Fort Worth, Texas Planning Modern Streetcar Network

[Fort Worthology]

The city of Fort Worth, Texas is looking to become the next American city to bring back streetcar service to its urban core. A city that tossed aside its original streetcar system decades ago, Fort Worth in the last several years has been undergoing a renaissance of its urban neighborhoods and Downtown. The success of revitalization that started with the Sundance Square district downtown has started spreading to the rest of downtown and spilling out into the surrounding districts thanks to a new planning department that has fully embraced urban reinvestment and new residents who have been desiring a choice apart from the usual suburban sprawl.

Now, the city is planning a modern streetcar system in the vein of Portland, Seattle, Tacoma, etc. Using modern European rolling stock, the streetcar system is planned to link Downtown and its surrounding districts. The new network builds on the routes of the old pre-war network to bring new life and activity to central city districts.

After extensive work by a city-appointed committee and various independent development organizations, the city has put together a starter system plan. It goes before the City Council tomorrow (Dec. 16) for approval to move forward with engineering and funding.

Here is a rough map (subject to final engineering in places especially in Downtown) of the starter system, the first phase:

(The exact route in Downtown is still being decided based on engineering reports but this is roughly how it will look. The routes extending out will be as shown.)

The plan creates a modern streetcar loop in Downtown Fort Worth. This loop links the Sundance Square district, the county government district, the city government district, and the South Downtown/Convention Center district. It also allows for an easy transfer from either the Texas & Pacific station (home to Trinity Railway Express commuter rail and later the new Southwest-to-Northeast commuter rail) or the Intermodal Transportation Center (home to Trinity Railway Express rail, Southwest-to-Northeast rail, Amtrak, and city bus service).

Branching out of the Downtown loop, one short extension runs north through into the Uptown/Trinity Bluff district down Samuels Avenue where extensive infill development is underway.

Heading west out of the Downtown loop down will be a line down West 7th Street to the Cultural District. This ties into the famed museums like the Kimbell, Carter, and Modern, as well as the Will Rogers Memorial Center and the extensive new infill happening on the 7th Street corridor. The line will run 7th Street to Montgomery to Lancaster to Currie and back to 7th into Downtown.

Finally, as part of the starter system there will be a line linking Downtown with the Near Southside. The Near Southside is the second largest employment center in the city behind Downtown, with over 30,000 employees thanks to the five large hospitals located in this district. It is now also the scene of new infill development thanks to the guiding hand of Fort Worth South, Inc., an organization encouraging new walkable and transit-oriented infill development in the district. This line will run out of Downtown down South Main, then down Magnolia Avenue (the bustling indie offbeat heart of the district), then up 7th Avenue and Terrell before going back (this may be changed to go up 7th Avenue to Cooper and over to the planned Southwest-to-Northeast commuter rail station in this district). This line will hit all five of the major hospitals (John Peter Smith, Baylor All-Saints, Harris Methodist, Cook Childrens, and Plaza) as well as popular destinations on Magnolia and existing historic neighborhoods and new infill.

An extension off the Near Southside route would run the system east to Evans & Rosedale as preparation for future expansion.

Future expansions would see lines running east down East Rosedale to Texas Wesleyan University, south from Magnolia down to Texas Christian University, north up North Main to the Stockyards, and perhaps west from the Cultural District down Camp Bowie and out northeast of Downtown to Race Street.

With a price tag of around $250 million the system is not exactly cheap, but the city is confident that funding can be had - and the intent is to avoid federal dollars. Part of the price is because the city wants to kick off with a fairly extensive system, hitting several major points to guarantee a strong start. Part of it is also an assumption of full double tracking for cost estimation purposes - several places could be effectively done with single track at first to reduce cost, but the desire was to estimate with the upper range of price. Estimations of time vary, but are generally from 2 years to launch on the near side to 5 years to launch on the long side with desires running strong to shorten the time as much as possible.

 

[Guest_Birdy_*]

Sounds good. But why are you trying to avoid federal money?

I'm wondering what the advantage of a streetcar is over a bus if the track isn't separated in some way from the street.

 

[Joel N. Weber II]

I'm wondering what the advantage of a streetcar is over a bus if the track isn't separated in some way from the street.

You may be able to get more people in the streetcar than you would in a bus. You can couple multiple streetcars together. Steel rails end up providing a smoother ride than a bus does. I think if you are going to have dedicated lanes for the streetcars and are going to have ridership that will exceed what easily fits in buses, streetcars can make a lot of sense.

Streetcars typically run off overhead electric power lines, but it's also possible to get buses to run off overhead electric power lines.

 

[AlanB]

I'm wondering what the advantage of a streetcar is over a bus if the track isn't separated in some way from the street.

You may be able to get more people in the streetcar than you would in a bus.

Not maybe, you definitely can fit more people in a street car than a bus. Phoenix's new light rail system that just opened a little over a week ago can carry 226 people in one light rail car. The best bus might be able to handle 90, max 100.

And of course the rest of what you mentioned is also true Joel. I'll also add that street cars require less repairs and run many more miles between failures than buses do. Add to that the fact that your average bus lasts 12 to 15 years, while a street car doesn't need to be replaced with a new one for at least 30 years and can often last 40.

Streetcars/light rail is also cheaper to operate. Charlotte, NC discovered after their first full year of operation last September IIRC, that it costs them $2.70 in operating expenses for the average passenger ride. The average passenger ride on a bus costs them $4.30 per person. A large chunk of that difference is the ability to couple cars together, as that doubles capacity, yet you don't need another operator. Whereas with a bus, you need at least 5 to 6 buses to achieve the same capacity and each bus needs a driver. Salary costs are typically at least 50%, and generally more, of any transit agency's costs.

 

[had8ley]

The city of Fort Worth, Texas is looking to become the next American city to bring back streetcar service to its urban core. A city that tossed aside its original streetcar system decades ago, Fort Worth in the last several years has been undergoing a renaissance of its urban neighborhoods and Downtown. The success of revitalization that started with the Sundance Square district downtown has started spreading to the rest of downtown and spilling out into the surrounding districts thanks to a new planning department that has fully embraced urban reinvestment and new residents who have been desiring a choice apart from the usual suburban sprawl.

Now, the city is planning a modern streetcar system in the vein of Portland, Seattle, Tacoma, etc. Using modern European rolling stock, the streetcar system is planned to link Downtown and its surrounding districts. The new network builds on the routes of the old pre-war network to bring new life and activity to central city districts.

After extensive work by a city-appointed committee and various independent development organizations, the city has put together a starter system plan. It goes before the City Council tomorrow (Dec. 16) for approval to move forward with engineering and funding.

Here is a rough map (subject to final engineering in places especially in Downtown) of the starter system, the first phase:

(The exact route in Downtown is still being decided based on engineering reports but this is roughly how it will look. The routes extending out will be as shown.)

The plan creates a modern streetcar loop in Downtown Fort Worth. This loop links the Sundance Square district, the county government district, the city government district, and the South Downtown/Convention Center district. It also allows for an easy transfer from either the Texas & Pacific station (home to Trinity Railway Express commuter rail and later the new Southwest-to-Northeast commuter rail) or the Intermodal Transportation Center (home to Trinity Railway Express rail, Southwest-to-Northeast rail, Amtrak, and city bus service).

Branching out of the Downtown loop, one short extension runs north through into the Uptown/Trinity Bluff district down Samuels Avenue where extensive infill development is underway.

Heading west out of the Downtown loop down will be a line down West 7th Street to the Cultural District. This ties into the famed museums like the Kimbell, Carter, and Modern, as well as the Will Rogers Memorial Center and the extensive new infill happening on the 7th Street corridor. The line will run 7th Street to Montgomery to Lancaster to Currie and back to 7th into Downtown.

Finally, as part of the starter system there will be a line linking Downtown with the Near Southside. The Near Southside is the second largest employment center in the city behind Downtown, with over 30,000 employees thanks to the five large hospitals located in this district. It is now also the scene of new infill development thanks to the guiding hand of Fort Worth South, Inc., an organization encouraging new walkable and transit-oriented infill development in the district. This line will run out of Downtown down South Main, then down Magnolia Avenue (the bustling indie offbeat heart of the district), then up 7th Avenue and Terrell before going back (this may be changed to go up 7th Avenue to Cooper and over to the planned Southwest-to-Northeast commuter rail station in this district). This line will hit all five of the major hospitals (John Peter Smith, Baylor All-Saints, Harris Methodist, Cook Childrens, and Plaza) as well as popular destinations on Magnolia and existing historic neighborhoods and new infill.

An extension off the Near Southside route would run the system east to Evans & Rosedale as preparation for future expansion.

Future expansions would see lines running east down East Rosedale to Texas Wesleyan University, south from Magnolia down to Texas Christian University, north up North Main to the Stockyards, and perhaps west from the Cultural District down Camp Bowie and out northeast of Downtown to Race Street.

With a price tag of around $250 million the system is not exactly cheap, but the city is confident that funding can be had - and the intent is to avoid federal dollars. Part of the price is because the city wants to kick off with a fairly extensive system, hitting several major points to guarantee a strong start. Part of it is also an assumption of full double tracking for cost estimation purposes - several places could be effectively done with single track at first to reduce cost, but the desire was to estimate with the upper range of price. Estimations of time vary, but are generally from 2 years to launch on the near side to 5 years to launch on the long side with desires running strong to shorten the time as much as possible.

Beautiful detailed report. I was truly amazed that the 1930's art-deco T&P building still had the red diamonds on the door handles. Someone sat down and planned that intermodal facility to a T. We crossed tracks from the Texas Eagle and rode over to the T&P building. I think there were a total of three pax on the two car train but it was mid-day. Keep us posted as any progress arises.

 

[Joel N. Weber II]

I'm wondering what the advantage of a streetcar is over a bus if the track isn't separated in some way from the street.

You may be able to get more people in the streetcar than you would in a bus.

Not maybe, you definitely can fit more people in a street car than a bus. Phoenix's new light rail system that just opened a little over a week ago can carry 226 people in one light rail car. The best bus might be able to handle 90, max 100.

I don't have the numbers on seating capacity in front of me, but I would not be at all surprised if the MBTA's articulated buses used on routes such as the Washington Street route with the silver paint (the T would like us to believe that the silver paint on the side of the buses is a good substitute for a fully grade separated rail service) carry more passengers than the PCC streetcars the MBTA runs on the Mattapan Line.

But the Mattapan Line is a bit of an anomoly in that it happens to have its own mostly grade separated right of way (there are about two at-grade crossings with minor streets, one of which is right by a stop), and that track was built a long, long time ago. The T has apparently decided that neither permanent bustitution nor upgrading the bridges for full Red Line trains makes as much sense as continuing to rebuild those streetcars. I think that modern Green Line cars also would be too heavy for the existing bridges. (The cars now used on the Mattapan Line once ran on what is now the Green Line or a system interconnected with that, I believe.)

But I'm not disagreeing that streetcars can be built to carry more passengers than the largest buses, and I think the Mattapan Line is the only MBTA rail service that normally carries fewer seats per train than the largest buses.

And of course the rest of what you mentioned is also true Joel. I'll also add that street cars require less repairs and run many more miles between failures than buses do. Add to that the fact that your average bus lasts 12 to 15 years, while a street car doesn't need to be replaced with a new one for at least 30 years and can often last 40.

Then again, streetcars cost a lot more to buy initially. And part of the problem here is that every city typically has their own dimensional requirements for streetcars (in Boston, between streetcars and subway cars, we have five separate lines, each with its own unique dimensional requirements), whereas a bus is a bus and the manufacturer can design it once and sell it to a hundred different US cities (probably dealing with some minor issues of needing to install different fareboxes, etc, but the MBTA demonstrated that it's possible to replace all the fareboxes in a whole bus fleet of varying vintages in the space of some number of months).

A large chunk of that difference is the ability to couple cars together, as that doubles capacity, yet you don't need another operator.

Maybe that's true if you don't have unions. As far as I know, when MBTA Green Line cars are coupled together, each one has its own operator, and the operator in the second car also helps with fare collection at the surface stops which aren't prepayment stations. (Collecting fares on the inbound trains on the surface sections of the southwest part of the Green Line during the morning rush hour is not a problem the T has come up with a sensible solution to, as far as I've been able to determine.)

 

[AlanB]

A large chunk of that difference is the ability to couple cars together, as that doubles capacity, yet you don't need another operator.

Maybe that's true if you don't have unions. As far as I know, when MBTA Green Line cars are coupled together, each one has its own operator, and the operator in the second car also helps with fare collection at the surface stops which aren't prepayment stations. (Collecting fares on the inbound trains on the surface sections of the southwest part of the Green Line during the morning rush hour is not a problem the T has come up with a sensible solution to, as far as I've been able to determine.)

Well Boston has two problems that most other cites don't have. First, the fact that the Green lines already existed from years ago and they aren't newly installed. That leads to the fact that as you noted, you're dealing with a union to eliminate jobs, something that never goes over well.

The second issue is that Boston isn't a POP (Proof Of Payment) system. Most new lightrail systems are POP, and therefore there is no need for a second or third operator to verify/collect payments.

 

[zoltan]

How is fare collection done on the green line surface sections in that case?

And also, can someone explain the proof of payment system to me?

 

[Joel N. Weber II]

How is fare collection done on the green line surface sections in that case?

MBTA Green Line vehicles have fareboxes at the front door, just like MBTA buses. (Except that there's actually a farebox at each end of each Green Line vehicle, since the cars can be reversed, but the farebox at the back is not used.)

It's been a while since I've actually boarded a Green Line train where there wasn't a prepayment station. (I did disembark at a non-prepayment station in December 2008, but then got a ride home in a not-quite-single-occupancy vehicle so didn't get to do the return trip on the subway.)

At off peak times, what probably happens is that people pay their fares at the farebox just as they would boarding a bus.

At peak times, it's not clear to me that everyone pays their fare. I think that at least the D branch has machines at the stations to provide validation for proof of payment style operation, but given the inadequate capacity of the vehicles for the riders, it is unclear how an enforcement officer would efficiently check people's tickets. Furthurmore, if you do pay at the farebox, I'm not sure you get a reciept. Near as I can tell, the MBTA is trying halfheartedly to use several different schemes there, none entirely successfully.

And a part of me thinks they should have more prepayment stations, especially on the D branch where the stations are fewer and farther apart than the other branches. In some ways, the B, C, and E lines feel like overbuilt bus routes, such as the spacing of stops and how the fares are collected.

 

[AlanB]

And also, can someone explain the proof of payment system to me?

Basically it goes like this, one buys a ticket from a TVM (Ticket Vending Machine). Most TVM's today will take either cash, credit, or debit cards. On some systems, the TVM will also complete the second phase, but on most they just sell the ticket. One then takes the ticket to another smaller electronic machine, called a validator. You slide one end of the ticket into validator, which then stamps the date and time on the end of the ticket. Depending on the rules of that line and transit agency, one has a certain amount of time that the ticket is valid, typically between 1 and 2 hours. Therefore one has however many minutes to complete one's ride from the time stamp provided by the validator.

Roving patrols of either police or special agents patrol the trains at random demanding to see everyone's ticket. Anyone without a validated ticket, an expired ticket (because you went over the time limit), or no ticket is in violation of the law. The agents have the authority to remove you from the train at the very next stop and typically will issue you a ticket that can range from a low of $50 to $150 and even more. Some systems have a graduated scale that increased the fines each time you get caught. Failure to have proper ID to hand to the officer/agent can result in your being detained and even imprisoned overnight.

Monthly passes of course don't need to be validated, but you best have the correct month noted on your pass.

 

[zoltan]

I gather that that system is in place on VRE, and has been problematic, as where validation machines haven't been functioning correctly, people have been issued fines by conductors regardless, and so on and so forth. A requirement of validation does prevent abuse, but if problems occur it can create a lot of bad feeling.