John Levin

also a great day to give to those in need....help out a neighbor or www.standwithminnesota.com

Just getting to chapters 8 and 9 now. I feel like I've heard this story recently...

Okay maybe that map is really bad.... Cuz Route 63 can do WAY more than that.. Sigh..

Overlaid isochrone maps showing areas reached by driving and transit.

I can't vouch for the accuracy of the data or methodology, but this cool tool at CommuteTimeMap.com is a fun way to visualize the difference. (Here is 45 minutes by transit vs. 30 minutes by car from Grand & Victoria)

Freeways have also warped our sense of distance. 26th & Hennepin to Victoria & Grand is about 10 miles. Similar to the distance from Lower Manhattan to Washington Heights. And that trip on transit in NYC takes about 40 minutes, vs. an hour to get from The Wedge to Cafe Latte (or Mischief...).

I'm not sure our core urban form in the areas that are being discussed is necessarily to blame for this difference. Our over-investment in urban freeways matched with underinvestment in transit speed leads to a huge disparity.

Inch Beach on the Dingle Peninsula.

Highlighting the speaker who stood in front of the Surprise mayor and told him to consider what the Mayor of Ohrdruf must’ve thought before he died by suicide: “He might have thought ‘how is this my fault I had no jurisdiction over this’ maybe he said ‘this site was not subject to local zoning.’”

Looking for resolutions to propose at your caucus tonight... here are some more great idea for making our communities stronger and more sustainable. And of course don't forget to ABOLISH ICE.

Do it! You know you want to...

Thank you @metrotransitmn.bsky.social employees for getting us to and from the rally today. We ❤️ you! 🚊 🚌

St. Paul Public Works says employee illegally detained by ICE St. Paul Public Works Director Sean Kershaw says one of the department's workers was illegally detained by immigration agents.

A Saint Paul Public Works employee has been detained by ICE and taken to Texas

Public works director @seankershaw.bsky.social -
"This is someone who should be here, had every right to be here, was helping to take care of Saint Paul Streets, and was illegally detained"

www.fox9.com/news/st-paul...

Screenshot of Transit app at Jefferson Park Transit Center

There are better apps for that ….

Now the actual military has to dress like it’s not the military cuz federal law enforcement agencies dress too much like the military

NO! NO! NO! Maybe spend your time convincing DFL members to actually oppose what is happening rather than saying a few words and turning their backs. SHAME ON YOU ALL!

Image of the runway at Meigs Field in Chicago shortly after it was destroyed in March 2003 under orders from Mayor Dailey to force the closure of the airport.

Just sayin'...

It wasn’t until after I moved away from Chicago in my teens that I realized just how powerful “the Lake is always east” is as an orienting tool. Didn’t have that in DC. And certainly not in the Twin Cities (“the River is … north, south, east, and west… all at the same time” doesn’t help much)

Following

Yes! And the left side of the departures level is even more likely to be empty at any time of day or night.

But wouldn’t it also be nice if MSP traffic control wasn’t so absolutely pathetic. Mix indifference with conflict-avoidance and you get a pure mess almost 24 hours a day.

Don’t forget when you use @transit.app GO you are asked to respond to questions about conditions at the stop/station and on the bus/train. It’s a great way to provide information to your transit agency that they can use to improve service and facilities!

Screenshot from Transit app with text “You opened the app an impressive 1737 times over 186 different days”

@transit.app wrapped is here!! I don’t always use the GO feature so that’s not the best reflection of my transit rides. But the number of times I opened the app is great. “I thought about using transit on 186 days this year”

Walking one block from the Mpls Franklin Ave LRT Station to the Mpls Franklin Station LRT Station renovation open house. 🚷🚊
Sound off here:
www.surveymonkey.com/r/76Q3G9B

Map of Minnesota county outlines highlighting Cook County

Some days, following a lot of Chicago folks and not paying enough attention to details leads to some initial “Cook County” confusion.

I was trying to figure out the job duties analyzing moose and wolf counts, etc.

That probably wouldn't have been feasible, but sadly we were too constrained to think of other solutions to that problem.

/ and one last tidbit: When the Southwest line was being planned, the routing via Midtown Greenway and up Nicollet would have the Blue and Green lines at the east end of downtown, resulting in three lines running every 10 minutes. for a total of 36 trains per hour on 5th Street.

Finally, as @elindie.bsky.social notes, the introduction of the Green Line at the 35W Junction put significant constraints on the frequency and timing of the two lines. It would be challenging to reliably run 7.5 minute headways on both lines through that space /

/ while many at-grade stations were built with two-car platforms but with room to expand them to handle three-cars. So expanding from two-car trains to three-car was far easier than it might have been. All this at a time when no one knew what to expect from light rail in the Twin Cities...

As a side note, we should commend the prescient planners of the Hiawatha Line. Despite claims it would a "train to nowhere" they forecast significant future demand. The complex stations, like in the tunnel at Lindbergh and on structure at Lake Street were built with three car platforms /

And the peak schedule was also staggered, with roughly a 6 minute headway for the 2-car trains and a 9+ minute headway for the 3-car trains. Eventually, they had enough cars for a straight 10 minute headway all day.

Pretty quickly Metro Transit realized they needed more peak capacity so they a) extended the shorter platforms to allow for three car trains, and b) purchased more cars. But at first there weren't enough cars for all 3-car trains, so it was a mix of 2 and 3 car.