Category: Transportation

Anything related to transportation, including cars, traffic, other modes of transport, and so on.

Post #383: It’s tough to make predictions, especially about the future

I’m going to attribute the title of this post to Yogi Berra.  And while my last post was a lament for the things I think the Town ought to ask, this one is my prediction of what they’re actually going to do.

The point of this post is to predict what the zoning will look like for Maple Avenue, once the Town Council’s deliberations are finished five months from now, in February 2020.  (Or at least, scheduled to finish.)  And, by inference, what Maple will look like in the long run.

This post is just a plain statement of what I think we’ll get.  A subsequent post will explain why I think we’re going to get that.

Anyway, let’s face the facts.  Allowing just five months to redo the zoning, within a cumbersome legal and governmental framework, strongly limits what you can do and what you can consider.  Thus, once you’ve set that at the goal, you have a good idea of where this is going to end up.  That’s based on what’s on the table now, recent history, and some understand of the players.

Just as a hint, the original title of my last post was “why I despair”.  So if you expect something chipper and upbeat here, you’ve come to the wrong place.

But first, one more for the obits

I have one more item to add to the obits of the prior post.  Of all the things I could have added to that last posting, but forgot to, I want to mention “produce a drawing of what one whole block of Maple would look like, under MAC redevelopment”.  That came up at one of the recent meetings.  Staff were going to look into doing that.  But some Town Council members didn’t want anyone to do that.  So staff didn’t bother.  And it was forgotten.

The bottom line is that they Town is not going to commission any drawing of what the MAC build-out might look like.  Which is not a surprise, as that is just one more in the list of incredibly reasonable questions the Town might try to answer before plowing ahead.  But won’t.   Most of which I listed in my just-prior “obits” post.

A few pictures of a block-level build-out would be useful, if for no other reason than to see what it will look like when two abutting MAC developments are built  just off the common lot line, as the law allows.  But it’s obvious by now that this request — “may we please have even one image of what Maple might look like” — ain’t gonna happen.

As an economist, I believe in “revealed preference”.  That is, what you do reveals what you actually prefer.   So in this case, I infer that Town Council would rather buy a pig in a poke than let anyone have any image whatsoever of what they are actually voting for.  Fully admitting that (see post title), I just shake my head about that whenever I think about it.  The full extent of our forward-looking planning is going to be, more or less, “oh, just surprise us.”

So, because we won’t hire a professional to try to give you a picture of the future, I figure, what the hey, I might as well give it a shot — let me tell you what I think we’re going to get, to be decided by our Town staff Council over the next five months.  Let me first outline what, then why.

Continue reading Post #383: It’s tough to make predictions, especially about the future

Post #380: Sidewalk alignment and avoiding a waste of space

I want to make two simple points in this posting.

First, when I said the MAC sidewalks would not align with existing sidewalks, I was wrong.  They will, because the proposed 6′ buffer between the road and sidewalk, under MAC, is not new.  For almost all of Maple, it just matches what we already have.

Second,  if we are determined to have a 28′ wide sidewalk along Maple, my suggestion is not to waste it on outdoor seating that isn’t going to be used.  Maybe set it up to carry a “shared use trail” (a.k.a., a bike path) and integrate that with an eventual multimodal transit plan.

The upshot of that second point is that instead of ignoring the fact that Maple Avenue is an unpleasant transit corridor now, due to the traffic, it might be more efficient to acknowledge that and run with it.  It’s a traffic corridor.  Rather perfuming the pig, it might make more sense to focus on making it a better traffic corridor.

Continue reading Post #380: Sidewalk alignment and avoiding a waste of space

Post #378: Town Council work session 9/9/2019, Part 1

My wife and I attended last night’s Town Council work session, along with about (best guess) 40 other audience members.  I’m going to break my review of that into two separate posts:  This post will be a timely overview.  Other posts may go into more detail.

It’s almost not worth posting my audio file, because microphone discipline was poor.  FWIW:  Download the audio (.mp3) at this Google Drive link, and download the corresponding .xls index file (my notes at to what was said when) at this Google Drive link.

The work session covered four topics.  You can find the meeting materials at this location.  Click links below to get to a brief writeup of the four topics.

I didn’t stay for the last one, so I have little to say for that one until I listen to the Town’s audio recording.  An overview of the others follows.

Continue reading Post #378: Town Council work session 9/9/2019, Part 1

Post #377: Rental scooters, the Town begins to get ready.

For background on the rental scooter issue, see these posts:  Post #338, Post #330.

In a nutshell, due to a change in Commonwealth law, the Town needs to have some sort of program in place to regulate the use of rental scooters and bikes.  If not, then on 1/1/2020, the rental and use of such devices is deemed legal, including, if not explicitly barred, use on the sidewalk.  We probably don’t want that, based on the problems reported in cities that underwent unregulated use of rental “shared mobility devices” (see examples in Post #289).

The Town will begin discussion of this issue at the 9/9/2019 Town Council work session.  You can find the relevant meeting materials on this web page.

To cut to the chase:  My best guess is that the Town is developing a pro-forma way to satisfy Virginia statute.  We may or may not attract any dockless scooter or ebike rental operators to Vienna.

Continue reading Post #377: Rental scooters, the Town begins to get ready.

Post #374: Behavioral modification for Maple Avenue traffic

 

(Photograph taken from the website of the Ohio Department of Transportation).

The gist of this post is the following:  Maybe we could reduce some of the peak-period congestion on Maple by changing driving behavior.  First, maybe  dynamic messaging signs could “push” the message to drivers that they might be better off going around Vienna rather than going through it, under certain traffic conditions.   Second, possibly, through use of traffic cams and dedicated smart phone apps, we could “push” a message to Town residents to avoid doing their shopping during peak weekend traffic periods.

This is such an oddball idea, and one with so little available data, and so little prior discussion that I have seen, that I’m just going to describe what I mean, and leave it at that for now.  Obviously, that Town would have to make the investment to implement either of these.

Continue reading Post #374: Behavioral modification for Maple Avenue traffic

Post #373: The 9/4/2019 Multimodal study community meeting

My wife attended this meeting, held last night at Town Hall.  I believe she left slightly before the meeting finally broke up.

The contractors talked for about the first half-hour, and then people were invited to get up and look over some maps.  And chat.  There did not seem to be much newsworthy to report, but I am providing a copy of an audio recording of the first 35 minutes at this Google Drive link (download “2019-09-04 …”).  The discussion of traffic begins about 22 minutes into the recording.

I have said everything I care to say about this study in a series of recent posts, ending with Post #364.

The only thing of particular interest to me is that one my my neighbors quietly let the contractor know that there is some long-standing interest in this neighborhood for closing Wade Hampton at Maple.  This would be one way of dealing with the cut-through traffic that will be generated by 444 Maple West, 380 Maple West, and all the rest of whatever-the-Town-approves for my end of Vienna.  Apparently the contractors had never heard of that and were taken somewhat aback by it.  So while this was a study about changes in land use and so on, there was no attempt to address the details of the actual near-term land use changes that have already been approved for my neighborhood.  Certainly not changes that are being suggested by the residents, as a way to keep the burden of MAC-generated traffic off their streets.

FWIW.

 

 

Post #359: The Town’s multimodal transportation study, Part 1

In Post #358, I discussed what I saw as the single most important finding of the Town’s “Joint Maple Avenue Corridor Multimodal Transportation and Land Use Study“.  This post discusses the rest of that study, as presented at the Town Council (and PC and TSC) joint work session on 8/19/2019.

To cut to the chase:  There’s nothing (or almost nothing) useful in the rest of the report.  Not just because much of the detailed analysis was just-plain-wacky. It was, as I hope to discuss in a later post.  (Example:  Let’s let people park on Maple.)  But mostly, the basic approach was fundamentally wrong, in a way that prevents the Town from using the results to make rational decisions about Maple Avenue.  At best, I guess you might call it a place to start.  Or maybe a relatively inexpensive mistake, so that you know how to try to structure a usable study.

This posting is only about big-picture overview issues.  It’s already too long as is.  If I want to talk about the details, I’ll have to do yet another posting.

First, I’m posting my recording of this joint work session.

Why?  See Post #260.  Hope I’m wrong about that, but … just in case, my recording of the 7 PM 8/19/2019 work session is at this Google Drive link.

There’s no index, because it’s only 45 minutes.   Audio is lousy because there was poor microphone discipline, so it’s a mix of amplified and unamplified sound.  That requires a lot of post-processing (amplification, noise removal, compression) just to make it audible.  The heavy post-processing and low original volumes left a lot of artifacts in the recording.

But if you want to know what was said, and you weren’t there — sadly, looks like this is your one and only opportunity to do so.  See Post #260.

 

Continue reading Post #359: The Town’s multimodal transportation study, Part 1