KIRKWOOD DEATH; LOOP TROLLEY; NORTH COUNTY TRANSIT CENTER

I assume this fatality was either a cargo train or Amtrak.  However, this would be the second time in two weeks that someone has been hit on the tracks. (See last post.)

http://www.kmov.com/story/31501918/emergency-crews-responding-after-pedestrian-hit-by-train-in-kirkwood

For the most part, train tracks are privately owned and leased.  If you have ridden on Amtrak you learn this, because they have to stop A LOT for cargo trains, and local Metrolinks.  Not all of the tracks are well maintained, and Amtrak often has to stop or has problems due to problems with the tracks.  Sometimes these are long waits because they have to wait for the track owning companies to come make the repairs.

No entity that is private and for profit is going to put safety first. No entity that is funded by government money but not publicly owned is going to put safety first. Railroad tracks, like public transit, should be owned by the public and maintained at the highest standard.  Amtrak is completely subsidized by the government.

http://optinstl.blogspot.com/2014/05/the-industry-standard-should-be-safety.html


The Loop Trolley has encountered another error.  Shocking (*sarcasm*).  The main focus is on the fact that cars might be hit.  With that narrow a margin, this screams "pedestrian injury/fatality." PLEASE REMEMBER that the Trolley got a big chunk of money for "urban revitalization" (http://optinstl.blogspot.com/2014/03/the-loop-trolley-sucking-up-more.html).  Originally the Trolley was to run down Forest Park Parkway.  But to keep the Urban Circulator funds, they had to re-route the trolley through an "urban area"- in this case, the part of the Loop in the city.  (Let's not forget that this Trolley is about making sure no local "park and ride" and rural tourists have to set foot on a Metro bus to go drink beer and eat cheeseburgers at Blueberry Hill. That is ALL this trolley is really about.)

http://www.riverfronttimes.com/newsblog/2016/03/18/trolley-tracks-east-of-skinker-may-be-too-tight-for-comfort

I find the city and county planners, street services, and MODOT, do be completely blind to pedestrians and pedestrian safety.  The lights at the corner of Skinker and Delmar are a perfect example.  (I haven't actually been at that corner in awhile, completely avoiding it even if I had to go to the Loop by turning on Olive or Vernon, since I am always coming from the north.  So maybe they fixed it. I doubt it.  I pointed it out to them a few times when I first moved back here.)

Stand at any of the corners and watch the light sequence.  In each cycle there is a 30 second or so period where traffic is only moving from two directions- meaning no left or right turns.  The car traffic has usually slowed at this point.  During this time there is  the inevitable crossing of pedestrians against the light, because of the lag. There is also a turn light that comes up during this time, which adds to the confusion.  I can't recall which direction now, even though I used to encounter it daily a few years ago.   Day and night I've seen near misses as someone comes speeding to catch the light before they think it is going to change, and pedestrian confusion-  that is, stepping out into the walkway because the instinctual, intuitive understanding of how traffic lights are normally sequenced, and not expecting that out of sequence turn light.

(There is one turn light that looks like it was added much later than the rest.  At one point I made a little diagram of where the light needed to be sequenced. I'm pretty sure it was the right turn onto Delmar from northbound Skinker, and the lag was the north-south flow of traffic on Skinker.  But I can't recall exactly and have no idea where those notes are.  This is all from memory.)

Even with all the focus on Washington University students- many of whom walk and bike in the area, and live in the Loop- the people that make all the decisions do not walk or use public transit.  You need nothing more than a heavy snowfall to prove this.  The ploughs come out immediately, and the streets are clear. But all the snow is piled up on the sidewalks.  Even in the Loop and other areas with heavy foot-traffic, shoveling sidewalks is the responsibility of the property owners and businesses.


North County though, has to be the worst in terms of street planning and pedestrian safety.  To get to the new North county transit center on foot- and a lot of times it is faster to walk from your last connection than wait for a bus- you have to walk on a shoulder.  The bus stops in front of Centene have no shelter and trash cans.  The bus stop across from Centene-- west/south side- is on the shoulder and then there is a slope into a little ditch before the fence separating the 270 freeway.  Super fun to stand there at night. (Again, *sarcasm*.)

(http://optinstl.blogspot.com/2014/04/metro-does-not-take-responsibility-for.html)

It's always strange to me, when people talk about our "infrastructure".  Only in the last two hundred years have roads been mostly for something other than pedestrians.  Their were pedestrian fatalities from carriage accidents, but certainly not as many.  Horses in a wooden carriage versus horsepower and 2000 pounds of metal are a very different situation for the person on foot.

I heard President Obama say, when one of the highway bonds was up for the voters, "This is what we do- we build roads and bridges."  (Or something like that.) True.  But no one in the world has more than 65 years of experience building and maintaining roads solely for use of the internal combustion engine.  In this country the population of people and the amount of cars on the road doubled since the 1970's and we are only now seeing what a mistake it was to ditch the railroads for trucks and public transit for private automobiles.

All one has to do to see how blind to pedestrians the planners are is go look North County Transit Center. (Or Maplewood. The worst, in my opinion, as detailed in the optinstl link above, and here again: http://optinstl.blogspot.com/2014/05/the-industry-standard-should-be-safety.html)

These planners and city leaders, and most of the Metro executives, have never ridden the bus except on rare occasions, and seem to walk only for exercise or because they have dogs, and usually then, only in their own neighbourhoods.  (And sidewalks are often missing in areas that were "developed" after the 1950's.  Who needed them right?  We will all just drive a block to the store or park, etc.)

If St. Louis monitored pedestrian traffic as much as car traffic, there would be sidewalks and lighting in most parts of North County (and south and west county, too, actually).

There is nothing more troubling than seeing people with small children standing out on that shoulder in front of Centene, or the many other bus stops just like it.

And this last schedule change seemed to bring a higher than usual amount of bus stop closings.  I'm all for efficiency, but I don't trust the way Metro does things.  For example, on Chambers they are eliminating two bus stops.  On paper it makes sense.  But these two bus stops sit at the bottom of two hills, right where an apartment complex is.  That means that the people in wheelchairs or with health issues will have to go up the hill to catch the 61.

Route changes should not be made by asking the advice of random people motivated enough to go to one of the meetings, or briefly surveyed at Open Houses, even if they are held at transit centers.  Metro should have neighborhood liaisons that are employed or compensated by Metro to determine and tailor public transit to the community's needs.

Please, call Metro today and tell them what you need for a better, faster, safer transit experience: http://optinstl.blogspot.com/2014/04/what-metros-new-survey-should-be.html

Call Metro every time you ride!

METRO NEEDS BIG CHANGES

"Big Changes to Buses" comes the headlines today.

http://www.kmov.com/Clip/12282774/big-changes-coming-to-metrobus-routes-monday

http://www.nextstopstl.org/17968/metro-releases-new-north-county-service-plan/

They change the buses all the time, but it never makes anything better.  This is because Metro does not do enough research on what transit riders need, and when they do, it's the wrong way.

Their blog congratulates holding FOUR "open house" transit meetings.  Four.  To change the entire bus system.

At least they came to the transit centres.  But it is still not enough.  They really need to have someone out every day, soliciting information from passengers, and they need to have surveys.  (You can always volunteer the OPTINSTL survey information when you call them. http://optinstl.blogspot.com/2014/04/what-metros-new-survey-should-be.html)

I also find it amusing that they always congratulate themselves for figuring out that North County is the most transit dependent area.  The focus is always on "reducing traffic congestion".  Very few people with cars are going to give up driving to ride the sloooooow buses.  The train, maybe. But only to and from work and ball games.   Of course, most of the money for the North County Transit Center came from funding to reduce traffic congestion and emissions. 

Well, at least they are trying to appear like they are trying, and who knows? Maybe they really are. But four open house meetings? How many people decided these changes? It can't be more than 200.  Hardly representative or comprehensive.

I still don't see how they can live down the shame of buying those used Grand buses.  Love seeing them break down (*sarcasm*), and other than peak times, and between Mid-Town and Arsenal, they never seem very full. Remember how that was going to reduce congestion on Grand? Right.

It's up to the transit rider to call them, email, and generally communicate EXACTLY what we need to make public transit serve us, instead of the other way around.

Oh, and those sidewalks on Pershall, make sure there is plenty of lighting, too.  That whole area along 270 is a nightmare for pedestrians, on the Pershall and over on the other side, on Dunn.  If you live in North County you know how many accidents go unreported.  This one wasn't.  A transit friendly city is a pedestrian friendly city.  That would mean that the planners and designers and engineers and executives would need to ride transit and do some walking.

More people are going to be walking over to Clocktower Aldi's and the Wal-mart, and down to the Home Depot on Halls Ferry.  Don't just build the transit center and leave it, like you did in Maplewood for 7 years.  Put in the sidewalks NOW.

http://www.kmov.com/story/31467896/pedestrian-suffers-serious-injuries-after-being-by-car-in-north-county

METRO NEEDS TO STOP CUTTING CORNERS ON SAFETY

Someone else got hit by a Metrolink train.  When are they going to start making safety a priority?

http://www.ksdk.com/story/news/local/2014/08/14/pedestrian-struck-metrolink-track/14095037/

I've said it before but I'll say it again (and again, and again, and again): Metro and Bi-State Development Agency need to be separated.  Metro should be about public transportation, NOT business "development".  People that actually understand the needs of Public Transit riders needs to be in charge.  Not men like John Nations who are simply grooming their bid for State Senate and padding their campaign funds. 

ST LOUIS SPIKES

There was a Metro bus crash yesterday because a passenger attacked the driver. 

http://www.stltoday.com/news/local/crime-and-courts/metro-bus-crashes-downtown-after-passenger-assaults-driver/article_b7f39fe2-f03a-5bce-ab54-5a84646ac304.html

http://www.kmov.com/news/crime/Metro-Bus-driver-hospitalized-after-being-assaulted-while-driving-266954791.html

If I had to guess which bus line I'd say the #41.  And as the union comments, this type of thing is far too common on buses. 

Bus driver's take all the anger for everything that is wrong with Metro, and the heat for a lot of what is wrong in the city.

These spikes in violence and crime seem to be so bewildering to our "leaders".  It's as if they live in a completely different city, in fact, a different WORLD, than the rest of us.

Look at the crime maps of St. Louis, and it is obvious that these spikes are happening in the poorest and most downtrodden parts of the city.

The financial crisis of 2008, which we supposedly are "recovering" from, is not over.  In fact, it hasn't even begun.  The bank bailouts did NOTHING to fix the economy.  The bailouts simply shifted the problem.

And all of this screaming you hear about our roads and infrastructure, the insolvency of our state and government bodies, where do you think this money crunch is being felt the most?

At the bottom. 

Yes, you can keep taking a few dollars a week from SNAP recipients, make unemployment benefits harder to obtain, raise sales taxes, ignore our failing school systems, and keep adding more police to already overly-policed neighborhoods (more cops make bad neighborhoods worse), and all of us will pay the price.

This city treats North St. Louis like a concentration camp.  Half of this city doesn't exist, except for the crime reports (and the poor of this city making our legal system and lawyers and private prison owners wealthier).

And the more desperate the people become, the harder the state cracks down, the more explosive it is going to get.  The less they will be able to "contain" the spikes to the areas where no "decent" person will go.

I wish that not only were Metro officials required to ride the buses, I wish all the local politicians were required to actually walk the streets and ride transit and talk to people. 

And police should be required to "walk the beat" and get to know the people in the communities they police.

And, yes, Metro needs more security.  And they need to pay their drivers more.  Bus drivers take a lot of crap, and while some of them are jerks-- or jerks sometimes, they are people, after all, like the rest of us-- they deserve to be treated with more respect, not just from riders, but from the company that employs them.

THE INDUSTRY STANDARD SHOULD BE SAFETY FIRST

 http://www.stltoday.com/news/local/metro/investigation-continues-into-fatal-accident-at-umsl-metrolink-crossing/article_9743980d-0a35-5e2b-93ea-afa672301c66.html

From the above article, a Metro spokesperson commenting on the crosswalk where the woman died:

There is no signal or gate at the crossing, or at any of Metro’s other pedestrian crossings.

“Per the industry standard, we only have signals at street grade crossings,” Beck said. “If we had gates at pedestrian access crossings, people would just walk around them.”

I especially love the editorial on "people would just walk around them."  Really? Are you sure?  Maybe SOME people would.  Maybe the girl that died would have waited for the signal or gate.  But you don't know, do you?  That's just your low opinion of your rider's, right out there in the open.

There is a pretty serious lack of commitment to safety on the part of Metro.  The lack of coordination with street services on sidewalk and street maintenance near bus stops is obvious.  But the Metrolink has a lot of problems, not just at the crossings.

The Maplewood Metrolink is one of the most badly designed and unsafe stations I have ever seen.  There is no crosswalk at the street, to the bus stop.  The eastbound buses have to make a right turn out of the station and go down a Manchester a quarter mile, turn around, and come back up, because there were too many problems with oncoming traffic.

There is a naturally occurring blindspot for eastbound traffic at the curve in Manchester just before the Metrolink station.

That's just one of the most obvious examples.  You see, the people that do the planning and development and construction don't ride the train and buses.  They don't build the stations with an organic understanding of the flow of rider foot traffic.

It looks okay, and it follows the "industry standard".  They collect their paychecks and go home in their cars.  If there is a problem, it is never found until everything is built.  Like the traffic accidents that plagued the Maplewood station before Metro re-routed the buses to make right turns out of the bus depot.

Their should be more safety at rail crossings.  And there should be more safety from the rider's point of view built in to new structures.

Two people have died at this crossing.  What is it going to take Metro?

EDIT: There is no story or news link posted about the fatality on Metro's website.