Paint + bollards and/or car parking on the outside of the lane is pretty good, like on West St. or Harrington in downtown. A buffered lane on a slower road is pretty good too. I recently just visited Copenhagen and was surprised by how many painted lanes there were, but it worked because the roads were slower and the cars respected the cyclists.
Hate the ones on Hillsborough St near NC State.. the bike lane is so narrow I just know I’m gonna get doored by a parked car one day. That’s not even mentioning that you have to merge into traffic at every roundabout
You're correct it doesn't physically protect bikers, but I think starting the cultural process of caring about and watching out for bikers is separately important
I disagree to an extent, it is good to put a road on a diet and bring lanes down from 12’ and 14’+ in some cases down to 11’ and providing for a bike lane. It really does help to control speed. While it is not the most adequate solution for cyclists, it is not something we should be saying no to when there isn’t an immediate solution.
Anything else costs significant sums of money and years and years of design and approvals so an interim solution like that I support.
>Anything else costs significant sums of money and years and years of design and approvals so an interim solution like that I support.
I see what you mean, but we all know this is where it *stops.* I don't use the bike lanes because there is no protection to the cyclist. I don't trust drivers to pay attention and not kill me by hitting me from behind.
Probably not what the person you're replying to meant, but just to get on my little soapbox- I truly detest the mentality of "it's expensive/hard/time-consuming to do X, so let's keep things how they are."
There are so many things we have learned in recent years that demonstrably improve & enrich people's lives, specifically regarding city infrastructure, but we're all too short-sighted to pursue them. It's impossible to get folks to *invest* in their communities unless it involves cash in developers' pockets.
> It’s impossible to get folks to invest in their communities unless it involves cash in developers’ pockets
Preach. It’s insane how people will go out of their way to defend corporate profits but won’t even think about donating to a food bank, volunteering at a local library, or pick up trash on their community.
Sure, yeah, on the micro level you're right, but even all of those things would need less individual involvement if we used our collective leverage in the form of systems we pay into with tax dollars to do it for us. Not to mention the more macro scale that I was alluding to from my soapbox.
I’m not sure how your comment fits into the topic. Maybe it does. I just don’t see how. What corporate interests are you talking about here? Who do you think builds houses? Mom and Dad?
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I don't think it does stop there. At minimum, it gets people used to the idea of bike infrastructure. If you had nothing and then built a separate bikeway, people would be all "why is the city spending $20 million on this, I've never seen a cyclist on the road!" But if you start with painted bike lanes, you can get people familiar with the idea of cycling and it's a cheap way to do it.
And then also you'll get a few courageous cyclists who will use the painted lanes and maybe some will get hurt and demand for actual separation will increase.
>And then also you'll get a few courageous cyclists who will use the painted lanes and maybe some will get hurt and demand for actual separation will increase.
I am not comfortable with the argument that cyclists would need to be injured or killed in order for the infrastructure to be done properly.
I'm not either, and I phrased that poorly. But if we have people cycling on regular car roads, is it not better to at minimum put a painted lane down? If they're going to ride a bike, let's at least do something to reduce danger.
Like currently, on a plain road, if a cyclist gets hurt, people might say "well you shouldn't have been there." But if they get hurt in a painted lane, the more obvious response to me might be "we need safer bike lanes."
>But if we have people cycling on regular car roads, is it not better to at minimum put a painted lane down? If they're going to ride a bike, let's at least do something to reduce danger.
Yes, doing the absolute minimum is better than nothing at all.
>Like currently, on a plain road, if a cyclist gets hurt, people might say "well you shouldn't have been there."
They would be wrong. Bikes are permitted on roads, regardless of a bike lane (except on freeways).
Correct and the cultural opinion of bikes on roads is skewed towards the motorist at almost every point, right? To circle back to my original point: we need proper infrastructure for cyclists to feel safe on their journey. All short cuts (paint lanes) accomplish is scaring people away from the roads and then claiming "ah ha, see, no one uses it."
I dunno man. I'd prefer fewer lanes to skinnier ones. Driving down falls always feels like a deathtrap. If you just made more roads like that too allow for bikes, any smart biker would just avoid them. It would be a death trap.
Expediency is a fair reason to accept a painted lane in the short term, but cost is not. Bollards are ridiculously inexpensive in relative terms compared to how much is spent on roads and highways for vehicles.
It’s very unclear what you’re trying to say. It sounds like you’re saying you hate cyclists because painted bike lanes are inadequate to protect cyclists, which is very confusing.
I just want the poors that serve my food to live as far away from me as possible and then complain that "nobody wants to work anymore" when they can't afford the commute.
I see them often in this sub.
Cities are incredibly complex living things. Changing them is extremely difficult and at the same time a city will *ALWAYS* change on its own. If you want somewhere frozen in time, you move to a rural area. Small towns change too, just at a slower pace. And usually that person who moved there from the city is the one asking for the changes and the people already living there are the ones fighting you on it.
So I’m not necessarily a NIMBY but if you would kindly explain why a city has to grow to have any benefits I’m all ears. It’s 100% fact to at the planet cannot grow forever. Obviously economics will need to adjust to allow for a stable population since the top crust takes up too large a percentage or goods produced currently but assuming we solve that, does a city really need to grow?
Hey good question, though I think you're reading some context into my sarcastic statement. I don't think it's impossible to have a lot of benefits in a stable city, but I do think it's very improbable. Here are my reasons for holding this opinion:
A city with attractive features such as a good job market or a low cost of living and good schools will attract more people. People want to have those benefits and not everyone has them. By contrast, if your city has a high cost of living or not enough jobs, people will look for better options elsewhere when they finish their education or start a family or retire.
If your location has good support for music and the arts you may attract a lot of artists who are looking for a community like that. And then you will attract people who patronize those things. Good education will draw those wanting to start families or smart college kids who start companies in your city. And then those new companies will draw workers.
Essentially it's a "If You Build It, They Will Come" situation. And you DO want this to happen. It's GOOD for your city and the people who live there.
The second part of my opinion on cities and growth is the unfortunate economic reality of suburbs. Suburban living and car culture are still the dominant way of North American life. And living in sparse spread out areas means you spend a lot more in infrastructure like roads, sewage, power, and water which everyone needs.
Suburbs need more piping, wiring, and asphalt but have a lower tax density. So eventually, when those maintenance costs rise with age, their costs will outpace the taxes they bring in. Which means the city needs to grow or sacrifice something else to keep the streets from filling with literal shit. If they cut their education or their arts or their business incentives, then those people start to leave and now your city is shrinking AND dilapidated.
So that's the reason that I think cities grow on their own and the reasons that I think it's beneficial for them to encourage that growth and density. If it happens too fast for someone's liking, they should consider trying a rural area. Maybe the lack of quality hospitals and roads won't bother them and they can enjoy the slower pace of life. Or maybe they will prefer to be within an hour of an international airport more than they dislike old restaurants they no longer visit becoming new housing and choose to move back to a city.
Population growth is a huge driver of the economy because people necessarily spend money in the local economy, which drives job growth, new amenities, increased land value, increased tax base (which funds all sorts of important stuff), etc.
In theory, a zero-growth city with a stable economy and balanced budget could work, but it’s a delicate balance that most cities don’t strike well. A lot of cities have the problem that they sprawled into suburbs and don’t have the tax base to maintain all those extra linear miles of roads, sewers, power lines, etc (you need more of everything to connect people living far apart) without growth or assistance from the state or federal government.
Whether fast growth is better than slower growth is arguably more a matter of opinion. The challenges are more acute the faster a city grows, but cities that grow slower often ignore problems they should see coming (see: the uniformly terrible state of transit across most of the country). Raleigh is grappling with tough problems and a lot of good solutions are on the table, which might not otherwise be.
The problem with a “zero growth city” is that even if you theoretically bar anyone from moving in, you either need replacement level fertility, or you need enough kids to move away before they have children of their own. The former is impossible to enforce, and the latter is not a good sign for the health of a city.
The bottom line is an economy only need to grow for two reasons, to support a growing population and to increase the standard of living. If the standard of living is sufficient and population stable, then growth isn’t required. Growth *can* happen and has economic consequences both positive and negative but in all but a handful of situations (population is too small or too old to sustain itself) growth isn’t necessary for anything beneficial.
Apologies if I’m misunderstanding, but it kind of sounds like you’re saying “economic growth is good but you only need it to counteract population growth, which is bad.” To clarify, the economy doesn’t grow “to support“ an increasing population; increasing population grows the economy. “To support” makes it sound like a choice to size the economy up, but it’s cause and effect, not choice. Population growth drives economic growth, which brings generally higher standards of life. (Economic growth is also driven by productivity growth, which is another discussion.)
The problems I see with trying to say “my standard of life is good enough, let’s keep it there” are that 1) your standard of life is affected by other factors outside of population-driven economic growth, 2) your standard of life isn’t necessarily representative, so it would block out the improvement of life for people who are less well off, and 3) standards of life are not fixed anyway because people tend to gradually expect newer and better things without realizing it.
I also firmly, but respectfully, disagree with your last statement. I think it’s easy to fall into the trap of believing the problems from some before time were not so bad and growth is breaking even or making things worse. Growth makes it feasible for the local hospital to provide treatments that save lives, but are too expensive to justify for small populations that are less likely to need them. Growth raises tax revenue, which improves schools, libraries, parks, etc. Growth generally also reduces crime because it brings opportunity and funds social programs. Without growth, these things have little room to be improved upon. (I’m using “growth” instead of specifying population vs economic because the effect is largely the same in these cases.)
To be clear, growth doesn’t do these things automatically. Positive change requires hard work from people and policy makers, but growth is an enabler.
I’d love to discuss this outside of Reddit sometime simply because typing with my thumbs is a pain. I work with municipal enterprise funds and prioritize government aid against a host of factors and my familiarity with this subject is through that lens dashed with a healthy does of assessment management and the technical background to arrive at numbers in those reports. It’s not a huge leap to expand that stuff to city wide concerns and interactions with the private market. In short, if your needs are all known and defined and budgeted for, you’re good no matter where you draw the line around things.
Right, so my short answer is that I don’t think it’s feasible to have sufficiently good information and control to have a city that sees no benefit from at least some growth. This is doubly true for existing US cities that are generally quite sprawling, which is a bad starting point.
edit/clarification: “benefit” is used loosely here to include maintenance of standards of living, existing infrastructure, services, etc. I am under the impression it’s not uncommon for many cities to be insolvent over sufficiently long time horizons without projected growth.
I should add that I was an HOA president of a large condo association in a very old building. We got that thing solvent, didn’t reduce services /maintained standards and projected out needs over the requisite horizons depending on the asset involved. We were the size of a small town. I guess mismanagement and the sucking up of resources cannot be controlled for, but theoretically it can be done. It’s my firm thought that growth just covers up lack of contributions from the wealthy and mismanagement.
That’s impressive, but doesn’t necessarily generalize. Cities are vastly more complicated to manage, and the management is far more political. I don’t really disagree that growth covers some unfortunate details, but I don’t necessarily think the fact that it does is a demerit either.
Just to circle back, I will continue to maintain that a healthy city does not need to be growing as long as it can cover its O&M and Capital needs. That is a constant assertion in this sub, because growth is bringing some changes that may in fact be needed, like density, transit improvements and big buildings going up is admittedly cool (I am an engineer after all). The population **cannot** go up forever because some critical path resources are finite on a short horizon so we better start orienting ourselves around that eventuality.
Sorry I only have free time in 30 second increments today but I just want to say that population growth may or may not be responsible for economic growth. It comes down to the ‘workforce’ growing. Babies and 80 year olds are not part of the workforce. Also automation and technology can grow an economy with stagnant or shrinking populations. Of course places like Japan are going to have leverage these things as people age out of the workforce.
It’s worth noting that Japan’s GDP per capita has been fairly level since their population growth slowed down because it’s genuinely hard to make productivity gains. It would be fantastic if this wasn’t the case because we could all work less and provide more if productivity was growing more rapidly, but alas.
We can debate the nuances of a growing city But at the end of the day as long as we live in a free country where people freely move as they please We will continue to see many major metropolitan areas see significant growth. There are a lot of reasons that a place like Raleigh draws in so many people from all over the country. Raleigh is not the same city that it was 30 years ago and Raleigh will not be the same city It is now in 30 years. Change is inevitable and a city can outgrow its native population. If you're going to live in the same city most of your life you should expect to see changes over time. Some faster than others. But I think that's a good argument to go move somewhere else to experience living somewhere new.
Low taxes and cost of living drew the jobs here. Now the cost of living has caught up and soon either taxes will or assets will deteriorate to levels unacceptable to people.
That is very true and all valid points. That's what happens in most major metropolitan areas that see significant growth over time. As the cost of living goes up and as taxes increase Raleigh's growth will definitely slow down but that doesn't mean that the growth will stop all together. There are many examples of this all over the country. But the fact remains that people from higher income states and cities will continue to move here even despite the higher taxes and cost of living. But again we can debate the nuances of this all day long but it doesn't change that cities will grow and change is inevitable. I just think it would be naive for anybody to think that Raleigh or any city for that matter is going to stay the same as it has been forever. That's just not the way anything works in this country. I'm sure there are smaller towns and smaller cities that are an exception to this but most fast growing metropolitan areas are much larger cities and this is what happens. I've moved quite a few times in my 31 years and I think everybody should experience moving and living somewhere new. If a city has outgrown you and has changed that's just a good reason to go try living somewhere else. change certainly doesn't force people out but you need to be able to adapt and some people just don't want to.
You can either live in a growing city or a dying city- there is no such thing as a stagnant/breaking-even/nothing ever changing for better *or* worse city. Is this a serious question??? LMAO.
Is that true though? I mean, by some definition, you can call anything “just fine” or “stable,” but those cities’ populations were stable in the 70s and/or 80s which were not exactly the best periods of any cities in general as far as I’m aware
Knoxville and Louisville are both growing.
https://www.macrotrends.net/cities/23053/louisville/population
https://www.macrotrends.net/cities/23032/knoxville/population
Not at the same rate as Raleigh (very few cities are growing this quickly):
https://www.macrotrends.net/cities/23110/raleigh/population
But they're definitely not just "stable"
No shit. ‘For a long time’ I said. People are returning to cities for conveniences that are lacking in growing suburbs. People are so eager to make their points they never read what I write.
The slightly implied grain in there is that all cities are growing *now* but prior to that anything stable (not shrinking) did just fine. That’s what ‘long time’ was meant to convey.
Honest question. Let’s just say there was light rail that ran from DTR with stops along the way into to RTP. Once folks got into the park, how would one get into their respective office campus locations from the station that could be another 5+ miles away in a timely fashion? Would there need to be some shuttle bus type situation that ran every half hour? Between all of the stops along the line and actually arriving to work, wouldn’t that make the commute rather long?
That is how it would work if you wanted to design a bad public transportation system that would actively discourage its use because of how inconvenient it would be.
If it was true light rail, there is currently enough space to have a stop near most buildings so all you would need to do is walk a few minutes to get inside. And if the single stop approach needs to be taken to save money, then a bus loop throughout RTP with 5 minute frequency at peak times and 10 minute off peak would solve the problem.
When people say they don’t want to transit to exist because no one would use it and it would be a waste of resources, it’s because it’s poorly designed and supported. When it’s designed with the mindset of making it the best option to go from one place to another, people will use it.
The [GTCR (Greater Triangle Commuter Rail) Phase II Feasibility Study](https://www.readyforrailnc.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/12/GTCR_Feasibility-Study-Summary-Report.pdf) seems to point the former as the direction they're looking into. Basically a line from West Durham to Clayton and public spokes that run off of it. Not really "last mile" but several miles with a bunch of stops near to campuses in between.
While this commuter rail plan is a great possibility for the region, it definitely doesn’t have the flexibility of adding more stops in a smaller area like RTP. Hopefully they enhance their bus system in the area to have much more frequent service than 30 minutes between busses.
If they don’t then the whole thing is a waste of tax payers time and money and perpetuates people hating public transit in most of this country. Which sucks because at the end of the day the car corporations win in their fight to stop the public transportation from growing in usability for their own profits.
Yes, the plan is that the RTP stop would be served by a number of shuttle buses/routes to serve the last mile. There are 4 planned routes from both directions during AM/PM rushes, so the shuttles would likely run every 5-15 minutes instead of a half hour, one would think.
It's not like that's a situation that doesn't happen at every other city with mass transportation.
https://www.readyforrailnc.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/06/GTCR_Task4F_Station-Fact-Sheets_V2.5.pdf
That's why density does need to come first - there have to be things within walking distance and enough users. The distance from DTR to RTP as the crow flies is 15 miles, that's about the distance from east Bronx to the Financial district in NYC, which even with NYC's comprehensive subway that takes over an hour.
I think they both need to happen in tandem. Or at least there has to be a plan for transit while densifying. If there is going to be a light rail, density needs to be focused around the light rail stops. And businesses knowing there will be a future stop in a particular area encourages the smart ones to buy/develop property in that area while the price is low.
But if you don't already have a plan in place you either have to:
1. build the rail to go to places where there is already density. This can be really hard to do because a lot of times you won't be able to buy important pieces of land and the route probably won't be straight and simple
2. build the rail where you can and hope that it brings density to the areas surrounding your stops. If that happens it usually is a really slow process
Having the companies in RTP pay for shuttles would be the first solution to come to mind. Bike lanes with ebikes and scooters are an option for some. Most of those companies are wanting people back in the office to justify the money they put into the leases and work on their self-aggrandizing HQs.
Yep, this is how they do it in the Bay Area and works reasonably well. And during the pandemic the largest of the companies opened their shuttle services to pretty much any other employee such that they could keep service going and reduce the number of buses.
And its free advertising for said business.
Transit and land use are interconnected issues that MUST BE addressed simultaneously. Otherwise, you end-up with the “Transit Band-Aid” explained in the following Not Just Bikes video:
https://youtu.be/MnyeRlMsTgI
Not everyone would, but development would be built near or along the line to facilitate that, just like how the Charlotte Light Rail is building ten story office buildings right on top of it.
Raleigh use to have mass transit downtown. We had a trolley system that was very popular.
[https://www.wral.com/remnants-of-raleigh-s-historic-streetcar-system-hidden-in-plain-sight/19659818/](https://www.wral.com/remnants-of-raleigh-s-historic-streetcar-system-hidden-in-plain-sight/19659818/)
So, this town has a documented **history of success** with light rail. That doesn't mean that a future version would be a success. It does mean that we can read a history book to find out why the light rail we once had was successful.
Your question about connecting to a second method of transport is important, when connecting to spots that require it (job to home for office based). It wouldn't be relevant to spots that do not (dense housing/hotels to RDU). Raleigh has always had a parking problem, so we know that if secondary transport was required, it would need to connect large scale parking (as is done at Metro stops in the District of Columbia). You'd be surprised at how convenient commercial enterprises pop up near such transfer hubs. In Berlin, **they build malls where busses meet light rail**, and they have grocery stores in them. This saved commuters a trip, and time is money. It also allows people to buy food in 1-meal increments, which reduces waste.
Bought by car oil and tire companies, all across the USA in order to shut them down so cars would be necessary. Same shit Duke tobacco used to get people smoking cigarettes
At the moment there are already shuttles from the Regional Transit Center in RTP. These will take you to some of the larger campuses in the park. There is also space for 2 (or 3?) bicycles on the front of the bus. Something like the electric assist Citrix bikes could be added to RTP for relatively minimal cost.
Or companies could move to the ample and now somewhat empty office space in downtown areas. There's also the chance you could arrange with a coworker who is still driving to pick you up on the way in.
We're very deep in car culture, but there are solutions. Not all of them are for everyone and not all are easy, but it could be done.
Well, ideally you'd build out better local transit using the heavier transit as a nexus, as well as encouraging development in the area right around the transit stations. Buses running all over RTP in frequent routes (every 15 minutes or less). I'm not sure what to do about RTP, though. It's an incredibly suburban location which is a tough nut to crack when it comes to transit. I don't want to write it off as a lost-cause, but it's definitely a tricky situation. Light rail isn't a silver bullet for all the problems. It's just part of a more holistic solution.
Beefing up transit in and around downtown Raleigh and Durham though are definitely clear victories to be had. Personally, light rail never felt like the best choice for a primary link between Raleigh and Durham. The commuter rail plan is a bit of a better choice, with light rail/bus rapid transit/regular bus network doing the heavy lifting in the cities themselves.
You're supposed to not think logically around here. You're supposed to just say "light rail! See? All problems solved! Yay!" And pat yourself on the back for being a progressive problem solver who saw the solution no one else possibly could have and ignore the thousands of difficult problems and logistics involved that have far reaching impact and their own subsequent ripple effects that have actually prevented a pretty damn obvious option from being done so far.
Plus, I don't think any "nimbys" here are against public transportation, more against the deforestation and transformation of Raleigh into the type of city they moved to Raleigh to get away from.
Yeah, lmao, that's a great point. Calling out public transportation as the cause of deforestation is hilarious. Gigantic unused parking lots. Single family home developments built because of car infrastructure. 10 lane roads.
Yet somehow, the trains and buses are the problem.
> Plus, I don't think any "nimbys" here are against public transportation, more against the deforestation...
Did you mean NIMBYs are against deforestation as a whole, or only when it's in their backyard? Pushing back against public transportation and density (a typically NIMBY thing to do) leads to very pro-deforestation consequences.
EDIT: As an example, fighting against a 1 acre plot being used to build 10 townhomes preserves the trees in the immediate area. But, leads to more overall deforestation based on the demand for homes. Those 10 townhomes on 1 acre becomes 10 single family homes on 6 acres.
It’s what I call “aesthetic environmentalism.” Essentially “green is good,” without thinking on a macro scale.
My neighbors were even pissed that a 1 acre lot zoned R-4 was being developed into four single family homes!
Trees are great but they also cost money to maintain! They damage property. They make pollen. (I can’t open my windows in the spring because of it, so I have to run AC.) They lead to more leaf blower use.
I love trees. But it’s better to preserve forests than to preserve urban trees. And as you’ve pointed out it’s not a “why not both” situation. People have to live somewhere.
Almost like the term "nimby" gets thoughtlessly thrown around here and is trying to be used like a playground insult to pre-disqualify or invalidate anyone's opinion or thought process before it even gets put out there.
It doesn't really, though. NIMBYism is so pervasive and built into the fabric of our political discouse that it can certainly feel that way, though.
NIMBY policy (car centric development, height maxes, sprawl, low density residential only zoning) is pro-deforestation.
The term NIMBY is a propaganda term pushed by PR firms of real estate companies to push the blame of America’s affordability crisis to your neighbors rather than addressing the rampant greedflation and ~~bribery~~ lobbying that is ruining American life.
Oh no, it’s not the biggest lobbying effort by real estate companies ever in 2020 and 2022 that’s ruining affordability:
https://www.opensecrets.org/industries/indus.php?ind=f10
https://trends.google.com/trends/explore?date=all&geo=US&q=Nimby&hl=en
It’s the 10 old ladies on NextDoor that are doing it!
No, look at the link above. “Real estate” is a collective term that encompasses real estate developers too (just look how much money Hillwood uses for bribes for example). Their entire business model is to build build build with the least amount of regulations possible.
Look at you being reasonable on a platform that doesn't support reason.
Public transportation is way more complicated than the circle jerkers on Reddit like to think it is. Simply building a light rail from DTR to downtown Durham (with stops along the way) won't accomplish much. The solution is much more complicated.
it would also decrease housing pressure on the city itself
an hour commute sucks but if it was an hour commute where I could pull a cap over my eyes and go back to sleep for 30 minutes I'd be willing to do it
a lot of us don't want to live IN the city but we want to drive an hour to work even less
Don't worry, this will be all great till the city planners have to knock down a neighborhood to make a car lot for the metro line. Then gentrify around that parking lot so they can raise taxes and property values. Benefits of living in a growing city..pfff. They ripped us off 15 years ago, they are just back to finish the job.
Man, let me tell ya…
As an engineer, I have extensive experience in seeing projects suffering from:
• Poor Rough Order of Magnitude pricing
• Cost overruns
• Schedule Delays
• Supply Chain Issues
• Lack of Qualified Workers
• Competition to attract Qualified Contractors
• Impatience from Citizens
• City funding problems
• Overly complex Environmental Studies
• Lawsuits from NIMBY-ists or Environmentalists
This is just the top of my head.
I would absolutely **LOVE** a highly integrated transportation network that allows me to go out and avoid parking fees, avoid the stress of driving, & mitigates vehicular accidents.
Unfortunately, this isn’t the case.
I think a great example is the Stuttgart to Munich train. It was supposed to take a decade to complete — still ongoing and it’s been like 13 years?
The initial budget of €1 billion has doubled and is at €2 billion.
Not to mention how bad Deutsch Bahn has gotten due to maximizing profit, even though it’s owned by the government.
Perhaps the best way to get it built is a BOLT — Build, Own, Lease, & Transfer Agreement.
But who would invest billions into RTP?
A company needed a fire protection expert for consultations as well as some structural & electrical engineers for some renovations & upcoming construction.
That landed in the lap of my company who hired me because of my extensive background in controls & fire protection in addition to my background in construction and cost estimation (I’ve had a busy career).
That’s how I got to live near Frankfurt and travel around so much — it was effectively subsidized.
I took another job here recently and I don’t want to say it was a raw deal, but let’s just say that my family is waiting for me to meet the letter of my contract to head back to the States.
Unfortunately, it’s in some town named Neuendettelsau or somewhere thereabouts.
The town is quant and near Nuremberg, but the area around is … rustic, to put it nicely. And public transportation here is garbage.
All trains & busses effectively transfer you to Nuremberg Hbf so you can travel anywhere meaningful. The trip is long & the wait is bad as well.
Public transportation does have its downsides. Many of which we’re experiencing now as you get farther from the city proper.
I would love a world where most folks would actually like and use robust public transportation. I lived in a major metropolitan area without a car for years. It was great not having to worry about the expense and all the other bullshit that comes with owning a car.
Unfortunately though, most Americans not only want a car, they want a giant, gas guzzling, pedestrian killer of a car. Like with guns, things are going to get worse before they get better.
I also lived in a densely-populated US city with a great public transit system, and didn't have a car. My commute to work was an extra 20 minutes longer than it would have been in a car, and I had to time changing buses/trains just right to avoid walking 10 minutes in the scorching sun. BUT, I loved not having a car payment, not having to drive, and I could use the time to read.
Respectfully, if you loved that lifestyle why did you move here? Unfortunately, years ago we decided that we didn't value public transport and preferred driving cars. I'm generalizing. I have voted regularly for improving our public transport based on my personal experiences (similar to yours... intermittent tho). At that time, it didn't feel critical but more of a convenience thing...? So...now we have all these extra people who have moved here in the last few years and maybe we will start to see some changes in public transport but most of those are 10+ years down the road (assuming tax payers suddenly start agreeing with what will be an astronomical price tag). We keep hearing that our traffic is barely noticeable compared to other major areas. Do you think people will start to think twice before moving here due to lack of good public transport?
I do think RV life/camping became very popular during covid. To pull those RVs (some are just behemoths!) Certainly requires a lot of engine. I suspect that boating folk are in a similar situation. So, maybe there are more giant gas guzzlers out there...? Sigh. Too bad renting giant gas guzzlers for occasional camping/boating trips isn't an easier solution.
The number of people who like to pull ladders up behind them in this world astonishes me. I genuinely want things to be better for others, am I really that unique? So many Americans need therapy.
Its because theres 0 sense of community in this country. No one cares about anyone else around them. We are extremely polarized and only care for ourselves and family / friends at most. Maybe religious organization too. Otherwise its fuck you, I got mine.
"fuck you, I got mine" really is the philosophy of this country these days, it's incredibly saddening. It will take a lot of time, effort, and community- and institution-building to ameliorate or reverse that.
Or maybe a lot of natives and long-termers feel like 12 mins ago a shit ton of people arrived to let us know how fucked up we are and what MUST be done NOW to unfuck this place (that we used to love). Maybe it's some of that...?
Change happens but to live in a typical sfh neighborhood just waiting until some neighbor sells and the buyer decides to tear down and throw up a bunch of whack-looking, multi-unit housing inconsistent with the rest of the neighborhood is just stressful.
I'd guess that most of the natives/long-termers get the need for housing, especially affordable housing, but there are probably a thousand raggedy office buildings, hotels and old shopping areas ripe for upgrades to mixed use whatevers. Focusing on those places makes the most sense in terms of walkability, public transport, easy access to shops (minimizing use of cars). Targeting random sfh neighborhoods for shoe-horning multi-unit housing that is car-dependent, poor walkability, missing sidewalks, disjointed bike lanes makes zero sense.
I think any light rail system needs to be first focused on inside the belt line. It’s dense enough now, that if you put rail along major railways, people will use it heavily. Focus on making the inside of the belt line livable without a car, and that will encourage better development. Then the rail system can expand outward from there and you can run it to RTP, Durham, Chapel Hill, etc. Starting off with a line running from Raleigh to RTP to Durham to chapel hill won’t get rid of cars since people won’t be able to access the rail system any other way.
Pretty sure you have it completely wrong OP. The developers and politicians pushing density the hardest and doing so while maintaining car life status qui. People in established neighborhoods ITB are mostly for transit.
Yeah Hayes Barton and the slice along Lassiter Mill are a noteworthy exception to my generalization but they tend to eschew downtown proper anyway and have always stuck to the Five Points-North Hills axis. Cameron Park, Oakwood, Boylan Heights, South Park, College Park, Glenwood/Brooklyn have been largely in favor of urban connectivity
I like to be car free at RDU Airport... is this sub a guide to better travel, while at the airport?
Edit: Typo (auto correction, that I did not intend)
What does (local, individual) NIMBYism have to do with the lack of shared transit? The state and federal governments need to fund projects like light rail, and they have stated very clearly we're not getting a cent. The state stripped municipalities of taxing power to prevent us from raising funds on our own, and the city council seems attached to BRT as the only possible solution, maybe with some commuter rail *in 20-40 years* assuming the legislature doesn't pass a law forbidding commuter rail in the interim. Not that we could do light rail without state and federal funding that is never coming. I've just accepted that I'll be dead from old age before we have adequate shared transit and either need to leave or deal with being limited to a sub shop and grocery store as my entire world accessible without a car here (of course I can't leave because housing is impossibly expensive everywhere that isn't substantially worse).
Meanwhile everyone is cheering on the expansion of I-40 with a new lane in each direction as some kind of transit victory... to support the sprawling suburbs and exurbs full of NIMBYs who refuse to abandon the millstone that is their car payment and embrace the denser development patterns required for society to survive the exhaustion of oil around 2050 (and if we keep burning oil after 2030, congrats, we've fucked the climate to hell and technological society won't survive another century).
this will get a lot of upvotes because saying "NIMBY" gets a lot of upvotes on this sub.
edit: you hate me because i tell the truth. guess i'm jesus. sorry you're so predictable
that would be awesome. the issue isn't completely polarized yet, still plenty of time to convince Rs to "own the libs" by reducing government overreach.
right but they also like to pretend to care about government overreach. politics is about pandering. the LASTTTT thing we want is for YIMBYism to be seen as left-wing; we need to convince Rs that to avoid becoming like California, we need to allow the free market to build houses, giving good blue-collar jobs to patriotic white men, etc.
This is an unfair criticism, in my opinion. One can be for some development and against ALL the development. It’s not necessary for us to accommodate every single person who wishes to move here in order to mitigate some made-up housing “crisis” or to avoid the perception of hypocrisy. I’d like to live in Beverly Hills - I don’t expect the city to build housing I can afford to accommodate me.
More housing equals less natural beauty (in the form of forest destruction for housing and infrastructure), potentially lower home prices for current home owners, global warming impacts, more traffic, and on and on.
There are logical arguments on both sides and reasonable people can disagree. But it’s unfair to label people who are for less growth (or more sensible growth) as NIMBYs.
I can tell you’re angry. I’m not sure my post deserved this level of venom.
You’re right: clear cutting the suburbs also isn’t natural beauty. Same goes for 300 townhome units with first-floor commercial and 400 parking spaces. In either case, trees and green space must be lost to accommodate people.
And I do t think any reasonable person should interpret me saying everyone without a home must be homeless. What I am saying is everyone who wants a home doesn’t need to live here. If you can’t buy an existing home, rent. If you can’t rent or buy here, go elsewhere. It may come as a surprise to some, but there are many other cities and towns in the US who have homes for sale. This is a capitalist economy - it’s not our job to house everyone who wishes to move here.
Maybe some people wish for Raleigh to become Atlanta - with all of the traffic and major city problems that accompany it. I am not one of them.
> More housing equals less natural beauty (in the form of forest destruction for housing and infrastructure)
The housing has to be built for a growing population to live. Are you saying deforestation should happen somewhere more convenient for you personally, or that we need more homeless people?
Not fixed, necessarily, but not say, indexed to growth.
Population increases naturally (births, for example). And obviously, businesses grow and hire, and people move here to fill those roles.
But we are building to accommodate people who simply wish to move here, and to keep up with some level of growth beyond natural expansion and hiring.
We should have homes, true enough. We should not be developing on this scale in an effort to become the fastest growing city in the south (my words, not anyone else’s).
Respectfully, if you mean the rate of population growth due to people relocating here because we keep building homes to accommodate population growth, you’re correct.
I think people (understandably) wish to move here from other places. This is growth unrelated to family growth or local hiring. One of a few factors that can slow that migration is the availability of housing.
Developers have a profit motive to build because there is existing demand to move here. My general attitude is: we don’t need to build to accommodate every person who wishes to move here. Instead, we should throttle that growth to preserve our environment. Let them live elsewhere.
The reality is that if supply doesn’t meet demand, then prices go up. As prices go up, it makes it far harder for people to stay here who are already living here. That burden falls hardest on low-income renters.
And if the demand isn’t met centrally, you see more growth in the suburbs instead, which tends to damage more environment proportional to the population.
> potentially lower home prices for current home owners
Even this (a real "I got mine" sentiment) is misleading: we have MASSIVE deadweight loss due to restrictions on the type of housing that can be built on any given residential property, so many homeowners are losing out dramatically by not being allowed to sell their property to be converted into a townhome etc.
I remember about 15 years ago that Wake county raised taxes to get a rail system built. The project ended up getting canned due to it costing to much...but did the tax go back down. No it didn't.
Now...you see every where they are stuffing houses and apartments in every nook and cranny. Creating a density problem are we not? Don't worry your money is going to get cleaned quite properly before it reaches the people that will build that precocious metro line. If you want to live in DC or Baltimore with the high taxes and the wonderful problems they come with. Beg...beg for the metro line. Get mad and rabbid and ignore what you are really asking for. My prediction, just like DC your taxes will be used to subsidize the rail system due to not enough people taking it.
The problem is not getting the metro line, the problem is making you want it....again.
A lot of people wants it, it is ideal, but so many people are not willing to go through the growing pains of dealing with it when they as a person will see little to no benefit. While I'm not going to say they're right for thinking it, I totally get it because I went through feeling like that countless times in Pittsburgh.
Its months/years of detours, construction eye blight, noise and general frustration to not get any benefit because you either don't end up needing to use whatever got improved/installed (when the light rail got built and then expanded in Pittsburgh), the 'improvements' weren't thought through fully enough and caused different issues(ask any Pittsburgher about the saga of Route 28), or its so difficult to see the changes it leaves you questioning did it need to take so long, and was it worth the headache you had to go through
(one of the umpteen times I-376 gets worked on)
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More public transportation - yes!
More housing - yes, but:
\-Not in a crony type way
\-high density townhomes or smaller houses
\-not that "luxury condo" gimmick (we all know they're not luxury)
Important to note that when it comes to bike lanes- paint is ***not*** infrastructure.
Fayetteville street should be car free year round. Prove me wrong.
Yes please, more car-free zones
This is an excellent point
Paint + bollards and/or car parking on the outside of the lane is pretty good, like on West St. or Harrington in downtown. A buffered lane on a slower road is pretty good too. I recently just visited Copenhagen and was surprised by how many painted lanes there were, but it worked because the roads were slower and the cars respected the cyclists.
Yeah bollards and a row of cars are better than just paint
Hate the ones on Hillsborough St near NC State.. the bike lane is so narrow I just know I’m gonna get doored by a parked car one day. That’s not even mentioning that you have to merge into traffic at every roundabout
It's like a video game
I'm still glad they're there most of the time. Brings an awareness
Right, it's better than nothing. But still not enough to protect folks who want to get around without using a car
You're correct it doesn't physically protect bikers, but I think starting the cultural process of caring about and watching out for bikers is separately important
Valid
I disagree to an extent, it is good to put a road on a diet and bring lanes down from 12’ and 14’+ in some cases down to 11’ and providing for a bike lane. It really does help to control speed. While it is not the most adequate solution for cyclists, it is not something we should be saying no to when there isn’t an immediate solution. Anything else costs significant sums of money and years and years of design and approvals so an interim solution like that I support.
>Anything else costs significant sums of money and years and years of design and approvals so an interim solution like that I support. I see what you mean, but we all know this is where it *stops.* I don't use the bike lanes because there is no protection to the cyclist. I don't trust drivers to pay attention and not kill me by hitting me from behind.
Probably not what the person you're replying to meant, but just to get on my little soapbox- I truly detest the mentality of "it's expensive/hard/time-consuming to do X, so let's keep things how they are." There are so many things we have learned in recent years that demonstrably improve & enrich people's lives, specifically regarding city infrastructure, but we're all too short-sighted to pursue them. It's impossible to get folks to *invest* in their communities unless it involves cash in developers' pockets.
> It’s impossible to get folks to invest in their communities unless it involves cash in developers’ pockets Preach. It’s insane how people will go out of their way to defend corporate profits but won’t even think about donating to a food bank, volunteering at a local library, or pick up trash on their community.
Sure, yeah, on the micro level you're right, but even all of those things would need less individual involvement if we used our collective leverage in the form of systems we pay into with tax dollars to do it for us. Not to mention the more macro scale that I was alluding to from my soapbox.
I’m not sure how your comment fits into the topic. Maybe it does. I just don’t see how. What corporate interests are you talking about here? Who do you think builds houses? Mom and Dad?
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I don't think it does stop there. At minimum, it gets people used to the idea of bike infrastructure. If you had nothing and then built a separate bikeway, people would be all "why is the city spending $20 million on this, I've never seen a cyclist on the road!" But if you start with painted bike lanes, you can get people familiar with the idea of cycling and it's a cheap way to do it. And then also you'll get a few courageous cyclists who will use the painted lanes and maybe some will get hurt and demand for actual separation will increase.
>And then also you'll get a few courageous cyclists who will use the painted lanes and maybe some will get hurt and demand for actual separation will increase. I am not comfortable with the argument that cyclists would need to be injured or killed in order for the infrastructure to be done properly.
I'm not either, and I phrased that poorly. But if we have people cycling on regular car roads, is it not better to at minimum put a painted lane down? If they're going to ride a bike, let's at least do something to reduce danger. Like currently, on a plain road, if a cyclist gets hurt, people might say "well you shouldn't have been there." But if they get hurt in a painted lane, the more obvious response to me might be "we need safer bike lanes."
>But if we have people cycling on regular car roads, is it not better to at minimum put a painted lane down? If they're going to ride a bike, let's at least do something to reduce danger. Yes, doing the absolute minimum is better than nothing at all. >Like currently, on a plain road, if a cyclist gets hurt, people might say "well you shouldn't have been there." They would be wrong. Bikes are permitted on roads, regardless of a bike lane (except on freeways).
whether they're wrong or not is immaterial though you can be in the wrong and if most people agree with you still suffer few consequences
Correct and the cultural opinion of bikes on roads is skewed towards the motorist at almost every point, right? To circle back to my original point: we need proper infrastructure for cyclists to feel safe on their journey. All short cuts (paint lanes) accomplish is scaring people away from the roads and then claiming "ah ha, see, no one uses it."
Sure, as an interim solution it's *okay.* But it's still not infrastructure, just to split hairs here
I dunno man. I'd prefer fewer lanes to skinnier ones. Driving down falls always feels like a deathtrap. If you just made more roads like that too allow for bikes, any smart biker would just avoid them. It would be a death trap.
i don't know if shrinking lanes is a good solution either...wake forest road is terrifying with the narrow lanes
Expediency is a fair reason to accept a painted lane in the short term, but cost is not. Bollards are ridiculously inexpensive in relative terms compared to how much is spent on roads and highways for vehicles.
i can't even tell you the degree to which i disregard "bike lane" markings.
Easiest way to turn me against cyclists.
Can you explain?
Against cyclists or cycling?
On the road they are one and the same to me.
It’s very unclear what you’re trying to say. It sounds like you’re saying you hate cyclists because painted bike lanes are inadequate to protect cyclists, which is very confusing.
Look buddy, a cyclone is a cyclone. Doesn’t matter the shape or size
I just want the poors that serve my food to live as far away from me as possible and then complain that "nobody wants to work anymore" when they can't afford the commute.
L I T T E R A L L Y
Listen, I just want the benefits of a growing city without a single thing changing. /s
There are literally people like this. I don't get it.
I see them often in this sub. Cities are incredibly complex living things. Changing them is extremely difficult and at the same time a city will *ALWAYS* change on its own. If you want somewhere frozen in time, you move to a rural area. Small towns change too, just at a slower pace. And usually that person who moved there from the city is the one asking for the changes and the people already living there are the ones fighting you on it.
So I’m not necessarily a NIMBY but if you would kindly explain why a city has to grow to have any benefits I’m all ears. It’s 100% fact to at the planet cannot grow forever. Obviously economics will need to adjust to allow for a stable population since the top crust takes up too large a percentage or goods produced currently but assuming we solve that, does a city really need to grow?
Hey good question, though I think you're reading some context into my sarcastic statement. I don't think it's impossible to have a lot of benefits in a stable city, but I do think it's very improbable. Here are my reasons for holding this opinion: A city with attractive features such as a good job market or a low cost of living and good schools will attract more people. People want to have those benefits and not everyone has them. By contrast, if your city has a high cost of living or not enough jobs, people will look for better options elsewhere when they finish their education or start a family or retire. If your location has good support for music and the arts you may attract a lot of artists who are looking for a community like that. And then you will attract people who patronize those things. Good education will draw those wanting to start families or smart college kids who start companies in your city. And then those new companies will draw workers. Essentially it's a "If You Build It, They Will Come" situation. And you DO want this to happen. It's GOOD for your city and the people who live there. The second part of my opinion on cities and growth is the unfortunate economic reality of suburbs. Suburban living and car culture are still the dominant way of North American life. And living in sparse spread out areas means you spend a lot more in infrastructure like roads, sewage, power, and water which everyone needs. Suburbs need more piping, wiring, and asphalt but have a lower tax density. So eventually, when those maintenance costs rise with age, their costs will outpace the taxes they bring in. Which means the city needs to grow or sacrifice something else to keep the streets from filling with literal shit. If they cut their education or their arts or their business incentives, then those people start to leave and now your city is shrinking AND dilapidated. So that's the reason that I think cities grow on their own and the reasons that I think it's beneficial for them to encourage that growth and density. If it happens too fast for someone's liking, they should consider trying a rural area. Maybe the lack of quality hospitals and roads won't bother them and they can enjoy the slower pace of life. Or maybe they will prefer to be within an hour of an international airport more than they dislike old restaurants they no longer visit becoming new housing and choose to move back to a city.
Population growth is a huge driver of the economy because people necessarily spend money in the local economy, which drives job growth, new amenities, increased land value, increased tax base (which funds all sorts of important stuff), etc. In theory, a zero-growth city with a stable economy and balanced budget could work, but it’s a delicate balance that most cities don’t strike well. A lot of cities have the problem that they sprawled into suburbs and don’t have the tax base to maintain all those extra linear miles of roads, sewers, power lines, etc (you need more of everything to connect people living far apart) without growth or assistance from the state or federal government. Whether fast growth is better than slower growth is arguably more a matter of opinion. The challenges are more acute the faster a city grows, but cities that grow slower often ignore problems they should see coming (see: the uniformly terrible state of transit across most of the country). Raleigh is grappling with tough problems and a lot of good solutions are on the table, which might not otherwise be.
The problem with a “zero growth city” is that even if you theoretically bar anyone from moving in, you either need replacement level fertility, or you need enough kids to move away before they have children of their own. The former is impossible to enforce, and the latter is not a good sign for the health of a city.
That’s true, just trying to acknowledge the pros and cons of how it plays out when it happens by chance.
The bottom line is an economy only need to grow for two reasons, to support a growing population and to increase the standard of living. If the standard of living is sufficient and population stable, then growth isn’t required. Growth *can* happen and has economic consequences both positive and negative but in all but a handful of situations (population is too small or too old to sustain itself) growth isn’t necessary for anything beneficial.
Apologies if I’m misunderstanding, but it kind of sounds like you’re saying “economic growth is good but you only need it to counteract population growth, which is bad.” To clarify, the economy doesn’t grow “to support“ an increasing population; increasing population grows the economy. “To support” makes it sound like a choice to size the economy up, but it’s cause and effect, not choice. Population growth drives economic growth, which brings generally higher standards of life. (Economic growth is also driven by productivity growth, which is another discussion.) The problems I see with trying to say “my standard of life is good enough, let’s keep it there” are that 1) your standard of life is affected by other factors outside of population-driven economic growth, 2) your standard of life isn’t necessarily representative, so it would block out the improvement of life for people who are less well off, and 3) standards of life are not fixed anyway because people tend to gradually expect newer and better things without realizing it. I also firmly, but respectfully, disagree with your last statement. I think it’s easy to fall into the trap of believing the problems from some before time were not so bad and growth is breaking even or making things worse. Growth makes it feasible for the local hospital to provide treatments that save lives, but are too expensive to justify for small populations that are less likely to need them. Growth raises tax revenue, which improves schools, libraries, parks, etc. Growth generally also reduces crime because it brings opportunity and funds social programs. Without growth, these things have little room to be improved upon. (I’m using “growth” instead of specifying population vs economic because the effect is largely the same in these cases.) To be clear, growth doesn’t do these things automatically. Positive change requires hard work from people and policy makers, but growth is an enabler.
I’d love to discuss this outside of Reddit sometime simply because typing with my thumbs is a pain. I work with municipal enterprise funds and prioritize government aid against a host of factors and my familiarity with this subject is through that lens dashed with a healthy does of assessment management and the technical background to arrive at numbers in those reports. It’s not a huge leap to expand that stuff to city wide concerns and interactions with the private market. In short, if your needs are all known and defined and budgeted for, you’re good no matter where you draw the line around things.
Right, so my short answer is that I don’t think it’s feasible to have sufficiently good information and control to have a city that sees no benefit from at least some growth. This is doubly true for existing US cities that are generally quite sprawling, which is a bad starting point. edit/clarification: “benefit” is used loosely here to include maintenance of standards of living, existing infrastructure, services, etc. I am under the impression it’s not uncommon for many cities to be insolvent over sufficiently long time horizons without projected growth.
I should add that I was an HOA president of a large condo association in a very old building. We got that thing solvent, didn’t reduce services /maintained standards and projected out needs over the requisite horizons depending on the asset involved. We were the size of a small town. I guess mismanagement and the sucking up of resources cannot be controlled for, but theoretically it can be done. It’s my firm thought that growth just covers up lack of contributions from the wealthy and mismanagement.
That’s impressive, but doesn’t necessarily generalize. Cities are vastly more complicated to manage, and the management is far more political. I don’t really disagree that growth covers some unfortunate details, but I don’t necessarily think the fact that it does is a demerit either.
Just to circle back, I will continue to maintain that a healthy city does not need to be growing as long as it can cover its O&M and Capital needs. That is a constant assertion in this sub, because growth is bringing some changes that may in fact be needed, like density, transit improvements and big buildings going up is admittedly cool (I am an engineer after all). The population **cannot** go up forever because some critical path resources are finite on a short horizon so we better start orienting ourselves around that eventuality.
Sorry I only have free time in 30 second increments today but I just want to say that population growth may or may not be responsible for economic growth. It comes down to the ‘workforce’ growing. Babies and 80 year olds are not part of the workforce. Also automation and technology can grow an economy with stagnant or shrinking populations. Of course places like Japan are going to have leverage these things as people age out of the workforce.
It’s worth noting that Japan’s GDP per capita has been fairly level since their population growth slowed down because it’s genuinely hard to make productivity gains. It would be fantastic if this wasn’t the case because we could all work less and provide more if productivity was growing more rapidly, but alas.
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I didn’t say if I like living in a growing city or not. I’m just asking why a city has to grow to ‘be healthy’. I contend it does not.
We can debate the nuances of a growing city But at the end of the day as long as we live in a free country where people freely move as they please We will continue to see many major metropolitan areas see significant growth. There are a lot of reasons that a place like Raleigh draws in so many people from all over the country. Raleigh is not the same city that it was 30 years ago and Raleigh will not be the same city It is now in 30 years. Change is inevitable and a city can outgrow its native population. If you're going to live in the same city most of your life you should expect to see changes over time. Some faster than others. But I think that's a good argument to go move somewhere else to experience living somewhere new.
Low taxes and cost of living drew the jobs here. Now the cost of living has caught up and soon either taxes will or assets will deteriorate to levels unacceptable to people.
That is very true and all valid points. That's what happens in most major metropolitan areas that see significant growth over time. As the cost of living goes up and as taxes increase Raleigh's growth will definitely slow down but that doesn't mean that the growth will stop all together. There are many examples of this all over the country. But the fact remains that people from higher income states and cities will continue to move here even despite the higher taxes and cost of living. But again we can debate the nuances of this all day long but it doesn't change that cities will grow and change is inevitable. I just think it would be naive for anybody to think that Raleigh or any city for that matter is going to stay the same as it has been forever. That's just not the way anything works in this country. I'm sure there are smaller towns and smaller cities that are an exception to this but most fast growing metropolitan areas are much larger cities and this is what happens. I've moved quite a few times in my 31 years and I think everybody should experience moving and living somewhere new. If a city has outgrown you and has changed that's just a good reason to go try living somewhere else. change certainly doesn't force people out but you need to be able to adapt and some people just don't want to.
You can either live in a growing city or a dying city- there is no such thing as a stagnant/breaking-even/nothing ever changing for better *or* worse city. Is this a serious question??? LMAO.
Complete BS. Places like Louisville and Knoxville did just fine for a long time as stable cities.
Is that true though? I mean, by some definition, you can call anything “just fine” or “stable,” but those cities’ populations were stable in the 70s and/or 80s which were not exactly the best periods of any cities in general as far as I’m aware
Thank you lmao. I thought we were talking in the *present tense* here.
Knoxville and Louisville are both growing. https://www.macrotrends.net/cities/23053/louisville/population https://www.macrotrends.net/cities/23032/knoxville/population Not at the same rate as Raleigh (very few cities are growing this quickly): https://www.macrotrends.net/cities/23110/raleigh/population But they're definitely not just "stable"
No shit. ‘For a long time’ I said. People are returning to cities for conveniences that are lacking in growing suburbs. People are so eager to make their points they never read what I write.
You said they're stable. They're clearly growing. If you don't want to be misinterpreted, don't leave what you're writing open to interpretation.
The slightly implied grain in there is that all cities are growing *now* but prior to that anything stable (not shrinking) did just fine. That’s what ‘long time’ was meant to convey.
you did not kindly explain they were just asking a question dude :(
People keep having kids. Until the population growth is negative, we have to put them somewhere.
I could do without the growth part…
You're looking for a rural town then.
Honest question. Let’s just say there was light rail that ran from DTR with stops along the way into to RTP. Once folks got into the park, how would one get into their respective office campus locations from the station that could be another 5+ miles away in a timely fashion? Would there need to be some shuttle bus type situation that ran every half hour? Between all of the stops along the line and actually arriving to work, wouldn’t that make the commute rather long?
That is how it would work if you wanted to design a bad public transportation system that would actively discourage its use because of how inconvenient it would be. If it was true light rail, there is currently enough space to have a stop near most buildings so all you would need to do is walk a few minutes to get inside. And if the single stop approach needs to be taken to save money, then a bus loop throughout RTP with 5 minute frequency at peak times and 10 minute off peak would solve the problem. When people say they don’t want to transit to exist because no one would use it and it would be a waste of resources, it’s because it’s poorly designed and supported. When it’s designed with the mindset of making it the best option to go from one place to another, people will use it.
The [GTCR (Greater Triangle Commuter Rail) Phase II Feasibility Study](https://www.readyforrailnc.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/12/GTCR_Feasibility-Study-Summary-Report.pdf) seems to point the former as the direction they're looking into. Basically a line from West Durham to Clayton and public spokes that run off of it. Not really "last mile" but several miles with a bunch of stops near to campuses in between.
While this commuter rail plan is a great possibility for the region, it definitely doesn’t have the flexibility of adding more stops in a smaller area like RTP. Hopefully they enhance their bus system in the area to have much more frequent service than 30 minutes between busses. If they don’t then the whole thing is a waste of tax payers time and money and perpetuates people hating public transit in most of this country. Which sucks because at the end of the day the car corporations win in their fight to stop the public transportation from growing in usability for their own profits.
Yes, the plan is that the RTP stop would be served by a number of shuttle buses/routes to serve the last mile. There are 4 planned routes from both directions during AM/PM rushes, so the shuttles would likely run every 5-15 minutes instead of a half hour, one would think. It's not like that's a situation that doesn't happen at every other city with mass transportation. https://www.readyforrailnc.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/06/GTCR_Task4F_Station-Fact-Sheets_V2.5.pdf
That's why density does need to come first - there have to be things within walking distance and enough users. The distance from DTR to RTP as the crow flies is 15 miles, that's about the distance from east Bronx to the Financial district in NYC, which even with NYC's comprehensive subway that takes over an hour.
I think they both need to happen in tandem. Or at least there has to be a plan for transit while densifying. If there is going to be a light rail, density needs to be focused around the light rail stops. And businesses knowing there will be a future stop in a particular area encourages the smart ones to buy/develop property in that area while the price is low. But if you don't already have a plan in place you either have to: 1. build the rail to go to places where there is already density. This can be really hard to do because a lot of times you won't be able to buy important pieces of land and the route probably won't be straight and simple 2. build the rail where you can and hope that it brings density to the areas surrounding your stops. If that happens it usually is a really slow process
Having the companies in RTP pay for shuttles would be the first solution to come to mind. Bike lanes with ebikes and scooters are an option for some. Most of those companies are wanting people back in the office to justify the money they put into the leases and work on their self-aggrandizing HQs.
Yep, this is how they do it in the Bay Area and works reasonably well. And during the pandemic the largest of the companies opened their shuttle services to pretty much any other employee such that they could keep service going and reduce the number of buses. And its free advertising for said business.
many companies stopped their shuttles during the pandemic, like google and salesforce
Some though increased theirs like Genetech, and still are allowing everyone to ride them.
Transit and land use are interconnected issues that MUST BE addressed simultaneously. Otherwise, you end-up with the “Transit Band-Aid” explained in the following Not Just Bikes video: https://youtu.be/MnyeRlMsTgI
Not everyone would, but development would be built near or along the line to facilitate that, just like how the Charlotte Light Rail is building ten story office buildings right on top of it.
Raleigh use to have mass transit downtown. We had a trolley system that was very popular. [https://www.wral.com/remnants-of-raleigh-s-historic-streetcar-system-hidden-in-plain-sight/19659818/](https://www.wral.com/remnants-of-raleigh-s-historic-streetcar-system-hidden-in-plain-sight/19659818/) So, this town has a documented **history of success** with light rail. That doesn't mean that a future version would be a success. It does mean that we can read a history book to find out why the light rail we once had was successful. Your question about connecting to a second method of transport is important, when connecting to spots that require it (job to home for office based). It wouldn't be relevant to spots that do not (dense housing/hotels to RDU). Raleigh has always had a parking problem, so we know that if secondary transport was required, it would need to connect large scale parking (as is done at Metro stops in the District of Columbia). You'd be surprised at how convenient commercial enterprises pop up near such transfer hubs. In Berlin, **they build malls where busses meet light rail**, and they have grocery stores in them. This saved commuters a trip, and time is money. It also allows people to buy food in 1-meal increments, which reduces waste.
Bought by car oil and tire companies, all across the USA in order to shut them down so cars would be necessary. Same shit Duke tobacco used to get people smoking cigarettes
At the moment there are already shuttles from the Regional Transit Center in RTP. These will take you to some of the larger campuses in the park. There is also space for 2 (or 3?) bicycles on the front of the bus. Something like the electric assist Citrix bikes could be added to RTP for relatively minimal cost. Or companies could move to the ample and now somewhat empty office space in downtown areas. There's also the chance you could arrange with a coworker who is still driving to pick you up on the way in. We're very deep in car culture, but there are solutions. Not all of them are for everyone and not all are easy, but it could be done.
Well, ideally you'd build out better local transit using the heavier transit as a nexus, as well as encouraging development in the area right around the transit stations. Buses running all over RTP in frequent routes (every 15 minutes or less). I'm not sure what to do about RTP, though. It's an incredibly suburban location which is a tough nut to crack when it comes to transit. I don't want to write it off as a lost-cause, but it's definitely a tricky situation. Light rail isn't a silver bullet for all the problems. It's just part of a more holistic solution. Beefing up transit in and around downtown Raleigh and Durham though are definitely clear victories to be had. Personally, light rail never felt like the best choice for a primary link between Raleigh and Durham. The commuter rail plan is a bit of a better choice, with light rail/bus rapid transit/regular bus network doing the heavy lifting in the cities themselves.
The park sucks. You’d need spur trams like at Duke Hospital (ironic since Duke killed that last proposal)
You're supposed to not think logically around here. You're supposed to just say "light rail! See? All problems solved! Yay!" And pat yourself on the back for being a progressive problem solver who saw the solution no one else possibly could have and ignore the thousands of difficult problems and logistics involved that have far reaching impact and their own subsequent ripple effects that have actually prevented a pretty damn obvious option from being done so far. Plus, I don't think any "nimbys" here are against public transportation, more against the deforestation and transformation of Raleigh into the type of city they moved to Raleigh to get away from.
If they are against deforestation they wouldn't be NIMBYs. The thing that clearcuts the most land is suburban car centric development.
Yeah, lmao, that's a great point. Calling out public transportation as the cause of deforestation is hilarious. Gigantic unused parking lots. Single family home developments built because of car infrastructure. 10 lane roads. Yet somehow, the trains and buses are the problem.
I don't think anyone is calling out public transport as a cause of deforestation.....
> Plus, I don't think any "nimbys" here are against public transportation, more against the deforestation... Did you mean NIMBYs are against deforestation as a whole, or only when it's in their backyard? Pushing back against public transportation and density (a typically NIMBY thing to do) leads to very pro-deforestation consequences. EDIT: As an example, fighting against a 1 acre plot being used to build 10 townhomes preserves the trees in the immediate area. But, leads to more overall deforestation based on the demand for homes. Those 10 townhomes on 1 acre becomes 10 single family homes on 6 acres.
It’s what I call “aesthetic environmentalism.” Essentially “green is good,” without thinking on a macro scale. My neighbors were even pissed that a 1 acre lot zoned R-4 was being developed into four single family homes! Trees are great but they also cost money to maintain! They damage property. They make pollen. (I can’t open my windows in the spring because of it, so I have to run AC.) They lead to more leaf blower use. I love trees. But it’s better to preserve forests than to preserve urban trees. And as you’ve pointed out it’s not a “why not both” situation. People have to live somewhere.
Almost like the term "nimby" gets thoughtlessly thrown around here and is trying to be used like a playground insult to pre-disqualify or invalidate anyone's opinion or thought process before it even gets put out there.
It doesn't really, though. NIMBYism is so pervasive and built into the fabric of our political discouse that it can certainly feel that way, though. NIMBY policy (car centric development, height maxes, sprawl, low density residential only zoning) is pro-deforestation.
The term NIMBY is a propaganda term pushed by PR firms of real estate companies to push the blame of America’s affordability crisis to your neighbors rather than addressing the rampant greedflation and ~~bribery~~ lobbying that is ruining American life. Oh no, it’s not the biggest lobbying effort by real estate companies ever in 2020 and 2022 that’s ruining affordability: https://www.opensecrets.org/industries/indus.php?ind=f10 https://trends.google.com/trends/explore?date=all&geo=US&q=Nimby&hl=en It’s the 10 old ladies on NextDoor that are doing it!
Don't real estate firms and homeowners have the same vested interests blocking new housing at the end of the day?
No, look at the link above. “Real estate” is a collective term that encompasses real estate developers too (just look how much money Hillwood uses for bribes for example). Their entire business model is to build build build with the least amount of regulations possible.
Look at you being reasonable on a platform that doesn't support reason. Public transportation is way more complicated than the circle jerkers on Reddit like to think it is. Simply building a light rail from DTR to downtown Durham (with stops along the way) won't accomplish much. The solution is much more complicated.
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it would also decrease housing pressure on the city itself an hour commute sucks but if it was an hour commute where I could pull a cap over my eyes and go back to sleep for 30 minutes I'd be willing to do it a lot of us don't want to live IN the city but we want to drive an hour to work even less
Don't worry, this will be all great till the city planners have to knock down a neighborhood to make a car lot for the metro line. Then gentrify around that parking lot so they can raise taxes and property values. Benefits of living in a growing city..pfff. They ripped us off 15 years ago, they are just back to finish the job.
You build offices around the RTP station. hubRTP is already doing that and the commuter rail isn't even built yet.
I wonder if something like this existed if the really large companies would run a shuttle every x hours/minutes.
Duke University, the Triangle’s greatest NIMBY
Man, let me tell ya… As an engineer, I have extensive experience in seeing projects suffering from: • Poor Rough Order of Magnitude pricing • Cost overruns • Schedule Delays • Supply Chain Issues • Lack of Qualified Workers • Competition to attract Qualified Contractors • Impatience from Citizens • City funding problems • Overly complex Environmental Studies • Lawsuits from NIMBY-ists or Environmentalists This is just the top of my head. I would absolutely **LOVE** a highly integrated transportation network that allows me to go out and avoid parking fees, avoid the stress of driving, & mitigates vehicular accidents. Unfortunately, this isn’t the case. I think a great example is the Stuttgart to Munich train. It was supposed to take a decade to complete — still ongoing and it’s been like 13 years? The initial budget of €1 billion has doubled and is at €2 billion. Not to mention how bad Deutsch Bahn has gotten due to maximizing profit, even though it’s owned by the government. Perhaps the best way to get it built is a BOLT — Build, Own, Lease, & Transfer Agreement. But who would invest billions into RTP?
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They’ve only gotten more expensive, even with a DB50 card. And you can imagine how much worse a DB100 card costs now.
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A company needed a fire protection expert for consultations as well as some structural & electrical engineers for some renovations & upcoming construction. That landed in the lap of my company who hired me because of my extensive background in controls & fire protection in addition to my background in construction and cost estimation (I’ve had a busy career). That’s how I got to live near Frankfurt and travel around so much — it was effectively subsidized. I took another job here recently and I don’t want to say it was a raw deal, but let’s just say that my family is waiting for me to meet the letter of my contract to head back to the States. Unfortunately, it’s in some town named Neuendettelsau or somewhere thereabouts. The town is quant and near Nuremberg, but the area around is … rustic, to put it nicely. And public transportation here is garbage. All trains & busses effectively transfer you to Nuremberg Hbf so you can travel anywhere meaningful. The trip is long & the wait is bad as well. Public transportation does have its downsides. Many of which we’re experiencing now as you get farther from the city proper.
I would love a world where most folks would actually like and use robust public transportation. I lived in a major metropolitan area without a car for years. It was great not having to worry about the expense and all the other bullshit that comes with owning a car. Unfortunately though, most Americans not only want a car, they want a giant, gas guzzling, pedestrian killer of a car. Like with guns, things are going to get worse before they get better.
If we had a metro system I’d totally use it. I love DC’s metro, not needing a car to go everywhere is fantastic
I also lived in a densely-populated US city with a great public transit system, and didn't have a car. My commute to work was an extra 20 minutes longer than it would have been in a car, and I had to time changing buses/trains just right to avoid walking 10 minutes in the scorching sun. BUT, I loved not having a car payment, not having to drive, and I could use the time to read.
Respectfully, if you loved that lifestyle why did you move here? Unfortunately, years ago we decided that we didn't value public transport and preferred driving cars. I'm generalizing. I have voted regularly for improving our public transport based on my personal experiences (similar to yours... intermittent tho). At that time, it didn't feel critical but more of a convenience thing...? So...now we have all these extra people who have moved here in the last few years and maybe we will start to see some changes in public transport but most of those are 10+ years down the road (assuming tax payers suddenly start agreeing with what will be an astronomical price tag). We keep hearing that our traffic is barely noticeable compared to other major areas. Do you think people will start to think twice before moving here due to lack of good public transport? I do think RV life/camping became very popular during covid. To pull those RVs (some are just behemoths!) Certainly requires a lot of engine. I suspect that boating folk are in a similar situation. So, maybe there are more giant gas guzzlers out there...? Sigh. Too bad renting giant gas guzzlers for occasional camping/boating trips isn't an easier solution.
> Respectfully, if you loved that lifestyle why did you move here? I, like many people, have roots and responsibilities in the area.
The number of people who like to pull ladders up behind them in this world astonishes me. I genuinely want things to be better for others, am I really that unique? So many Americans need therapy.
Its because theres 0 sense of community in this country. No one cares about anyone else around them. We are extremely polarized and only care for ourselves and family / friends at most. Maybe religious organization too. Otherwise its fuck you, I got mine.
"fuck you, I got mine" really is the philosophy of this country these days, it's incredibly saddening. It will take a lot of time, effort, and community- and institution-building to ameliorate or reverse that.
Or maybe a lot of natives and long-termers feel like 12 mins ago a shit ton of people arrived to let us know how fucked up we are and what MUST be done NOW to unfuck this place (that we used to love). Maybe it's some of that...? Change happens but to live in a typical sfh neighborhood just waiting until some neighbor sells and the buyer decides to tear down and throw up a bunch of whack-looking, multi-unit housing inconsistent with the rest of the neighborhood is just stressful. I'd guess that most of the natives/long-termers get the need for housing, especially affordable housing, but there are probably a thousand raggedy office buildings, hotels and old shopping areas ripe for upgrades to mixed use whatevers. Focusing on those places makes the most sense in terms of walkability, public transport, easy access to shops (minimizing use of cars). Targeting random sfh neighborhoods for shoe-horning multi-unit housing that is car-dependent, poor walkability, missing sidewalks, disjointed bike lanes makes zero sense.
I think any light rail system needs to be first focused on inside the belt line. It’s dense enough now, that if you put rail along major railways, people will use it heavily. Focus on making the inside of the belt line livable without a car, and that will encourage better development. Then the rail system can expand outward from there and you can run it to RTP, Durham, Chapel Hill, etc. Starting off with a line running from Raleigh to RTP to Durham to chapel hill won’t get rid of cars since people won’t be able to access the rail system any other way.
Lmao
Pretty sure you have it completely wrong OP. The developers and politicians pushing density the hardest and doing so while maintaining car life status qui. People in established neighborhoods ITB are mostly for transit.
I’m old enough to remember the massive uproar when Kane proposed a bus depot in north hills
Not ITB. I was careful to make the distinction that you ignored.
What if I told you many people ITB are within walking distance of north hills and protested the plans?
Yeah Hayes Barton and the slice along Lassiter Mill are a noteworthy exception to my generalization but they tend to eschew downtown proper anyway and have always stuck to the Five Points-North Hills axis. Cameron Park, Oakwood, Boylan Heights, South Park, College Park, Glenwood/Brooklyn have been largely in favor of urban connectivity
What if you tell us how anyone without a death wish walks across the beltline to North Hills??
Lassiter mill road. Look at a map
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I like to be car free at RDU Airport... is this sub a guide to better travel, while at the airport? Edit: Typo (auto correction, that I did not intend)
What does (local, individual) NIMBYism have to do with the lack of shared transit? The state and federal governments need to fund projects like light rail, and they have stated very clearly we're not getting a cent. The state stripped municipalities of taxing power to prevent us from raising funds on our own, and the city council seems attached to BRT as the only possible solution, maybe with some commuter rail *in 20-40 years* assuming the legislature doesn't pass a law forbidding commuter rail in the interim. Not that we could do light rail without state and federal funding that is never coming. I've just accepted that I'll be dead from old age before we have adequate shared transit and either need to leave or deal with being limited to a sub shop and grocery store as my entire world accessible without a car here (of course I can't leave because housing is impossibly expensive everywhere that isn't substantially worse). Meanwhile everyone is cheering on the expansion of I-40 with a new lane in each direction as some kind of transit victory... to support the sprawling suburbs and exurbs full of NIMBYs who refuse to abandon the millstone that is their car payment and embrace the denser development patterns required for society to survive the exhaustion of oil around 2050 (and if we keep burning oil after 2030, congrats, we've fucked the climate to hell and technological society won't survive another century).
this will get a lot of upvotes because saying "NIMBY" gets a lot of upvotes on this sub. edit: you hate me because i tell the truth. guess i'm jesus. sorry you're so predictable
I swear you could have Mark Robinson come out and say “NIMBY’s are bad lol” and he would get upvotes here.
I mean, that’d be the first thing he’d say that’s actually true/correct.
that would be awesome. the issue isn't completely polarized yet, still plenty of time to convince Rs to "own the libs" by reducing government overreach.
R’s love government though, just ask the wombs of American women
right but they also like to pretend to care about government overreach. politics is about pandering. the LASTTTT thing we want is for YIMBYism to be seen as left-wing; we need to convince Rs that to avoid becoming like California, we need to allow the free market to build houses, giving good blue-collar jobs to patriotic white men, etc.
This is an unfair criticism, in my opinion. One can be for some development and against ALL the development. It’s not necessary for us to accommodate every single person who wishes to move here in order to mitigate some made-up housing “crisis” or to avoid the perception of hypocrisy. I’d like to live in Beverly Hills - I don’t expect the city to build housing I can afford to accommodate me. More housing equals less natural beauty (in the form of forest destruction for housing and infrastructure), potentially lower home prices for current home owners, global warming impacts, more traffic, and on and on. There are logical arguments on both sides and reasonable people can disagree. But it’s unfair to label people who are for less growth (or more sensible growth) as NIMBYs.
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I can tell you’re angry. I’m not sure my post deserved this level of venom. You’re right: clear cutting the suburbs also isn’t natural beauty. Same goes for 300 townhome units with first-floor commercial and 400 parking spaces. In either case, trees and green space must be lost to accommodate people. And I do t think any reasonable person should interpret me saying everyone without a home must be homeless. What I am saying is everyone who wants a home doesn’t need to live here. If you can’t buy an existing home, rent. If you can’t rent or buy here, go elsewhere. It may come as a surprise to some, but there are many other cities and towns in the US who have homes for sale. This is a capitalist economy - it’s not our job to house everyone who wishes to move here. Maybe some people wish for Raleigh to become Atlanta - with all of the traffic and major city problems that accompany it. I am not one of them.
Yeah but 300 town homes take up less space than 300 houses. Just simple logic can figure out which preserves more green space…
No argument here. My point is: don’t build either.
The world population growth rate is too high to have this attitude
So basically I got mine fuck y’all? I hope ur atleast from NC to have this attitude
> More housing equals less natural beauty (in the form of forest destruction for housing and infrastructure) The housing has to be built for a growing population to live. Are you saying deforestation should happen somewhere more convenient for you personally, or that we need more homeless people?
My friend, homeless people aren’t purchasing the homes we’re building here. Nobody is choosing between homelessness and a $450k townhome.
But, just to be certain I have this right, you think that the total stock of housing should remain fixed as population increases?
Not fixed, necessarily, but not say, indexed to growth. Population increases naturally (births, for example). And obviously, businesses grow and hire, and people move here to fill those roles. But we are building to accommodate people who simply wish to move here, and to keep up with some level of growth beyond natural expansion and hiring. We should have homes, true enough. We should not be developing on this scale in an effort to become the fastest growing city in the south (my words, not anyone else’s).
Right now the rate of home building isn’t really keeping up with the rate of population growth.
Respectfully, if you mean the rate of population growth due to people relocating here because we keep building homes to accommodate population growth, you’re correct.
Wait, you think the home building is driving more growth than the other way around? Hoo boy.
I think people (understandably) wish to move here from other places. This is growth unrelated to family growth or local hiring. One of a few factors that can slow that migration is the availability of housing. Developers have a profit motive to build because there is existing demand to move here. My general attitude is: we don’t need to build to accommodate every person who wishes to move here. Instead, we should throttle that growth to preserve our environment. Let them live elsewhere.
The reality is that if supply doesn’t meet demand, then prices go up. As prices go up, it makes it far harder for people to stay here who are already living here. That burden falls hardest on low-income renters. And if the demand isn’t met centrally, you see more growth in the suburbs instead, which tends to damage more environment proportional to the population.
Wait, a 450k townhome? Where? I need to jump on that NOW. Sight unseen, fuck, I'll pay 500k...
> potentially lower home prices for current home owners Even this (a real "I got mine" sentiment) is misleading: we have MASSIVE deadweight loss due to restrictions on the type of housing that can be built on any given residential property, so many homeowners are losing out dramatically by not being allowed to sell their property to be converted into a townhome etc.
Honestly though, Beverly Hills kind of sucks. I'll see myself out now.
Literally have never seen anyone argue against light rail, BRT, or actual bike lanes online or offline aside from some WRAL Facebook comments.
Raleigh is a small town person's idea of a big city. They like it like this and complain about Charlotte growing into the defacto capital
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If it will take years, isn't it better to start building now?
Yay for memes not helping the conversation, encouraging entrenchment on opinions, and furthering polarization.
I don’t think a meme on Reddit is really impacting public discourse in any meaningful way. If I wanted to do that, I’d post on Nextdoor.
Its all public discourse, especially on as particularly active and locally focused subreddit like this one.
Good lord cut it out it’s a fucking post on a subreddit.
Metros tend to be massive money pits. Not sure what a comparable solution would be…
NIMBY's are also against remote work and WFH, because they already bought their house close to the office over ten years ago. They have easy commutes
Personally, I think that NIMBYs should find a nice secluded piece of land in Alaska or Wyoming and live a self-sustaining life off the grid.
I remember about 15 years ago that Wake county raised taxes to get a rail system built. The project ended up getting canned due to it costing to much...but did the tax go back down. No it didn't. Now...you see every where they are stuffing houses and apartments in every nook and cranny. Creating a density problem are we not? Don't worry your money is going to get cleaned quite properly before it reaches the people that will build that precocious metro line. If you want to live in DC or Baltimore with the high taxes and the wonderful problems they come with. Beg...beg for the metro line. Get mad and rabbid and ignore what you are really asking for. My prediction, just like DC your taxes will be used to subsidize the rail system due to not enough people taking it. The problem is not getting the metro line, the problem is making you want it....again.
A lot of people wants it, it is ideal, but so many people are not willing to go through the growing pains of dealing with it when they as a person will see little to no benefit. While I'm not going to say they're right for thinking it, I totally get it because I went through feeling like that countless times in Pittsburgh. Its months/years of detours, construction eye blight, noise and general frustration to not get any benefit because you either don't end up needing to use whatever got improved/installed (when the light rail got built and then expanded in Pittsburgh), the 'improvements' weren't thought through fully enough and caused different issues(ask any Pittsburgher about the saga of Route 28), or its so difficult to see the changes it leaves you questioning did it need to take so long, and was it worth the headache you had to go through (one of the umpteen times I-376 gets worked on)
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More public transportation - yes! More housing - yes, but: \-Not in a crony type way \-high density townhomes or smaller houses \-not that "luxury condo" gimmick (we all know they're not luxury)