Welcome to the back side of summer – solstice passed, 4th of July over, and the back to school ads have probably already started. But not at streets.mn, because our summer picnic is next Saturday, July 13, 2019 starting at 11:30 am at Boom Island Park in Minneapolis. We’d love to see you! Getting […]
This summer, for the first time, I had the opportunity to use the A-Line arterial bus rapid transit (aBRT) on Snelling Avenue. I don’t mean ride the A-Line. I’d done that for the first time during a visit to the Twin Cities (I live in Philadelphia) the summer before, soon after the service had started operating. But […]
Here’s a chart from Doug Mack’s Twitter feed and FiveThirtyEight (thanks Jeb!): The yellow is the drive time from the airport to downtown (with a 10-minute wait, which makes all the difference) and the blue is the transit time. It’s rare to see Minneapolis at the top of a list, and this one is actually pretty […]
The Ford Plant and the Twin Cities Army Ammunition Plant (the Arsenal) offer rare opportunities to design new neighborhoods from the ground up. Both will feature a mix of commercial and residential, will be pedestrian friendly, and will incorporate public transit. In terms of transit potential, however, the two could hardly be more different. Transit to […]
Last fall, my wife and I decided to move away from our downtown condo and bought a house in South Minneapolis. This was kind of a big deal for me, as I always viewed being able to walk to work as an important part of my physical and psychological well-being. Indeed, I bought a condo downtown […]
Note: This post is part of the streets.mn/Nice Ride crowdsource conversation, a series of crowdsourced looks at how to expand or improve Nice Ride planning. Check out the rest here. The wedge of city I wrote about in my last post – between the river and Hiawatha from the falls north to Seward – is rich in […]
As the Twin Cities proceeds with plans to build over three billion dollars worth of rail extensions for the Blue and Green Lines, many transit advocates question if we’re missing an opportunity for transformative projects that lift up urban neighborhoods on their routes between suburban park & rides and the downtown core. Will Rogers once […]
It’s 2015 this year, and the Green Line feels like the future to me. Lot’s of people are riding it. How many? Take a look: According to the Metro Transit blog, “September’s strong light-rail ridership can partly be attributed to special events. More than 193,000 light-rail rides were taken to home sporting events last month.” […]
The Institute for Transportation and Development Policy (ITDP) has published an updated Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) Scorecard. Now I know this post is about Light Rail Transit (LRT), but the scorecard was rewritten in a way that makes it easier to evaluate rail systems as well as bus systems, and after all they are only […]
On the METRO System fares are supposed to use a proof of payment system, where you are required to have your ticket or pass with you while riding. Recently, a report detailed how fare evasion had been measured on both rail lines, and a strange tidbit many people overlooked when discussing “those” people who had […]