ghmoore.bsky.social
MN--> NC! Urban planner-person ~ transportation, land use, zoning, environment | Usually transportation and specifically Amtrak posting, probably! [also Minnesota sports, sorry] | Opinions are just mine, thanks!
1,061 posts
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Ok: My rapid response Dundee area source (this is a real thing lol) has confirmed that Nothing Days is, indeed, still Something and will be in the future!
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Dundee won the "adjacent railroad boomtowns battle"! The 2020 census evenshowed a tiny increase in Dundee's population from 68 '10 to 73 in '20. In 2019 Dundee resurrected one of the best-named town festivals in MN, Nothing Days; dk if it happened in 2024 but it went on again for several years
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Tidbit: David Ogilvy, the 10th Earl of Airlie (Scottish noble) was the president of the Dundee Improvement Company, which founded Kinbrae--briefly name Airlie in his honor. Ironically, the town of Dundee, a stone's throw from Kinbrae, was NOT founded by that company! en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kinbrae...
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I was waiting for Kinbrae to be mentioned and was not disappointed! I'm just old enough to remember the Kinbrae supper club, which was pretty good.
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(should say--according to the chart, that the B Line *will* be launched with. It's not like the E Line corridor is marginal compared to the B Line corridor despite lower existing ridership. It seems worthy of at least starting out with the standard service frequencies and adjusting if needed.)
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Really surprised and disappointed to see that the E Line won't be at the same 10 min freq weekend standard that the B Line (and I believe all other aBRT lines to date?) were launched with. Especially when weekend ridership is what has increased the most when aBRT lines start--due to the good freq!
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(By still refer to, I mean that the use of the proper format is applied in a very inconsistent manner, such that one article will say "the Metro D Line" and another "the D-Line" and still another "the D-line," and only one of these is right!
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It amuses me that the Strib (& others!) still refer to the lettered arterial BRT lines with hyphens, like the A-Line, C-line when Metro Transit does not and never has (to my knowledge) used hyphens/dashes to separate the names like that! The proper way is very clear! www.metrotransit.org/route/aline
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People make fun of Dem messaging but there's truly a desperate need to get through to people. The info environment is awful and regular non-online people (including immigrants!) in rural areas haven't been hearing what's actually been happening, basically for the past decade-plus due to social media
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He also mentioned: 1. An 18 yr old coworker who, after Trump won, said he "couldn't wait for gas prices to go down again" (he tried to rebut this & the group of Rs looked at him like he was stupid!) 2. People he overheard at a restaurant still blaming Obama, and Biden via Obama, for everything
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An friend from my rural MN hometown called me yesterday to commiserate. He's a liberal in what's become an (even) more conservative area, on the whole. He mentioned a Latina co-worker who "hates ICE" and the casual racism she gets, but voted for and loves Trump. The info environment is really bad.
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Hooray!! So glad to hear that. I was supposed to take the Borealis for the last leg of my Amtrak odyssey home for Thanksgiving from NC to MN, but of course coming into Chicago I was super delayed (Early weeks of the oft-delayed Floridian). Another time! Anyway, I hope you have a good trip!
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So yes, it definitely be who knows how many years until this can happen! IF the Northern Lights Express from the Twin Cities to Duluth had already gotten federal $ we could've seen movement, as the state funding legislation includes language about buying NLX + Borealis equipment at the same time.
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To be fair to MN, Borealis equipment is a MN, WI, & IL thing. The Midwest pool Venture order was done long before the Borealis came to be, so MN never could've been a part of it. Any new Borealis trainsets need to be decided on and purchased by all three states sponsoring the service.
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Unfortunately, there are no near-term prospects for new Borealis rolling stock; with the Secretary of Transportation, FRA, etc. leadership being (by and large) train and transit-hating incompetents, things look grim unless the states go it entirely alone. Possible, but unlikely given bigger issues.
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The situation isn't funny, though, and Amtrak compounds the cancellations by cancelling even when the weather isn't that extreme. It's sort of a mega-precautionary principle due to rolling stock issues, but it's an embarrassment and is sometimes done when the weather is really not dangerously bad.
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In the meantime, bilevel Superliner coaches (that Amtrak somehow rustled up) are assigned to one of the trainsets maybe even until spring, and the other one has been using a mixture of Horizon and Amfleet (same coaches used on East Coast) cars. It's made for a funny hodgepodge of equipment.
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The Horizon coaches that are assigned to the Borealis were already notorious for their toilets freezing in very cold weather, and that occurred in January, leading to delays, cancellations at least one (at times both?) of the trainsets assigned to the service being pulled. Not great!
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Addendum: Borealis ridership will be notably lower (several thousand at least, most likely) in January and probably also February due to cancelled trains. Why? Well, for one, the ancient rolling stock, and two, Amtrak's (imo) overly conservative recent policy of cancelling trains in winter.
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And lastly, believe it or not, this is by far the best and most accessible explainer of the Borealis that I've seen from a non-government or non-profit source. Make sure to watch the actual video report! Bonus for the nerds: Tons of great footage of the Borealis from all angles! tinyurl.com/2pwu4x98
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This was nice coverage from the start of Borealis service www.route-fifty.com/infrastructu...
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Given that the Borealis reached 100k in only 22 weeks, and was strong out of the gate, this all bodes well for future success, absent any meddling from the current administration. media.amtrak.com/2024/10/bore...
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According to AAMN, Dec Borealis ridership remained strong, at 20,570. (around 20,000 has been norm), and the Borealis almost certainly went past 155,000 riders (all time) in Jan. Amtrak's original 2015 estimate was 155k/year, so Borealis will be way past that!
allaboardminnesota.org/about/new-2n...
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The above anaylsis includse this info: "62% of trips are “big city to big city," like Chicago - St. Paul. "Over 30% of trips are “big city to small town.” Example: Chicago to Tomah. This is a market that has few bus/air alternatives."
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Per WisArp, an avg of roughly ~30% of Borealis riders from last May - Nov (remember the Borealis didn't begin until May 21st!) were on the Milwaukee-Chicago portion of the route--the Hiawatha corridor. The Borealis is an extension of an existing Hiawatha trip. wisarp.wordpress.com/2024/12/19/o...
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The Borealis had over 88,000 riders in just over 4 months, helping Amtrak set an all-time ridership record in Fiscal Year (FY) 2024 as described in the above link! See this link for a fun look at ridership on all Amtrak routes in FY 2024: media.amtrak.com/wp-content/u...
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Awful.
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Similar as in sad bc climate change
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This is similar to what makes me sad about Minnesota these days—historically it was often sunny and gorgeous in winter when it was cold to very cold. Sun sparkling off the snow, not depressing. Now with climate change there’s more temps in the 30s+ which means ugly gray & overcast skies 😭
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No snow + safer + greenery equals the pacific northwest most directly! Denver and the non-mountain more populated areas of CO are nice but can be VERY brown and doesn’t have as nice of a tree canopy and greenery as, say, Minneapolis and St. Paul. (But much less extreme cold, of course)
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From what I’ve read it does seem like Mpls’s code needs further updates to update FAR regs and other factors that seem to make it super hard to build triplexes. And yes, Mpls should allow 4-6 units everywhere! Also needs to derestrict corner commercial zoning to allow NEW, not just legalizing old!
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I appreciate both your and @zyudhishthu.bsky.social ’s work on this! Given that St. Paul’s zoning reform allowed 4 units (nearly) everywhere and (irrc; don’t live in the TC right now) 5-6 units w/affordability bonus on some lots, I am interested to see future analysis on what happens in St. Paul.
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Very grateful to not have had anything more intense! Masks work! Given that since earlier 2022 I've been out in the world a lot + have had a decent bit of travel (all while masked) it's not surprising I have gotten a couple things, but am so grateful for not constantly being sick like many I know.
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Truly! In 5 years I've not had the flu, COVID, or anything like the walking pneumonia that's going around. I did get what was probably norovirus once (and now I now more about how to protect against it) from air travel and have had like 2 instances of 4-7 days of cold-like postnasal drip. That's it!
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Not disagreeing with current construction/service management issues and minimal outcomes for huge spending. It's shocking that CT spends that much yearly because even I (as a non-expert) know it doesn't seem their network is getting anywhere near that...bonkers.
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The private RRs were mismanaged postwar, but they never could have competed against many 100s of billions over decades for their direct competitor modes + destruction or hollowing out of many of the dense city centers that supported rail via "renewal." Modern mismanagement is a separate issue!
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If the argument is still "the previous private US passenger rail system 'lost out' to highways and cars," I'm not buying it. The generational impacts of no public investment in intercity rail concurrent with mass investment in roads + air wasn't some equal market where rail "lost out" organically.
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The tiny handful of Great Soc. subways--not relevant since we're talking about intercity rail--and emergency NEC investment (that irrc also didn't happen until the late 60s?) are not an equivalent public investment program to the rebuilding of the W. European & Japanese rail networks psot-1945.
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The US was not doing the same, though, for a nationwide, centrally (or planned at all) intercity passenger rail network? The US's national passenger rail network was (largely) in a state of privately-owned decay, minus prestige routes, from the ~40s onward. During the same period roads got billions.
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I don't dispute anything you said about Amtrak & construction, capital planning, service quality/ops, etc. All lessons that need to be learned! I admit I wasn't aware the extent to which high-speed rail is profitable internationally--I'd always read it was only Japan, and only due to real estate!
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To be clear, I *also* take issue with Americans who are seemingly only obsessed with recreating a sad, slow, inadequate facsimile of the 1960s network. The US needs to look to other nations & learn. And also, it's a miracle Amtrak exists, & it feels unfair to say that Amtrak has had adequate $.
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There were innovations in Europe & Asia post WWII that never happened in the US, yes. But isn't the point that those governments were actively investing large sums over decades in both roads AND publicly funded rail? It wasn't a bunch of haughty, competing private RRs with no public dollars, yes?
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from post WWII to through the 60s, and that is the timeframe Matthews hearkens back to, when the old passenger RRs died and had no public investment. Was the rail vs. road investment so disproportionate in Europe? Not from what I've read? How could the old US RRs not fail under those circumstances?
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I appreciate your non-US perspective on Amtrak. I take issue with "...but this system was what lost out to highways and cars to begin with." Do you have stats on the *proportion* of investment into roads (and air) vs. all else? US poured 100s of billions into roads + urban "renewal" + airports 1/?
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Very cool!!
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Wait, no way?! King Country Metro having MLK’s face as part of their logo/branding or whatever (I have to have seen it through them since I’m a transit nerd) makes SO much more sense now! I never had heard the story on this before, so thanks
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This might be the best one of these I've seen since the "Gut Doctor Begs Americans: Throw Out This Vegetable NOW!" series of related garbage ads
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Most accurate post of 2025 so far
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#Bothsides tone poem is the best phrase I've ever heard to describe the strib (and similar) situations