Does KC have decent public Transportation?

[trailerkid]

Do people agree that not having good transit (comparable to MPLS or Denver) is a major liability for KC's future? We basically have no mass transit infrastructure other than a limping bus system...this is a major negative for our metro area and needs to be addressed soon.

[KCK]

Where is the money that KC deserves not only from the states of Missouri and Kansas, but also from the federal government for mass transit infrastructure? If I hear one more thing about how St. Louis is spending billions expanding their light rail while at the same time KC area transit can hardly rub two cents together, I will go crazy.

[ignatius]

I ride the bus daily to work and it serves what I need in the urban core. Where it can be improved is to have 5-10 minute service at peak and 10-15 from 7PM-1AM. The erratic schedules and confusing bus lines are the problem. You shouldn't have to look at a schedule to get around in the core. The bottom line is that I don't depend on a car to get to work but the schedule can be inconvenient. The other problem is public perception towards taking a bus. I'd say about 5-10% of above avg income use the bus on Main and Broadway.

The problem with having a metro-wide system is that we are so badly sprawled that even multiple light rail and commuter rail lines won't make much of a difference. You MUST have pedestrian oriented areas (aka, density) in order for a metro-wide transit system work well. But having a few park and ride lines to/from the burbs would help.

I think the metro-wide system proposed by MARC is unrealistic. It has lines all over the place in low density areas. Frequency is more important than number of lines. If you spread your budget with too many lines, then you will have less frequency in key major lines. Everything fails if you have poor frequency on key lines.


My ideal metro-wide solution... Commuter rail from Olathe and Lee's Summit/Independence to Union Station with park/ride garages along the way. There is a freight rail line that goes N along the River that could be branched to the airport. The burbs could also build pedestrian friendly hoods/new urbanism along the lines. The challenge is of course buying time on busy freight rails.

Start with multiple rapid bus lines in the core. They would go down State Line, SW Trfway, Broadway, Main, Gilham, Troost. They should run every 5-10 minutes at peek and every 10-15 til 1AM. Convert to light rail later if it makes sense but I'd rather have 5 well done rapid bus lines in the core than 1 LRT line.

Unfortunately, the BRT that is now being developed isn't being done as top notch as I think it should be. But it will be a huge improvement to have frequent service down Main til 1AM.

BTW, even though STL has a very heavily used light rail, overall transit usage is WAY down every since it was first built. They've focused so much budget on LRT that they had to cut significantly into feeder bus lines, significantly reducing overall ridership.

http://www.publicpurpose.com/ut-stljtw2000.htm

[Tosspot]

If it weren't for all this low-density sprawl we might already have competent public transportation around here.