Right Now Downtown

HEAR YE, HEAR YE!

Chapter $18 of the book $20 Per Gallon is entitled, “Renaissance of the Rails.”  Says author Christopher Steiner, “People will cling to their steering wheels and their airline seats until their fingers are pried off by sheer financial behest.”

At $12 per gallon, Steiner asserts that the United States will have a desire to fund passenger rail in meaningful amounts.  By the time gasoline reaches $18 per gallon, the U.S. will muster the political will to invest in a national high-speed rail network.

Since 1956, the federal government has spent $20 on highways for every $1 it has spent on railways.  Railroads spend more than 15% of their revenues on track repairs, upkeep, and signals.  As gasoline prices increase, the ratio of public expenditures between highways and railways will become more and more even until, Steiner maintains, U.S. rail to road expenditures will become equal at about $18 a gallon. 

High-speed rail will not be limited to the Northeast Corridor, nor will new high speed investments be limited to California and Florida.  At $18 a gallon for gasoline, even Ohio will be brought, kicking and screaming, into reality.

The third chapter of the book $20 Gasoline is subtitled, “$8, The Skies Will Empty.”  Author Christopher Steiner argues that the number of airline seats will contract by half as the cost of fuel jumps to 60% of industry operating costs from 13% in 2003.  With the exception of Continental Airlines, “legacy” airline companies will cease to exist, including United, USAirways, American, Delta and Northwest.

Smaller airports such as Dayton’s will lose most of their service.  Small, regional jets will disappear.  Airlines will no longer offer flights for distances of less than 350 miles because of the amount of fuel required for taking off and landing an aircraft.

Scheduled air service will remain, but will become too expensive for most people.  Airline terminals will close gates.  Cities with multiple airports will consolidate service into one.

Some destinations such as Las Vegas that rely on leisure air travel will survive, but experience large-scale abandonment.  Others such as Disney World will close.

Families will live closer together.  College students will study closer to home.  Only the very rich will be able to fly to Aspen for a ski vacation.  Economies throughout the world will become more local.

Columbus seems to have a phobia about congestion.  Several years ago, for example, I served on a taxicab task force to discuss ways to make cab service more appealing.  We spent a great deal of time talking about how to encourage more people to hail taxis and made several recommendations to the City to eliminate a perception that it discouraged hailing.

Safety officials were particularly vexed by late-night taxi service on Park Street near the North Market.  From 10 p.m. to 3 a.m. Park Street looked like Manhattan, with a steady stream of taxis dropping and cruising for fares.  There were too many taxis!  Cabs stopped in the street!  People stepped into the street to climb into a cab!

The fear of congestion runs deep in some Columbus circles.  Last week, a Public Safety official asked the Pearl Market to eliminate its vendors on Broad and Gay streets.  Although the Public Service Department had issued permits, the Public Safety Department had not.

According to the Safety official, the “problem” with the Pearl Market is pedestrian congestion!  There are too many people on the sidewalk!  People are lingering!

In honor of this request, I feature a picture of the ideal downtown sidewalk.

The 2010 Downtown Columbus Strategic Plan was adopted by Columbus City Council on July 19, after many months of public input, planning, discussion, dreaming and synthesizing.  This Plan is not a to-do list; rather it is meant to guide investment and development in downtown for the next 10 years.  It takes off where the 2002 Strategic Business Plan for Downtown Columbus ended, building on the long-term framework and looking to identify catalysts for growth.

The planning process, which included public meetings, an online survey and discussion with downtown stakeholders, identified a list of 10 Principles to define the community’s goals and vision, 12 Ideas emerging from those Principles, and 8 Strategies to implement the Ideas.  To view the complete Plan, including the Principles, Ideas and Strategies, click here.

What does this mean for Capital Crossroads Special Improvement District (CCSID)?  First off, Cleve Ricksecker, Executive Director of CCSID, was involved in the planning meetings and participated in a downtown stakeholder interview.  All efforts to improve the downtown are important to the SID, and Ricksecker approached the planning process with that point of view in mind.

“The SID had already worked with MSI to develop our Public Realm Enhancement Plan - a wish list for the SID, if you will.  I was able to offer input from a SID-perspective through the strategic planning process,” explained Ricksecker.

Andrew Overbeck of MSI added, “We know Cleve real well and he was part of these meetings.  The SID’s plan was done beforehand, so that informed our planning sessions with regard to what enhancements they were looking for downtown.  It will be great to integrate these plans.”

As the City seeks to implement the Strategic Plan over the long term, public/private partnerships will play a vital role.  And over the years, CCSID has acted as a catalyst for such parternships, from the revitalization of Gay Street in 2007 to the wayfinding sign system that was installed in 2008.

Overbeck identified Ideas four through nine of the Plan, which deal with the High Street Core, as falling specifically within the SID boundaries and as places where the City, the Columbus Downtown Development Corporation (CDDC) and others will look to partner with CCSID.  These ideas include:

• Redefining Broad Street as the civic spine of the City;
• Restoring High Street as downtown’s commercial corridor;
• Developing a Downtown Transit Center to replace the High Street Transit Mall;
• Building a 3-c Multi-Modal Station;
• Developing a Downtown Field House.

“We have looked at each part of the Plan and identified where partnerships currently exist and where they can be developed.  Right now these are just ideas, but it’s important to get everyone at the table to let some of these ideas take hold,” added Overbeck.

Ricksecker agrees.  “We look forward to partnering with the City, CDDC and others to bring these ideas to fruition.  Through the SID’s efforts, some advance work has already been done, particularly with regard to bike facilities and restoring the High Street retail corridor.”

Overbeck noted that if one looked at photos of Columbus from 1995, one would see an abandoned prison, an abandoned school and an undeveloped gash through the city where 670 cut through.   Fifteen years later, those same areas are vibrant sectors – the Arena District, COSI and the High Street cap over 670.  The vision of our city leaders in the 1990s has taken root in our city’s fabric.

“It’s an inspiring thing.  We can do an awful lot in Columbus.  None of these things is out of reach,” concluded Overbeck.

The next fifteen years should be something to behold.

Reconstruction of the I-71 and I-70 “split” in downtown shows how badly Ohio’s transportation policies need to be fixed.

Ohio will soon spend $1.7 billion rebuilding a few miles of interstate highway in downtown.  The result will be a wider trench and monster freeway roaring through half a dozen urban neighborhoods.

One reason for reconstructing this stretch of highway makes sense, to make it safe.  The other reason, to increase capacity, is ludicrous.  Additional lanes for through traffic will not fix anything.  According to ODOT, the wider highway will quickly fill to capacity, leaving us with no more than a bigger traffic jam.  Why?  Bigger highways merely enable the same people to drive longer distances to do tasks previously done closer to home.

In the meantime, Ohio legislators cannot seem to agree on spending $17 million per year to operate a 260-mile passenger rail line.  Isn’t it interesting that our State legislators don’t debate the cost of maintaining highway “improvements?”  How much do taxpayers spend on highway patrols, snow removal, roadway and bridge repairs, landscaping, lighting repairs, storm-water run-off, litter collection, signage, emergency medical services and other ongoing costs?

There is a solution for the highway “split” in downtown.  Fix the safety problems.  Don’t increase road capacity.

Cars are expensive!  The Columbus Dispatch reported on Friday that the average cost to own and operate a car is $8,487 per year.

I remember the sticker shock I experienced when I bought my first car in 2007 (earlier I married into a car, had kids and got divorced).  With joint custody of three school-age kids, taxicabs did not meet all of my needs, and the closest Zipcar location was a 30-minute walk.

Prior to buying into the “American dream” of owning a car, transportation had cost me $60 to $80 a month.  Expenses included a car rental about once a month and a cab ride about once a week.  My employer paid for my bus pass.

Living in Columbus without a car was easy.  From 1977 to 2007, I lived in Bexley, German Village, Short North and University District.  All of these neighborhoods offered life’s necessities within walking distance, including groceries, pharmacies and bars.  I have always worked in or near downtown.

In seven years, I will go carless again.  The money I save will go toward something more pleasurable than sitting in traffic.

Several years ago, the national Sierra Club analyzed urban sprawl and ranked metropolitan areas from those with the biggest sprawl problem to those that spread out the least.  The study looked at population and land area.  If urban land area grew, but the population did not, the metro had a sprawl problem.

The Sierra Club ranked Dayton as the area with the worst sprawl in the U.S.  Dayton’s urban land mass grew tremendously and pushed into outlying counties, yet its population remained flat.  “Growth” was merely a shell game.

An article in the March 24 Columbus Dispatch, “I-75 corridor driving economic growth” came as a disappointment given all the talk about “smart” growth.  The Ohio Department of Transportation is investing $1.5 billion in roadway improvements between Cincinnati and Dayton with the express goal of generating “green field” development.

Sadly, the Dayton shell game will continue at an accelerating rate.  I-75 improvements will shift more jobs and residents from existing neighborhoods to areas with lower and less sustainable densities.  ODOT will create two new taxpayer burdens, one to pay for even more new infrastructure once the green fields are developed and a second to address the social problems where divestment occurs.

Recent snow storms showed that employees who commute by bus can be more reliable than employees who drive.  Last Tuesday, I had to advise my own staff about whether to come to work on Wednesday in a level 2 snow emergency.  Because driving is discouraged during a level 2 emergency, I notified employees who drive to work that they could stay home on Wednesday.  Employees who take transit had no such excuse.  I required them to come to the office.

The experience got me thinking more about the logic of company policies toward parking and transit.  Employee parking benefits are common, but transit benefits are not.  Some companies pay $85 to $160 per month for an employee to park at commercial garages or lots.  Others build and maintain their own parking facilities and offer “free” parking to employees.

Both options are expensive and create an artificial demand for parking, unless companies also offer transit benefits.  Parking benefits can drive up the cost of doing business downtown because bus passes are generally less expensive than parking.  Given a choice, many employees will choose to take transit if free passes are offered as an alternative to free parking.

I have a pet peeve about the use of statistics, and an article in the Saturday (January 16) Columbus Dispatch made me peevish.  The Dispatch ran an article entitled, “Worst corridors to bike, walk.”  An insert listed the most “dangerous streets” in order of danger, led by North High Street from Dodridge Street near OSU to Goodale Street in the Short North.  MORPC provided the data.

I will not dispute that High Street has the high volume of crashes because it undoubtedly carries the highest volume of bicycle and pedestrian traffic in central Ohio.  But to say that High Street is the most dangerous corridor in Central Ohio is absurd.  Is biking or walking along High Street more dangerous than Polaris Parkway?  According to this article, it is, by virtue of the fact that nobody walks or bicycles on Polaris Parkway.

In my experience, High Street is a relatively safe arterial street because bikers and pedestrians are so prevalent that motorists tend to watch for them.  The MORPC report is a service to the extent that it leads to improving the design of High Street.  But to call High Street the region’s most dangerous corridor makes no sense at all.