Khyber Sen

Adding Up What Urban Highways Really Cost A new report maps the economic toll that downtown freeways exact on 142 US cities — and tallies up what that land could be worth if it was developed for other uses.

A new report by @thedotcity.bsky.social quantifies the economic toll of downtown freeways, and the economic potential of tearing them down.

The 66K acres that downtown freeways occupy could yield more than half a trillion dollars of development and over $5b annually in property taxes.

Did the flammable single-story, single-family homes survive the fires?

Recommended Growth Scenario Compared to baseline: Train Miles increase by 93% Operating support increases by 21-31% (with high/low ridership forecasts)

Example of crew efficiency gains: With peak-only service, one crew has a long hotel rest, with only short periods of revenue service With regional rail all-day service, two crews cover the same amount of work time as the peak only service, but a much higher percentage is revenue service.

These improvements will increase service by 93% while requiring only 25% more funding, due to the efficiencies that come with all day, regional rail-style service. Imagine the further gains with electrification and level-boarding!

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The New Jersey Turnpike Authority is scaling back the controversial Newark Bay Bridge project (loved by labor; hated by environmentalists/locals).

A single-span two-lane bridge with shoulders will begin construction this year.

Story coming at NorthJersey.com

“On the D1, the increase in costs to SEPTA are nearly as high as if every passenger had started evading the fare.”

Judge Lewis Liman (brother of Doug Liman) has ruled that the federal government can‘t unilaterally end congestion pricing, giving the MTA yet another court win on congestion pricing

YouTube video by SWFT Andor: Mon Mothma's Speech

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TBMs are cheap, though, and if you buy more TBMs you can build the project faster, which will lower costs, minimize inflation, and get to profitable revenue faster.

Besides even the size, the TBM types are likely to be different, and there's a good chance that the Sepulveda and the San Gabriel tunnels will have to use different TBM types for different parts of each project.

Usually cell service is better anyways

From the LAMetro community on Reddit: CAHSR 2026 business report recommends electrifying Metrolink AV Line by 2039 Explore this post and more from the LAMetro community

Holy shit CAHSR now planning on electrifying AV Line by 2039! @calelectricrail.org

And Kawasaki wants to leave the US FRA market. The M9As were exorbitantly expensive as well, way more than the Kawasaki M9s. If Kawasaki wasn't refusing, they probably could've built cheaper ones, too.

I think they're just M9As with the motors removed. When they're such similar prices, though, or even more expensive than the equivalent EMU, they should just buy EMUs and run them as coaches (not using the motors) until they electrify.

1. Because by meter is the easiest way to compare globally with different car lengths.

Costs are extreme, and dominated by stations and in particular station size. So keeping ~40 tph constant, you should make your stations as small as possible.

Because BART trains are very long, so stations are very expensive to build.

BART (FTA) and Caltrain (FRA) can't run on the same track.

Congestion pricing for national parks

VMT is reduced way more for QL and other outerborough lines where many driving trips are replaced.

I'm not sure, but the 20YN and QL IBC have VMT reduction numbers.

I think parks are where the extra 40 acres (180 to 140) are going, but I don't know where the extra 12 are going (192 to 180).

It's not that hard to just have a daily cap on cars/people. China does this a lot. And US national parks usually have a checkpoint/ticket booth you drive past, so they could just close after too many people.

But your blog says "there is no such thing as overtourism" with no qualifications.

What about overtourism of natural or historical wonders that damage them? What about sex tourism?

And if you build far enough, you'll start getting much cheaper Shenzhen transit costs.

The coaches are old and falling apart but they'll buy new ones (more ideally, they'll just buy EMUs and pull them with locomotives in diesel territory).

The new Chargers?

All of the development plan websites say 180. Maybe they're excluding some land around the edges?

Haven't they bought a ton of dual mode locomotives already? And forced transfers already happen, so they can have more of them, too, for any remaining non dual modes going to Penn.

I thought Sunnyside is only 180 acres, and they only plan to develop 140 acres of it. But still, 12k is only 87 du/ac. I would think 2-3x higher is feasible, similar to the new LIC development nextdoor.