QLine going public

[emu steve]

Oops, I did have a brain fart.

Everyone believes that a QL2 along E. Jefferson to Belle Isle [[actually a little further east) would be great for the neighborhoods along that route.

But few have talked what effect that line would have continuing through downtown up Michigan Ave. to say 14th or 16th.

Developers, buy your Michigan Ave. property now... Train station, anyone?

[professorscott]

Oops, I did have a brain fart.

Everyone believes that a QL2 along E. Jefferson to Belle Isle [[actually a little further east) would be great for the neighborhoods along that route.

But few have talked what effect that line would have continuing through downtown up Michigan Ave. to say 14th or 16th.

Developers, buy your Michigan Ave. property now... Train station, anyone?

I think an East Jefferson route would be easier to get started in the short term than Michigan Avenue; there is too much of a gap in Michigan Avenue between downtown and Corktown at the moment, IMVHO.

However, MVHO is not dispositive here; what it comes down to is this. Roger Penske is not, most likely, going to reprise his starring role in any new streetcar line, and John Hertel is busy running SMART and doesn't have the amount of time it would take to reboot and get a new effort started. [[I haven't talked to John but I know how busy he is; Roger just about came out publicly and said he wouldn't do this again.)

So all we need - for East Jeff, or Michigan, or, fuck it, Mound Road, wherever you like, is for somebody to come along and be the champion, and put together private philanthropic and/or developer money sufficient to convince Uncle Sugar that we are serious and can dip into the federal trough once again, minus the cost of a service facility since we already have that, plus the cost of some vehicle storage space since the one we have won't easily expand. [[Ooh - and - make sure any new tracks connect to the QLine tracks, otherwise the fact that there's already a service facility isn't of much use.)