This is a little ridiculous: 3 regional commuter train stations in 3 miles in Hammond, Indiana

A South Shore Line train enters the Hammond Gateway station in north Hammond, where passengers can transfer between the Lakeshore Corridor, the traditional east-west route, and the Monon Corridor, the long-awaited West Lake Corridor extending south to Dyer. Doug Ross photo, "Transit development districts already fulfilling promise to attract prosperity," Indiana Business Magazine.

I wrote recently about the extension of the South Shore Line to Hammond and Dyer ("South Shore Line Interurban extension in Indiana").  The South Shore Line is the last functioning interurban railroad in the US.  

It travels from South Bend (the airport, not downtown) to Chicago.  It has many trains each workday, 28 daily, and 28 total on weekends, but basically the ridership is abysmal: before the expansion post-covid it was fewer than 7,000 daily riders.   

Of course, if the Chicago Bears move to Hammond, that could perk up weekend ridership a lot.  Apparently Hammond is closer to a lot of Chicago than is the suburb of Arlington Heights, which the Bears are also considering.

Officials turn dirt at the ceremonial groundbreaking Thursday, April 16, 2026, for the new $10 million South Shore Line station to be built in downtown Hammond. (Doug Ross/for the Post-Tribune)

The Gary Post-Tribune reports, "Ground broken for new South Shore station to serve downtown Hammond," that the city is building a new downtown station for $10 million.

From the article:

“If we are serious about downtown Hammond, we have to have a station in downtown Hammond,” Mayor Thomas McDermott Jr. said. The station plays a key role in the city’s plans to revitalize the downtown.

“Not long ago, we stood together to celebrate the opening of the Monon Corridor, a transformational investment that expanded the South Shore Line and changed the trajectory of our region,” he said. “Today, we build on that momentum. Because this isn’t just another ribbon-cutting. This is proof that the investment is already delivering results.”

The new station will join two new stations that began service as a result of the $945 million Monon Corridor extension of South Shore Line service to Dyer. The Hammond Gateway station is a mile north of the new downtown station being built, and the Hammond South station is about two miles south.

Granted the downtown should always be served by a transit line, but this isn't a subway or streetcar, it's railroad.  So the number of added riders is likely to be minimal.  It's not like people are going to use the railroad passenger service to travel within Hammond.

Or perhaps they could consider closing one of the other stations.  Except they just built them.  Why didn't Downtown Hammond get a station from the start?

The historical antecedents of rail-based transit oriented development

Today, many transit "nerds" lament how countries like Japan have amazing railroad stations replete with stores and other amenities, or that MTR in Hong Kong is an active developer and a significant amount of their annual revenue comes from property leasing, not just rider fares.

What the nerds fail to recognize is that for that to work, you need incredible passenger volumes.  "Small" stations in Tokyo have at least 100,000 riders per day, allowing the creation of great places that are also attractive to non-train users.

Even in the US, Grand Central Station and Penn Station aren't great places for retail ("MTA struggles to fix the dead mall under New York City," Crain's New York Business) despite their relatively high volumes of riders.  

The food hall at Grand Central Station in better days.

Other cities, even DC or Philadelphia or Los Angeles, with grand stations have a difficult time as well.  Smaller places have no real chance.

That being said, subway systems like DC's have been quite good at fostering economic development, even though it can take decades for the effects to fully play out.  One success in particular has been the infill New York Avenue Station ("NoMa: the neighborhood transit built," Urban Land).

But the reality is that most of the areas served by Metrorail in DC's core, both commercial districts and neighborhoods, have significantly improved in the almost 50 years since the system began opening.

 And because government agencies aren't especially good at entrepreneurship, most of the direct benefits have been reaped by real estate developers, although cities benefit from the tax revenues they generate.

A thread on Reddit got me to thinking about the antecedents that laid the foundation for today what we call transit oriented development.

Before trains there were the waterways--rivers, oceans, ports, canals--and bumpy roads that weren't a network.  Before electricity, water was also used as a form of power for industrial operations in particular "mills."  Lowell, Massachusetts created a set of canals so that flowing water could power all sorts of industry. 

Erie Canal.

Before railroads, George Washington thought what became Washington, DC would become an excellent location for commerce, by developing the C&O Canal to provide access to the nation's interior.  But canals took a long time to dig, especially when they were dug by hand. 

Railroads ended up overtaking canals for the primacy of commerce--although barge traffic is still significant today in some places--because they could serve locations beyond proximity to a river.

Freight Train services facilitated industrial development, transporting raw materials to plants for reproduction into final products, transporting finished goods, agricultural products, etc.  

Food companies trading at the national scale developed in response to railroad-based transportation created the foundation of the mass market of the US as a whole, rather than goods being produced and traded more regionally, because of the high cost to get goods to market before train service existed.  

E.g., instead of just a handful of stove manufacturers or battery makers today, most big cities had their own firms, because of the expense of shipping super heavy items.

In time, passenger railroad services helped to develop cities more generally, but also "suburbs," more bucolic places in a metropolitan area not too long a trip from "the city." An astute conductor for the New York Central Railroad recognized he had repeat riders "to the city," and proposed a reduced rate to ride, "commuted" from the regular rate.  It spawned the term "commuter."

The streetcar, in various iterations, facilitated residential development outside of the core of center cities, which were pretty much developed.  These are referred to as "streetcar suburbs" by the academics (Streetcar Suburbs: the Process of Growth in Boston, 1870-1900).

In the DC area, Chevy Chase is a classic streetcar suburb.  Takoma Park is a classic railroad suburb (Chevy Chase: A Home Suburb for the Nation's Capital).

Within the city, outer areas from the central core, like Mt. Pleasant or H Street NE were opened up to development by streetcar services.

Business districts around train stations.  For both passenger railroad stations and termination points for the streetcars, usually a small commercial district developed, focused on the sale of convenience goods, often times the area around the station may have had tenements, apartments, boarding houses, etc., in part serving railroad workers, but also providing lower cost housing.  

This was true at two different scales, the areas around city train terminals, and the stations serving suburban and rural communities.

Grand Central Station.  According to the Smithsonian Magazine, "New York’s Grand Central Terminal Helped Provide the Blueprint for American Cities. It Happened by Accident."  Trains serving the city ran on the surface, using coal powered locomotives.  It was dirty and grimy.  

Grand Central Station as the first example of Station Area Planning.  Terrible train crashes resulting in multiple deaths led the New York Central Railroad to create a new station, where the yard and tracks serving it were undergrounded, leading to a newly constructed grand station.  To pay for it, they built a deck over the railyard, and then leased those spaces to developers of office buildings, hotels, and other commercial establishments.

The station, bringing together multiple train lines, led to the concept of the "Union Station" or Terminal served by multiple railroads, rather than each firm ending service at its own station.  (Chicago today is a great example of that form of service, as some of the stations predating Union Station still exist.)

Still, creating Union Stations was hard because railroads competing and didn't want to lose what they thought of as their competitive advantage.

Grand Central Station as a civic monument.  The Station is also notable for harnessing the architecture and design around the station as a civic monument and anchor of the city.  Special attention was paid to the design of the station in all aspects, including entryways, waiting areas, retail services including food, and travel to and from the platform--GCS is far superior to Penn Station when it comes to "herding" passengers on and off the trains.

The Santa Fe Railroad versus the Transcontinental Railroad.  President Lincoln initiated the transcontinental railroad project as a national building exercise, linking east to west.  Union Pacific Railroad, from Omaha, and Central Pacific, from Sacramento, met in Utah, creating a nationally serving freight and passenger rail service by connecting to eastern railroads.

But the transcontinental railroad had/has a problem.  It served the northern and upper central parts of the West, which are underpopulated, although still with plenty of business for railroads. But not as much business compared to other areas.

The privately created Santa Fe Railroad, serving the southern and lower central parts of the West, was much better positioned to facilitate and take advantage of commerce ("How the Santa Fe Railroad Changed America Forever," Smithsonian Magazine, "The Entrance of the Santa Fé Railroad into California⁠," Pacific Historical Review).  

Astutely, the company created cities at prominent locations served by the railroad, pairing them with economic development programs (most all the railroads did a form of this) and marketing the areas to future residents ("Santa Fe Railroad Built Empire," Los Angeles Herald-Express), "Railroads and Real Estate - The Pacific Land Improvement Company," Orange County Historyland) and tourists.

The large scale Western National Parks drew millions of tourists arriving by train 

A parallel firm, The Fred Harvey Company, working with the railroad, developed hotels and restaurants along the line, and in the national parks.  The park concessionaire firm Xanterra, has its foundation in the Harvey Companies.

Extension of the Santa Fe to Chicago further facilitated the development of rail-based commerce.  Montgomery Ward created the first large scale retail catalog operation in Chicago, leveraging access to the railroads meeting there, serving all parts of the country.  Etc.

Brightline Florida and modern TOD.  Is a new private passenger railroad service between South Florida and Orlando, home to Disney World.  They intend to extend service to Tampa and possibly at some point, Jacksonville.  

I argue the reason they can make it privately, maybe--right now they are losing tons of money--is because tourists arriving in Orlando don't need a car once they are at Disney World.  

Rendering of a future train-served Downtown in Stuart, Florida.

Anyway, they claim to be driven by real estate development as a significant source of future revenue.

I'm somewhat doubtful, although development is happening at their stations, because of the relatively low usage of the train, plus the fact that station locations don't necessarily lend themselves to development the way they might in Japan or Hong Kong, or even in Downtown DC.

But the real estate believes otherwise  ("Shaping Florida’s Urban Future With Transit-oriented Development," NAIOP, "Beyond the Tracks: A Valuation Expert’s Guide to the Stuart Brightline Station," Walter Duke & Partners).  

Ironically, the State of Florida is a classic example of antecedent TOD as it was opened up to development by Henry Flagler, a founder of Standard Oil, and his creation of the Florida East Coast Railway (Henry Flagler: The Astonishing Life and Times of the Visionary Robber Baron Who Founded Florida).

Although, like other transit infrastructure projects, its creation is having a positive effect on the residential real estate market too ("Home price boom along Brightline train route in Florida," New York Post).

Why hasn't light rail revitalized the Midway neighborhood of St. Paul | While it has for the Prospect Park neighborhood of Minneapolis

WRT the previous blog entry, I'd been meaning to write about the topic for months, having come across a story about the soccer stadium and its failure to contribute ancillary development in the neighborhood.  With the Sun-Times article, I was able to connect multiple examples, which is how I like to write the entries, so that the conclusions are more generalizable.

Just as with the stadium as an augur and in terms of reproduction of space, the Midway neighborhood is an example of how with rail transit development, pre-conditions are required to have seemingly "immediate success" and less well off areas don't have the preconditions.

The story of Midway is similar to many other transit station catchment areas across the US.

Green Line LRT at University and Snelling Avenues in St. Paul. Credit: MinnPost photo by Corey Anderson.

Why hasn't light rail been a great augur for the Midway neighborhood?  A separate question from the Allianz stadium is why is the Midway neighborhood languishing despite the presence of light rail ("A tale of two Green Lines: 10 years after ‘Central Corridor’ light rail transformed University Avenue," and "A better future for the 10-year-old Green Line should include signal priority, business investment,"  MinnPost).

From the first article:

Talking to him today, Thoj feels like the light rail hasn’t transformed his part of St. Paul. Like most people I talked to, he keenly remembers the disruptive construction years, and points to the persistent inequality. Parts of the line near the Minneapolis border have seen significant growth, but in the central swath of St. Paul, there’s been practically nothing. “ 

The promises were never delivered,” Thoj said. “Overall in terms of new businesses there has been none in this stretch of the avenue, from Frogtown and Rondo to the Capitol. I don’t think we’ve seen a whole bunch of net gains. I think that’s because there has not been as much investment between Lexington and Marion.”

In other words, the light rail has not been a silver bullet, alleviating inequality. When something this big goes through an area, it’s easy to see why people get their hopes up for generational change. The vacant lots are still vacant, and there’s no new money streaming in.

Green Line at sunset.  Photo: Bill Lindeke.

I think the answer is: income level and density of the neighborhood, and distance from the core of the city and the core of the light rail system, in terms of both access to transit and "location, location, location," and anchors-stakeholders motivated to invest.

And while the Minneapolis-St. Paul transit project is considered best practice because of the pre-development revitalization plans for the Green Line, as well as a financial commitment from the Metropolitan (Planning) Council and area foundations to support the construction of affordable housing at stations, maybe the plans needed to be even better.  From "Transit Oriented Development in Minneapolis and St. Paul":

In 2010, the Metropolitan Council created the Livable Communities Act - Transit-Oriented Development (LCA-TOD) Grant program. Since its creation, the grant program has allocated tens of millions of dollars toward the development of hundreds of projects containing thousands of housing units in the Twin Cities' myriad of light rail and bus transit corridors.

And like I pointed out wrt the Purple Line suburban light rail project in Greater DC, there needs to be a community development corporation charged and funded to ensure development is much more speedy in the areas that are economically languishing ("Purple Line Part 6 |  Creating a transportation development authority in Montgomery and Prince George's County to effectuate placemaking, retail development, and housing programs in association with the Purple Line").  

Otherwise it takes many years to see improvement at outlying stations, as developers focus on the best areas first, and it can take decades before a rebuilt out core lacks developable parcels, leading firms to take on what were previously less profitable opportunities.  From the second MinnPost article:

[with the Blue Line] it took over a decade for development to happen in the sleepier parts of the corridor, such as 46th Street South. In stagnating parts of town, it takes years for good economic “comps” to sway wary investors to float loans for new housing construction.

From "After years of stagnation along the Blue Line, new housing booms in Longfellow":

... for the most part, the pace of transit-oriented development has seemed glacial. According to Metropolitan Council studies, more than 12,000 new apartments have been built along the Blue Line since its opening. But if you glance at a map, the vast majority of this construction has been downtown, or else subsidized in some way. For most interstitial stops along Hiawatha, south of downtown, there’s been very little new housing construction. Even the rosiest development booster would have to admit it’s been a slow climb.

I've suggested when transit lines and stations are being constructed, that "Public Improvement Districts" should be created, or at least an action plan, for each station ("Public improvement districts ought to be created as part of transit station development process: the east side of NoMA station as an example").  In the planning field, this is called "station area planning."

The model action plan I suggested for New Carrollton, which already has Metrorail, regional commuter, and Amtrak service, but will be getting the Purple Line too, outlines what can be done at a larger scale ("Setting the stage for the Purple Line light rail line to be an overwhelming success: Part 4 | Making over New Carrollton as a transit-centric urban center and Prince George's County's "New Downtown""), the same with the series on Silver Spring.

Purple Line Part 5 | Fenton Street, East-West Highway, and Wayne Avenue, Silver Spring, as building blocks for a Silver Spring "Sustainable Mobility District"
-- Part 1: Setting the stage
-- Part 2: Program items 1- 9
-- Part 3: Program items 10-18
-- Part 4: Conclusion
-- Part 6 |  Creating a transp

The lesson from DC Metrorail is that it took about 30 years for substantive transit oriented redevelopment to occur in the city outside of the core.

Hundreds of new apartments sit in a spot that had a negligible population a decade ago. Credit: MinnPost photo by Bill Lindeke.

Note that at least one area along the Green Line but in Minneapolis, the Prospect Park neighborhood, has experienced this kind of growth, because of purposeful planning, strong community organizations, and financial commitments from major partners like the University of Minnesota, which created the Towerside Innovation District there ("Prospect Park eyed for development Green Line," Minnesota Daily, "In Prospect Park near the U, three developers come together in sweeping makeover," Minneapolis Star-Tribune).  From the MST:

The developers praised an overarching vision, first laid out in 2008, for redeveloping the area into a mixed-use urban village featuring high-density housing and green infrastructure. The plan emerged from the Prospect Park neighborhood association and was later spun off into a new organization called Prospect Park 2020. That group has since been joined by a public-private coalition called the Prospect North Partnership.

The latter group, established in 2014 through the efforts of the Urban Land Institute, counts among its public members the University of Minnesota's real estate arm, the city of Minneapolis and Hennepin County. Perhaps its most active private-sector member is Prospect Park Properties, a firm led by neighborhood booster and second-generation real estate professional Jeff Barnhart.

Like with how the Prospect Park neighborhood created new branding around the "Innovation District" (Towerside Framework for Planning and Implementation), I wonder if when doing transportation related revitalization planning, if it's possible to come up with "unique selling propositions" for different station areas, as a way to move improvement faster.

In any case, Minneapolis sites are likely to continue to develop more quickly than St. Paul sites because Minneapolis is a higher functioning local economy ("Prospect Park: They have the vision, but what about the will?," MinnPost).

And in short, those areas that do jump ahead in terms of improvement, like Prospect Park, show the value of a transformational projects action planning approach (e.g., "Authors term post-Katrina revitalization of New Orleans a failure | It's a confirmation of my "Transformational Projects Action Planning" concept").

Revitalization success is much more likely when these elements are present.

1. A commitment to the development and production of a broad, comprehensive, visionary, and detailed revitalization plan/s;
2. the creation of innovative and successful implementation organizations, with representatives from the public sector and private firms, to carry out the program. Typically, the organizations have some distance from the local government so that the plan and program aren't subject to the vicissitudes of changing political administrations, parties and representatives;
3. strong accountability mechanisms that ensure that the critical distance provided by semi-independent implementation organizations isn't taken advantage of in terms of deleterious actions (for example Dublin's Temple Bar Cultural Trust was amazingly successful but over time became somewhat disconnected from local government and spent money somewhat injudiciously, even though they generated their own revenues--this came to a head during the economic downturn and the organization was widely criticized; in response the City Council decided to fold the TBCT and incorporate it into the city government structure, which may have negative ramifications for continued program effectiveness as its revenues get siphoned off and political priorities of elected officials shift elsewhere);
4. funding to realize the plan, usually a combination of local, regional, state, and national sources, and in Europe, "structural adjustment" and other programmatic funding from the European Regional Development Fund and related programs is also available (Hamburg, as a city-state, has extra-normal access to funds beyond what may normally be available to the average city);
5. integrated branding and marketing programs to support the realization of the plan;
6. flexibility and a willingness to take advantage of serendipitous events and opportunities and integrate new projects into the overall planning and implementation framework (examples include Bilbao's "acquisition" of a branch of the Guggenheim Museum and the creation of a light rail system to complement its new subway system, Liverpool City Council's agreement with a developer to create the Liverpool One mixed use retail, office, and residential development in parallel to the regeneration plan and the hosting of the Capital of Culture program in 2008, and how multifaceted arts centers were developed in otherwise vacated properties rented out cheaply by their owners in Dublin, Helsinki, and Marseille).
7. commitment and time.  Revitalization is a forever process that takes a long time to begin to see results.  It needs to continue beyond the vicissitudes of changing political administrations.
8. adaptive management. Visionary revitalization requires continuous process improvement.  Other ways to think about it are using the design method or adaptive management instead of remaining static.  Programs can always be improved and should be.

Just a reminder to do and effectuate access planning before major transportation infrastructure opens: Peru's airport

 According to Bloomberg, "Nice Airport, If You Can Get to It: No Subway, No Highway, No Bridge," Lima Peru is getting a new airport without roadways to it--they are planning to cross a river with temporary bridges and no transit.  From the article:

A highway meant to whisk travelers to the $2 billion terminal has yet to be built, even though flights are supposed to begin operating in just seven weeks. A bridge to get across a river that runs along the grounds was never constructed. There’s a subway stop labeled “Airport” planned for Lima’s new metro system, but that station is set to be built (three years from now) much closer to the old airport that’s being decommissioned.

“Having a subway station named ‘Airport’ where there won’t be an airport anymore — it’s just the most graphic example of our lack of planning as a nation,” said Carlos Gutierrez, the head of Peru’s airline industry trade association.

... The bridges will get private cars from congested side roads into the terminal, but there’s no bus service currently scheduled, and there’s no room to allow pedestrians to walk across. That’s a problem for the airport’s 17,000 workers, most of whom now arrive at the existing terminal via public transportation. And officials are worried about the safety of travelers forced to navigate the traffic-choked streets in the crime-filled neighborhood that surrounds the airport.

I do think airport mobility planning in the US can be weak.  It was abetted for years by a rule by the Federal Aviation Administration that airports couldn't pay into existing transit systems that also serve non-airport riders.  Fortunately, the Biden Administration dropped that rule.  But it still affects airports like LaGuardia, Newark, JFK, and Philadelphia.

... US airports with decent transit like Cleveland or National in DC are connected through the largesse of local authorities.  

-- "Manhattan Institute misses the point about the value of light rail transit connections to airports | Utility and the network effect: the transit network as a platform," (2020)

-- "To and from origin stations can be difficult: More on the Silver Line and intra-neighborhood transit (tertiary network)," (2022) -- links to many past entries

Although lack of access planning for regular transit stations is an issue too.  In Baltimore it was an issue with the Lutherville light rail station. In DC, with the NoMA station among others ("Revisiting creating Public Improvement Districts in transit station catchment areas," 2020).

Transit oriented development station typology revisited

The Washington Post ("Welcome to the loneliest Metro stop ") discusses how the Loudoun Gateway Metrorail station is pretty desolate.  There's a decent discussion on Reddit about it.  The main issue is the station is exurban compared to the core of the region and that much of the Silver Line is more like a commuter railroad than a subway line--ridership on the Silver Line is pretty pathetic, when all is said and done.  It reminds me of the UMN Center for Transportation Studies study of the Hiawatha Light Rail Line there, which found that the best ROI is within the first 10 miles of the system.  From the article:

But at Loudoun Gateway, the second-to-last stop on the Silver Line extension, there is never any bustle. This year, an average of 317 people have entered the Loudoun station each day, according to Metro’s rail ridership survey. That’s about 0.08 percent of the system’s daily riders.

What's frustrating to me is the failure to recognize there is a station typology that makes it easier to understand why stations can be successful with TOD and others are much less likely to be so.  You'd think after almost 50 years of experience with Metrorail, this would be better understood.

And it's not like Metrorail hasn't already created a station typology, although it was focused more on bicycle and pedestrian access, it's applicable to TOD questions.

I wrote a summary piece about this a few years ago, "The ability to develop around transit stations is conditional on land use and mobility context" (2021).  From the entry:

Categorizing transit stations in terms of access and the opportunity for development.  Perhaps the best way to think about the opportunity for "transit oriented development" is to consider  how WMATA categorizes its Metrorail stations, as laid out in the Bicycle and Pedestrian Access Improvements Study (2010), in Appendix D.  There are nine categories, based on land use context, from dense/connected/compact to undense/disconnected.

• High Density Urban Mixed-Use in a Grid Network (21 stations)
• Urban/Suburban Residential Center -- (12 stations) [opportunity for multiunit buildings close to the station, even if the area is otherwise single family residential)
• Urban Residential Area with a Bus/Automobile Orientation (5 stations)
• Campus and Institutional (3 stations)
• Mixed use in a "pod" layout (13 stations) [isolated, disconnected locations]
• Long-Term Potential for High Density Transit Oriented Development (TOD) or Planned Unit Development (PUD) (4 stations)
  
• Suburban Residential Area (9 stations)
• Auto Collector/Suburban Freeway -- (5 stations) 
• Employment Center/Downtown/Urban Core -- (12 stations)

Note that to make this typology work more universally, two more categories need to be added:

• Smaller Town Center (Suburban/Exurban)
• Exurban Station (Residential primarily)

Update:  Although with Loudoun Gateway the typology needs to be tweaked to include light industrial.

• Employment Center/Downtown/Urban Core -- (12 stations)
• High Density Urban/Suburban* Mixed-Use in a Grid Network (21 stations)
• Urban/Suburban Residential Center -- (12 stations) [opportunity for multiunit buildings close to the station, even if the area is otherwise single family residential)
• Urban Residential Area with a Bus/Automobile Orientation (5 stations) -- less dense and usually in what would be thought of as the "outer city" as opposed to the inner city or "core"
• Campus and Institutional (3 stations)
• Employment Center/Industrial-Office Park  -- Mixed use in a "pod" layout (13 stations) [isolated, disconnected locations]
• Long-Term Potential for High Density Transit Oriented Development (TOD) or Planned Unit Development (PUD) (4 stations)
  
• Suburban Residential Area (9 stations)
• Auto Collector/Suburban Freeway -- (5 stations) 
• Smaller Town Center (Suburban/Exurban)
• Exurban Station (Residential primarily)
• Exurban Station (light industrial)

The area around Loudoun Gateway is mostly home to data centers, which take up a lot of space, but have very few employees.

* I added Suburban to the first category "High Density Urban/Suburban* Mixed-Use in a Grid Network" because it better captures large scale Suburban business districts like Silver Spring or Bethesda.

-- Ten Principles for Reinventing America's Suburban Business Districts, Urban Land Institute

Mayor Bowser gets shade for claiming every transit line serves Gallery Place | Capital One Arena and point about Downtown planning

Technically, Mayor Bowser is wrong because Galley Place is served directly by the green, yellow, and red lines, while nearby -- a few blocks -- Metro Center, has the blue, orange and silver lines along with red ("DC Mayor Muriel Bowser forgets which Metro lines service arena stop while defending keeping teams downtown," Washington Examiner).

But not many people seem to know it's easier and faster to get out and walk.  So they congest the red line between the two stations when going to games.

Although there has been talk for almost 20 years about creating an underground walkway between the stations (GALLERY PLACE / CHINATOWN - METRO CENTER PEDESTRIAN PASSAGEWAY TUNNEL STUDY, WMATA, 2006).

The last I remember the cost was going to be about $200 million and there wasn't the belief it was worth it.

HOWEVER, it does remind me of the late 1960s Urban Design Manhattan report by the Regional Plan Association, which called for more purposeful vertical and horizontal planning between Manhattan's transit stations, the street ground plane, underground entrances to buildings, and the first couple floors of buildings.

When MTA interlined a bunch of lines, they had the opportunity to build an integrated system of underground connections, comparable to Chicago's Pedway, Toronto's PATH network and Montreal's Underground City, but instead they just filled it in.

DC could have taken the opportunity with both a Metro Center to Gallery Place connection and a Farragut North to Farragut West connection, to begin to do a similar kind of pedway network, and strengthen the value of Central Business District.

Chicago Pedway

Other opportunities are presented by the proposed Downtown Maglev station ("DC, Transformational Projects Action Planning, and the Baltimore-Washington Maglev project") and in terms of vertical and horizontal connections, the NoMA station ("Public improvement districts ought to be created as part of transit station development process: the east side of NoMA station as an example," Revisiting creating Public Improvement Districts in transit station catchment areas").

DC hasn't been particularly forward on constantly planning and investing in maintaining the value and centrality of the Downtown Central Business District.  Given how voracious Northern Virginia is in recruiting DC based businesses, plus having other advantages (airport access, lower rents, cheaper and more land, but sprawl), this is extremely short sighted.

Special assessment districts for undergrounding utilities

 Over the years I've mentioned the issue of above ground utility lines in cities, which can be ugly and are subject to failure during storms.  DC is unusual in that above ground lines are banned in the core city (called the L'Enfant City) with an exception for streetcar wires.

12th Street NE, Brookland.  Photo: LoopNet.

When in 2007, I worked as a Main Street commercial district revitalization program manager in the Brookland neighborhood--located in DC's outer city, originally "Washington County", residents there wanted the lines undergrounded on 12th Street, the major commercial street of the neighborhood.

But they were wacked in the way they went about it.  Rather than working with area planning efforts by the city planning office and transportation agency, they argued with them, and the city wasn't interested in undergrounding, because the local utility, Pepco, quoted such high rates (10x the rate of other cities).  

Ideally a utility wire underground program would also have been extended to other major streets in the neighborhood like Monroe Street (pictured), Michigan Avenue, 4th Street, etc.  Photo: Elvert Barnes.

IN FACT, after the actual streetscape construction project was underway, then some litigious residents sued the city over this.  

But if they started out with an attitude focused on working together, focused on solutions, maybe change could have been effected ("Moving towards an underground utility line infrastructure in DC," 2008)

Newport Beach, California has special assessment districts for utility undergrounding.  I just found out that in 2016, Newport Beach passed legislation allowing for the creation of Utility Underground Assessment Districts, so that residents can pay off over time the high cost of burying the lines and re-connecting buildings to the grid from overground to underground ("Underground utility lines in Newport Beach to go to vote," Orange County Register).

Currently, at least six neighborhoods in the city are in the process of burying utility lines, using this method to ease the upfront cost.  Although not without difficulties ("Higher-than-expected bids prolong process of putting Newport utility lines underground," Daily Pilot).

Assessment districts.  

-- "Revisiting creating Public Improvement Districts in transit station catchment areas," 2020,  recommends creating PIDs in association with transit station catchment areas.  In DC, the Brookland commercial district is in the catchment area of the Brookland Metrorail Station

-- "Basic planning building blocks for urban commercial district revitalization programs that most cities haven't packaged: Part 1 | The first six". 2020.  Item #6 discusses "regularized funding" for improvements and discusses special assessment districts such as Business Improvement Districts (which San Diego also uses to fund Main Street programs), San Francisco's Green Benefits District, etc.  

-- "Public improvement fees as sales tax add-ons," 2016.  Colorado and other states have sales tax funded revenue streams for public improvements.

Conclusion.  Had Brookland residents focused on the outcome, getting undergrounded utility lines, instead of being obstreperous, maybe this method could have been adopted to facilitate the project.  Instead, they lost the opportunity for improvement for at least a generation.

Likely, the program in Newport Beach has influenced other Orange County communities, as Dana Point is considering launching a similar program ("Dana Point will consider undergrounding utility lines to improve views and safety," Orange County Register).  The city, at the instigation of residents, is looking into a very ambitious undergrounding program.  Probably, they'll end up with a less ambitious program, more like that of Newport Beach, where residents willing to make the change, agree to special assessments.

===

Also see "Paradise Valley Views Free of Utility Poles," Newport This Week, about a project in Greater Newport, Rhode Island where utility wires were undergrounded to preserve viewshed qualities.  There are nice before and after photos.

"Wide aisle" transit turnstiles to be tested in NYC

"MTA to test new 'wide-aisle' turnstiles at five subway stations," New York Post

MTA photo.

To accommodate luggage, for many years I've suggested that turnstiles and escalators be wider for subway and light rail systems at train stations and airports.

But in terms of improving disability access, it should be universal.

That's what they'll be doing on the New York Subway system, as they plan to install wide aisle turnstiles at 200 stations, about 40% of the system's total.

Train stations as mobility and community hubs: Union Station, DC and intercity bus service

Points about train station planning.  There are tons of references about train station planning, but in keeping with my concept of "transformational projects action planning," despite all those documents and initiatives, transit planners in a region don't start off by saying "the big train station is our most prominent marketing touchpoint for transit, and we should plan around it in a manner that promotes and strengthens the transit network."

Union Station is a perfect example of this.  It should be planned at many scales to best leverage the opportunities it presents.

Yes, the planning has been inadequate as it relates to other modes, including pedestrian and bicycling, but also surface transit, subway transit and commuter rail ("A "Transformational Projects Action Plan" for a statewide passenger railroad program in Maryland," 2019, "Virginia’s $3.7 billion rail plan called a ‘game changer.’ Here’s what we know about it," 2020, Post).

Like my point about better planning around maglev ("DC, Transformational Projects Action Planning, and the Baltimore-Washington Maglev project"), so much more ought to be considered.

Washington's Union Station not multimodal enough?  Union Station is in the news again because plans for the station's expansion, combined with the construction of a mixed use development over the trainyard between the station and K Street NE, are said to be too automobile focused ("Federal agency to revise design for Union Station overhaul, criticized for being too focused on cars," Washington Post) and stint on accommodation of buses--providing less space for buses ("Virginia’s $3.7 billion rail plan called a ‘game changer.’ Here’s what we know about it" Post).

In the planning process, I made extensive written and verbal comments about the accommodation of motor vehicle traffic, pedestrians, and bicyclists, and especially in terms of aesthetic dimensions.

(WRT pedestrians, I said the intersections on Massachusetts from North Capitol to 2nd Street, along First Street, and the unit block of G Street needed to be treated as a network.  I made points about access to the rear of the station from H Street NE beginning with planning engagements starting in 2001!)

Union Station should be a world class train station because its owned by the US Department of Transportation.  I made the point that since the station is owned by the US Department of Transportation, they should be focused on making it a national, if not world class best practice example of integration of multiple sustainable transportation modes.

I also have an extensive discussion of how Union Station can be better leveraged as a tourist information and cultural center, with museum and tourist train functions as well ("New State Rail Planning Initiative in DC," 2015).

The front of the station is chaos, mixing pedestrians, tourist buses, taxis and ride hailing vehicles, and personal automobiles doing pick up and drop off.  

These two parking lots in the foreground seem like a great place for a complementary inter city bus terminal for Union Station.

Alongside regional and long distance Amtrak service and Maryland (MARC) and Virginia Railway Express commuter trains, plus MARC Penn Line's weekend service, the station also mixes rental cars, a bit of car share vehicles, local transit buses, inter-city bus services (Greyhound, Bolt, etc.), and bicycles.

-- "Union Station bus terminal," 2011
-- "New bike parking facility at Maastricht train station in the Netherlands reminds me of the need to create high profile bike hubs in the US," 2018

This 1950s Hertz rental car ad promoted the idea that you would travel long distances by train, and then rent a car to get around your destination.  This ad mentions Washington's Union Station specifically.

Separating bus services by placing them on different sides of train stations in Germany.  In my comments I referenced what I saw with city train stations in Hamburg, Dortmund, and Essen, where transit buses were on one side of the station, tourist buses on another, and intercity buses on a third, although with Hamburg they are accommodated in a separate terminal, a short walk from the station, but proximate to a subway entrance.

Underground bus concourses in Denver and Brisbane.  My preference was to move most of the surface traffic--taxis and automobile pick up and drop off, and local transit buses, but not tourist buses--underground, in front of the station.  

Good examples of underground bus terminals are Denver's Union Station, where transit buses serve the station via an underground station.  And Brisbane, Queensland, Australia, where the Queen Street Station in the central business district, accommodates the inter city bus commuting services from the suburbs.  

Denver

But there are decent above-ground inter-city bus terminals in many places, including Montreal and Hamburg.  They have gates, good wayfinding signage, integrated arrival and departure screens, etc.

But given the underground train and subway tunnels as well as the possibility of expansion of these tunnels, to fit in all this would require a couple of levels, and the space probably doesn't exist.

Between the train tunnels, limited space, and the high construction cost of underground facilities, I can see why they might have blown off my recommendations.  But when you're building something to last two or three generations and such a signature facility, you really ought not to satisfice, because you'll pay the price for generations (like with Penn Station in New York City).

A couple other ideas about inter city bus at Union Station.   First Street NE.  According to the Post article, the plan is to shift the location of intercity bus from one deck of the parking structure, accessible from H Street NE, to First Street NE, with outside staging of platforms on G Street NE.  

The complaint, I think justified, is that it is not enough space.  Plus outside line up to get on the buses is not particularly comfortable for riders and is likely to be a visual and logistical mess.  Which is a high source of complaints aboutthe quality of intercity bus services now ("Taming the Inter City Bus Industry," Gotham Gazette).

Put it closer to New York Avenue.  One was to put the intercity bus terminal closer to M Street and the NoMA subway station, with an airport style walkway to Union Station.  This would put the bus terminal closer to New York Avenue, which is the main way the buses move north and south, easing congestion effects.  It would be difficult to do though.

My preferred alternative: Put it across the street, off Massachusetts Avenue.  Alternatively, the bus terminal could be built underground and above ground on the two Senate parking lots across from the Station/Post Office, between Massachusetts and Louisiana Avenues, bisected by E Street, as shown on the left section of the satellite image below.  With an underground passageway from Union Station.

That's along the same lines of the current station planning, but without the physical constraints, and offering indoor accommodations for riders.  Providing the Senate is willing to give up their parking lots.

To deal with the bus traffic and congestion, I would create an underground bus tunnel on First Street NE, between New York Avenue and the Union Station complex, connecting to the bus terminal. 

The Terminus Centre-Ville commuter bus station is proximate to commuter rail and subway stations.  Gates to buses are accessed from a central waiting area 

Wikipedia photo by Henrickson.

The Downtown bus terminal in Charlottesville, Virginia, serving both local transit and inter city bus services, has an analogous set up, although it's above ground.  A nice waiting sized waiting room with seats protects riders from the weather.  Queen Street Station in Lancaster, Pennsylvania too.  And many others

Gimbels Passageway to Penn Station versus the Socony-Vacuum Passageway to Grand Central Station

This is relevant to past entries making the point that horizontal and vertical connections to, from, and around transit stations need to be better planned as part of station development projects and station area planning.

-- "Public improvement districts ought to be created as part of transit station development process: the east side of NoMA station as an example," 2016
-- "Revisiting creating Public Improvement Districts in transit station catchment areas," 2020
-- Urban Design Manhattan, 1969, Regional Plan Association

Gimbels Passageway and Penn Station, New York City.  When writing the previous piece which referenced the PATH transit system serving Lower Manhattan and New Jersey, I came across a mention of the Gimbels Passageway, which had provided a direct underground connection between Penn Station, the 34th Street-Herald Square subway station and the 33rd Street PATH Station, via a sub basement in the Gimbels Department Store.

Gimbels went out of business and eventually the building was redeveloped into the Manhattan Mall, with a food court on the bottom where the passageway was.

The passageway was closed in 1986 when the city was in decline.  Partly the dispute was over who should pay for improvement and maintenance, and who owned the property, MTA or the real estate developer, now Vornado.  

In any case, the passageway has been shuttered ever since, although in 2010 the owner, Vornado, claimed they would reopen it someday as part of an office project ("Remembering the Gimbels Tunnel," New York Post).

Missed connections between Penn Station, the Herald Square subway station and the 33rd Street PATH Station

From the Eric TB website

Map of the PATH transit system

Lost opportunity with the Moynihan Station project.  I find it shocking that as part of the expansion of the Penn Station complex with the addition of the Moynihan Station train hall, that the opportunity to revive the passageway didn't come about, especially since Vornado is part of the consortium that created the Moynihan Station.  (Also see "PATH to Penn Station: Restoring an Underground Passage to Streamline NYC Transit," Stewart Mader.)

The station had its grand opening in January which opened in January, 

-- "New York’s new Moynihan Train Hall is dazzling but flawed. Philly should do better," Philadelphia Inquirer
-- "Moynihan Train Hall: It’s Stunning. And, a First Step.<" New York times

One Vanderbilt and Grand Central Station.  By contrast, the development of the One Vanderbilt Avenue project adjacent to Grand Central Station has resulted in a slew of improvements, including the restoration and reopening of the old underground passageway between the old Socony-Vacuum Building and Grand Central Station.

While I understand New York City subway's underground passageways tend to be simple in design, there is an opportunity for public art in some of these tunnels, such as the underground passageway light exhibit connecting to Essen Germany's main train station.

Photo credit

To get approval of the controversial One Vanderbilt project, the developer SL Green committed to funding and/or constructing $220 million worth of transit and mobility improvements, including the underground passageway ("Behind the rise of the 77-story One Vanderbilt," New York Post).

The ability to develop around transit stations is conditional on land use and mobility context

Photo from AA Roads.

The Greater Washington Partnership released a report on how a bunch of transit stations in Maryland ought to be more developed, which the Washington Post wrote about, "Study: Development around Prince George’s, Anne Arundel rail stations needs a boost."  From the article:

The study focused on the following rail stations in Anne Arundel: Odenton, Glen Burnie and Laurel Race Track. In Prince George’s, it centered on New Carrollton, Greenbelt, Morgan Boulevard and Southern Avenue.

The PG County stations are Metrorail stations, although both New Carrollton and Greenbelt also have commuter railroad service--New Carrollton also has Amtrak service, and the Penn Line operates every day.  Seemingly, Southern Avenue is ripe for development, as it is on the DC Line, but the area is not highly urbanized. Morgan Boulevard is an end of the line station.

Glen Burnie is the end of the line station for the Baltimore Light Rail system and some residents see the station as an attractor for crime("Addicts, crooks, thieves’: the campaign to kill Baltimore's light rail," Guardian) .  

Odenton is on the high frequency MARC Penn Line and Laurel Race Track is on the low frequency MARC Camden Line, which doesn't offer weekend service.

I have a great piece about how the New Carrollton area can be revitalized through repatterning around transit service.  New Carrolton will also be the end point for the forthcoming Purple Line light rail.

-- "Setting the stage for the Purple Line light rail line to be an overwhelming success: Part 4 | Making over New Carrollton as a transit-centric urban center and Prince George's County's "New Downtown"," 2014/2017

Transit oriented development.  This desire is nothing new.  It was a priority for Maryland's Democratic governors, who advocated for a Smart Growth agenda--that is, focusing development on existing places rather than sprawl.  Transit oriented development (TOD) is a land use and transportation  planning approach that intensifies development around transit stations.

It's not particularly pathbreaking in that's how development occurred historically, around train stations and later around streetcar lines ("streetcar suburbs") and subway and other heavy rail lines.

I wrote about this a fair amount in terms of Maryland, because I believe that they didn't really understand that just because there is a railroad or transit station station doesn't mean that it possesses great potential for "more urban" development.   

-- "For TOD to be successful, necessary antecedents are required, there's no magic wand," 2011
-- "What matters isn't "transit oriented development": what really matters is compact development and integrating transportation and land use," 2011
-- "What the State of Maryland still doesn't get about smart growth," 2011
-- "Bad Montgomery County policy/law initiative #1: removing density bonuses for building around MARC train stations," 2012
-- "Planning for intensity of land use: the question is at what scale are we planning?," 2012
-- "Prince George's County still doesn't get "transit oriented development" and walkable communities: Greenbelt edition," 2012
-- "Department of Duh: Apartments not always successful next to transit stations," 2018

General planning documents

-- Trans-Formation: Recreating Transit-Oriented Neighborhood Centers in Washington, DC | A Design Handbook for Neighborhood Residents, DC Office of Planning, 2002
-- Ten Principles for Successful Development Around Transit, Urban Land Institute, 2003
-- Station Area Planning: How To Make Great Transit-Oriented Places, Reconnecting America and Center for Transit-Oriented Development
-- Rails to Real Estate: Development Patterns along Three New Transit Lines, CTOD

WRT Metrorail, the heavy rail (subway) line serving Metropolitan Washington, once the service started in 1976, it took 10-20 years (1986-1996) to see substantive improvement in core served areas, in particular Downtown DC and Arlington County's Wilson Boulevard Corridor, mostly centered around commercial office development, although in Arlington, also high density multiunit residential.  

In DC, it took at least another 10 years after that (2006) to see the benefit of Metrorail access on community revitalization outside of the core.

Today, in the core of the city with 31 stations (out of 42 total) virtually all of the areas are economically healthy, when in 1976, most decidedly were not.

Categorizing transit stations in terms of access (and indirectly, the opportunity for development.  Perhaps the best way to think about the opportunity for "transit oriented development" is to consider  how WMATA categorizes its Metrorail stations, as laid out in the Bicycle and Pedestrian Access Improvements Study (2010), in Appendix D.  There are nine categories, based on land use context, from dense/connected/compact to undense/disconnected.

• High Density Urban Mixed-Use in a Grid Network (21 stations)
• Urban/Suburban Residential Center -- (12 stations) [opportunity for multiunit buildings close to the station, even if the area is otherwise single family residential)
• Urban Residential Area with a Bus/Automobile Orientation (5 stations)
• Campus and Institutional (3 stations)
• Mixed use in a "pod" layout (13 stations) [isolated, disconnected locations]
• Long-Term Potential for High Density Transit Oriented Development (TOD) or Planned Unit Development (PUD) (4 stations)
  
• Suburban Residential Area (9 stations)
• Auto Collector/Suburban Freeway -- (5 stations) 
• Employment Center/Downtown/Urban Core -- (12 stations)

Note that to make this typology work more universally, two more categories need to be added:

• Smaller Town Center (Suburban/Exurban)
• Exurban Station (Residential primarily)

Using this typology, the seven stations identified by GWP all have serious problems in terms of sparking development, all are pretty much in undense, automobile centric locations, most are pretty distant from Baltimore or DC.   

This illustration from The House Book by Keith DuQuette shows the "transect" of land use context from less dense and more spread out (rural and suburban) to highly concentrated (urban).

Final development plan for the West Hyattsville Station, 2006.

One station not included in the list, the West Hyattsville Station in PG County has had a station area TOD plan for 22 years!!!!!!!!! and the area is just now starting to see development.  

Seemingly it's a good location, about 1.3 miles from the DC/Maryland line, and four miles from the Fort Totten Station, with plenty of land able to be redeveloped and a nearby neighborhood commercial district, and access to trails and parks.  

But until better locations (greater demand, greater economic return) are developed first, the site will continue to lie fallow.

-- West Hyattsville Transit Oriented Development Strategy, 2003

In the Metrorail access study, the difference between the stations is whether or not they are (1) in dense places, either urban or suburban; (2) with an urban form/urban design that prioritizes sustainable mobility (walking, biking, transit); (3) versus a built form that is de-concentrated and automobile-centric; (4) located closer in or farther out in the context of the transit system and the core of a metropolitan area; and (5) end of the line stations.

Stations that are located in deconcentrated places and are car dependent don't particularly lend themselves to compact development.  At best they are pods.  If they do attract residents and tenants, the residents still need a car for most trips and it is difficult for the project to spark further development.

There are many examples of failures to fully leverage transit as a development augur, in places that have better conditions for TOD.  

In DC, the Rhode Island Metrorail station was originally an endpoint station, so commuters drove to the station and parked there.  The area was industrial and when the station was created, the city did not in turn re-plan the area for an urban form more typical of the core of the city.  As a result the station hasn't fully realized its opportunity to reshape the landscape.

It is starting to happen.  The parking lot at the station was redeveloped as apartments (not particularly well, but it did occur), and a nearby shopping center is being redeveloped as a mixed use residential and commercial development.   But this is over a 35-55 year time frame from when the station first opened.  Clearly, a more active station area planning process would have significantly improved the velocity of change.

And the city developed the "Home Depot" shopping center across from the station without replatting the land, thereby failing to fully reap the opportunities presented, and develop it in a more urban and mixed use fashion.

Similarly, most of the developments around Fort Totten Station, also in DC, in an area that was and is comparatively suburban, have failed to take the opportunity to re-plan the area around the station in a more dense, more urban way.

There are plenty of books, studies, journal articles, plans, etc. about TOD.  

What surprised me about advocacy around the Purple Line in 2014, was that it seemed like they were more interested in getting lessons from other light rail systems--because it was the same mode--rather than figuring out very carefully the lessons the Baltimore-Washington area already has to offer, both in terms of creating successful transit networks and the economic development opportunities proximate to transit and how to realize them.

I wrote this piece when I worked for Baltimore County.  I wasn't involved in the master planning process, but I wrote this memo for them, at their request.  (Because it was the Baltimore County Master Plan, I didn't discuss extending the light rail to Columbia in Howard County, another essential step to making the light rail a lot more useful.)

-- "From the files: Transit planning in Baltimore County," 2009/2012

I suggested that they organize the transportation element of the master plan around six principles.  By contrast the county's transportation planner had a pretty convoluted section about fostering TOD through the County Executive's Office. 

1. Optimal mobility. 
2. Linking land use and transportation planning. 
3. Complete streets and facilities.
4. Transportation Demand Management.
5. Transit Value Capture/Funding Mechanisms.
6. Phasing the construction of new infrastructure.

Later in the process I developed my "Signature Streets" concept, but the big point was that to be useful and to make it economically viable to build more densely around transit, the transit system needed to be bigger and better.  It needed to be a network, not a couple of lines, and it needed to serve destinations that are in demand.

Note that Baltimore County is a great example in how transit stations don't automatically create complementary development.  They have three MARC stations on two lines, 11 light rail stations, and three subway stations.  None of the stations is a noteworthy example of TOD.  In fact, the Owings Mills station and adjacent development there is a great example of the difficulty in creating successful TOD at end of the line stations.

Most all of the stations--train, subway and light rail--are located in very undense places or don't directly serve town and employment centers.

Back then I was pretty derisive of what the county had been doing.  But at that time, I didn't really understand how difficult the job of the county's sole transportation planner was, in the context of a county that prioritized the automobile and derided public transit as a service for poor people.  One of the County Executive's top transportation priorities was buying cars for poor people.

WRT what I laid out for Baltimore County, the seven stations listed in the GWP study have similar kinds of issues that hinder the ability to push development forward around those stations.  And like the examples of Rhode Island and Fort Totten Stations in DC, they need to do better physical planning in order to reap the opportunities that could exist.

Note also that creating a regional (Baltimore and Washington) transit system that integrates modes and expands access to service throughout DC and Maryland in this case, but also Virginia with connections to Pennsylvania, Delaware, and West Virginia, makes development at these stations more possible.

-- "The answer is: Create a single multi-state/regional multi-modal transit planning, management, and operations authority association," 2017
-- "A new backbone for the regional transit system: merging the MARC Penn and VRE Fredericksburg Lines," 2017
-- "One big idea: Getting MARC and Metrorail to integrate fares, stations, and marketing systems, using London Overground as an example," 2015