Solar powered train station in London, why not here?

Electrifying the transportation system (which I believe is both needed and happening) will have lots of pieces to it.  One of these is using solar power where possible to operate train stations and other facilities.  One recent success story is the Blackfriars railway bridge and station in central London.  The bridge over the Thames has been roofed with solar panels as part of a much bigger network upgrade (story here). 

If they can get solar power even in sun-starved London, can’t we do better in the US?

NASTO Notes 2014

Every year representatives of the state DOTs of the Northeast states (and assorted interested folks like me) gather to hear panels, exchange information, and socialize.  This is the annual meeting of NASTO (Northeast Association of State Transportation Officials), one of four regional groups in the US.  It’s not only a great place to exchange news and views but a great place to get a sense of what’s happening in state transportation circles.  This year’s conference was held in beautiful Portsmouth, NH and hosted by New Hampshire DOT (great job NHDOT folks!).

Some impressions:

Climate Change – This topic may not be taken seriously in some places, but it is a huge concern among Northeast DOTs.  A session on Climate Change Resilience and Sustainability, chaired by Sue Minter of Vermont (where Irene made believers of just about everybody) demonstrated some big advances.  Kate Zyla of Georgetown Climate Center gave an update on the work of the Transportation and Climate Initiative (website here).  If you’re not familiar with TCI, it’s a remarkable collaborative effort of the transportation, energy, and environment agencies of the 11 Northeast states and DC.  (I am not impartial, having a bit of a paternal interest, as I helped facilitate getting the group started a couple of years ago.)  Another remarkable collaborative effort is being undertaken by 50 climate scientists and transportation engineers in the northeast.  Jennifer Jacobs of the University of New Hampshire gave a briefing on the Infrastructure and Climate Network (ICNet, website here) which is sponsoring workshops, webinars, and pilot projects that connect high-level scientific findings on climate change and extreme weather events with practical engineering design guidelines.  Niek Veraart of the Louis Berger Group showcased some innovative new projects for sustainability in Hoboken, NJ, and Staten Island and Long Island. The concern for resiliency in these places, of course, was prompted by the flooding caused by Sandy.  Mike Meyer of Parsons Brinckerhoff gave an update on the new National Climate Assessment and some other new reports that continue to expand our knowledge of the science and the range of possible responses.  At a more practical level, a panel on Storm Coordination demonstrated how seriously the operations and maintenance folks are preparing for future extreme weather events.  A much talked about touchstone for all these discussions was the recent New York Times story reporting on how the Northeast states have managed to reduce emissions and increase economic growth at the same time (here).

Northeast Corridor – Another topic of special interest to the region is the future of the Northeast Corridor rail spine.  Chronically underfunded, stuck in an organizational nightmare, despised by a majority in the House of Representatives – and yet perhaps the biggest key to transportation and economic development in the Northeast.  Mitch Warren, of the Northeast Corridor Commission, set up by Congress to make recommendations for the future, gave an update.  Brett Taylor, of Delaware, gave the perspective of states on the corridor, who continue to invest heavily in improvements from their own resources.  Outlook?  A final report is due this year.  We’ll see what happens.  Rich Davey of Massachusetts gave a peek at one key opportunity.  MassDOT hopes to significantly expand South Station in Boston, with new tracks, more platforms, and significant joint development opportunities.  And Rich says these improvements will speed up service from Back Bay to South Station, the slowest mile on the whole Corridor.

Freight – There was a good panel on freight, but I’ll just mention two key takeaways from the presentation by Louis Renjel of CSX.  First, coal traffic is way down (confirming what looks to be a permanent decline), but the railroad has been able to compensate by increasing intermodal traffic.  Second, CSX is changing its network from a corridor model to a hub-and-spoke model, borrowed from UPS and FedEx.  Both trends are important – and encouraging – for transportation and land use planners.

Funding – Surprisingly, there was little talk of funding problems at this conference.  Why?  I think partially because almost half of the states in the region have gotten funding packages through their legislatures in the past couple of years.  More to do, but still a pretty good track record – and at a time when pundits in Washington say nobody will support gas tax increases!  Speaking of Washington, Sen. Jeanne Shaheen gave a synopsis of the situation in Congress.  She attempted to put a positive spin on the chances for MAP-21 extension, but without any real evidence to give much hope (and this was a day before Eric Cantor went down, which I think makes our chances even worse).  Two Shaheen statements to comment on:  “Failure is not an option.”  Agree completely!  “We need to be creative.”  Half agree.  Yes, we need to be creative to design and build a 21^st century transportation system and an appropriate long-term funding system.  No, we don’t need to be creative to solve the immediate (say, 5-year) funding problem.  We just need the votes to raise the bloody gas tax!

Performance management – The DOTs of Maine, Vermont, and New Hampshire explained in some detail their work in developing robust performance management systems in their agencies, including much work in agreeing on common performance measures.  The content is too complicated to get into here, but a very important takeaway is the conclusion all three states have come to that good performance management increases confidence in their legislatures and their publics and leads to more investment!

Memorial Bridge – This new lift bridge, connecting New Hampshire and Maine, is the pride and joy of New Hampshire DOT, the lead agency, and they took every opportunity to show off the impressive and innovative engineering achievements in designing and building it.  We can build great things in this country!

Congrats to New Hampshire DOT for a great conference!

I-495 Closed in Delaware: Notes from the Department of Redundancy Department

I-495, the interstate bypass of Wilmington, Delaware is closed down now due to a very problematic bridge (story here).

Since I have occasion to travel on this road frequently (the last time being the morning of the day the bridge problem was discovered and the road closed!), I can sympathize with DelDOT’s challenge in getting this heavily traveled roadway (90,000 AADT) back into service.

Fortunately, there are alternatives: I-95 through downtown Wilmington, the New Jersey Turnpike, I-295 (also on the New Jersey side of the river), and lesser roads.  Amtrak and SEPTA also provide excellent service through the area for trips that can be switched to rail.  The trick is to keep travelers informed and direct them to alternatives.  The I-495 problem is a reminder of the importance of redundancy in our systems – not just for natural calamities, but also for all-too-common infrastructure failures.

Good luck to Shailen Bhatt and his team in getting through this!

A Tale of Two (Streetcar) Cities

Who doesn’t love streetcars?  (Well, other than a few folks in Arlington, VA.)

A lot of us see streetcars as both smart transportation and as stimulators of urban revitalization.  Notes from two cities:

Philadelphia – The Girard Avenue streetcar is a nice “heritage” line, restored to service by SEPTA in 2005.  Urban revitalization along Girard Avenue?  Not so much.  A lot more to be done (photo below).

Washington – The new H Street line – the starter line for a 36-mile system (more here) – still doesn’t have a launch date (story here, photo of “parked” streetcars below).  The good news is that H Street has been the object of a DC Great Streets initiative (link here), a multi-pronged, multi-agency revitalization initiative.  And it shows (photo below)!  Yes, there are plenty of rough edges, but also many signs of investment.  Just need the streetcars to roll!

National Climate Assessment – Four Key Messages for Transportation (plus six more)

The new National Climate Assessment report is bound to get lots of press attention, although whether it will have any impact on the Flat Earthers is doubtful.

Transportation isn’t a leading topic of the report, but does get a chapter (available here), put together by a team led by Henry Schwartz and Mike Meyer.

The report has four “key messages” for transportation:

Key Message 1: Reliability and Capacity at Risk – “The impacts from sea level rise and storm surge, extreme weather events, higher temperatures and heat waves, precipitation changes, Arctic warming, and other climatic conditions are affecting the reliability and capacity of the U.S. transportation system in many ways.”

Key Message 2: Coastal Impacts – “Sea level rise, coupled with storm surge, will continue to increase the risk of major coastal impacts on transportation infrastructure, including both temporary and permanent flooding of airports, ports and harbors, roads, rail lines, tunnels, and bridges.”

Key Message 3: Weather Disruptions – “Extreme weather events currently disrupt transportation networks in all areas of the country; projections indicate that such disruptions will increase.”

Key Message 4: Costs and Adaptation Options – “Climate change impacts will increase the total costs to the nation’s transportation systems and their users, but these impacts can be reduced through rerouting, mode change, and a wide range of adaptive actions.”

Most of this is pretty straightforward.

Messages I would add:

Added Message 1: Redundancy and connectivity is really important.  The report notes that a “network” approach to infrastructure is good, but this subject needs a higher profile.  Simply filling in missing street grid and prohibiting future cul-de-sacs not only helps in emergency situations but also mitigates congestion and greenhouse gas emissions on an everyday basis.

Added Message 2: We need better planning.  Although the report says this too, I think it needs more emphasis. For example, one example provided of possible climate change impacts is the vulnerability of Mobile, Alabama to flooding.  Interestingly, the last Alabama long-range transportation plan (admittedly due to be updated) outlines hurricane evacuation routes, but doesn’t mention climate change.  Some long-range plans do a good job of at least attempting to grapple with climate change (see my comments on Maryland DOT’s plan here), but many don’t.

Added Message 3: Prepare for the consequences of electrifying the transportation system.  The report talks about changes in fuels, but the writers probably didn’t want to get into a fight about natural gas, hydrogen, etc.  To me, it is pretty evident that pretty much the whole transportation system is going to need to be electrified, which will have all sorts of effects on adaptation.

Added Message 4: Remember there are other changes going on.  The report quotes old sources to warn about increasing VMT and freight movements.  In fact, VMT has flattened out, demographic changes are affecting travel habits, and at least some manufacturing is being reshored.

Added Message 5: We need to cope with the uncomfortable prospect that climate change adaptation will cause new conflicts between transportation agencies and environmental agencies.  Engineers who design “all-weather” roads to serve as evacuation/emergency routes will likely look at more bridges, higher bridges, elevated causeways, and more impervious surfaces – all anathema to current environmental policies and regulations.

Added Message 6: We need to think more about walkable/bikeable, resilient neighborhoods and towns, with “islanded” electric grids and local goods and services.  When roads are closed, the main grid is down, and long-range travel is perilous, walking to a corner store with solar power will look like a pretty good option.

So let’s hope the National Climate Assessment – and the President’s sales pitch – is effective in moving the nation toward better climate policies.  And let’s expand the next Assessment to grapple with some of the issues I suggested.

Maryland House in spring

The new Maryland House rest stop is beginning to look cheerier now that we actually seem to have a spring in the Northeast.  The new facility has a lot to be said for it (as it should for $30 million).  This is reputedly the busiest rest stop in the entire US, so it’s important to get it right.

Just a few thoughts:

·      The traffic pattern needs work.  Although it may have made sense on paper, I found myself having a difficult time finding the pathway back to I-95.  Lots of possibilities for conflicts.

·      The traffic info panel is good, but still not doing what I think technology can do for us.  We need to get to real multimedia, interactive displays with more information and more razz-ma-tazz.

·      Why is the tourist information area so much smaller than the old one was?

·      Interesting to see that the landscaped strip leading to the front door (which looks like it was designed just as a partition in the parking field) has been converted by the traveling public into a green pedestrian pathway!

All in all, Maryland has done a good job with the new facility.  I just miss the old Maryland House, a rather picturesque and sentimental landmark for many of us for many years.

One Wisconsin highway “boondoggle” stopped!

Congrats to WISPIRG for leading the way in stopping one extraordinarily bad highway project in Wisconsin (see Streetsblog USA story here).

WisDOT has dropped plans to widen State Highway 38, a winding, mostly rural, two-lane road with no apparent need for major improvements.  Although WisDOT says the project was stopped due to local opposition, I believe the fact that WISPIRG highlighted the Route 38 project in its 2011 “Building Boondoggles” report (available here) was really the beginning of the end. 

Having provided research for WISPIRG on the “Boondoggles” report, I have to say this project is one of the least meritorious I have ever come across.  It’s a mystery why it progressed so far, and a good thing that it has ground to a halt.  Let’s hope this is the beginning of better choice making in Wisconsin, which has plenty of real transportation challenges to cope with.