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Philadelphia- Roosevelt Blvd. Subway Extension |
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Posted by TransitChuckG on Fri May 20 09:35:26 2022 EYES ON THE STREET Can we afford the Roosevelt Blvd. Subway? Maybe now is the time By Jay Arzu May 1, 2022 Cars visible driving north on Roosevelt Boulevard. Traffic heads north on Roosevelt Boulevard near East Front Street. (Emma Lee/WHYY) In 2003, six engineering, consulting, and design firms submitted a study to the Philadelphia City Planning Commission and SEPTA detailing the potential for rapid transit on Roosevelt Boulevard in Northeast Philadelphia. The Roosevelt Boulevard Corridor Study looked at multiple modes of rapid transit including light rail, bus rapid transit, and a heavy rail/subway line directly connected to the Broad Street Subway’s express tracks north of Erie Station. The study found a Broad Street Subway extension along Roosevelt Boulevard and a one-mile extension of the Market-Frankford Line from Frankford Transportation Center to a new underground interchange between the lines at Bustleton Avenue and Roosevelt Boulevard would take under a decade to complete. The subway was designed to offer six-minute peak headways and 12-minute off-peak headways along Roosevelt Boulevard and would complete the trip between the Far Northeast and City Hall in just 32 minutes. The line would have taken 83,300 cars off the road and had a daily ridership of 124,500, comparable to the patronage on SEPTA’s two other heavy rail lines. There are few heavy rail projects of this magnitude anywhere else in the nation. The closest comparison would be the Purple Line extension that will connect downtown Los Angeles to Westwood — the full extension will attract nearly 50,000 weekday riders. When built, the Second Avenue Subway Phase 2 on the east side of Manhattan will serve 100,000 new riders daily. In San Jose, VTA’s BART Silicon Valley Phase II will carry 54,600 passengers each weekday. With an estimated 124,500 riders, the Roosevelt Boulevard Subway would have a higher daily use than any proposed subway in the Federal Transit Administration’s capital investment grants (CIG) program. Unfortunately, even with these impressive ridership numbers, the subway was not built, not because of community opposition from northeast residents but because of a complicated funding situation with the Federal Transit Administration (FTA) during the Bush Administration. The Roosevelt Boulevard subway was estimated to cost between $2.5 and $3.4 billion in 2000. To obtain federal funding from the FTA, the City of Philadelphia and the State of Pennsylvania needed a local match of 50%; it was not fiscally possible. Spending $1.7 billion is a great deal of money in a city with diverse transit needs like Philadelphia. Hence, policymakers and planners explored other transit alternatives for the corridor, like enhancing bus service. The failure to build the subway started a nearly decade-long period where the corridor was studied multiple times, but none of the studies included building a subway. In 2011, the city’s 2035 Citywide Vision reviewed the subway line but recommended further study to identify transit alternatives. At the time, funding for heavy rail projects was simply not there. In May 2016, the Delaware Valley Regional Planning Commission released a report which considered less expensive alternatives to the subway, mainly bus rapid transit. Most recently, in May 2021, the City of Philadelphia, SEPTA and PennDOT released the Final report for Route for Change, which seems to have abandoned the idea of a subway entirely for an underground expressway. The Roosevelt Boulevard subway was not built nearly two decades ago because of a lack of funding, but today billions of dollars in federal financing exist for transportation projects from the bipartisan infrastructure law and the RAISE discretionary grant program. The Biden Administration’s FTA could be more amenable to funding an infrastructure project that would create jobs, encourage transit-oriented development, and end a significant transit inequity. This combination of federal dollars and infrastructure grants makes now the perfect time to build the Roosevelt Boulevard subway once and for all. Jay Arzu is a doctoral student of City and Regional Planning at the University of Pennsylvania Stuart Weitzman School of Design. |
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Re: Philadelphia- Roosevelt Blvd. Subway Extension |
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Posted by Andy on Fri May 20 10:01:45 2022, in response to Philadelphia- Roosevelt Blvd. Subway Extension, posted by TransitChuckG on Fri May 20 09:35:26 2022. The proposal for a Roosevelt Boulevard subway extension to/from Broad Street is nothing new. In the mid-1960s such an extension was planned in detail. The extension would swing off the Broad St. Subway at Hunting Park and follow Roosevelt Blvd. into Northeast Philly – not sure exactly how far. As I understand, Sears built a new store and warehouse along the proposed route that included the underground shell for a subway station that was never built. |
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Re: Philadelphia- Roosevelt Blvd. Subway Extension |
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Posted by TUNNELRAT on Fri May 20 11:04:09 2022, in response to Re: Philadelphia- Roosevelt Blvd. Subway Extension, posted by Andy on Fri May 20 10:01:45 2022. the "used to be " sears tower had a built at their own expense 2 track subway station in their basement.once a month they go down to examine it. |
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Re: Philadelphia- Roosevelt Blvd. Subway Extension |
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Posted by Andy on Fri May 20 11:40:12 2022, in response to Re: Philadelphia- Roosevelt Blvd. Subway Extension, posted by TUNNELRAT on Fri May 20 11:04:09 2022. Where is that building located - Roosevelt and where? I don"t live in Philly but know the area. |
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Re: Philadelphia- Roosevelt Blvd. Subway Extension |
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Posted by TUNNELRAT on Fri May 20 18:29:56 2022, in response to Re: Philadelphia- Roosevelt Blvd. Subway Extension, posted by Andy on Fri May 20 11:40:12 2022. I..............dunno. |
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Re: Philadelphia- Roosevelt Blvd. Subway Extension |
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Posted by Andrew Saucci on Fri May 20 21:28:25 2022, in response to Philadelphia- Roosevelt Blvd. Subway Extension, posted by TransitChuckG on Fri May 20 09:35:26 2022. I wonder if a subway and an expressway could not be constructed together. The expressway makes sense because Roosevelt Blvd-- US 1-- is an expressway north and south of Philadelphia. It shouldn't have to be "either/or" but rather "both/and." As we say in railroading, "mind the gap." |
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Re: Philadelphia- Roosevelt Blvd. Subway Extension |
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Posted by nh153 on Sat May 21 07:19:52 2022, in response to Re: Philadelphia- Roosevelt Blvd. Subway Extension, posted by TUNNELRAT on Fri May 20 18:29:56 2022. Sad to say, Sears isn't building anything anymore. I wonder where this store, tower and unused subway station are?I suppose it would have been easy to build a subway line under Roosevelt Boulevard with minimal interruption to local traffic. Just put it under the median. Then restore the median to grass once the construction is over. |
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Re: Philadelphia- Roosevelt Blvd. Subway Extension |
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Posted by randyo on Mon May 23 02:03:29 2022, in response to Re: Philadelphia- Roosevelt Blvd. Subway Extension, posted by nh153 on Sat May 21 07:19:52 2022. I building of the station for the proposed line, lends a bit of credence to my theory about the existence of the oft discussed 76 St/Pitkin Av station. It may also have been built by an entity other than the city but that entity may not have had the interest in maintaining the integrity of the station infrastructure the way Sears did. |
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Re: Philadelphia- Roosevelt Blvd. Subway Extension |
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Posted by Mark S. Feinman on Mon May 23 13:59:01 2022, in response to Re: Philadelphia- Roosevelt Blvd. Subway Extension, posted by nh153 on Sat May 21 07:19:52 2022. The building no longer exists. It was imploded on October 31st, 1994.--Mark |
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