LTD ignores state and federal transit agencies on 6th/7th Avenues EmX . A guest viewpoint by Brian Weaver of Eugene.

By Brian Weaver

LTD ignores state and federal transit agencies on 6th/7th Avenues EmX 

In 1984 the Federal Highway Administration and Oregon Department of Transportation submitted an Environmental Assessment report to justify widening 6th and 7th Avenues to 4 lanes, from 3.  These agencies stated in their EA report that “both 6th and 7th Avenues have only 3 travel lanes in most sections and are congested now (1984) during peak traffic hours” (page #1).  They also state that “traffic volumes are projected to increase at least 30% over the 1982 volumes by the year 2000.” (page #27)
Now, the West Eugene EmX extension will be routed on 6th & 7th Avenues, from Charnelton to Garfield Streets.  The Lane Transit District has proposed "reassigning-a-lane" on about a quarter of this corridor, and intends to designate this lane exclusively for EmX buses and cars turning off of the corridor.  This design will eliminate a through traffic lane, which will reduce the traffic capacity by 25% in these sections; taking part of this corridor back, 27 years, to the 3-lane configuration.  


LTD has claimed that with this design “traffic analysis show that through traffic in this corridor will operate more efficiently because the design moves transit and right-turning vehicles out of the traffic flow for much of the corridor.”  LTD needs to recognize that they currently do not have any bus traffic on 6th and 7th Avenues, making this claim deceptive.  Traffic turning off of this corridor can not possibly offset the 25% decrease in traffic capacity, caused by the loss of a lane.
  
The Alternative Analysis report that the district submitted to the public, claims that traffic congestion will be reduced by this plan.  However, the district only references lofty traffic predictions based exclusively on the year 2031.  LTD's AA report does not consider traffic congestion the day after completion, nor does it consider the time during the 20 year period, to the year 2031.  LTD needs to consider the whole 20 year span of their project, not just 2031.  


LTD’s mitigated drawings show a 3-lane section on each avenue.  The length of these narrowed sections are 3 and 5 blocks long, and resemble "choke-points", or traffic constrictions.  Traffic will have to negotiate these constrictions, as they go from 4 lanes to 3 then back to 4 lanes.  The mitigated plan also shows a bus stop in front of the 7th Avenue Wells Fargo Bank, which will block a lane of traffic when the bus is stopped, loading and unloading passengers. 
   
LTD needs to recognize that the 1984 EA report states, “An alternative that involves widening only those portions of the streets where congestion would be worst is not considered reasonable.  This would mean 3 lanes in some sections and 4 lanes in others.  Weaving and merging of traffic resulting from widening from 3 lanes to 4 lanes, then tapering back to 3 lanes would lessen traffic safety and hamper the smooth, orderly flow of traffic."  (page #5)


The 1984 EA report also states, “In 1981, the accident rate (on 6th/7th) was 7.08 accidents per million vehicle mile, whereas the statewide average was 4.83." (page#14)  LTD needs to recognize that any immediate increase in congestion, caused by their plan, will result in an increase of accidents, as well.
LTD also needs to recognize that there is a good chance their project will impact bordering residential neighborhoods, as well.  The 1984 EA report states, “To avoid the congestion, some vehicles may instead use parallel residential streets, such as 5th and 8th Avenues.  Increased traffic on these residential streets is considered detrimental to the residential character of these neighborhoods.”  (page #27)


Most of this corridor is part of the state highway system and is also used as a freight-route through downtown Eugene.  Since this is ODOT’s jurisdiction, the department could address these 3-lane "choke-points", and would more than likely seek to widen the avenue back to 4 lanes, as they did in 1985.  This will open the door to future forced property acquisitions using eminent domain; so much for LTD mitigating the negative impacts of their plan.  The public has become wary of LTD because mitigation does not create real estate and thus can set the stage for more property seizures.


LTD needs to recognize that their proposed West Eugene EmX extension ignores ALL the logic used by the FHWA and ODOT, 27 years ago.  If they do not, it seems their plan is less about sensible public, commercial, and private transit, and rather more about the "free" federal money and keeping the LTD administrators employed.  If this plan is implemented, it will create more upheaval and permanently scar West Eugene.  To learn additional facts and accurate information on this misguided proposal visit Our Money Our Transit. 


Brian Weaver, an industrial electrician, has lived in west Eugene for 10 years.

LTD on the Ropes. A Dear LTD guest viewpoint by Scott Reynolds.

BY SCOTT REYNOLDS

These last few weeks have not been very kind to our friends at Lane Transit District. While not very much media attention has been afforded recently to LTD's ill-conceived West 11th EmX project, or even to the beginning of new LTD general manager Ron Kilcoyne's tenure leading the agency, LTD has managed to thrust itself into the spotlight, with the aid of local citizens on a couple of these occasions.

A few weeks ago, MyEugene published a video on their site in which local citizen Ben Hallert's dash camera caught an EmX bus speeding through a red light on Gateway Street in Springfield near Applebee's. In the video, it is clear that the light for Hallert was green for a good second or so before the EmX barreling through the intersection even comes into view! This incident also was featured on KEZI 9.In the MyEugene article, it is also mentioned that LTD will not discuss how this matter was handled with the driver due to union rules. In this same article, LTD spokesperson Cosette Rees stated that "safety is extremely important to LTD".

On June 18, the Register-Guard reported that the Oregon Legislature cut funding to a program that provided free transportation to middle and high school students in the Eugene/Springfield area, and LTD responded on a Facebook post that they will be losing about $1.2 million in funding. In this same Facebook response, LTD stated that they assume youth fares will replace about $600,000 of that moneyand no cuts will need to be made. Additionally, in the same post, LTD did state that if they had to absorb the entire $1.2 million in cuts, that some operating budget cuts would likely have to be made.

On July 16, KEZI aired a report about an LTD bus operator pinning the bus between construction on Pearl Street and a fire hydrant, which blocked traffic in the area.

Yesterday, LTD also made the news again on KEZI for a bus operator driving the wrong way down Lincoln Street near downtown Eugene, when it should have headed south on Charnelton Street. We would like to give credit to Jeffery Egbert for sending the photo of the offending bus to local media!

Regular readers of this page may remember a recent article published here aboutEugene attacking free speech in which it is mentioned that LTD had limited access to its Facebook page so that citizens and taxpayers could not post on their wall anymore. Today  Michael Weber was on KEZI today because LTD requested that Weber change a Facebook page previously known as "Dear LTD" to a group as opposed to a page. Weber refused to back down to LTD's demands to do so, but did compromise on changing the name of the page to "Dear Lane County Public Transit, can you hear me now?" Weber also started another blog site about LTD at dearLTD.blogspot.com.

In closing, it is beyond my understanding why LTD is even trying to waste this community's resources and time in trying to build an EmX system that has been hotly contested every step of the way, and that we believe a majority of our community does not want. At the public hearing held in February at the Hilton and the hearing held at the Wheeler Pavilion at the Fairgrounds a few months later, people speaking in opposition to the EmX outnumbered those speaking in support by nearly a 2 to 1 margin. All around town, signs can be seen opposing the EmX project, but how many do you see supporting it?

In just the last few weeks, LTD operators have, without shadow of a doubt, shown a blatant disregard of traffic laws and for the safety of the general public, had their funding cut by $1.2 million with no idea how much may be recouped by youth pass fees, and has expended energy into limiting free speech by harassing an administrator of a Facebook page that had fewer than 100 readers at the time. When 3 unsafe driving incidents have been caught on camera/video in under a month, it is terrifying to think about how many more similar incidents like these have occurred that were not caught on film.

Rather than go chasing after tens of millions of dollars to fund an unwanted project that will do more to disrupt business, cause the loss of an untold number of jobs (which fund LTD operations by way of payroll tax) and has no proven need, LTD needs to return to its core functions of simply providing SAFE, frequent and efficient bus service to all parts of its service area, and making sure that its drivers are operating the buses in a safe and law-abiding manner. For LTD to focus its energy on anything else at this time is absolute nonsense.

Eugene resident captures photo of LTD bus going wrong way down street

By Jaculynn Peterson On July 18, 2011

Today, at around 1:30 p.m., Eugene resident Jefferey Egbert captured this photo of an LTD bus going the wrong way on Lincoln Street.

According to Egbert, the photo, which has been published on the Dear LTDFacebook page, depicts the 51 bus stopped at the light on 6th Street after going the wrong way.

“This incident was caused by human error,” said Cosette Rees, public relations specialist for LTD. “The operator is a veteran operator with a record of safe driving. He was driving an inbound 51 Santa Clara and turned south on Lincoln instead of Charnelton. He realized his mistake and, exercising great caution, continued to the next safe opportunity to correct the mistake. When he reached Eugene Station he called our Operations Dispatch and reported the incident.”

Rees said there will be an investigation, which can take 2-3 days, into why the incident occurred and “if warranted, there will be discipline.”

MyEugene has also learned that just this morning Rees met informally with Eugene resident, Mike Weber, administrator of the Dear LTD Facebook page and operator of multiple other Facebook pages that are critical of LTD.

During the meeting Rees also delivered a message from her office informing Weber that LTD considered the Dear LTD page to be a violation ofFacebook policy.

Weber disagrees: “It’s a community page for sharing information about LTD.”

The two did agree that the Facebook page name should be modified to make it clear that the page was not an “official” Lane Transit District page.