From M-Live:

Michigan Flyer users are riled up after Detroit Metro Airport announced plans to relocate the popular bus service’s stop at McNamara Terminal from curbside to one 500 feet away where passengers must brave the elements.

Michigan Flyer officials say they worry the new stop could hurt their 98 percent on-time record because they can’t load or unload passengers if they can’t find a parking slot at the new stop, located at the Ground Transportation Center. The current stop is located just outside a waiting room for International Arrivals.

The move takes place Monday and affects all Michigan Flyer customers taking flights to or from McNamara Terminal, which serves Delta and Air France passengers.

TRANS4M, an advocacy group for public transportation in Michigan, is also taking a stand against the switch, saying it will hinder seniors and those with disabilities.

Michigan Flyer officials say in an email, “We’re urging DTW to reconsider the move, or at least make it easier on passengers.”

Wayne County Airport Authority officials say the move will increase safety and ease congestion, according to TRANS4M. Michigan Flyer argues it has an “impeccable safety record” at the current location.

MLive is seeking a response from the authority about the new location.

Frequent users of the bus say they haven’t witnessed congestion at the current stop.

“When using the service I have not experienced or seen congestion,” wrote Liz Boyd, political consultant and former spokeswoman for Gov. Jennifer Granholm. “Also, it’s also my understanding the other buses – including the employee bus service – that use the drop-off location 168 times a day — are not being relocated.”

Michigan Flyer in an email lobbied its users to write the Detroit airport to complain about the switch:

Your opinion matters. If you’re so inclined, you can share it in one email to several key people involved in this decision: Thomas Naughton, CEO of the Wayne County Airport Authority; Michael Ford, CEO of the Ann Arbor Area Transportation Authority; Gordon Mackay, CEO of Michigan Flyer; Michigan Governor Rick Snyder; Senator Debbie Stabenow and the Michigan Department of Transportation.Just put “DTW relocation of Michigan Flyer-AirRide” in the subject line of your email, express your thoughts, then copy and paste all of the following addresses into the “To” area and hit Send: thomas.naughton@wcaa.us; airride@theride.org; info@michiganflyer.com ; rick.snyder@michigan.gov; senator@stabenow.senate.gov; mdot-oca@Michigan.gov

From The Detroit News:

The tracks have been cleared for the state to develop faster, cushier Amtrak service between Detroit and Chicago now that the Michigan Senate has ended its probe of a state passenger rail car purchase.

State transportation officials want to buy two sets of cars and engines, built in the United States by an affiliate of Spanish train maker Talgo Inc., as part of an Amtrak upgrade. The updates would allow trains to reach 110 miles an hour and, in a few years, get passengers from one city to another two hours faster than they can today.

Officials also hope to improve Amtrak’s on-time service, which ranged from as low as 6.5 percent to as high as 52.3 percent among the Detroit-Chicago trains in July. Amtrak’s website reports on-time rates on the route have ranged from 21.5 percent to 39 percent in the last 12 months.

Lawmakers who questioned a one-bid contract awarded to a Spanish firm for “next-generation” passenger cars now are willing to let the deal proceed, said Senate Transportation Committee Chairman John Pappageorge, R-Troy.

The $58 million for Michigan’s two train sets is to come from $200 million in federal funds for Amtrak improvements in Michigan and other states, mostly in the Midwest. The move to the faster trains is expected to give a boost to the Detroit-Chicago route, where ridership steadily has been building back toward a 20-year peak of nearly 504,000 passengers in 2010.

Down the road, the state will use additional federal money for more “next-generation” passenger car and engine sets, said Michigan Department of Transportation railroad chief Tim Hoeffner. The state will own the cars and the Michigan rails on the Detroit-Chicago route for now.

Hoeffner said the Talgo car purchase isn’t finalized. An evaluation of the equipment’s suitability for Michigan’s needs is taking longer than expected, so the cars won’t be in service next month as originally proposed, he said.

Bid controversy

The two Talgo sets will replace 30- to 40-year-old Amtrak cars on two of the three daily Detroit-Chicago runs on the route Amtrak calls The Wolverine. Older cars will continue on the other run until the state buys newer equipment in a couple of years.

“The difference between them is like the difference between the car I learned to drive in the 1970s and the cars my kids learn to drive now,” Hoeffner said. Michigan’s passenger trains, he said, gradually will become more like the sleek, modern trains that run in Europe and Asia.

Current aluminum coaches on the route lack modern amenities and are deteriorating because Amtrak has no budget to overhaul them, according to MDOT. They have institutional decor, lack carpeting, contain harsh lighting and lack hot water in restrooms, the department says.

Pappageorge said what “raised red signals” was that Talgo was the sole bidder to supply the cars. The company happened to have newly built train sets sitting at an Amtrak facility in Beech Grove, Indiana, and Michigan needed to act quickly because federal funds were available.

“It was appropriate to look into it because that didn’t look right,” Pappageorge said. “Digging into it, we came to the conclusion that Talgo was the right answer — not a perfect one but adequate.”

In a statement on behalf of her company, U.S. public affairs vice president Nora Friend said Talgo officials “are very pleased that the Senate committee is being respectful of the (bid) process and is allowing the deal to go forward.”

The train sets were built for Wisconsin’s Amtrak routes, before Gov. Scott Walker canceled the deal. They are sitting idle in Indiana while the company and that state battle in court over money Talgo claims Wisconsin still owes it.

The Senate’s inquiry, which lasted through the summer, resulted from a challenge by a competing firm, Chicago-based Corridor Capital, which didn’t bid but claimed the process seemed to favor Talgo. The state’s bid specifications were so narrow only one company could meet them, Corridor Capital said.

The criticism, aired at Senate committee hearings, also came from former U.S. Rep. Joe Schwarz of Battle Creek, a train buff and volunteer adviser to Gov. Rick Snyder on rail issues. He questioned whether Talgo’s equipment can meet Michigan’s needs — a criticism Corridor Capital continues to press.

“They didn’t meet the minimum requirements,” charged Lansing public relations specialist John Truscott, who represents Corridor Capital. “If they did qualify, this would have been an easy decision. We (still) feel it would be just as easy for MDOT to do the right thing and open this back up (for rebidding).”

‘Incremental’ improvements

But Pappageorge said members of the Senate’s Transportation and Appropriations committees found the bid process was handled properly. They also concluded Talgo’s equipment is adequate, based on hours of testimony about train car specifications, he said.

A problem for Corridor Capital was that the company didn’t have train sets ready to go, Hoeffner said. The firm sought a state contract under which it would take over the entire state rail service, not just supply rail cars. It is working on a similar deal with Indiana.

State transportation department analysts believe an “incremental approach” is more prudent for Michigan right now, Hoeffner said. The goal is to continue building ridership on the Detroit-Chicago route, the busiest of its three passenger corridors, through faster service and nicer cars.

“All customers want to know is: When do I leave, when do I arrive and is it convenient?” Hoeffner said.

The trip now takes about 6½ hours most days, but Hoeffner said MDOT’s goal is to reduce the time to 4 hours — about the same amount of time needed to drive the route in a car. The state has purchased the in-state portion of the route and is in the midst of upgrades that should be completed in late 2017 or in 2018.

From The Chicago Tribune:

For many of the 120,000 rail passengers who pass through each day, Union Station is either a mystifying maze of ramps and escalators, or a perplexing funnel that forces them to navigate perilously narrow platforms.

Commuting challenges include dodging water from leaky roofs and trying not to breathe diesel fumes too deeply.

Officials from the Chicago Department of Transportation, Amtrak, Metra and other agencies have been working since 2010 on a master plan to improve the station and make commuting easier.

In an update Wednesday, officials provided a glimpse of both short-term fixes, mainly better access to CTA buses, and proposals for long-term enhancements. Planners are studying ways to reconfigure the building last remodeled in 1992 by its owner, Amtrak, to accommodate more trains and passengers and improve the flow of foot traffic.

The station is like a “warren of obscure passageways with no natural light,” said Marc Magliari, Amtrak’s manager of media relations.

Jeffrey Sriver, planning director for the Chicago Department of Transportation, said work will be underway in 2015 on two projects that will produce an immediate benefit for commuters.

The first is the addition of dedicated lanes on Canal St. to improve access to CTA buses.

The second will be the construction of an off-street bus terminal on Jackson Blvd. between Canal and Clinton streets. to provide direct, weather-protected connections between the station and CTA buses while also relieving congestion on nearby streets.

Longer-term improvements include converting unused platforms so they can be used by commuters and Amtrak. Tracks would be realigned to accommodate wider platforms and new stairways so passengers can exit without using the concourse.

No major changes are planned for the historic Great Hall, which dates to 1925 and is the site of the iconic stairway scene in the 1987 movie “The Untouchables.”

Amtrak predicts growth in ridership, most immediately from additional trips serving Downstate and the Rockford-Quad Cities area, and from the development of high-speed rail, said Joe Shacter, director of public and intermodal transportation for the Illinois Department of Transportation.

David Kralik, Metra’s head of long-range planning, acknowledged the congestion caused by service disruptions, particularly involving BNSF trains that use the station’s south concourse. The BNSF is the busiest of Metra’s 11 lines.

BNSF commuters experienced another jam-packed evening rush hour Tuesday when signal problems forced Metra to cancel two trains. Crowds extended up the escalators and into the station’s food court level.

To ease the pressure, Metra has tried to encourage passengers to wait in the Great Hall during delays. “There’s just not enough space for everyone,” Kralik said.

As he caught a BNSF train Wednesday afternoon, longtime rider Mark O’Brien, 62, said any changes that would mean wider platforms and eased congestion in the concourse would be a welcome relief.

“When they have train delays, it’s actually dangerous in there,” O’Brien said.

Source: http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/local/breaking/chi-union-station-improvements-20140910-story.html

From The Grand Rapids Press:

From the second-floor of The Rapid’s headquarters in downtown Grand Rapids, Conrad Venema looks out at U.S. 131 cutting through the heart of the city.

The view offers a stark contrast of travel of old — mammoth concrete corridors designed for personal vehicles — against what transportation planners like Venema see as the future with shared rides that reduce potential gridlock and speed movement.

And just as highways helped spur the region’s growth for years, West Michigan leaders are confident this week’s launch of the $40 million Silver Line Bus Rapid Transit system — the first of its kind in Michigan — will play a central role in the next wave of economic, housing and transportation development.

The 9.6-mile line that connects the center city and the Medical Mile with its southern suburbs of Wyoming and Kentwood, supporters say, offers an efficient alternative by cutting a typical 45-minute drive to a 27-minute commute.

“We’ve designed this to attract the choice rider,” Venema said of people who can select their method of moving around the area. “We finally have a transportation mode that’s competing with the car.

“This is part of Grand Rapids growing up. It’s a bigger city, and it’s a bigger project.”

Some aren’t as optimistic and say the route isn’t nearly as transformational as advocates claim.

In fact, Jeff Steinport from the Kent County Taxpayer’s Alliance alleges the Silver Line is a spending boondoggle that duplicates public transportation routes already available through The Rapid’s traditional bus system. He also claims it is unlikely to speed traffic for those on the bus or for those still driving, particularly along Division Avenue, the main corridor of the line.

“A quarter of existing routes are faster…it’s not really that big of an improvement,” Steinport said.

The experiment starts Monday, Aug. 25, with a week’s worth of free rides to entice people to give the Silver Line a try, but the test of the system’s necessity and its ability will be over years, not months.

According to the National Transit Database, The Rapid’s passenger trips for 2012 climbed to 11.9 million, up from 10.8 million rides in 2011 and 9.7 million in 2010. Venema sees those numbers growing with Silver Line serving as an addition and complement to current service, but he admits some of those riders might choose to move within the system.

Steinport doubts Silver Line will make the splash its supporters claim.

“The Rapid’s busiest Route 1 already serves Division, and ridership numbers rose by about 5 percent from September 2011 to 2012 then fell by the same amount the following year. It’s unrealistic, at best, a new bus along an existing route would add development,” Steinport said.

“It seems they’re reaching the point of saturation. You’re going to run into the limit where the route covers.”

Rapid officials insist the service eventually can serve at least 5,000 riders each weekday. According to the agency’s latest figures, April 2014 saw about 2,900 daily passengers on Route 1.

A FUTURE INVESTMENT

Grand Rapids’ system hopes to replicate the success the BRT has in Cleveland, which served as a model and stimulated about $5.8 billion in development since 2008. Officials are certain there will be growth because of the Silver Line, but they note the size of the boon in West Michigan remains uncertain.

“It’s a well-informed bet based off of other bus rapid transit systems across the country and the economic development that has spurred,” said Suzanne Schultz, Grand Rapids’ planning director, pointing to Cleveland’s Euclid Avenue Health Line.

“Cleveland now is a poster child…you have a high concentration of employment and education,” said Schultz, referencing similarities between the cities medical schools and hospitals. “It really serves as the anchor to draw people into the transit system.”

The Silver Line equates to roughly $3.5 million to $4 million per mile of investment, Venema said. Grand Rapids’ Downtown Market, Van Andel Arena, DeVos Place, Grand Rapids Community College and many more housing developments and eateries lie on the route’s northern end and the hope is that the growth spreads southward.

Jerry DeGood, vice president of the Division Avenue Business Association admits there’s more to be desired along the route outside a scattering of fast food restaurants, car lots and thrift stores. He knows the area well, having been an owner of a used car dealership on that stretch for more than 25 years.

He sees the Silver Line as a worthwhile gamble, a bet the community can afford to take.

“The perception is that they’ve done this in other communities, and the positives have outweighed the negatives,” DeGood said. “Businesses have gone up; property values went up; apartment and condos go under construction.

“History has shown in the majority of other BRT projects across the country, it’s worked. We’re just hoping it falls in line, here, and we have our turn at it.”

About $32 million sourced from the federal government — the largest piece of Silver Line funding — in October 2012 turned the project from concept in 2003 to reality more than a decade later.

That amount rests atop about $7.9 million from the state and $15.3 million generated annually from a May 2011 millage, with one-third helping to pay for Silver Line operational costs, including driver salaries and diesel fuel when the buses’ electric motors begin to switch over past 25 mph. That millage was passed by a slim 136-vote margin. At the time, critics complained the tax would be collected from property owners in six cities, but the Silver Line would pass through only three municipalities.

The Rapid CEO Peter Varga said the project’s $40 million total cost is roughly 10 percent under budget, though final calculations still are being determined.

GET THERE FROM HERE

The route begins at the system’s Central Station along Grandville Avenue, weaves its way through downtown’s main corridors of Monroe Avenue and Michigan Street before intersecting Fulton and Wealthy streets. The line will pass down Division Avenue and turn around at 60th Street.

A bus rapid transit service boils down the time of the trip when compared with a traditional bus system and allows riders to be productive while on the go, Venema said. The buses have technology that keeps traffic lights green, enabling the driver and passengers to cruise through intersections. Riders can use Wi-Fi capability — a function that won’t be immediately available due to a vendor snafu — while moving.

Imagine a commute, Varga says, without the worry of being caught in traffic or having to find a parking space. The trip gets faster when rush hour bus-only lanes take traditional traffic out of bus drivers’ sight. The right lanes in some portions of the route will be only for buses, which will stop at each station every 10 minutes. Riders can monitor the system with real-time arrival and departure times.

“When you start putting all these layers on top, that totally separates it from your regular bus,” Venema said. “That’s when you start having that competitive edge.”

A ride on the Silver Line will cost $1.50, the same as a regular bus trip, with options to buy passes for two weeks or a month at a time. Rather than paying a driver or at the central station, passengers will be on an honor system and able to pay for fares at kiosks resembling an ATM at any of the stops.

While the Rapid will have spot fare checks, leaders are confident most will pay. Research by Transit Cooperative Research Program that found nine out of 10 passengers pay when bus drivers aren’t collecting fares upon boarding.

And fare-jumping won’t be cheap with $65 fines for the first offense and higher penalties for additional offenses that quickly climb above $200.

There also are consequences for vehicle drivers who don’t follow the bus-only lane regulations, with a ticket costing a minimum of $110 and adding two points on an operator’s license.

THE FUTURE

The Silver Line, supporters say, is positioned to move people along its route and benefit the communities it serves, though only time will tell how successful it becomes.

While this project is Michigan’s first such BRT line, a 12-mile “Laker Line” between Grand Valley State University and downtown Grand Rapids on Lake Michigan Drive could be its second. Transit officials currently are conducting a $600,000 grant-funded study to determine how much the project would cost and what it ultimately might look like upon completion.

That project combined with the Silver Line could create additional opportunities for the region and help offset a potential traffic crunch, Schultz said.

“Given that Grand Rapids is a regional employer, we have about 50,000 people who are either employees or visitors within a square mile,” she said. “Having everyone drive their own vehicle is not going to be the answer if we’re going to have economic development.

“If we did not do some sort of improvement for transit, bikes and pedestrians, everything comes to a stop.”

Source: http://www.mlive.com/news/grand-rapids/index.ssf/2014/08/striking_gold_with_silver_line.html

More coverage in The Grand Rapids Press/M-Live.com:

http://topics.mlive.com/tag/silver-line/posts.html