The MT Position

Posted by Fred Jandt
Editor, Mass Transit

Everyday as I come into work I see a guy riding his bike and he is pedaling hard. He’s got a backpack slung over his shoulder and it’s hard to tell if he is going to work or school, but he’s been at it everyday this summer.

I remember when I was a kid, pedaling my bike to my grandparents house five miles away was an epic journey. It was something I looked forward to and the distance never came into consideration. Now, I admit I am a little older, a little rounder and a little less inclined to tackle five miles on a bike to see any relative.

Bike travel isn’t new to transit. Virtually every agency in the country is outfitted with bike racks on their buses or a spot for bikes on the trains. But a bike used for transit in the states isn’t what it’s like in Europe — for now.

A recent report came out about a new bike rental initiative being put into place in Paris. The city has placed bikes you can rent in about 300 locations around the city. For about $40 a year for an annual pass or a single Euro for a half hour, a person can rent a bike, ride it anywhere in the city and drop it off at a different rental location. This is a new thing for Parisians, but is already in place in other parts of Europe like Barcelona and Geneva.

So what does this mean for the U.S.? Milwaukee is about to initiate the same program in 2009, with 300 bikes (in comparison to Paris’ 10,000) located at rental centers in the city’s more populated areas.

City officials hope to give people an alternative to driving for short trips. They hope that people who would normally drive for a five to six block journey (as opposed to walking) would instead look to bikes as another alternative.

Will it work? Who knows. Milwaukee isn’t as conducive to bicycle or pedestrian traffic as Paris is. But it gives officials a chance to start changing people’s mindsets towards daily transit use and maybe if they get on those bikes for short trips and like it, they will get curious and step on a bus for the longer ones.

We can only hope.

Thanks for reading the MT Position.

You may have noticed that it’s Friday, not Thursday. It’s not a mistake, we’ve changed the blog to go out on Fridays now, along with an extra news e-blast each week because we’ve had overwhelming support to get you more news. So as you sip your coffee on Friday morning, you can do your weekend wind down with the MT Position.
Fred
fred.jandt@cygnusb2b.com

Posted by Fred Jandt
Editor, Mass Transit

Summer is the time when a lot of families travel. I know when I was growing up, my parents would put my brothers and me in a car and take us all over Wisconsin to see one landmark or another.

It was traveling on these summer journeys where I learned how to read road signs, found out what mile markers were for and how to properly use (and fold) a map. My wife on the other hand has no knack for navigation as she gives me directions like, “make the left turn at Subway and go down until you see the McDonald’s on your right.”

Of course, this isn’t far from the norm. Studies show men are more prone to using signs and street names, while women are more likely to navigate by landmarks. But how do people navigate with transit?

I recently read an article discussing station and line names for transit, comparing names used by London’s Underground versus Toronto’s system. The story noted that London used names for its stations and lines that gave you a flavor of the area, like Notting Hill, Marble Arch, Jubilee and Bakerloo to name a few.

What routes or lines do you travel on regularly? The “C” line? The “Red” line? Route 42?

How about the stations or stops you get on or off at? 60^th and Main? 8^th Ave. South? Lombard Street?

Wouldn’t it be better if the stops and stations were named after local landmarks? To give you a real feel for the system you’re riding on and how it is part of the city it carries you through?

Some agencies are already doing this. On Sound Transit’s new Central Link light rail line, the stations are named things like SODO, Stadium, Chinatown. And better yet, each station has an icon associated with it that is shown on all the cars and at the stations themselves.

Wouldn’t you rather ride a Central Link line from SODO to Chinatown rather than the Blue line from 8^th Ave. South to North West Ave?

Thanks for reading the MT Position, updated every Thursday.

Fred
fred.jandt@cygnusb2b.com

Posted by Fred Jandt
Editor, Mass Transit

Gas prices went up again. Well at least here in the Midwest where I live. Checking out the prices around the country, there are places a lot cheaper than here, but the average is still more than $3 a gallon.

The interesting thing about this latest price hike in a series of hikes this year is the impenetrable silence that followed it. Last year at this time the air was full of cries of righteous indignation. How can prices be this high?! The gas companies are ripping us off!!

This year it’s more of a shrug of the shoulders and a quiet resignation that people are just powerless to do anything about this. And really, have people changed their lifestyles at all because of the higher gas prices? My nephew plays baseball and summer basketball, and my brother has to cart him all over the state for the different games and tournaments my nephew plays in. Have the higher gas prices slowed them down? No, not really.

How about for transit? Sure, we’re seeing a steady increase in ridership, but are their huge surges this summer? If there are, we’re not hearing about them. People just seem to expect gas prices to be this high and have accepted that.

According to a recent report U.S. consumers have paid an extra $20 billion for gas this year. That’s about $146 per car. And what’s the solution … a smaller car?

Yep, the Smart Car is making its way to the U.S. next year. If you haven’t seen one of these cars yet, they are cute, but awfully small. When I was in Europe recently, they were all over the place. I even saw a Smart police cruiser on the streets of one town in Spain.

What amazes me is that no one seems to be thinking about transit. Heck, a lot of consumers are still resistant to it. But with congestion growing, I sure would rather spend more time getting where I was going on a bus or a train rather than sitting in my new ultra-small car waiting for traffic to move. That sounds like the real smart thing to do.

Thanks for reading the MT Position, updated every Thursday.

Fred
fred.jandt@cygnusb2b.com

Posted by Fred Jandt
Editor, Mass Transit

I admit that I am a Discovery and History Channel junkie. The varied and in-depth topics are fascinating to me. Who knew you could do a two hour program on the history of concrete and make it fascinating?

So I was particularly interested in a new Discovery Channel program called Boneyards, which started last week. The basic premise is what do people do with old and worn out vehicles and things that get taken to, well, boneyards. The first episode was on railroad boneyards.

This was fascinating to me, especially the part where they used old rails to make fence posts. Watching them take worn out rails, heating them up, rolling them and pressing them into fence posts was just neat to see. Sure, watching them cut up an old locomotive and using its materials for scrap metal was interesting, but to watch them reuse worn out materials was the most interesting part.

Members of the Colorado Rail Car company were interviewed about its taking old railcars, refurbishing them and putting them back into service. This was the highlight for me. Seeing those old cars now back in service was a sight to see. And think of the savings!

When I was in Nashville earlier this year, I took a ride on the Music City Star. This new commuter line uses all refurbished equipment. It’s cars came from Metra in Chicago and its locomotives from Amtrak. And they saved a ton of money doing it that way.

One of the things people point out when discussion of adding rail lines to a system is the high cost associated with it. Considering how much can be saved from reusing old equipment, maybe they need to check out a few boneyards before making up their minds.

Thanks for reading the MT Position, updated every Thursday.

Fred
fred.jandt@cygnusb2b.com