Green Line Extension to Medford & Union Sq

Re: Green Line to Medford to start in 2011

CSTH said:
So, done right, congestion pricing is not specifcally about compensating unjust losses to other users ("each driver should pay for their tiny share of the lost time of every other user which"), its about finding a price to efficiently allocate a scarce resource. And the only thing complicated about that is finding good data to extrapolate from, because its an empirical problem.
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Fine logic, but the government cannot do that.

A private company can charge what the market will bear because its goal is to make money by selling people things. A government cannot. A government can only charge what it takes to make up the cost of maintaining the resource its charging for.

The government cannot be a business which charges for things people want or need to use simply because they can make money that way. If that logic held, transit systems would triple their fares during peak hour because "that will keep trains from being overcrowded." You're only applying this logic to highways because it advances the ability of urban dwellers to redistribute resources from suburban drivers to themselves by claiming that it's for the drivers' own good.

If we price and tax to make up the gap in funding necessary infrastructure fixes and system improvements, fine. That's pretty much what Gov. Patrick has proposed and I'm ok with it. I don't like the plans I hear over and over again on AB where we freeze road construction, rebuild urban roadways specifically to exclude, impede, and discourage auto use, spend untold billions on subways and streetcars and then ask drivers (and only drivers) to pay for the harm being done to them.

Matthew:

By your reasoning, every iPod should have a surcharge placed on it so that people who buy music on vinyl can enjoy more affordable turntables and replacement parts. Those things were efficient to make and therefore inexpensive when there were no competitors to the technology, but became inefficient to produce and expensive once investments were made in newly-developed alternatives.

The transit agency is stuck because it provides an obsolete product which is crucial to allow low-income city residents to move at all. If it charges a higher rate for usage to those who can afford it, they'll bail for the superior mode which does not force them to stand in close proximity to strangers for an hour to get to work and which they can also afford. Transit must be subsidized because, for most people using it, it isn't worth what it costs to maintain it. It may be a civic necessity, but in that case it should be the public collectively paying for it, not just people who drive being forced out of spite to cover it.

By the way, the government does not "subsidize auto use." It subsidizes home ownership, and for many decades used redlining to discourage living in racially-mixed urban areas. In fact, the government makes money off of every part of the process. It taxes your purchase of a car massively, it taxes the gas you buy, it taxes the maintenance you pay others to perform, and in many places it tolls your highway use. Also, it's irrelevant what happens along "the corridors in which transit runs," since there are no other modes following those routes. That's like saying "when trying to get from their bedroom to their kitchen, the vast majority of people are pedestrians."
 
Re: Green Line to Medford to start in 2011

Equilibria said:
Fine logic, but the government cannot do that.
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Sure it can! Particularly States. Virginia is a JV-partner in the new dynamic-pricing lanes on its part of the Capital beltway. (see https://www.495expresslanes.com/ ). Even more (to the chagrin of drivers) New York (since the days of Nelson Rockefeller) uses profits from the bridges around Manhattan to subsidize transit.

And Virginia isn't doing this because its gone all socialist/dirigiste (French), but because its the free market solution to rush hour congestion.
Equilibria said:
A private company can charge what the market will bear because its goal is to make money by selling people things. A government cannot. A government can only charge what it takes to make up the cost of maintaining the resource its charging for.
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Nope. (You have neither the law nor the facts on your side) Perfect counter-examples include the USA's auctioning of cellphone spectrum. The air is free and cost the government nothing to build or maintain, yet the government sold it for billions as the most-efficient way of allocating it. Period. Same goes for deep-ocean oil rights and plenty of other stuff that, when the government is thinking straight (instead of paying off constituencies or pandering) it auctions. Rush hour road capacity should be no different.

Economist-advisors on the government auctions stressed that the scarce thing goes to the highest bidder because that bidder has stumped up real cash to prove that he's got big/successful/high-value uses for the asset.
Equilibria said:
The government cannot be a business which charges for things people want or need to use simply because they can make money that way. If that logic held, transit systems would triple their fares during peak hour because "that will keep trains from being overcrowded."
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That logic *does* hold, and is *exactly* what the Washington DC Metro does as a way of making the people who overcrowd the system pay more for it (about a 60% premium on rush fares). It also shifts demand out of the peak (you'll see people lingering at the turnstiles waiting for 7pm). Yes, transit can/should have peak pricing too. THat more systems don't do this is mostly a failure of political will (and an unwllingness to peak-price). Fixed prices are sooo 1920 (when fares were collected mechanically, they couldn't do time-of-day pricing).

There are more subtle time of day things done on transit: some "Daily Pass" programs (unlimited rides for tourists) can't be used before 9am or 10am--if you want to go in the morning rush, you have to pay extra or separately--they are only willing to discount the off-peak. You'll also see some systems charge penalties for buying tickets on commuter trains at the peak (to discourage "congesting" the conductor and to shift transactions to off-train)

Equilibria said:
You're only applying this logic to highways because it advances the ability of urban dwellers to redistribute resources from suburban drivers to themselves by claiming that it's for the drivers' own good.
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Nope, we're doing it because its good public policy allocate scare resources using pricing (supply and demand) rather than silly processes like waiting lists, traffic jams, or lottery-award.
 
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Re: Green Line to Medford to start in 2011

Arlington said:
Sure it can! Particularly States. Virginia is a JV-partner in the new dynamic-pricing lanes on its part of the Capital beltway. (see https://www.495expresslanes.com/ ). Even more (to the chagrin of drivers) New York (since the days of Nelson Rockefeller) uses profits from the bridges around Manhattan to subsidize transit.
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Note the key role the "JV" plays in that example. Yes, the government has formed public-private-partnerships to build tollways, but those involve for-profit companies leasing public roadways. Under that agreement, the state makes money to pay for whatever it likes, and the private operator maintains the road and thus the relationship with the driver. It's the state leasing it's land and infrastructure, not the state making general fund money off of drivers - at least not directly.

Arlington said:
Nope. (You have neither the law nor the facts on your side) Perfect counter-examples include the USA's auctioning of cellphone spectrum. The air is free and cost the government nothing to build or maintain, yet the government sold it for billions as the most-efficient way of allocating it. Period. Same goes for deep-ocean oil rights and plenty of other stuff that, when the government is thinking straight (instead of paying off constituencies or pandering) it auctions. Rush hour road capacity should be no different.

Economist-advisors on the government auctions stressed that the scarce thing goes to the highest bidder because that bidder has stumped up real cash to prove that he's got big/successful/high-value uses for the asset.
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I'm not a legal expert, but those are most certainly not "perfect examples." The government has, in the past, sold resources when those resources simply cannot function without being strictly allocated. 2 companies can't provide cell-phone service on the same frequency, nor can 2 oil companies park rigs over the same spot.

Most importantly, there is a defined amount of both of these things available to the public, and this amount cannot be increased. Not so with highways. Highways are not resources in the public domain which must be allocated. They're investments that the public made with their own tax dollars with the understanding that they could use them to move efficiently and at will around their city, state, and country. Now, you're advocating that the government come back and say "Uh, we have sort of a problem here... uh... that money you paid isn't enough anymore. So... yeah... we'll need you to pay some more, and yeah... we'll also be charging you extra if you're expected at work at the start of the workday if you want to keep your job... and... uh... also... that money you give us won't make your life or commute any easier, we're using it to give people 30 miles from you a train to somewhere 35 miles from you, and... yeah... also they don't have to pay anything."

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fy3rjQGc6lA

By the way, congestion taxes are used in aviation to control access to slot-controlled airports. I believe that the money raised from the airlines in this way (like all money raised from airlines) is prevented, by FAA regulation, from being spent in ways which do not directly benefit the airlines (beyond a certain low cap, IIRC). This regulation exists because cities and counties owning airports would likely behave in the very way you're proposing for roads: by viewing airlines (and thus air passengers who don't live in the jurisdiction) as a way to print money for pet projects.

Arlington said:
That logic *does* hold, and is *exactly* what the Washington DC Metro does as a way of making the people who overcrowd the system pay more for it (about a 60% premium on rush fares). It also shifts demand out of the peak (you'll see people lingering at the turnstiles waiting for 7pm). Yes, transit can/should have peak pricing too. THat more systems don't do this is mostly a failure of political will (and an unwllingness to peak-price). Fixed prices are sooo 1920 (when fares were collected mechanically, they couldn't do time-of-day pricing).

There are more subtle time of day things done on transit: some "Daily Pass" programs (unlimited rides for tourists) can't be used before 9am or 10am--if you want to go in the morning rush, you have to pay extra or separately--they are only willing to discount the off-peak. You'll also see some systems charge penalties for buying tickets on commuter trains at the peak (to discourage "congesting" the conductor and to shift transactions to off-train)
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I didn't have time to research while I was writing that post. Ok, there's ONE transit system that does it already, and I agree that all of them should. I have no problem with the idea of pricing the TRANSPORTATION SYSTEM AS A WHOLE variably to fund improvements. I have no problem with all highways being tolled and having variable pricing schemes. My issue is solely with the notion that congestion pricing is a way to address the negative externality of congestion caused by cars and cars alone, which brings us to:

Arlington said:
Nope, we're doing it because its good public policy allocate scare resources using pricing (supply and demand) rather than silly processes like waiting lists, traffic jams, or lottery-award.
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B.S! You brought this up in the first place by saying the following:

Arlington said:
Congestion is the other HUGE externality that (mostly) cars and (somewhat) trucks impose on the other modes with smaller footprints (bike, transit, and walking) or greater densities of people (rail & bus).
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Your claim in that post was that congestion pricing paid by cars and only by cars was a way to pay their debt to those on other modes for clogging city streets. When I responded to that, CSTH changed course entirely by claiming that congestion taxes were meant to price a public resource, which is what you claim here.

Which is it?
 
Re: Green Line to Medford to start in 2011

Its both. They are sides to the same coin, opposite views of the same thing.

When you understand them, you will see that it is neither BS nor contradictory. Congestion is both a *cost* and an *allocation mechanism* (a bad one) of allocating a scarce resource (asphalt at rush hour).

Dynamic tolls are both a cost (a price) and the "real" allocation mechanism that has the power to draw investment to fix the problem. But it will also raise the cost of your rush hour car trip.

Congestion pricing tries to turn waiting (or not waiting) into money, not primarily as a way of raising money, but as a way of getting a more-liquid, less-government mandated market. It seems like manipulation to you only because your (rush hour) price would go up in a "real" market.

The next key analogy is that congestion functions *exactly* like a Soviet bread line: an allocation mechanism for a scarce resource that's been underpriced as a supposed favor to its users "Want some road? Wait in this long line!" Need to be at work at 9? Be prepared to wait longer

Tolls are also a cost, and also function as an allocation mechanism: "Want some road? Pay this toll! Want some *uncongested* road? Pay this *dynamic* toll!"

Some will wait in line because they have no choice (there's no free-flowing tolled alternative). If there were a black market or alternative uncongested system, many would choose to use it (you mean I can pay "Western" prices for bread and get some whenever I want? ) (Toll roads function as a legal, parallel system, and dynamically-tolled roads function as a real market alternative...capacity that's ready and priced when you need it).

So drivers in congestion are like Soviets in a bread line. Its a cost (a waste of time) but also a way of "proving" (paying your dues to show) that you need the thing. The bread and the road have both been underpriced, so there's no incentive (or market ability) to provide enough of it. So demand (for road from exurb to city) vastly exceeds supply of road (at rush hour, anyway), and your car crawls in congestion like a queue at a Soviet grocery store.

The government in both cases was stupid enough to tell you that you could have a thing for less than it costs to provide, that it could supply enough of a thing it was undercharging for, and that it could somehow allocate it based on some non-price mechanism (cheap for all!)

There's even hoarding...people removing supply from the market exactly when it would be most useful... as little neighborhoods close themselves off as cut-throughs (Boston has lots of hoarding, signs like: "local residents only 7am to 9am, 4pm to 6pm"...that's hoarding...they want it for their consumption but not for yours exactly when you're most hungry for asphalt)
 
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Re: Green Line to Medford to start in 2011

Holy moly, Equilibria. Well you completely misunderstand the point of Pigouvian taxes. No, vinyl records do not AFAIK produce any unpaid-for negative externalities. So that is not an application.

The transit agency is stuck because it provides an obsolete product which is crucial to allow low-income city residents to move at all.
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WOW! You really don't understand transit at all?! Well I'm not sure how much more of my time this discussion is worth. But I'll give it a shot for old time's sake.

Transit is not an "obsolete product" to be replaced by cars. Let's get that out of the way. I know some people once believed that and decided to do "urban renewal" to build the "future" but it didn't work out.

Why is transit a fundamental part of modern cities? Well it's one word: geometry. Nothing else can match the sheer capacity and people moving power of a properly operated transit line (likely rail, but technology aside) in the same amount of space. In a typical city, space is at a premium. A car occupies something like 20 times the amount of space that a person does. A car requires a place to occupy at all times, even when the person operating it is not around. To accommodate the movement and storage of cars on a city-scale is a problem which confounds itself. Without transit, all available space gets put towards the problem of finding room for all the cars. The result is either stagnation or sprawl.

If it was just a matter of replacing an "obsolete product" then all we'd have to do is subsidize cars even more in order to get them into the hands of every last person. And then invent automated cars for children, the incapable, and the elderly.

But in any human city above a certain size and density, there will be a need for transit because of that fundamental geometry problem. And as far as I can tell, people will always naturally tend to form such cities, as they have throughout history.
 
Re: Green Line to Medford to start in 2011

That cars are underpriced in their own special way (no peak pricing; using only congestion as a peak-allocation) is partly due to cars traditionally not being behind faregates, but rail and bus have always had a fare-collector who could look at his watch.

Equilibria said:
I didn't have time to research while I was writing that post. Ok, there's ONE transit system that does it already, and I agree that all of them should. I have no problem with the idea of pricing the TRANSPORTATION SYSTEM AS A WHOLE variably to fund improvements.
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That is what we're saying too--but you won't listen to the additional reality that in a good, holistic view, two things are seen:
1) cars can and should be hit hardest with price increases because they have uniquely over-used their under-priced highways, and urban street space at rush hours, and their free parking all day long.
2) If you had a choice of cost-effective / highly desired ways of adding capacity, it would probably be bus (if roads were uncongested the 80 Bus would be a dream and an 80 Skip-Stop would probably suffice. But we're building the Green Line Extension on its own right of way because the MBTA has concluded that street running bogs down too many people and assets)

You are also not listening that when we talk about TRANSPORTATION SYSTEM AS A WHOLE we include costs like:
1) The cost of pollution
2) The cost of providing government services to far-flung / spread-out populations
3) The costs of delay

These are costs that are mainly imposed by sprawl and cars, but not reflected in the prices they pay.

For the record, I think that the MBTA should charge both distance-based charges (longer trips cost more) and time of day charges (rush hour costs more). But the MBTA does not have exit card readers (washington dc does) to apply the "how far you came" and "what time did you enter"). The old exit fares / aboveground is free worked well (FWIW)>

This study from Canada suggests that rush hour transit can be priced between 50% and 100% higher than average rush.

And here (from a quick Google) are systems that charge Rush Hour premiums:
LIRR
Metro North
Minn-St.Paul Bus
DC Metro Rail
London
Seattle (King County)
LA Metro (Senior/Disabled Off-Peak discounts)

The point is that in many systems (including some of the largest systems in the world), they apply the exact same peak pricing mechanism to transit that we're saying should also apply to cars. It will get applied to cars to discourage their congesting of everyone's roads and then, money in hand, governments will spend it in ways that maximize the demand for mobility. With cars properly priced, people are likely to demand buses and rail.
 
Re: Green Line to Medford to start in 2011

Can we keep this on topic of the Green Line Extension. The Medford Street Rail Bridge in Somerville is now under construction. Medford Street was closed Yesterday and will remain closed for about 3 weeks with a detour in place. Crews are cleaning and painting the existing rail bridge.

National Grid is relocating utilities on Harvard Street to accommodate the new widened bridge.
 
Re: Green Line to Medford to start in 2011

Perhaps we could split all this off into a car vs train thread? Mods? Though it is sad to see the animosity between car and train. Can't we all get along and agree that we hate cyclists?

To bring things back to the specifics of Massachusetts and funding the transit projects (particularly on the backs of drivers), the Reason Foundation recently released their annual highway report. Very nice concise stuff.
http://reason.org/studies/show/20th-annual-highway-report

Here's MA, ranked 18th best highways in the nation:
http://reason.org/files/20thannualhighways-ma.pdf
Here's NH, ranked 43rd best highways in the nation:
http://reason.org/files/20thannualhighways-nh.pdf

Note that NH routinely spends ~150k per mile of highway, while MA routinely spends ~650k per mile of highway. Half a million more per highway mile, or more than 4 times as much per highway mile, however you want to look at it. Crazy part is that NH isn't even in the cheapest half per mile in the country (they're the 29th least expensive).

And the frightening part is that MA has the 7th *worst* bridges in the country, but the 6th *highest* cost per bridge mile. On the bright side, we've got the lowest highway fatalities and the best rural interstate conditions, so there's that.

Added up, and it doesn't take much for citizens of the Commonwealth to be skeptical of the idea that all their current tax dollars are being spent prudently, so I really can't blame them for balking at the idea of their taxes going up even higher. It really seems that there must be some serious graft and inherent inefficiencies in the system as it stands. Truly tragic, because I remain convinced that, if someone were actually able to clean house, we'd have enough money to go full steam ahead on many of the major infrastructure projects.
 
Re: Green Line to Medford to start in 2011

I don't know exactly what this means but it appears that the MassDOT board is going to vote on allocating $393 million to the T for the Green Line project at its meeting next week.

13. Authorization to execute an ISA in the amount of $393,046,243.09 and for the MBTA to execute Interim Guarantee Maximum Price contracts to MBTA Contract CM/GC-E22, “entitled Green Line Extension Project with White Skanska Kiewit with a duration of fifty-one (51) months from date of the Notice to Proceed.
http://www.mbta.com/about_the_mbta/public_meetings/?id=26008
 
Re: Green Line to Medford to start in 2011

Semass said:
I don't know exactly what this means but it appears that the MassDOT board is going to vote on allocating $393 million to the T for the Green Line project at its meeting next week.

13. Authorization to execute an ISA in the amount of $393,046,243.09 and for the MBTA to execute Interim Guarantee Maximum Price contracts to MBTA Contract CM/GC-E22, “entitled Green Line Extension Project with White Skanska Kiewit with a duration of fifty-one (51) months from date of the Notice to Proceed.
http://www.mbta.com/about_the_mbta/public_meetings/?id=26008
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Formality from the Transportation Bill that was passed. It's not the full amount they need because of the way the bill was gutted in the Legislature so they've still got question marks about funding the last stages of the build, but GLX gets its representative share of the reduced bill. At minimum it's full speed ahead for Lechmere relocation, the Union branch, Phase I opening for the Medford branch (Washington St./Brickbottom) and all the Lowell Line pre-prep upstream. The stuff they can operate without the carhouse being funded.

Maybe some indeterminate amount of Phase II intermediate stations also doable with the money currently committed, but that starts hitting a capacity brick wall without the carhouse funding. They definitely need another appropriation to finish to Medford Hillside and have capacity to operate it all. With Route 16 not even funded for design and only committed at this point by squishy Legislative I.O.U.


Lots of drama yet to come, but at minimum you can now safely say a one-seat ride to Union and East Somerville is clinched to happen this decade.
 
Re: Green Line to Medford to start in 2011

So we should take this as a positive development that the state is moving forward without relying 100% on the federal Santa Claus? It sounds like a good start.
 
Re: Green Line to Medford to start in 2011

Semass said:
So we should take this as a positive development that the state is moving forward without relying 100% on the federal Santa Claus? It sounds like a good start.
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Yes. If you want to take the glass half-full view of what DeLeo and Murray did to the Transportation Bill. It was all about pissing in Patrick's corn flakes to remind him who's really boss. So the politics of transportation in this state didn't improve one bit from that fiasco. But...something is something.

Hopefully the next Gov. cares enough about transit to take another swing at it in '15 as one of the first orders of business. They'll usually get grace period for one piece of signature legislation before the Dictator of the House and Senate Monarch revert back to dick-measuring contest status quo vs. the Executive branch.
 
Re: Green Line to Medford to start in 2011

^Please God don't let our next governor be Martha Coakley!
 
Re: Green Line to Medford to start in 2011

F-Line to Dudley said:
Hopefully the next Gov. cares enough about transit to take another swing at it in '15 as one of the first orders of business. They'll usually get grace period for one piece of signature legislation before the Dictator of the House and Senate Monarch revert back to dick-measuring contest status quo vs. the Executive branch.
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They are both gonna be gone before the next Governor is in office.
 
Re: Green Line to Medford to start in 2011

MBTAddict said:
They are both gonna be gone before the next Governor is in office.
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Yeah. And that's what we said about the last 4 or 6 of them before they were indicted, impaled themselves on failed gubenatorial bids, cashed out before they were indicted to make millions on the lobbying circuit, or fled to cushy university presidencies before the shit hit the fan with their murderous mobster siblings. There is always a new heavy to replace them when they go. It's a structural flaw with the top-heaviness of the Legislature's leadership ranks, not some temporary phenomenon.

We haven't had a Speaker finish his tenure as Speaker without indictment in 23 years, and haven't had a non-compromised Senate Prez. in 35 years. Murray and DeLeo are #1 and #2 in lobbying donations in the state, and smashed pretty much every fundraising record by each of their predecessors despite having to deal around much stricter Legislative donation limits than nearly all of their predecessors. Both of them are a cinch to follow Bob Travaglini onto the lobbying circuit when they term out in their positions. This is structural. Whoever leads each chamber can pretty much do whatever the fuck they want and keep the membership totally cowed with carte blanche over committee assignments and fear of repraisals for any sustained opposition to the leadership.

It's structural. Independent of how you feel about the Transportation Bill, it went down like so many others: a bullying reminder of who really runs this state. There is ALWAYS one piece of major legislation per term that gets unilaterally spiked or gutted by those same 1-2 people for no other reason than to reinforce that message. The content of the legislation itself is irrelevant, and so is whatever explanation they give for gutting it. It's territorial pissing...no more, no less.
 
Re: Green Line to Medford to start in 2011

F-Line, how did the new developers get around having to relocate Lechmere? Weren't the old permits (or a land swap or something) dependent on the developers footing the Lechmere bill? I realize that old developers flamed out, but do you know why the new developers were let off the hook?
 
Re: Green Line to Medford to start in 2011

AmericanFolkLegend said:
F-Line, how did the new developers get around having to relocate Lechmere? Weren't the old permits (or a land swap or something) dependent on the developers footing the Lechmere bill? I realize that old developers flamed out, but do you know why the new developers were let off the hook?
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The land swap is contingent on Pan Am Railways paying to streetscape Lechmere Sq. whenever they got their developer for the old site. In exchange the T got an under-price deal on the land it acquired from Pan Am. Including some stuff that has nothing to do with GLX/Northpoint, like the 2 decades-abandoned Lowell freight yards that they're cashing in for new commercial/residential development.

Lot of quid pro quo with those transactions. I have to wonder if the absolute steal the state got on buying the Conn River Line/Vermonter route and the Adams Branch for the relocated Berkshire Scenic RR excursion train were secret I.O.U.'s tied up in this bundle. They only paid $17M for the Conn River, which is easily worth 3 times as much.


I would say they got their money's worth out of Pan Am for that whole convoluted series of land swaps. They were always going to have to pay for the station construction themselves, but a shitload of land and ROW assets under public control is a pretty nice haul.
 
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