I watched the replay of their webinar from two days ago. Among the highlights for me was hearing one of their project engineers say that Site 3 would allow a "cross-platform transfer" between the Downeaster (5 trains per direction each day) and the east-west rail service (doesn't exist).
We're supposed to nod our heads in agreement at the matrix shown on the Station Site Comparison slide in their presentation, which puts Sites 2 & 3 on equal footing on the basis of transit connectivity. Site 2 is adjacent to the bus system's High-Frequency Corridor, where multiple routes converge to provide 10-minute headways into Downtown. Site 3 is along a single bus route that comes through every half-hour...and could be the future home of a hypothetical cross-platform transfer!
Getting the station off the Mountain Division and onto the mainline makes plenty of sense from an operational standpoint, so at least in the abstract, this is a worthy project. But Site 3's real comparative advantage is that it provides easy access to the branch, where the maintenance facility is located and where future rail service to Westbrook would run...but they could have their cake and eat it too if they just rebuilt that portion of the wye. I look at all the stats that are meant to impress me about how inefficient it is for them to access the branch on a yearly basis ($973,000 in costs! 31,000 passenger hours!) and can't help but wonder why they haven't already built it, or why they aren't proposing to relocate the maintenance facility off the branch, too.
Truth is, none of the three proposed sites would be much of a step up in terms of TOD, bike/ped/transit connectivity, etc compared with the existing PTC. The Western Promenade, while beautiful, is a geographic barrier that puts the area around St. John Street at least a half-hour walk from the heart of Downtown. It would be hard to beat Congress Street in terms of transit access no matter what, but if the proposed rail bypass along 295 were ever built, then the best spot for compelling TOD would be in Bayside, along Marginal Way. A station over there would only be a half-mile walk from Downtown and offer much more potential to grow and to naturally integrate into the existing built environment.
If there were local advocates pushing the rail-along-295 vision as the ideal, long-term solution, then NNEPRA could always build an inexpensive station on Site 3 to reap the benefits of improved operational efficiency without giving anyone the idea that this is the very best Portland can ever do. Because Portland absolutely could do better.
