42 St LR and no car traffic

What on earth is this? Closing down 42nd street and making it into a LR system (i guess right ontop of the 7?)

http://www.vision42.org/

42nd is already so crowded so let's put a light rail system in there, that really makes sense. And this will all be done by eliminating auto traffic on 42nd. OMG, could you imagine how much more traffic there would be around midtown if autos couldn't cross 42nd street? The article also said that there are 1/2 million pedestrians on 42nd street; quite a large number of them are tourists who walk around just to soak in the sights, not every one is trying to get from river to river.

I think that the article said it best "The sidewalks are becoming increasingly congested with every new development." A new light rail system across 42nd is a new development and would cause more congestion especially for motorists.

This idea is absolutely rediculous, and 42nd St is the dumbest location for this. There's already 2 subways there, one of which will soon basically run the length of 42nd St. If anywhere in midtown, 34th St needs this.

Does anyone know the story behind this? Who asked for these studies? Who is behind this? Did someone with no time or a big college project just decided to do something.

From the Vision42 site wrote:The Purpose:

New York City can finally have a 42nd Street that welcomes pedestrians with space, greenery, and amenities, combined with speedy and efficient river-to-river travel, via a modern, at-grade, low-floor light rail line. This can be a reality within four short years with the adoption of vision42—an auto-free, light rail boulevard.

42nd street has never been about greenery and open space and butterflies and flowers and all those pretty things. These people are trying to turn mid-town Manhattan into an eco-friendly place which it certainly isn't. You just can't go and change the heart of a city, especially a city like New York.

If you read their explanation on how traffic won't be affected, you'll laugh, non of their plans make sense. This is a joke!

These are the same people who think that in tens years nobody will use cars, but hover-crafts and jet packs. This idea is absolutely absurd.

And you really think people will go for this. Hello, NIMBY. Someone mentioned traffic, exactly. And RR crossings would make not sense for about 8 reasons. There is no need there, let alone in manhattan.

And we want to keep midtown Manhattan automobile-friendly (as if it were ) because ???

Yeah, Vision42 is just the lastest incarnation of an silly idea which simply won't die, the 42nd St Trolley which arose during the Guiliani era - I remember in the mid-90s the idea was to block off one direction of travel for the LRT, and leave one direction open (I think Westbound, as 40th St was supposed to receive the brunt of the redirected traffic). Now, having good ol' streetrunning like the old 42nd St trolleys wouldn't be all that bad an idea, but I'm not sure why they insist on isolating the dang LRT ROWs from traffic lanes when you really need the flexiblity for both - Bad Urban Planner! Bad! Bad! Anyway, this even sillier latest version of the 42nd St Trolley was mentioned in the local dailies a few months back, and as expected it encited all the wackos and burnouts from Transportation Alternatives and Tri-State Transportion to crawl out of the woodwork and start their incoherent bleating right on schedule - also a handful of Hotels and Entertainment centers kinda/sorta said it may be a good idea, perhaps because they thought they could get a free public plaza outta it - Don't really know.

rcervel wrote:These are the same people who think that in tens years nobody will use cars, but hover-crafts and jet packs. This idea is absolutely absurd.

Well, if we have have jet-packs and flying cars and personal tele-transporters (with new & improved Heisenberg Compensators!), then why would anyone need a 42nd St. LRT line anyway?

Charge a high toll for non commercial vehicles in certain parts of the city. This is done in London England. Or, just ban non commercial vehicles from certain parts of New York. (maybe not the greatest idea).

There is no subway that goes the length of 42 St. The (S) and (7) can't have a station at 2nd Avenue, the (7) won't even have a 10th Avenue station at all, only slow buses run the entire length of 42 St

GreatOne2k7 wrote:There is no subway that goes the length of 42 St. The (S) and (7) can't have a station at 2nd Avenue, the (7) won't even have a 10th Avenue station at all, only slow buses run the entire length of 42 St

I think they are supposed to build the infrastructure for a station (meaning a wider tunnel at that point), but the station itself won't be built (which is a shame, as a 10th Ave. station would be very useful, even in the short term).

Yes, it will be a shell without the actual station, allowing for one in the future.

... we're sure glad the citizenry of Hudson County in specific, and New Jersey in general, were far less hostile to light rail transit than the representative "New York" response to LRT is here.

It's not our call to judge a specific rail project on a specific (42nd) street outside New Jersey. But we'd question the conventional wisdom voiced here that LRT can't operate on city streets -- lots of U.S. cities say otherwise. We'd question why people just can't buy the concept that less capacity for cars won't result in less traffic -- plenty of peer-reviewed studies from respectable sources say otherwise. (Feel free to disagree, of course -- but peer-reviewed proposals are a step up from "wacko" level.)

We'd turn to San Francisco's Market Street -- it's got a "subway," underground LRT, and surface streetcars all -- to question why such a thing absolutely, positively couldn't function in one (that's 1) borough of New York that holds twice the population of the city by the Bay.

Finally, we'd question why the outrage -- oh, the horror -- of an alternate transport concept is so strong when it's daily apparent how "well" 42nd Street operates right now.

42nd St is a major crosstown corridor connecting two interstates. A recent study showed that 20% of the rush hour traffic in midtown is just passing through. I have a good feeling that Canal St and 42nd St are carrying the brunt of that traffic. If that is the case, there is no way the local side streets can handle the extra traffic load without causing major delays, even worse than the existing ones.

LRT can work in NYC, just in the right place. Queens Blvd would be excellent. 34th St could certainly use a crosstown line, though it may face the same traffic problems.

Considering there is existing rail service on most of the exact same corridor, perhaps if NYC wants to make 42nd Street more pedestrian-friendly in the high pedestrian volume areas it should simply close off some of the blocks (say from Park Avenue/GCT to 7th Avenue/Times Square or perhaps 8th Avenue/Port Authority Bus Terminal) period and scrap the light rail idea. (The cross avenues and Broadway would still be open to vehicular traffic.)

I'll be very blunt (and show my rail bias) - people who visit NYC and use the subways to get around will continue to use the subways, and people who are either too fearful or too stupid to use the subways will continue to get around by taxi or foot. If people want to use some sort of rail to get around NYC for "tourist" purposes, they can use the subways. It's not like they can't get you from Point A to Point B in many cases.