Property values and mass transit

[Pat]

At the risk of starting a whole new mass-transit blab-fest, I thought
I would post this as a matter of interest.

http://www.buffalonews.com/258/story/94205.html

Property values higher near Metrorail stations
Christopher Michel - News Business Reporter
Updated: 06/08/07 10:20 AM


Houses located within a half-mile radius of Buffalo's light rail
stations are assessed to be valued between $1,300 and $3,000 more than
houses not within walking distance to a station, according to
University at Buffalo study.

The study, "Impact of Proximity to Light Rail Rapid Transit on Station-
area Property Values in Buffalo, New York" by Daniel Hess, assistant
professor of urban and regional planning in the UB School of
Architecture, found property values were increased in neighborhoods
close to stations at the UB South Campus, LaSalle Street, Amherst
Street, Humboldt Avenue-Sisters Hospital, Delavan Avenue-Canisus,
Allen Street-Buffalo-Niagara Medical Campus and Fountain Plaza.

"The gain in property value around rail stations suggests that lower
property values in the City of Buffalo, compared to its suburbs and
other U.S. metropolitan areas, offer a distinct advantage for economic
development," Hess said in a press release.

[RJ]

Post by Pat
"The gain in property value around rail stations suggests that lower
property values in the City of Buffalo, compared to its suburbs and
other U.S. metropolitan areas, offer a distinct advantage for economic
development,"

Guess that explains why all those investment dollars are flowing to
Buffalo. They are, right?

[Free Lunch]

On Fri, 8 Jun 2007 20:27:56 -0400, in misc.transport.urban-transit

Post by RJ

Post by Pat
"The gain in property value around rail stations suggests that lower
property values in the City of Buffalo, compared to its suburbs and
other U.S. metropolitan areas, offer a distinct advantage for economic
development,"

Guess that explains why all those investment dollars are flowing to
Buffalo. They are, right?

Compared with Detroit, sure.

[RJ]

Post by Free Lunch
On Fri, 8 Jun 2007 20:27:56 -0400, in misc.transport.urban-transit

Post by RJ

Post by Pat
"The gain in property value around rail stations suggests that lower
property values in the City of Buffalo, compared to its suburbs and
other U.S. metropolitan areas, offer a distinct advantage for economic
development,"

Guess that explains why all those investment dollars are flowing to
Buffalo. They are, right?

Compared with Detroit, sure.

Probably higher than Kabul, too.

[Free Lunch]

On Sat, 9 Jun 2007 01:53:49 -0400, in misc.transport.urban-transit

Post by RJ

Post by Free Lunch
On Fri, 8 Jun 2007 20:27:56 -0400, in misc.transport.urban-transit

Post by RJ

Post by Pat
"The gain in property value around rail stations suggests that lower
property values in the City of Buffalo, compared to its suburbs and
other U.S. metropolitan areas, offer a distinct advantage for economic
development,"

Guess that explains why all those investment dollars are flowing to
Buffalo. They are, right?

Compared with Detroit, sure.

Probably higher than Kabul, too.

Well, sure, but Detroit is just across Canada from Buffalo.

[George Conklin]

Post by Free Lunch
On Sat, 9 Jun 2007 01:53:49 -0400, in misc.transport.urban-transit

Post by RJ

Post by Free Lunch
On Fri, 8 Jun 2007 20:27:56 -0400, in misc.transport.urban-transit

Post by RJ

Post by Pat
"The gain in property value around rail stations suggests that lower
property values in the City of Buffalo, compared to its suburbs and
other U.S. metropolitan areas, offer a distinct advantage for economic
development,"

Guess that explains why all those investment dollars are flowing to
Buffalo. They are, right?

Compared with Detroit, sure.

Probably higher than Kabul, too.

Well, sure, but Detroit is just across Canada from Buffalo.

Population loss in the region is the problem with land values, not
transit.

[Bolwerk]

Post by RJ

Post by Pat
"The gain in property value around rail stations suggests that lower
property values in the City of Buffalo, compared to its suburbs and
other U.S. metropolitan areas, offer a distinct advantage for economic
development,"

Guess that explains why all those investment dollars are flowing to
Buffalo. They are, right?

Mixed bag really. It has a pretty strong academic culture, but an
ever-weakening industrial base. It does well in areas like biomedicine
and finance. So maybe it's good at attracting the highly educated, but
I doubt it leaves much for the middle class.

As for the light rail system, it's not expanding anytime soon.

[Amy Blankenship]

Post by Bolwerk

Post by RJ

Post by Pat
"The gain in property value around rail stations suggests that lower
property values in the City of Buffalo, compared to its suburbs and
other U.S. metropolitan areas, offer a distinct advantage for economic
development,"

Guess that explains why all those investment dollars are flowing to
Buffalo. They are, right?

Mixed bag really. It has a pretty strong academic culture, but an
ever-weakening industrial base. It does well in areas like biomedicine
and finance. So maybe it's good at attracting the highly educated, but I
doubt it leaves much for the middle class.

I'd venture to say most highly educated people consider themselves middle
class.

[Bolwerk]

Post by Amy Blankenship

Post by Bolwerk

Post by RJ

Post by Pat
"The gain in property value around rail stations suggests that lower
property values in the City of Buffalo, compared to its suburbs and
other U.S. metropolitan areas, offer a distinct advantage for economic
development,"

Guess that explains why all those investment dollars are flowing to
Buffalo. They are, right?

Mixed bag really. It has a pretty strong academic culture, but an
ever-weakening industrial base. It does well in areas like biomedicine
and finance. So maybe it's good at attracting the highly educated, but I
doubt it leaves much for the middle class.

I'd venture to say most highly educated people consider themselves middle
class.

Well, upper middle class then. Whatever the Amerikan term is.

[Pat]

Post by Bolwerk

Post by RJ

Post by Pat
"The gain in property value around rail stations suggests that lower
property values in the City of Buffalo, compared to its suburbs and
other U.S. metropolitan areas, offer a distinct advantage for economic
development,"

Guess that explains why all those investment dollars are flowing to
Buffalo. They are, right?

Mixed bag really. It has a pretty strong academic culture, but an
ever-weakening industrial base. It does well in areas like biomedicine
and finance. So maybe it's good at attracting the highly educated, but
I doubt it leaves much for the middle class.
As for the light rail system, it's not expanding anytime soon.

The problem with the subway in Buffalo is that it was an incredibly
stupid idea. I'm not saying all subways are stupid, just this one.

The University of Buffalo has two campuses. The "Main Street" Campus
is the new one. The "Amherst" or "North" campus is the new campus
(and is significantly larger than the original compua. The original
idea was pretty good. Connect the two campus by subway with a few
stops in between. Slick, esp. in the Buffalo winter. Well, Downtown
Buffalo felt left out and felt that if the subway went north out of
the city, then no one would ever go downtown again, so they wanted it
to continue south down Main Street and hook downtown into the linear
system. That would increase the population that would ride it
(supposidly) and would connect all of those people into the college's
system, allow easier commutes to the suburbs, etc. while allowing kids
to go downtown. Plus it might de-concentrate college housing. Again,
not a bad idea.

Then it got stupid.

Due to budget cuts, the couldn't build the whole system. For
political reasons, they decided to abandon the half of the system that
connected to the two campuses and would ensure heavy use while keeping
college busses off of the streets.

So they built the downtown to Main Street Campus leg of the system.
It is the subway to nowhere. It is a remarkably clean and efficient
system. After all, it's easy to keep the trains running on time if no
one is riding them.

I would guess that they didn't do the campus-to-campus leg because
that was the more needed section and they believed they could get the
funding to do that, later, more easily than going back for the
downtown leg.

So to make the system a perfect disaster (as only Buffalo can do),
they decided that running it was a subway the entire length wasn't a
big enough of a screw up. When it gets downtown, it rises out of the
bowels of the earth and becomes a regular rail system at 5 mph with
stops every block. To accomplish this disasterous feat, they decided
to close Main Street and run it right down the middle of the street.
So now Main Street is decimated because it has no traffic, the subway
isn't used very much because it has no real purpose, and there's no
plans to extend it to the North Campus so the North Campus has become
an economic powerhouse on its own and is leaving the Main Street
Campus behind.

Ahhh. Transit Planning. You've got to wonder what those people were
thinking. And of course Buffalo, which never misses an opportunity to
miss an opportunity.

[Bolwerk]

Post by Pat

Post by Bolwerk

Post by RJ

Post by Pat
"The gain in property value around rail stations suggests that lower
property values in the City of Buffalo, compared to its suburbs and
other U.S. metropolitan areas, offer a distinct advantage for economic
development,"

Guess that explains why all those investment dollars are flowing to
Buffalo. They are, right?

Mixed bag really. It has a pretty strong academic culture, but an
ever-weakening industrial base. It does well in areas like biomedicine
and finance. So maybe it's good at attracting the highly educated, but
I doubt it leaves much for the middle class.
As for the light rail system, it's not expanding anytime soon.

The problem with the subway in Buffalo is that it was an incredibly
stupid idea. I'm not saying all subways are stupid, just this one.
The University of Buffalo has two campuses. The "Main Street" Campus
is the new one. The "Amherst" or "North" campus is the new campus
(and is significantly larger than the original compua. The original
idea was pretty good. Connect the two campus by subway with a few
stops in between. Slick, esp. in the Buffalo winter. Well, Downtown
Buffalo felt left out and felt that if the subway went north out of
the city, then no one would ever go downtown again, so they wanted it
to continue south down Main Street and hook downtown into the linear
system. That would increase the population that would ride it
(supposidly) and would connect all of those people into the college's
system, allow easier commutes to the suburbs, etc. while allowing kids
to go downtown. Plus it might de-concentrate college housing. Again,
not a bad idea.
Then it got stupid.
Due to budget cuts, the couldn't build the whole system. For
political reasons, they decided to abandon the half of the system that
connected to the two campuses and would ensure heavy use while keeping
college busses off of the streets.
So they built the downtown to Main Street Campus leg of the system.
It is the subway to nowhere. It is a remarkably clean and efficient
system. After all, it's easy to keep the trains running on time if no
one is riding them.
I would guess that they didn't do the campus-to-campus leg because
that was the more needed section and they believed they could get the
funding to do that, later, more easily than going back for the
downtown leg.
So to make the system a perfect disaster (as only Buffalo can do),
they decided that running it was a subway the entire length wasn't a
big enough of a screw up. When it gets downtown, it rises out of the
bowels of the earth and becomes a regular rail system at 5 mph with
stops every block. To accomplish this disasterous feat, they decided
to close Main Street and run it right down the middle of the street.
So now Main Street is decimated because it has no traffic, the subway
isn't used very much because it has no real purpose, and there's no
plans to extend it to the North Campus so the North Campus has become
an economic powerhouse on its own and is leaving the Main Street
Campus behind.
Ahhh. Transit Planning. You've got to wonder what those people were
thinking. And of course Buffalo, which never misses an opportunity to
miss an opportunity.

Interesting take. Supposedly it still serves 23,000 people/day, which
doesn't actually seem so bad for such a poorly planned system.

Maybe if they started it two decades earlier and brought it around the
entire city, it could have done something.

[Stephen Sprunk]

Post by Pat
At the risk of starting a whole new mass-transit blab-fest, I thought
I would post this as a matter of interest.

...

Post by Pat
Houses located within a half-mile radius of Buffalo's light rail
stations are assessed to be valued between $1,300 and $3,000
more than houses not within walking distance to a station,
according to University at Buffalo study.

That's it?

DART did a study years ago that showed the land near LRT stations had risen
in value $800M more than similar land not around stations. That's after
less than a decade and nearly matching the $850M spent on the part of the
system that existed then. I'm not aware of a follow-up study now that the
system has doubled in size; they're probably going to wait until we've
doubled it again in 2012.

What's funny is that the land initially went down in value because people
thought transit wasn't going to work, but then shot up when DART surpassed
ridership projections. Now land values start rising around stations before
construction even starts and the cities are screaming for DART to build
more, faster because of how much rail increases property tax revenues (vs.
buses, which depress them).

S

[drydem]

Mass Transits primary mission is to move people and lessen local
highway congestion. However, the side effect of how it might impact
nearby property values does factor into getting the community
acceptance. This story make me think of a FOXTV Simpson's
episode on the building of a monorail in Springfield [1]

[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marge_vs._the_Monorail

Post by Pat
At the risk of starting a whole new mass-transit blab-fest, I thought
I would post this as a matter of interest.
http://www.buffalonews.com/258/story/94205.html
Property values higher near Metrorail stations
Christopher Michel - News Business Reporter
Updated: 06/08/07 10:20 AM

[Bolwerk]

Post by drydem
Mass Transits primary mission is to move people and lessen local
highway congestion. However, the side effect of how it might impact
nearby property values does factor into getting the community
acceptance. This story make me think of a FOXTV Simpson's
episode on the building of a monorail in Springfield [1]
[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marge_vs._the_Monorail

It's pretty unlikely that mass transit does much to lower highway
congestion. It's usually a small fraction of trips taken anyway.

Assuming you built a rail line that took 15% of people off a given
highway route, the improvement would probably be short-lived. Someone
else would come along and consume the space.

[George Conklin]

Post by Bolwerk

Post by drydem
Mass Transits primary mission is to move people and lessen local
highway congestion. However, the side effect of how it might impact
nearby property values does factor into getting the community
acceptance. This story make me think of a FOXTV Simpson's
episode on the building of a monorail in Springfield [1]
[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marge_vs._the_Monorail

It's pretty unlikely that mass transit does much to lower highway
congestion. It's usually a small fraction of trips taken anyway.
Assuming you built a rail line that took 15% of people off a given
highway route, the improvement would probably be short-lived. Someone
else would come along and consume the space.

Urban areas are still growing, as is the population as a whole.

[Bolwerk]

Post by George Conklin

Post by Bolwerk

Post by drydem
Mass Transits primary mission is to move people and lessen local
highway congestion. However, the side effect of how it might impact
nearby property values does factor into getting the community
acceptance. This story make me think of a FOXTV Simpson's
episode on the building of a monorail in Springfield [1]
[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marge_vs._the_Monorail

It's pretty unlikely that mass transit does much to lower highway
congestion. It's usually a small fraction of trips taken anyway.
Assuming you built a rail line that took 15% of people off a given
highway route, the improvement would probably be short-lived. Someone
else would come along and consume the space.

Urban areas are still growing, as is the population as a whole.

So?

Buffalo maybe isn't.

[Baxter]

-
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Free Software - Baxter Codeworks www.baxcode.com
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Post by Bolwerk

Post by drydem
Mass Transits primary mission is to move people and lessen local
highway congestion. However, the side effect of how it might impact
nearby property values does factor into getting the community
acceptance. This story make me think of a FOXTV Simpson's
episode on the building of a monorail in Springfield [1]
[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marge_vs._the_Monorail

It's pretty unlikely that mass transit does much to lower highway
congestion. It's usually a small fraction of trips taken anyway.
Assuming you built a rail line that took 15% of people off a given highway
route, the improvement would probably be short-lived. Someone else would
come along and consume the space.

Keep in mind that 1% can make the difference between free-flow and gridlock.

[Bolwerk]

Post by Baxter
-
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Free Software - Baxter Codeworks www.baxcode.com
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Post by Bolwerk

Post by drydem
Mass Transits primary mission is to move people and lessen local
highway congestion. However, the side effect of how it might impact
nearby property values does factor into getting the community
acceptance. This story make me think of a FOXTV Simpson's
episode on the building of a monorail in Springfield [1]
[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marge_vs._the_Monorail

It's pretty unlikely that mass transit does much to lower highway
congestion. It's usually a small fraction of trips taken anyway.
Assuming you built a rail line that took 15% of people off a given highway
route, the improvement would probably be short-lived. Someone else would
come along and consume the space.

Keep in mind that 1% can make the difference between free-flow and gridlock.

I know. And maybe sometimes 1% actually happens.

Either way, if rail is built just to take cars off highways instead of
because it has intrinsic value itself, rail isn't going very far.

[drydem]

Post by Bolwerk

Post by drydem
Mass Transits primary mission is to move people and lessen local
highway congestion. However, the side effect of how it might impact
nearby property values does factor into getting the community
acceptance. This story make me think of a FOXTV Simpson's
episode on the building of a monorail in Springfield [1]
[1]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marge_vs._the_Monorail

It's pretty unlikely that mass transit does much to lower highway
congestion. It's usually a small fraction of trips taken anyway.
Assuming you built a rail line that took 15% of people off a given
highway route, the improvement would probably be short-lived.

The only reason I've seen that gets people in Washington
DC switch over to mass transit over motor vehicles is
economical ones. Making parking very expensive, making
fuel very expensive, and installing toll roads. For certain
special events where roads are blocked off and nearby
parking is restricted or non existent - most people
can be forced to use mass transit.

Post by Bolwerk
Someone else would come along and consume the space.

Development depends on the growth policy of the area
and the zoning ordinances in place.

[Sancho Panza]

Post by drydem

Post by Bolwerk

Post by drydem
Mass Transits primary mission is to move people and lessen local
highway congestion. However, the side effect of how it might impact
nearby property values does factor into getting the community
acceptance. This story make me think of a FOXTV Simpson's
episode on the building of a monorail in Springfield [1]
[1]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marge_vs._the_Monorail

It's pretty unlikely that mass transit does much to lower highway
congestion. It's usually a small fraction of trips taken anyway.
Assuming you built a rail line that took 15% of people off a given
highway route, the improvement would probably be short-lived.

The only reason I've seen that gets people in Washington
DC switch over to mass transit over motor vehicles is
economical ones. Making parking very expensive, making
fuel very expensive, and installing toll roads. For certain
special events where roads are blocked off and nearby
parking is restricted or non existent - most people
can be forced to use mass transit.

Post by Bolwerk
Someone else would come along and consume the space.

Development depends on the growth policy of the area
and the zoning ordinances in place.

There are number of other factors like capital markets, market demand,
availability of reliable and plentiful utilities and so on and so on.

[Bolwerk]

Post by drydem

Post by Bolwerk

Post by drydem
Mass Transits primary mission is to move people and lessen local
highway congestion. However, the side effect of how it might impact
nearby property values does factor into getting the community
acceptance. This story make me think of a FOXTV Simpson's
episode on the building of a monorail in Springfield [1]
[1]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marge_vs._the_Monorail

It's pretty unlikely that mass transit does much to lower highway
congestion. It's usually a small fraction of trips taken anyway.
Assuming you built a rail line that took 15% of people off a given
highway route, the improvement would probably be short-lived.

The only reason I've seen that gets people in Washington
DC switch over to mass transit over motor vehicles is
economical ones. Making parking very expensive, making
fuel very expensive, and installing toll roads. For certain
special events where roads are blocked off and nearby
parking is restricted or non existent - most people
can be forced to use mass transit.

Well, it doesn't take a lot to get people to use it, if it's actually
useful. In Washington's case, it's great for commuting to the city, and
okay for getting around the city. It's not all that handy for getting
around the suburbs, so it loses a large portion of its potential market.

Frankly, taking Metro into Washington for a day trip is less of a hassle
than dealing with unpredictable traffic going in and out of Washington
and then dealing with parking the car, etc.

Post by drydem

Post by Bolwerk
Someone else would come along and consume the space.

Development depends on the growth policy of the area
and the zoning ordinances in place.

I wasn't really talking about population increase. Traffic is often
just as much a problem in slow-growth places.

[Pat]

Post by Bolwerk

Post by drydem

Post by Bolwerk

Post by drydem
Mass Transits primary mission is to move people and lessen local
highway congestion. However, the side effect of how it might impact
nearby property values does factor into getting the community
acceptance. This story make me think of a FOXTV Simpson's
episode on the building of a monorail in Springfield [1]
[1]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marge_vs._the_Monorail

It's pretty unlikely that mass transit does much to lower highway
congestion. It's usually a small fraction of trips taken anyway.
Assuming you built a rail line that took 15% of people off a given
highway route, the improvement would probably be short-lived.

The only reason I've seen that gets people in Washington
DC switch over to mass transit over motor vehicles is
economical ones. Making parking very expensive, making
fuel very expensive, and installing toll roads. For certain
special events where roads are blocked off and nearby
parking is restricted or non existent - most people
can be forced to use mass transit.

Well, it doesn't take a lot to get people to use it, if it's actually
useful. In Washington's case, it's great for commuting to the city, and
okay for getting around the city. It's not all that handy for getting
around the suburbs, so it loses a large portion of its potential market.
Frankly, taking Metro into Washington for a day trip is less of a hassle
than dealing with unpredictable traffic going in and out of Washington
and then dealing with parking the car, etc.

Post by drydem

Post by Bolwerk
Someone else would come along and consume the space.

Development depends on the growth policy of the area
and the zoning ordinances in place.

I wasn't really talking about population increase. Traffic is often
just as much a problem in slow-growth places.
From what I've seen, POTHOLES are the biggest problem is slow-growth

areas like around here. Traffic is fine.

[RJ]

Post by Bolwerk
Frankly, taking Metro into Washington for a day trip is less of a hassle
than dealing with unpredictable traffic going in and out of Washington
and then dealing with parking the car, etc.

Like he said, when you make the alternatives painful enough, people will
be forced to consider mass transit.

Post by Bolwerk
I wasn't really talking about population increase. Traffic is often
just as much a problem in slow-growth places.

There are lots of variables that could affect this but in my experience
traffic in economically depressed areas is not the problem it is in high
growth places.

[Bolwerk]

Post by RJ

Post by Bolwerk
Frankly, taking Metro into Washington for a day trip is less of a hassle
than dealing with unpredictable traffic going in and out of Washington
and then dealing with parking the car, etc.

Like he said, when you make the alternatives painful enough, people will
be forced to consider mass transit.

Washington's metropolitan area is made painful by virtue of being
car-dependent, sort of like southern California. The Metro works not
because anyone made cars painful to use, but rather because under
certain conditions Metro is easier to use.

The only thing that made the car trip so painful is economic demand for
the highway space during rush hour (which never seems to stop there).

Post by RJ

Post by Bolwerk
I wasn't really talking about population increase. Traffic is often
just as much a problem in slow-growth places.

There are lots of variables that could affect this but in my experience
traffic in economically depressed areas is not the problem it is in high
growth places.

Well, most areas are high-growth or low-growth. There aren't many that
are actually no-growth (Buffalo, NY, maybe?).

That said, you may be right to some extent. But glaring exceptions
might even include decaying inner city Washington. (The metropolitan
area is one of the fastest growing in the country, however.)

[Sancho Panza]

Post by Bolwerk

Post by RJ

Post by Bolwerk
Frankly, taking Metro into Washington for a day trip is less of a hassle
than dealing with unpredictable traffic going in and out of Washington
and then dealing with parking the car, etc.

Like he said, when you make the alternatives painful enough, people will
be forced to consider mass transit.

Washington's metropolitan area is made painful by virtue of being
car-dependent, sort of like southern California. The Metro works not
because anyone made cars painful to use, but rather because under certain
conditions Metro is easier to use.
The only thing that made the car trip so painful is economic demand for
the highway space during rush hour (which never seems to stop there).

Post by RJ

Post by Bolwerk
I wasn't really talking about population increase. Traffic is often
just as much a problem in slow-growth places.

There are lots of variables that could affect this but in my experience
traffic in economically depressed areas is not the problem it is in high
growth places.

Well, most areas are high-growth or low-growth. There aren't many that
are actually no-growth (Buffalo, NY, maybe?).
That said, you may be right to some extent. But glaring exceptions might
even include decaying inner city Washington. (The metropolitan area is
one of the fastest growing in the country, however.)

It's a company region with a regular growth industry and a guarantee of no
downside.