Transit News in Raleigh

Back in 2005 the headlines were saying Regional Rail In Peril and Easy, cheap rail proves elusive. On Monday, The Special Transit Advisory Commission’s recommendation of the triangle rail set those headlines as past circumstances.

Although, that doesn’t mean the rail will now be easy… or cheap.

This election brought a lot of new progressive leadership to Cary (new mayor) and Raleigh (new progressive majority on council). The times they are a-changing.

There was one upset in Chapel Hill and pundits are still puzzling over how the “dark horse” candidate beat out the incumbent.  I don’t know, but I do note that he pledged to bike to all city council meetings and to be a “forceful advocate for cycling in Chapel Hill”.

In San Francisco, real estate developers introduced a proposition that would increase parking spaces—in direct contrast to the city’s “transit first” policy.  Local human-scale development activists organized the “Yes on A, No on H!“ campaigning to defeat H and promote the proposition to increase funding for transit and the transit agency’s authority over the streets.

More below the fold

As the bike culture in America gets trendier and trendier, Alleycat races are popping up in most urban cities across the country.  A subculture has been created that is taking these areas by storm.  Young kids of all ages and cultures are fixing up bikes graphically and stylistically.  From Scraper Bikes, to Velospace, to fixing up old freestyle bikes, the DIY bike culture has hit a new high, only matched by that of the mid 80s (BMX and Messenger Culture and Film).  Even musical artists are catching on to the craze.  From The Cool Kids getting “busy as a bee on my bike grips” to Bat for Lashes and her animal crew cruising down an eerie Donnie Darko-esque night street scene doing spins and wheelies to PedalMafia and their constant coverage of NYC, bike culture in the US is ready to tackle small urban centers.  Is Raleigh ready?

I hope so…....

Saturday will be your chance to see Raleigh’s version of this bike steez with Hallowheels, a cleverly named and well fun bike race in downtown Raleigh.  Meet at Cup of Joe and have your bunny suit ready, I’ll have my video camera handy.

More on Spooks and Spokes Below the Fold

Well, not really bullshit, it certainly needed repair;  but with 10 months of beltline resurfacing coming to the south of the city- I imagine quite a few commuters are not excited about the alternate paths.  The 13 miles of beltline from Wade Avenue to the 40 split east of the city will be slowly replaced every night from 9pm to 6am.  Drivers are encouraged to go *way the hell out of the way* north of the city on 440 or 540.  The fun starts tonight, the N&O has the gritty details:

The work includes replacement of about a dozen broken concrete pavement slabs, with extensive repair work to the existing pavement elsewhere. After repairs are finished, all lanes in both directions will be topped with a layer of special asphalt called UltraThin.

N&O

UltraThin- the new Black.

Tomorrow night (Tuesday October 2nd) is the public hearing for the roundabouts on Hillsborough Street—both at Pullen/Oberlin and at Morgan. They are separate projects: Kimley Horn is presenting the Hillsborough Streetscape from Dan Allen to Oberlin, including the roundabouts. and PBS&J is presenting the Morgan/Hillsborough roundabout.  Public Hearings are at 7pm in Council Chambers and these two projects are first on the agenda.

Details below the fold.