Makes sense to me. Joel
At 11:01 AM 10/29/08 -0400, you wrote: >Sorry for the late reply. I think Rob Morache's earlier post contains >the kernel of a major solution: more park'n'rides. > >I agree there should be less "flag stops;" they are amazingly time >consuming. I had an unbelievably long bus ride to and from T-burg last >month which ended up way over schedule. (Perhaps flag stops could be >allowed only during "off-peak" hours). > >However there should be many more "park and rides" to serve outlying >AND not so far out areas. You can have parking nodes that cluster >cars without having to build housing nodes and/or abandon existing >housing stock (especially if they are in areas with farm stands or >minimarts where people may also want to shop after work). > >If some park and rides are near town, people who need to do errands >after work can take the bus back to their car and then go to the >grocery store or--gasp--the mall without going all the way home first >to get their car. Existing "side roads could be feeders to the bus >system, so the only infrastructure change would be creating the >parking areas. This would keep cars out of downtown, off the >campuses, and help keep rural areas rural. > >And they don't have to be paved; Enfield is a great example. But we >also need them closer in--say on the land the County owns near the >hospital and the Health Department's current location (hmm; could the >existing parking there turn into a park and ride once the Health Dept >moves?) > >I think ALL the major routes into town need park and rides far out, >part way into town, and then close in. > >To use 96 B as an example: say, South Danby, the hamlet of Danby, and >then around the Danby-Town of Ithaca line. 96 North of Ithaca already >has one in T'burg, but needs one further south in Ulysses and then >again in the Town of Ithaca near CMC (where people from Iradell and >Hayts Rd and the Dubois Rd areas could feed into the system). I live >on Hayts Rd, and I know there is a LOT of interest in being able to >take the bus to the colleges and downtown. > >I know park and rides require a lot of inter-municipal and interagency >cooperation, but cooperation is generally a good thing to do. > >Margaret > > > >On Oct 21, 2008, at 11:13 AM: > > > Luckily, zoning does not exclusively determine how our cities and > > towns are > > shaped. Transportation is actually more critical. No amount of land > > use > > policy could have created Syracuse, Rochester and Buffalo: they were > > made > > possible by the Erie Canal, and the canal had to come first. The > > settlements > > followed the design for transportation. The same later happened with > > the > > railroads. Similarly, in Curitiba, Brazil, planners designed fixed bus > > routes through the countryside and mandated the densest future > > development, > > hence the most riders, be within a 5 minute walk of public transit. > > Thirty > > years later, Curitiba enjoys a convenient, well-used bus system > > serving a > > city filled with green-space. The fixed routes have been so > > successful that > > busses may soon be replaced by trains, to handle growing ridership. > > > > What built the ridership base was frequency of service. people could > > rely on > > bus connection to the core city without worrying about a schedule, > > such that > > the bus became a more convenient alternative to the car. Limiting > > stops by > > clustering development along the routes sped up travel times and > > made bus > > transit even more attractive to commuters, again boosting ridership. > > However > > these incentives to ridership came by way of intelligent land use > > policy in > > outlying areas. something we could clearly learn from the Brazilians. > >_______________________________________________ >For more information about sustainability in the Tompkins County area, >please visit: http://www.sustainabletompkins.org/ > >RSS, archives, subscription & listserv information for: >[email protected] >http://lists.mutualaid.org/mailman/listinfo/sustainabletompkins >free hosting by http://www.mutualaid.org _______________________________________________ For more information about sustainability in the Tompkins County area, please visit: http://www.sustainabletompkins.org/ RSS, archives, subscription & listserv information for: [email protected] http://lists.mutualaid.org/mailman/listinfo/sustainabletompkins free hosting by http://www.mutualaid.org
