Category / Rail Related

by Adron

What Do I Think About The TriMet Performance?

A number of days ago I posted a poll (which if you’d like, I’m still taking feedback and collecting it together). In it I asked a few questions about Trimet, how it is doing as an agency, and a few other simple questions. I’m going to produce a shiny report in the near future with the results, but for now, as previously promised here are my answers.

Name:

Transit Sleuth

Do I think that things could be better in transit for the city of Portland?

Yes

Do I think TriMet is doing a good job as a whole with the revenue they take in and from taxes?

Compared to other transit agencies around the United States, they’re doing one of the best jobs in the United States. Compared to the Canadian cities or even to the United States of the past? I think Trimet is making the exact same mistakes that are forced upon every major US city today. Transit agencies are setup to beg for funding while roadways are setup for automatic subsidies. There’s an obvious and outright discrimination to any mode or thought that a United States Citizen would do anything besides drive. This is reflected in the regulatory and nightmarish transit policies and monopolistic practices that transit agencies are setup with throughout the United States, which also pushes their costs up to often absurd levels. Throw in a heavy dose of monopoly Union control over the agencies, a lack of any clear competitiveness except to beg for money, and transit in the United States is ripe for inefficiencies on a grand scale. Overall though, I find that it could safely be said, that under Government monopoly operations transit is about 20-40% more expensive than private operations. To summarize, do I think we could get more for our tax dollars? No. Do I think we could get more as consumers of a service? History would say yes and I side with history.

Who do I think is responsible for the problems (if you think they have issues) at TriMet?

Let me create a list:

  • The Federal Government and many of the absurd standards and regulations they’ve set on transit. The vast subsidies that control the transportation industry in the United States (which also in many ways has almost destroyed the transit aspect of it) and give little freedom to cities, businesses or individuals to truly setup and operate transit agencies in general.

  • The State has poor management over most of the roadways it controls in Portland. Namely 82nd and Powell are a mess and there is little Portland – even though these are obviously Portland roadways now – have almost zero control over what to do with or how to remedy these massive traffic problems. Trimet, or anyone in the city for that matter, can’t run BRT, light rail, or for that matter many more buses than already run on the street. For this, ODOT shares a large part of responsibility in our transit mess. If they build the monstrous CRC then ODOT will absolutely be responsible for creating one of the largest nightmares in Portland’s history.

  • Portland Leadership (Mayor, etc) is not even attempting to make Trimet run lean. Not that the leadership should, it isn’t technically their responsibility. It is however in their best interest to make Trimet and leaner, cleaner transit machine to improve the livability of citizens in the city. Overall, I blame the leadership at this level only a small bit.

  • PDC, the Portland Development Commission and let’s include the Metro Committee or whatever they’re called has a huge say in how things are developed, what will be developed and how it will be developed in Portland. This inherently bleeds over to Trimet in a large way. I however, happen to agree with the PDC in most cases and actually support it’s existence. I support it for one reason, I’ve seen the opposite of it in other cities and it causes absolute havoc. It is why Portland can act and act quickly, with a clear mission, toward improving livability and other things throughout the city. Many cities in America cannot do this and it shows in  the fact they’ve allowed their downtown cores to be decimated, their suburbs to sprawl for hundreds of square miles, their tax bases to disappear and the cities to almost falter except for the existence of some tall buildings. It is indeed sad. So do I blame the PDC? Yes, but I generally blame them for much of the positive focus and clarity around Trimet’s actions and work with the city to build roads, stops and other amenities that benefit cyclists, pedestrians and dramatically increase safety for both of these peoples. Almost inadvertently auto safety has increased through a byproduct of a lot of these designs.

  • Trimet, we now get to the people that are responsible for the agency itself. At least, responsible for a 90% of everything about the agency. The other part is of course the Union. The union provides Trimet the workforce that drives the buses, MAXs and because they forced the city to use the ATU (Amalgamated Transit Union) labor, the streetcar. The WES is however serviced by the freight railroad that actually owns the track and trackway, the Portland & Western Railroad. Trimet is also largely responsible for many of the issues, and I’ll even admit that they could stand to replace many of the buses that have been neglected over the years. Some of those buses really shouldn’t be on the road anymore, it’s time to recycle them. I also think it is a problem, however it is somewhat small, that Trimet actually manages capital projects, which seems smart and not. The reason it is smart, there is no closer entity to the problems the capital projects will solve than Trimet and why it is not smart, is because Trimet’s main onus of operandi is to run transit services. The operational needs of services provisions should one up the project management of these projects. Fortunately, this is again a small overall problem. In the end, it’s a boost to the overall local economy for the duration of any capital projects, whether roadway, rail or otherwise.

  • ATU Trimet Union is another huge candidate in the overal scheme of things. They have poor leadership (DUIs and other absurd dishonorable actions on their member’s part are more frequent than one would like to admit, I personally have even received, albeit forgave, a death threat from ATU Members). Do I support unions? These days not particularly. Have I supported and are there situations I might support Unions? Yes. Do I support the ATU right now? Not really, they’ve screwed up far more than Trimet has, overreached their bounds, and battled to get the drivers so much that it makes the labor cost for basic transit service fairly unreasonable – but NOT something the drivers shouldn’t deserve and expect – the Union has just gone about it in a horribly inefficient way and setup Trimet so that the only real option is to start fighting them over costs. This is bad for EVERYBODY involved. The Union, its members, the customers of Trimet and the citizens of Portland.

Do you know about, what they’re for, and how the PDC (Portland Development Commission), City of Portland Mayor, Commissioners, City Council, etc work?

Yes. See above. I often get involved when I can and when I find the issue is truly important.

What would be the #1 thing that TriMet – or any entity – in Portland should do to help improve transit in the city?

This list is huge. The biggest win for the United States and especially Trimet could receive is a dramatic and immediate reduction in road subsidies from the Federal Government and a removal of the arbitrary regulations around road building and Interstates. Setting up where money is allocated to cities based on density, number of people and prospective service while reducing the subsidies and zoning encouragement for large sprawl and allow local cities and states dictate how they will build out their infrastructure, systems and related networks. The only large scale infrastructure the Feds have ever accomplished was the Interstate System, which displaced hundreds of thousands of minorities through eminent domain destroying vibrant downtown cores of once majestic cities and then in turn lumping the costs of almost the entire system on the states even though capital outlay was primarily funded through central planning and implemented in an authoritarian way (yes, those of you that are confused, the Interstate System is indeed an example of how Communism and Socialism can work, if that’s what you consider a success).

Simply put, getting the Feds out of our pockets and out of the decision making in Portland would be the greatest boon for cycling, transit and general livability this city could imagine.

The second best thing, which is probably more reasonable, is to expect a more balanced approach to city building. Even though Beaverton, Hillsboro and Gresham don’t pay in remotely close to the amount that Portland proper pays into the transit budget, they should however be built up further around core city center concepts. For the next 5 years, I’d say the metropolitan area should allocate 80% of all funds for transit, livability improvements, bikeways and related funding to the outer city centers (those stated) and the micro-town centers throughout the metropolitan area. I also agree, that bus line amenities and capital outlay and improvements should continue and be a larger part of the city budget. Trimet should focus more on operations around Light Rail and Buses, connecting and getting the frequencies more closely spaced to make the system easier and easier to use. I do NOT think we should lose focus on building out a core backbone in the system with light rail, if anything we should INCREASE spending to get core backbone with LRT and also BRT, but not wimpy piece meal BRT. If we’re going to do BRT half way, I say skip it and sink the capital for light rail now. BRT that isn’t dedicate ROW is a joke. Seattle is proving that for us right now, as I type this, at how poorly and catastrophically bad it can go for a city. Fortunately they’ve spent almost nothing for it (except they’ve had to further cut core services to make sure they could meet their Federal match for it).

Overall, do I think Trimet is doing a bad job? Considering their regulatory, legal and budgetary restrictions, no. Do I think their doing the best job or even close to the best job they could? no.

So there you have it. My two cents, the Transit Sleuth

Yes transit could improve in Portland. Trimet, PDC, the ATU, Portland Leadership, and especially the Federal Government all play a part in the issues that exist with getting better service. Do I blame any single entity entirely, no.

Do I think things will improve over the next 3-5 years? No, primarily because I don’t think the economy will dramatically improve for 3-5 years. However, until the Feds straighten their nonsense out, this 3-5 years could drag on much longer. But time will tell and there is no point on dwelling.

In the end, I hope for improvement. But in the meantime I’ll keep on contributing, being involved and living as best as I can.

Happy riding, cycling and walking! Cheers

by Adron

A Grand Lodge, A Long Transit Ride, A Great Weekend

Over this last weekend I headed out to Forest Grove to Mcmenamins Grand Lodge. It’s a great place to spend a weekend away from everything, with the bonus of actually being reachable by transit. From downtown, take any MAX that goes to either Beaverton Transit Center or Hillsboro and transfer at either of those places to the #57 Bus that goes to Forest Grobe. I prefer to take the MAX for and wait until the end of the line to transfer. It always makes working on a laptop dramatically easier than riding on a bus, thus my main reason on many trips for taking rail over the bus.

Between the soaking pool, which is a great heated pool that is absolutely wonderful during the winter, I started pondering. I ought to spearhead a website that lays out the locations that are close to stops on the light rail, streetcar, WES and bus corridors in the TriMet Service area. However I’d not want to do this alone. If you’d like to volunteer to help me out (don’t worry, we’re only talking about content and helping to find cool places, you don’t have to code or actually create the website) with this let me know. Just enter the things you could provide and I’ll get in touch ASAP.

← Back

Thank you for your response. ✨

Cheers – Transit Sleuth

by Adron

Chinese Railroads Aren’t the Advertised Achievement We’re Sold

I got another email from a train & transit buddy of mine recently. Talking about how the United States has fallen behind in the race to have high speed rail. Now before I leap into what I’m going to say, I want to make it abundantly clear that what we are achieving today, what we’re doing today as a nation is pathetic. I’m talking about 3rd world nation pathetic. While we ride on the backs of technology to carry the country along and any hope of growth, the real industry leaders of railroads, construction and manufacturing have fallen into dormancy. In large part because of the disgraceful behavior of the Government and the politicians pretending they can run and economy and build cities.

Simply, they will not and can never achieve what the US did and the titans of industry accomplished with the help of the American people between 1865 and 1915. I’m not saying everything is hunky dory and lovely from that era, I’m just saying we’ve become absurdly pathetic as a nation. We can’t achieve what we did then, we can’t innovate nor have we proven that we have the insight or drive to create, innovate, build and bring about a better future for everyone. Simply, the United States is absolutely a shadow of what it once was and there is no light at the end of the tunnel. We’re in for an extremely rude awakening that we have taken what our forefathers provided us, and rested heavily on our laurels to our children’s detriment. They are now the one’s, completely ill-prepared, to rebuild that level of achievement and growth. Something that the Chinese or some other country, that is actually less prepared to handle these things, will have to take the reigns anyway.

So let’s talk about a few comparisons, since everyone is so wowed by the Chinese and their railroad. Let’s get a better perspective about what the Chinese are achieving compared with the United States of 1865-1915.

The Chinese, in 50 years have built approximately 65,545 miles of railroad. This has been done with tooling and equipment that they’ve built using designs and technology created by the United States, Europe and other nations. It is technology that we used between 1865-1915, also a 50 year span, to build 129,774 miles of railroad by 1890, with a total of 250,000 miles by 1915. So really, the Chinese have accomplished a mere portion of what the United States did with technology that had to be developed when the US Railroads were being built. Many Chinese Americans also helped to achieve that, because here they innovate and create in ways that just wouldn’t happen in China itself (at least, there has been no evidence to the contrary, new ideas are extremely slow to take hold in mainland China, however a change of Governmental systems seems to do the trick, as Taiwan and Hong Kong have shown without doubt). To put it simply, the freer the market, the greater the achievements  The same can be seen for “free-market” Britain as well as “market driven” TGV, Shinkansen  etc. I could go on about this even more, but suffice it to say at 250,000 miles of railroad, no country on Earth has even come close to the achievements of American entrepreneurs and industrialists during 1865-1915. NOWHERE EVEN CLOSE.

For another comparison, let’s take speeds achieved by the Chinese on their high speed rail. The trains generally, now after several accidents causing dozens of deaths, travel at a safer 187 mph. Which is now, in 2012 the general speed of high speed rail. No real achievement has been made here. The TGV holds the highest speed at record and has areas that operate at higher speeds.

In the US, and I know this isn’t in the 1865-1915 range, but just stay with me for a minute. The New York Central in 1966 achieved 196 mph with the M-497. In the 1940’s the Milwaukee Road ran rail service over 100mph, hitting up to 120 mph for part of the trip. Note, that was the 1940’s. In 1934 the Milwaukee Road had a line running a peak of 103.6 mph, in 1934!

Ok, so those speeds are all great right, but let’s step back again to the years we’re really comparing. In 1905 the Pennsylvania Railroad ran a speed record at 127.2 mph near Crestline, Ohio with an E7sa 4-4-2 Atlantic. This same train was running rail service at 88-90 mph daily at the time. Something that makes the current Chinese rail operations seem not so spectacular, and the modern US rail operations a complete embarrassment. When we look at the averages, things look even better for our forefathers in the 1865-1915 period too, as our modern averages drop horribly low. But let’s not dig into how poorly we do today compared to our forefathers.

Another great thing the Chines have built is this fantastic sprawling train station shown below.

Again, don’t get me wrong. They’ve created an amazing station here. But let’s step back to that 1865-1915 America again just for a second and take a look at Cornelius Vanderbilt’s Grand Central Terminal.  Here are the upper tracks:

The suburban (as in sub-urban) level of the station. (Click for full size image)

The suburban (as in sub-urban) level of the station. (Click for full size image)

Oh yeah, and here’s the OTHER LEVEL of tracks.

The express level. (Again, click on for full size image)

The express level. (Again, click on for full size image)

That’s two decks of train tracks, built in 1913. All underground so it doesn’t block up massive sprawling space like the station shown in China. It was built that way to better service New York at its very core. But wait, that’s not all. Guess what else is under the station. If you said the 42nd street subway you’d be correct! The subway was running as of 1904, with the station finally open for business in 1915.

Summary

So what am I really saying by doing this comparison? It’s simple, I’m saying we’re not and should not be trying to compete with the modern Chinese. We should be competing with ourselves. Our own nation has languished and become weaker by the year. Our peak, militarily can be said to have happened in WWII, however our economic powerhouse was created in the span of 1865-1915. What was built then was what enabled us to power our way through WWII, out producing every nation on Earth. It was these years of economic strength that set us up to be able to create the greatest middle class to the world had known. But now we’re too busy fussing and begging the Government to build us out of our debt and misfortune. We’ve become a nation not of doers but of beggars and people subsisting on others. We’re in debt beyond our wildest dreams while we continue to out consume and further plunge into debt. We act like we own houses while we make massive mortgage payments, also known when translated as “death payments”. What we have achieved was basically set into motion in those years, 1865-1915, and we’ve done little to truly progress past that, except to increase our dependence on an unreliable and faulty Government.

What the Chinese have built is commendable, but it isn’t anything that the United States had not already accomplished almost a hundred years ago. It’s just we’ve fallen so far from our peak, our achievements have withered and we’ve forgotten and cared not what we once were as a nation.

The good thing is, the United States may find itself yet. We may find that maybe, just maybe there is another type of grand success and great life to be had. Maybe we don’t have to acheive these things. Maybe the Chinese are merely chasing our own failures while we’re finding our way to different things. I think we’ll still need to build our way out of the current doldrums, but we could still do it. It just won’t be anything like what we achieved in the past.

Simply, our forefathers have seriously kicked our ass, and there’s no way the modern generation, or next few generations are going to reclaim that pedestal. We’re too busy figuring out how to create “social media” empires of pettiness.

…and also, the next entry will be much more positive. I just had to get this written out as I’m tired of how the “Chinese are beating us”, when in reality we’re not being beaten by anyone but ourselves.

by Adron

Boston, Portland’s Sister City?

Recently I took a trip over to the north east coast with my girl. We had a great trip visiting Conneticut, with our flight in and out of Boston. We used a mix of transit while in Boston to connect from the airport to the intercity bus to Hartford. Where we then bummed a ride with my girl’s folks. Overall it was a great trip, but this is my Transit Sleuth Blog, so enough about all that, let’s talk about hard core transit in Boston and how bad ass Boston is.

I’m generally pretty hard to impress when it comes down to transit. Portland does OK, San Francisco does OK, but the cities that really get me are usually the hard core operators like Chicago, New York or Vancouver, British Columbia. Well, Boston has officially entered those ranks of amazing cities. When it comes to removing that noose of automobile ownership and really getting down to important ideals, livability and effective transit and biking options.

Boston Transit Options

Two lines we took that are built out subway style heavy rail, included the Red and Orange Lines. Both of these lines were clean, are practically spotless by American standards, and amazingly well run. The lines were also smooth, without much jarring, and during rush hour I was still able to easily board and de-train in the inner core of the city.

Boston’s subways are cleaner, seemingly faster, and better rides than other comparable systems in cities like New York (MTA has notorious bumpy subway trains, they’re still not as bumpy and jarring as busses, but for a train they’re ridiculous) or Chicago. They’re also very easy to ride. The signage is good and getting around is simple, even when I wasn’t paying attention. The calls for each stop were clear and easy to hear (by comparison, there’s always room for improvement) which was a pleasant break from the standard mumbling on some systems.

The another rail mode option, as Portlanders, San Franciscans and Seattleites would now know, is light rail. I believe in Boston they refer to these as Streetcars however, but I’m not 100% sure. The Green Line was the main line we rode on, getting from North End to the Northeast College area. These trains were driven like a bat out of hell, jarring a bit in the turns, but fast and extremely efficient with solid ridership. The Green Line even splits into three separate segments as it exits the inner core of the city. This line, as the orange and red, was also technically a subway.

Which speaking of, the Silver Line is a bus line, that is underground that runs directly from the airport. This line is technically BRT the way it is intended to be built. However, Boston just refers to it as part of their subway system. There is a lot of contention about the quality of service of the Silver Line versus real rapid transit lines like the other subway lines, since Bostonians were originally promised a light rail line. It appears, after some research on wikipedia and digging through state records that they botched up the construction estimates and planning during the epic big dig failure.

On any of these lines, albeit during rush hour, we never waited for more than 90 seconds, with most of the trains we transferred from or to we had zero wait time. We literally walked onto the platform and onto the train. A transit rider’s dream transfer!

Next…

I’m aiming to have a part II to this article regarding the biking options and other parts of the MBTA and Boston’s Transit & biking options. Stay tuned!

by Adron

Arbor Lodge, A Transit Romance

I visit a lot of coffee shops, and have more than a few favorites in town, but Arbor Lodge has really grown to have a special spot in my transit loving, premium coffee drinking, bike loving heart.

The Arbor Lodge

The Arbor Lodge

My first visit to Arbor Lodge happened purely by accident about a year and a half ago. I was in the area to have breakfast with my parents. We often meet in north Portland along the Yellow Line route at different stops to eat together. They come down from the great northern enclave of Vancouver and Interstate Avenue is an easy way for them to either drive to, or drive and take the MAX to.

This particular day I had arrived a bit early. Since I had 45 minutes to kill I decided to check out this little coffee shop that I spied across the street from Nite Hawk Cafe and Lounge. Nite Hawk is a joint I check out on a semi-regular basis. It’s good diner style food, with a super convenient location next to the Yellow Line Light Rail Stop.

Transit Sleuth Meet Arbor Lodge, Arbor Lodge Meet Transit Sleuth

I went in and immediately took in the simple yet woodsy interior of the coffee shop. The tables, counter and other elements had a finished glazed look of varous pieces of tree stump and wood. It was a warm feel with an openness that was attractive. I pulled up to the counter which provided full view of the espresso machine and other elements behind the counter. All was clean which is always a good sign. To the right of the counter was a glass display case with pastries and other basic items. The pastries were of the local high quality variety.

I ordered a soy cap (cappacino). I didn’t get the scary response of, “what size would you like?” So far, so good. I took a seat at the bar facing out the front window of the shop. The seats were a solid, good quality wood cut, that provided a great view outside of the MAX Stop for south bound light rail trains, the Nite Hawk, and the New Seasons further across the tracks. The traffic on the street out front had regular auto traffic, but also a steady flow of cyclists. Something that isn’t abnormal in Portland, but is a little newer in this northern area of the city.

Hacking @ Arbor Lodge

Hacking @ Arbor Lodge

As I sat and watched all of this I extracted my laptop & phone to sit on the bar counter. I pulled up and checked some email while I waited. Within a short minute or two, my cap was ready. I got up and walked around to the side of the counter where the drink was placed, waiting for my judgement. The foam looked right, the smell was wonderful, and even had a hint of blueberry and pine. I thought to myself, “could this shop be one of the up and coming top notch joints in Portland?” I held up the cap to my nose to smell and sip off some of the foam.

To my delight I was ecstatic. I sipped again, pondering if this were true. It was indeed true! Arbor Lodge, the barista here, had just provided me one of the best capacinos in the entire city! Saying that in Portland is saying something pretty huge. I walked back, perched upon the stool facing outside and enjoyed my drink. I was truly happy, content and enjoying the view. It was one of the tranquil moments in life, when things just seemed all perfect.

I had fallen in love with this great new coffee shop. “I would definitely be back“, I thought to myself.

Fast Forward

Here it is, it has been more than a year and a half since that visit and I’ve been back an easy dozen plus times. Every cup of espresso or coffee is superb. Arbor Lodge carries Coava, which for those coffee drinkers out there, you might just know about this brand.

So next time you’re out and about on the Yellow Line. Stop in for an amazing cup of coffee, cappuccino or other beverage of your choice.

Happy sipping & riding,
-Transit Sleuth

Departing back to downtown Portland.

Departing back to downtown Portland.