Better than Rail

Rosewood Park in East Austin is a pleasant place.  Mature trees provide shade for picnic tables and a historic log cabin that serves as a museum of artifacts from 19^th century East Austin.  An activity center provides an indoor place for kids after school lets out, although when the weather isn't inclement they're likely to be outside using the playground, swimming pool, or basketball courts.

It stands out as a particularly nice park in a city full of parks, except this one has its tranquility interrupted four or five times per day when freight trains rumble through with their horns blasting.

This rail line is owned by Capital Metro, and is the proposed home of the "Red Line", if voters give their approval to the plan on November 2.  The freight trains will be moved to the evening and night hours, and 60 mile per hour commuter trains will replace them during the day.

Safety

The tracks run directly through the middle of Rosewood Park, within throwing distance of the playscape and many of the picnic tables.  The entire Boggy creek greenbelt is split in half.

The commuter trains will not blow their horn when approaching intersections or parks, due to a change in federal regulations.  The track is not currently fenced, but that will have to change once the high-speed commuter trains begin running.  Over a mile of chain link fencing, topped with barbed wire, will split Rosewood Park and the Boggy creek greenbelt in half.

But the train hasn't left East Austin yet.  On its way it will also pass right next to Ridgetop and Maplewood elementary schools.  Further north it continues to disturb learning at the Redeemer Lutheran School, Twin Oaks Montessori, and the Oakmont School.

Sixty mile-per-hour trains, parks, schools, and children are a poor mix.

Downtown, the train will share the streets with cars.  Houston has the same arrangement, and has about 6 train/car collisions per month.  How does a driver collide with a train?  The train approaches a left turning car from behind.  Checking over your shoulder for an accelerating vehicle approaching from the rear is not typical driving behavior.

Trains and cars sharing streets are a poor mix.

Benefits

Cap Metro customers who currently ride the Leander Express bus into downtown from the Leander Park & Ride will be forced to take the train or drive, since Express bus service will be discontinued while the train runs.  The express bus takes an hour for this journey, 10 minutes more than the train.  The bus is more useful, however, as it stops at major destinations, and then continues on south of the river.

Bus service can be reconfigured as necessary to adapt to changing commute patterns. The train route and stations are fixed and will become less useful as development moves away from them.  Whatever transit-oriented development does appear along the rail corridor will be invisible compared to the expected growth in the northeast Pflugerville/Round Rock area and south in Hays County.

Bus riders aren't the only type of commuter that will suffer if the Red Line is built.  The train will cross more than 50 streets in a one-way journey.  Many are smaller neighborhood streets that will only have signs to warn of the approach of a 60 mph train.  But the train also crosses arterial streets such as Koenig, MLK, the I-35 feeders (twice), 45^th, Lamar, West Anderson, the 183 feeders, Braker, and 620.

Capital Metro's budget does not include any bridges.  Indeed at some of these intersections (such as at 45^th and Airport) it would be difficult or impossible to install grade separation.  Multiply even just a handful of drivers by 50 intersections and 14 trains per day and the number of drivers forced to stop and wait for the train can easily be 10,000 or more.

This estimate doesn't include the circulator busses that will take train riders to their final destination.  They will control traffic lights such that the bus will always have a green light.

A better idea

The CAMPO 2030 Mobility Plan (page 33, Table 9) shows that the number of people who walk or bike to work is more than double the number of people who use mass transit.  Capital Metro should accept the fact that people even prefer walking to busses and capitalize on this trend.

To this end the Travis County Libertarian Party has an alternate proposal for the Red Line.  Capital Metro should admit that purchasing the line from the city of Austin was a bad idea, and quit throwing good money at it.  The Red Line could be transformed at almost no cost into what would probably be the finest walk and bike commuter way in the nation.

In contrast with commuter rail, this plan would reduce vehicular congestion, accelerate our trend toward cleaner air, and reinforce Austin's image as a place where clever ideas take shape.  But the first step is to show up at the polls on November second and vote no for the Red Line.