people from place to place. I don't know why people think profitability is the standard by which it should be measured. Nobody ever makes that argument about, say, municipal trash collection, or police and fire, or the DPW sign shop, but for some reason DDOT isn't doing its job unless it's turning a profit. I don't get it.

[DetroitPlanner]

And no, people rode the streetcars. DSR was paid off from the Big 3 to dismantle them and replace them with buses.

Your post is utter bullschitt.

Dunno about that. Transportation Quarterly has a different view.
http://www.lava.net/cslater/TQOrigin.pdf

The Transportation Research Board sponsored this paper, which leads me to believe all that you learned about transportation policy came from a cartoon:
http://marthabianco.com/kennedy_rogerrabbit.pdf

From that paper: "In this regard, the compelling nature of the myth's villain, the General Motors Corporation, speaks volumes. If we cannot cast GM, the producer and supplier of automobiles, as the ultimate enemy, then we end up with a shocking and nearly unfathomable alternative: What if the enemy is not the supplier, but rather the consumer? What if, to paraphrase Oliver Perry, we have met the enemy, and the enemy is us?"

The last thing we as Detroiters need to do is to continue to wrongfully and ignorantly bite the hand that still feeds many of us.

Of all those cities you mentioned that people are leaving Detroit and going to in droves? Where are there streetcars?

The fact of the matter, like it or not, buses were seen as the preffered mode for transportation prior to WW-2. Am I saying that there will never be an instance where a streetcar won't be preferred over a bus? No. This trend started 70 years ago. Trends change.

[lilpup]

I don't know why people think profitability is the standard by which it should be measured. Nobody ever makes that argument about, say, municipal trash collection, or police and fire, or the DPW sign shop, but for some reason DDOT isn't doing its job unless it's turning a profit. I don't get it.

As if you haven't heard all the kvetching about tax loads already in place?

Let's look at another TOD scenario: http://www.baltimorebrew.com/2010/04...more-red-line/

[dtowncitylover]

I don't mean to contradict myself, but the historical stuff does not matter anyways. The fact is we don't have streetcars or a subway, but we know we NEED them in order for Detroit to grow, among other things that must change.

[ghettopalmetto]

The fact of the matter, like it or not, buses were seen as the preffered mode for transportation prior to WW-2. Am I saying that there will never be an instance where a streetcar won't be preferred over a bus? No. This trend started 70 years ago. Trends change.

Yeah, just ask anyone in their 80s how they felt when the streetcars were ripped out and replaced with buses. I'm sure they just all woke up one day and decided, "We like buses better!"

[gdogslim]

""If Detroit had had a subway system starting say in the fifties or sixties, then we wouldnt be talking of the problems of depopulation you have now. ""

This is not this fifties. this is 60 years later. there are no people to pay for it except for people who live outside of Detroit. There are no riders who would make it 40% viable.

It is a nice dream to have a Jetson Space Age transportation system, unfortunatly that dream is in a pipe somwhere.

[ghettopalmetto]

""If Detroit had had a subway system starting say in the fifties or sixties, then we wouldnt be talking of the problems of depopulation you have now. ""

This is not this fifties. this is 60 years later. there are no people to pay for it except for people who live outside of Detroit. There are no riders who would make it 40% viable.

It is a nice dream to have a Jetson Space Age transportation system, unfortunatly that dream is in a pipe somwhere.

So what you're saying is the 900,000 "nobodies" of Detroit [[including 300,000 who have no access to an automobile) don't deserve to get to jobs?

Seems pretty wasteful to automatically eliminate that many people from an economy.

Unfortunately, your "Jetsons Space Age" transportation system is EVERYWHERE ELSE EXCEPT Detroit. Detroit is the exception, not the norm, and boy does it ever show.

[dtowncitylover]

The stupidity of Metro Detroiters makes me want to move to Toronto or Boston [[my two favorite cities other than Detroit), thus I will.

[lilpup]

If Detroit had had a subway system starting say in the fifties or sixties, then we wouldnt be talking of the problems of depopulation you have now.

Yes we would because the then obsolete and landlocked factories would have still left for less expensive and more open land where they could have larger footprints cost-effectively.