Dallas Area Rapid Transit

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electricron
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Re: Dallas Area Rapid Transit

Postby electricron » 08 Jan 2023 16:47

OrangeMike wrote:
electricron wrote:There are just too many governmental entities involved…


Thanks for sharing the detailed breakdown on the revenue sources. Lots of good info.

electricron wrote:The counties, cities, and other Federal agencies provide zero financial support.


One minor quibble: Not sure which cities you mean to include here, but the 13 DART member cities absolutely do provide financial support because they are the entities choosing to allocate that 1% of their sales tax revenue to the transit agency. They incur an additional cost for doing so because places like Frisco, Allen, McKinney, etc., spend that same 1% of their pot on economic development that often lures businesses away from DART member cities instead of on joining the regional bus and train network.

Thanks, but the data is available at DART's web site.
Having already mentioned and acknowledged sales taxes, which you correctly point out comes from member cities, I was suggesting no other funds come from cities directly. I guess I did not quite write my thoughts down correctly. Thanks for the correction anyways.

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The_Overdog
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Re: Dallas Area Rapid Transit

Postby The_Overdog » 09 Jan 2023 09:10

Other funds do come from cities directed towards DART. Not dramatic amounts and not every year, but Richardson paid out of pocket to re-align the Silver Line and Plano has done lots of planning around the Silver Line station. Cities also use internal funds to upgrade sidewalks around DART stations and bus stops, including Addison, Plano, Richardson, and Dallas that I'm aware of. DART is now providing funds to do some of those same upgrades, but they haven't always.

If you mean to fund DART directly, then I'd agree, but to improve DART assets (or the city's assets around DART I guess)- they do.

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electricron
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Re: Dallas Area Rapid Transit

Postby electricron » 09 Jan 2023 15:46

True, but the amount granted is relatively small. Look at my earlier reply and check out other non-operating revenue and compare that to sales taxes and Federal grants. But every penny, nickel, dime, quarter, and dollar helps.

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zaphod
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Re: Dallas Area Rapid Transit

Postby zaphod » 24 Apr 2023 21:49

This is speculative, but fun to think about.

D2 would be expensive and take forever to build and may never be justified by the ridership it would add if rail ridership remains flat due to ongoing trends like less downtown office occupancy. However a Museum Way station would be appealing, depending on how much that Field development comes to fruition.

What if D2 was built at-grade as planned from Victory past Museum Way, but then rather than submerging below ground it would end in a wye with the existing transit mall at Griffin and Pacific? If you look at that location there is just exactly enough room for it without demolishing any structures. This would be achieved by closing Griffin street between Ross and Pacific and creating a plaza.

It would cut about a 1/4 mile off the total size of the network if you removed the leg of track from the junction by union station to where it turns off by Victory station.

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electricron
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Re: Dallas Area Rapid Transit

Postby electricron » 09 May 2023 10:45

zaphod wrote:This is speculative, but fun to think about.
What if D2 was built at-grade as planned from Victory past Museum Way, but then rather than submerging below ground it would end in a wye with the existing transit mall at Griffin and Pacific? If you look at that location there is just exactly enough room for it without demolishing any structures. This would be achieved by closing Griffin street between Ross and Pacific and creating a plaza.

It would cut about a 1/4 mile off the total size of the network if you removed the leg of track from the junction by union station to where it turns off by Victory station.

Building a light rail spur to service a museum seems even more of a waste of money. All transit lines should be built to connect destinations. Whyich type of transit line depends upon ridership and demand. I'm sorry, a museum that may attract 1000 visitors per day just is not enough ridership potential to even warrant a streetcar, possibly not even a dedicated bus.

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dzh
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Re: Dallas Area Rapid Transit

Postby dzh » 09 May 2023 21:52

I maintain that a properly built rapid transit (heavy rail) system would do incredibly well in Dallas. The issue is that a properly built system with well placed stations is unlikely to ever get the funding, nor get past the red tape to ever be built. It's quite a shame.

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electricron
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Re: Dallas Area Rapid Transit

Postby electricron » 06 Jul 2023 18:42

To drive higher ridership, what DART needs to do is lower train headways or if you prefer increase train frequencies. Interlining 4 different lines through one at surface transit mall limits train frequencies beyond the split offs. Having a second route through downtown Dallas is needed to reduce the interlining from four lines to two lines. that would allow doubling the frequencies on the individual lines beyond the splits. The Blue line in Garland and south Dallas could go from a train every 20 minutes to every 10 minutes. Likewise the Red line in Oak Cliff and Plano could go from every 20 minutes to every 10 minutes. and the Green line in Pleasant Grove and Carrolton could see the same increasing frequencies. Within the splits you would go from every 10 minutes to every five minutes. The downtown street mall would be less crowded, with headways every 2.5 minutes increasing to every 5 minutes as half the trains are rerouted to the second route.
DART does a fairly hood job keeping the trains clean. the major complain I read about on all transit forums is its low train frequencies beyond where the interlining routes split. Of course, the difficult political difficulty is finding a second route most will like.

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Tucy
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Re: Dallas Area Rapid Transit

Postby Tucy » 07 Jul 2023 11:29

electricron wrote:To drive higher ridership, what DART needs to do is lower train headways or if you prefer increase train frequencies. Interlining 4 different lines through one at surface transit mall limits train frequencies beyond the split offs. Having a second route through downtown Dallas is needed to reduce the interlining from four lines to two lines. that would allow doubling the frequencies on the individual lines beyond the splits. The Blue line in Garland and south Dallas could go from a train every 20 minutes to every 10 minutes. Likewise the Red line in Oak Cliff and Plano could go from every 20 minutes to every 10 minutes. and the Green line in Pleasant Grove and Carrolton could see the same increasing frequencies. Within the splits you would go from every 10 minutes to every five minutes. The downtown street mall would be less crowded, with headways every 2.5 minutes increasing to every 5 minutes as half the trains are rerouted to the second route.
DART does a fairly hood job keeping the trains clean. the major complain I read about on all transit forums is its low train frequencies beyond where the interlining routes split. Of course, the difficult political difficulty is finding a second route most will like.


That all sounds good in theory, but by DART's own projections, adding the D2 line downtown does not increase system ridership; sadly, they actually project reduction in system ridership (and it's not as if DART, or any transit agency, is conservative in their ridership projections).

https://dartorgcmsblob.dart.org/prod...rsn=d672d953_1
https://dartorgcmsblob.dart.org/prod...vrsn=93f48ab_1

itsjrd1964
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Re: Dallas Area Rapid Transit

Postby itsjrd1964 » 16 Aug 2023 14:51

DART celebrates 40th anniversary

Hard to believe it has been 4 decades since area voters approved what became DART. Dallas was previously served by DTS (Dallas Transit System).

A couple of still pictures are shown during the interview, one is an aerial of early work being done at Mockingbird Station, the other is installation of track downtown for the light rail line in front of DART headquarters.

https://youtu.be/cGfdzpKH6lk

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jcblindsey
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Re: Dallas Area Rapid Transit

Postby jcblindsey » 16 Sep 2023 09:11

Is there any history out there regarding the design approach DART took on some of the train stations? I personally think the partial barrel roof style that you see at a lot of stations (Lovers, LBJ, Arapaho, White Rock, Zoo, Tyler/Vernon, etc.) looks a bit cartoonish and dated. Is it meant to imitate an underground tunnel? In general I prefer the style you see at the downtown transit mall, Medical District, Royal Lane, Downtown Carrollton and others. My personal favorite is the Camp Wisdom Station- to me the design is very clean and modern but it's the only one I know of like that.

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OrangeMike
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Re: Dallas Area Rapid Transit

Postby OrangeMike » 16 Sep 2023 12:24

jcblindsey wrote:Is there any history out there regarding the design approach DART took on some of the train stations? I personally think the partial barrel roof style that you see at a lot of stations (Lovers, LBJ, Arapaho, White Rock, Zoo, Tyler/Vernon, etc.) looks a bit cartoonish and dated. Is it meant to imitate an underground tunnel? In general I prefer the style you see at the downtown transit mall, Medical District, Royal Lane, Downtown Carrollton and others. My personal favorite is the Camp Wisdom Station- to me the design is very clean and modern but it's the only one I know of like that.


That large barrel roof canopy design is from 1996, close to 30 years old now, so yeah it's going to look a little dated. I don't know why it was chosen back then but I would guess that the scale of the structures was meant to visually announce the new form of transportation since a lot of these are right next to Central up the Red Line. Some of the press from back then talks about how it shades riders from the "Texas sun" but the design is not great at any real shelter from the elements. I remember being stuck on the Galatyn Park platform while trains were stopped for a tornado-warned storm to go by directly overhead and those canopies didn't keep anyone safe or dry. The newer (2010-ish) canopies like you see on the elevated Green Line are a smaller-scale revision of the same curved design and a little better at being functional shelters, and the urban stations reduced the same design concept to a minimal single piece of metal with cables. Camp Wisdom is one of the newest stations and appears to have been designed to complement the Singing Hills Rec Center. Personally, I think it looks like DART installed a bunch of off-the-shelf gas pump canopies—so to each their own, I guess.

My favorite is the one-off design for Fair Park Station that complements the Art Deco architecture behind it.

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electricron
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Re: Dallas Area Rapid Transit

Postby electricron » 18 Sep 2023 20:57

The tall station canopy designs were designed to announce the train stations presence.
To make a statement in each neighborhood so blessed that we are here.
You do not often hear people asking where the station is within a few blocks of it.
In that way, they have been very successful.

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I45Tex
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Re: Dallas Area Rapid Transit

Postby I45Tex » 22 Sep 2023 01:08

Thanks Ron!

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Cbdallas
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Re: Dallas Area Rapid Transit

Postby Cbdallas » 12 Oct 2023 14:48

Did anyone ride DART on OU Texas to the fair. I did and thought it was the smoothest it had ever gone. Still crowded still delays but without D2 to breakup the bottleneck downtown it went fairly well. They didn't use the Green line loop around downtown this year and instead ran more green line cars 3 hours before to probably 4 hours after the game. They also ran special extra Red line cars directly to the fair from the north. I hope they stick with this new plan for the future.

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northsouth
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Re: Dallas Area Rapid Transit

Postby northsouth » 13 Oct 2023 23:32

It's operationally way simpler to just add more Green Line trains and a few special Red Liners instead of the one-day realignment (and way easier to navigate as a rider), but I did miss getting to ride trains through the yard this year (I don't ever go to the game, I just have other reasons to be downtown on Saturdays).

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The_Overdog
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Re: Dallas Area Rapid Transit

Postby The_Overdog » 17 Oct 2023 14:05

Did anyone ride DART on OU Texas to the fair.


I didn't go TX/OU weekend - but I went later via DART. Other than the credit card kiosks being broken/disabled, so I had to download GoPass, which wasn't well stated nor easy to find in the AppStore, and the internet connection at the site was no good, so I couldn't download it, so we all got on the train and scofflawed it. I was able to pay by the next stop. I'm not an app person, so I'd have preferred if the credit card reader was working. The three car train setup was also a dramatic improvement. It was busy but not jammed, and the wait times were reasonable - 15 minutes. No major complaints about DART or the Fair.

The last time I rode a few weeks ago, the credit card reader was working.

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The_Overdog
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Re: Dallas Area Rapid Transit

Postby The_Overdog » 17 Oct 2023 14:15

Also, I ride the redline south - once you pass Richardson, it's kind of embarrassing what you pass on the way to downtown. Most the DART stops are absolutely horrible for being in a major city. It's been 20+ years - IMO the Silver Line is going to have more valuable stops in 20 years than the majority of the Red Line stops north of downtown until the suburbs.

itsjrd1964
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Re: Dallas Area Rapid Transit

Postby itsjrd1964 » 22 Jan 2024 15:43

DART is still rolling out seat conversions to vinyl from their longtime fabric covered seating. The next phase will start in March.

Seats on buses have already been changed to vinyl, according to the article.

https://www.nbcdfw.com/news/local/dart- ... e/3441113/

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northsouth
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Re: Dallas Area Rapid Transit

Postby northsouth » 03 Mar 2024 01:13

itsjrd1964 wrote:DART is still rolling out seat conversions to vinyl from their longtime fabric covered seating. The next phase will start in March.

Seats on buses have already been changed to vinyl, according to the article.

https://www.nbcdfw.com/news/local/dart- ... e/3441113/


Rode on two trains this week that had the vinyl seats installed (could've been same train at different times though).

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electricron
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Re: Dallas Area Rapid Transit

Postby electricron » 08 Mar 2024 09:08

Looks like vinyl seats will be the future for all transit vehicles. Covid crisis brought up cleanup is far cheaper with vinyl than with any cloth material.