our newsletter - Get There PGH

COMMUNITY
PARTNERS
•Allegheny Conference on
Community Development
•Allegheny County Department
of Economic Development
•Allegheny County Transportation
Action Partnership
•Allegheny County Transit Council
•Bike Pittsburgh
•Carnegie Mellon University
•Carlow University
•City of Pittsburgh Dept. of City Planning
•Duquesne University
•Local Government Academy
•Hill District Community
Development Corporation
•NAIOP, Pittsburgh Chapter
•Oakland Planning &
Development Corporation
•Oakland Transportation
Management Association
•Oakland Task Force
•PA Department of Transportation
•Pittsburgh Community
Reinvestment Group
•Pittsburgh Downtown
Neighborhood Association
•Pittsburgh Downtown Partnership
•Pittsburgh Interfaith Impact Network
•Pittsburgh Parking Authority
•Pittsburgh Partnership for
Neighborhood Development
•Pittsburgh Penguins
•Pittsburgh Sports & Exhibition Authority
•Pittsburgh United
•Port Authority of Allegheny County
•Southwestern Pennsylvania Commission
•Sustainable Pittsburgh
•University of Pittsburgh
•UPMC
•Uptown Partners of Pittsburgh
•Urban Land Institute
What Happens Next?
A series of community meetings will be held during the last week
of September and first two weeks of October. These meetings
will include a detailed discussion of the refined alternatives with
particular attention to stations and street configurations. See the
front page for more information.
Using public and stakeholder input from these meetings, the
project team will rate and further refine the options using the
evaluation measures. With greater detail on street configurations, bus stop/station locations and types, vehicle types and
service plans, the project team will compare the alternatives. The
alternatives will then undergo a second-level screening process
that will take into consideration environmental, community and
traffic impacts as well as ridership projections, cost estimates and
cost-effectiveness calculations. The cost information will also be
used to develop financial plans.
By spring 2013, the final milestone in the planning process will
occur with the selection of a Community Preferred Alternative.
Based on the results of a second screening, evaluation measures
and public/stakeholder input, the project team will determine
the configuration that best addresses the needs of the Downtown-Oakland-East End Corridor. Documentation describing the
Community Preferred Alternative and the rationale for its selection can then be submitted to the Federal Transit Administration
for approval to advance the project into the engineering and
design phases.
For more information, go to GetTherePgh.org or call 412.258.6643.
Downtown-Oakland-East End
Bus Rapid Transit
COMMUNITY
MEETINGS
Oakland
Thursday, September 27
6:00 – 8:00 pm
University of Pittsburgh
Alumni Hall, First Floor Ballroom
4227 Fifth Avenue, Oakland
Hosted by Oakland Planning & Development Corp.
& Oakland Transportation Management Assoc.
East End
Monday, October 1
5:30 – 7:30 pm
Carnegie Library – East Liberty
(across from the East Liberty Presbyterian Church)
130 South Whitfield St., East Liberty
Hosted by East Liberty Development, Inc.
Uptown
Thursday, October 4
6:00 – 8:00 pm
UPMC Mercy Hospital
Sr. Ferdinand Clark Auditorium
1400 Locust Street, Uptown
Hosted by Uptown Partners
T
his newsletter begins with three scenarios for you to imagine Bus Rapid
Transit (BRT) in your life. A more vivid
demonstration of these scenarios will be
shown at four public meetings through
a visualization of BRT in the DowntownOakland-East End Corridor. This visualization includes real footage dramatization
of these scenarios with animation explaining how BRT can provide better bus
service, even in heavy traffic.
The meetings will also feature a BRT
simulation, an interactive computer tool
to illustrate station types and amenities
as well as options for placing bus lanes,
auto lanes, bike lanes and parking along
sample street segments. The simulation
will allow meeting participants to explore
different scenarios for stations and streets,
and record which options they prefer.
Hill District
Hill District Community Meeting
Thursday, October 11
5:30 – 7:30 pm
Elsie H. Hillman Auditorium at Kaufmann Center
(next to the Hill House)
1825 Centre Avenue, Hill District
Can’t attend? Information on alternatives, the BRT visualization & simulation
plus a comment form, is available at GetTherePgh.org.
Imagine Bus Rapid Transit
Imagine you’re a nurse at one of Oakland’s
hospitals. It’s 3:00 pm. You just finished
your shift and made plans to see your
friends after work. Oakland’s streets begin
to fill with cars and you don’t want to be
stuck in traffic when you could be with your
friends instead. With the money you saved
on parking and gas through commuting on
the fast and reliable BRT, you can go shopping and treat your friends to an early dinner in Uptown. You head to the BRT station,
where you check the real-time display. Your
bus will be there soon, so you text your
friends that you’ll see them in a few minutes.
You get there with time to spare as your bus
zips past congestion in a dedicated bus lane.
Imagine finishing up a long day at the of-
fice in Downtown Pittsburgh. You rush out
to the BRT station. The station is easy to
spot, well-lit and marked with “BRT” in big
letters. It’s already 7:16 pm and your spouse
has just sent you a text – “please don’t be
late for dinner.” You pull up the BRT app
on your smartphone. The next bus leaves
at 7:17! You dash to the station – there’s no
mistaking it for a regular bus stop – just in
time to catch the bus. 7:17 on the dot. As
you settle into your seat, you text back – “no
problem, honey.”
Imagine that you and your spouse have
recently retired. You’ve moved into an
Uptown loft to enjoy all the city has to offer
– including convenient access to Bus Rapid
Transit. You want to enjoy a night on the
town to celebrate your 40th wedding anniversary, but don’t want to worry about parking.
Luckily, the BRT station is just steps from
your apartment. At the station, you buy two
tickets from the vending machine and then
have a seat on the bench. Only a few minutes pass and the bus arrives at the station.
You’re in Downtown before you know it;
queue jump lanes enable your bus to bypass
auto traffic. You get off just a couple of
blocks from the O’Reilly Theater, where you’ll
be seeing an August Wilson play.
The Region’s
Core
Transforming Neighborhoods
The Downtown–Oakland–East End
Corridor includes Southwestern
Pennsylvania’s top two activity centers
and some of Pittsburgh’s most distinctive neighborhoods. These neighborhoods have many qualities which make
them great places to work and live as
well as to attend universities, visit museums, libraries and other cultural and
entertainment facilities and to receive
medical services. The combination of
tree-lined streets, small green spaces
and architecturally distinctive and
historic buildings provide these neighborhoods with a high aesthetic appeal,
further enhancing their attractiveness
to residents, workers, students and
visitors.
Vibrant & Growing
Nevertheless, even with all of their
current assets, additional improvements are being planned for these
neighborhoods. Major new development
is envisioned for the Corridor. This
includes new offices to be built for both
institutional uses (university and medical) and private companies desiring
convenient access to research facilities
in Oakland and the professional services in Downtown. Additionally, new
condominiums, apartments and town
homes as well as new hotels, restaurants and retail development is also
expected to take place in the Corridor
to serve the needs of the residential and
office population and the needs of the
surrounding neighborhoods.
New Challenges
In order to improve the quality of life
within these neighborhoods as well as
ensure that new development does not
overwhelm the Corridor’s neighborhoods
with more traffic, transit service to and
within the Corridor must be improved.
Currently, local roadways are frequently
congested and the transit system is often
hard-pressed to meet demand. The intense level of development in Downtown
Pittsburgh and Oakland limits the amount
of land available for parking which results
in high parking rates. Transit already
serves nearly 68,000 trips per day in the
Corridor, accounting for nearly a third of
the total Port Authority ridership and 25%
- 30% of the total trips in the Corridor.
BRT is a Solution
BRT will provide faster, more reliable and
more evenly-spaced transit service within
the Corridor, attracting more riders, reducing the number of automobile trips and
attracting new economic growth. The BRT
Corridor is being designed with a “complete streets” approach, which will serve
all modes of transportation – including
pedestrians and bicycles. BRT will tie the
Corridor together, supporting Oakland’s
role as an economic center, spurring new
development in Uptown, and enhancing
opportunities in adjacent neighborhoods
such as the Hill District, Bloomfield,
Shadyside, Friendship, East Liberty and
Squirrel Hill. With unique branding and
high-quality transit service, BRT will
transform our city and our region!
We Have Options!
I
n early 2012, a set of alternatives were
developed for the Hill District, Uptown,
Oakland and other East End neighborhoods. These include various routings in
neighborhoods, one- and two-way street
operation and even use of the Martin
Luther King Jr., East Busway. Various
placement options for exclusive bus lanes,
bike lanes and auto traffic lanes along
Fifth and Forbes Avenue are also included
in the set of alternatives.
These alignments will be modified based on
input from the community. Parking, bicycle
and transit all need to be balanced in the
limited street width.
Uptown
In the Uptown area, BRT options are proposed along Fifth Avenue. Exclusive bus
lanes would be established in both directions on Fifth Avenue, with a single travel
lane remaining for westbound auto traffic.
On Forbes Avenue, a single eastbound lane
will be provided for eastbound automobile
traffic and a two-way bicycle path separated
from the travel lanes. One of the alternatives
consists of an eastbound reverse-flow bus
lane along the south curb of Fifth Avenue
and a westbound bus lane along the north
curb of Fifth Avenue. The other alignment
consists of an eastbound contra-flow bus
lane along the south curb of Fifth Avenue
with an adjacent westbound bus lane and
an auto traffic lane along the north curb.
This would require widening Fifth Avenue
at station locations to construct islands
adjacent to the westbound bus lane. On
Forbes Avenue, a single eastbound lane will
be provided for eastbound automotive traffic
and a two-way bicycle path separated from
the travel lanes.
Hill District
The service plan would examine ways to
improve connections between the Hill,
Downtown and Oakland, as well as restore
or improve connections between the Hill and
Uptown. These connections could include
enhancements to the existing 81 Oak Hill
and 83 Webster bus routes, rerouting the
82 Lincoln route to connect to Uptown via
Dinwiddie Street or creating a new loop service connecting the Hill to Uptown. Transit
service serving the Hill District would
connect directly to BRT in Downtown and
Oakland.
Oakland
Four alignments are under consideration for
Oakland. The first two are similar to the two
options proposed in Uptown, with exclusive
bus lanes established in both directions
on Fifth Avenue. In these alternatives,
westbound general traffic would remain on
Fifth Avenue, with eastbound auto traffic
and a parking lane remaining on Forbes
Avenue.
Bicycle lanes would be provided on both
Fifth and Forbes Avenues, although this
may require widening of the roadway at
some locations.
• One of the alignments consists of an
eastbound contra-flow bus lane along
the south curb of Fifth Avenue and a
westbound bus lane along the north
curb of Fifth Avenue.
• Another alignment consists of an
eastbound contra-flow bus lane along
the south curb of Fifth Avenue with
an adjacent westbound bus lane and
auto lane against the north curb. This
would require widening Fifth Avenue at
station locations to construct islands
adjacent to the westbound bus lane.
• T
he third alignment under consideration for Oakland retains the existing
eastbound contra-flow bus lane on
Fifth Avenue and establishes a westbound contra-flow bus lane on Forbes
Avenue. In a variation, exclusive bus
lanes in the same direction as general
traffic will be evaluated as an alternative to contra-flow lanes. In this alignment, bus lanes are included on both
streets, but parking will be removed
from Forbes Avenue.
• In the last option, both Forbes Avenue
and Fifth Avenue would be converted
back to two-way operation, with Fifth
Avenue accommodating through traffic
and Forbes Avenue accommodating
buses, bicycles and local retail traffic.
Squirrel Hill
BRT service would extend from Oakland
to Squirrel Hill via Forbes Avenue, with
stations at Morewood and Murray Avenues
as well as at some existing stops. Due to
Forbes Avenue’s narrow width, it would not
be possible to separate bus lanes and the
service would operate in mixed traffic. The
service plan would evaluate extending bus
service to The Waterfront, as well as maintaining direct connections from Oakland to
Regent Square and other communities.
Shadyside | Bloomfield | East Liberty
East of Oakland, BRT buses would use
the same routing as the current P3 East
Busway-Oakland route. From Fifth
Avenue (or Forbes Avenue), buses would
travel north on Neville Street, crossing
Centre Avenue and entering the East
Busway. From there, buses would turn
east toward Shadyside and serve all stations from Negley to Swissvale. As part
of the BRT service, frequency of operation
would be increased and service would be
extended later into the night and provided
on weekends. To improve service for residents living along Baum Boulevard and
Centre Avenue, two new stations along the
East Busway will be considered.
Background
T
he Downtown–Oakland–East End
Corridor is the busiest transit corridor
in the Pittsburgh region. Although bus
service is frequent and operates throughout
the day and much of the night, it is not
as reliable, efficient, visible and effective
as needed to serve a corridor linking
the region’s two largest activity centers.
Beginning in 2009, area stakeholders
began exploring the possibility of using Bus
Rapid Transit to improve transportation in
this Corridor.
August 2011
Bus Rapid Transit is an enhanced bus
system that operates on bus lanes or other
transitways in order to combine the flexibility of buses with the efficiency of rail. BRT
operates at faster speeds, provides greater
service reliability and increased customer
convenience. It uses a combination of
advanced technologies, infrastructure
and operational investments that provide
significantly better service than traditional
bus service.
January 2012
2009
The project team developed a set of initial
alternatives to propose various alignments
and street/sidewalk configurations to
accommodate buses, bicycles, pedestrians, auto traffic and parking. Options
have been considered for the Uptown, Hill
District, Oakland and neighborhoods east
of Oakland.
Port Authority’s Transit Development Plan,
undertaken to determine how the agency
could most effectively operate service within
existing financial resources, recommends a
rapid bus concept between Downtown and
Oakland and communities to the east.
Fall 2010
Sustainable Pittsburgh hosts a forum at
Duquesne University to present BRT to the
public, elected officials and stakeholders
and discuss its potential for the Downtown–
Oakland–East End Corridor. Continuing
the momentum from that forum, more
than 30 different groups – from community
organizations to major businesses – form
the BRT Stakeholder Advisory Committee,
facilitated by Sustainable Pittsburgh, to
guide a study to evaluate the potential for
BRT in the Downtown–Oakland–East End
Corridor.
The BRT study begins under management
from Port Authority. The project team
meets with citizens, community groups,
transportation advocates and representatives of major institutions (such as Carnegie
Mellon University, University of Pittsburgh,
UPMC, Sports & Exhibition Authority and
Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh) to discuss
Bus Rapid Transit and its potential for improving travel between Downtown, Oakland
and other East End neighborhoods.
The project team convened informational
public meetings to review early insights and
gain citizen input. The GetTherePgh.org
website, hosted by Sustainable Pittsburgh,
launches as a portal for Bus Rapid Transit
information, including economic and environmental benefits, a public meeting calendar and list of project partners.
February-March 2012
April-May 2012
The BRT Stakeholder Advisory Committee
hosts meetings in the Hill District, Uptown,
Oakland and East Liberty to present various alternatives to the public and discuss
how BRT would function in the neighborhoods, including issues for further consideration. Those who attended the meetings
had a lot to say. Here’s a sample of what we
heard:
• “Hill District needs
better bus service.”
• “Make Forbes Avenue a bus street.”
• “Improve bike connections – hospitals
and universities are key destinations.”
• “Install bike racks or
lockers at stations.”
• “Fifth and Forbes street space is
too precious to dedicate to bike
lanes. Parking is needed.”
• “Having real-time passenger
information at stations
would be great.”
• “Stations need to be well lit.”
• “Change how people enter
and exit buses.”
• “There are too many stops.”
• “Have far-side [of intersection] stops.”
• “Have buses one way on Forbes
Avenue and the opposite
direction on Fifth Avenue.”
• “Current bus routes serve
students, not residents.”
• “Uptown being used as a
pass-through. We are a
neighborhood, not a corridor.”
Summer 2012
A separate analysis of Downtown bus
routing has begun. This will identify how
BRT and all of the other Downtown bus
routes can operate most efficiently and
effectively in the Golden Triangle. The goal
is to improve traffic flow for both bus riders
and motorists, create more convenient
transfer connections between buses and
other forms of transit and to encourage the
continued growth and vitality of Downtown
Pittsburgh.
Based on public input and technical evaluation, the longer list of alternatives has
been shortened to a reduced number of
options. This will focus the public and
technical evaluation of the alternatives
as well as allow for more detailed community, economic, environmental, and
transportation analyses of the alternatives.
Evaluation measures have been developed
to rank the alternatives.