Nope, split separations "win" because they involve the largest amount of road construction, the largest amount of utility work, the highest costs, the longest construction time, the most disruption to local road traffic, the most egregious opportunities for cost blowouts (THIS EVERY TIME.
" The split grade option tends to win as it's cheapest and mostly keeps the trains out of sight (and hearing) of the rich." It's all Other People's Money, after all, we're doing it for The Safety of Our Children, and The Preferences of the Community Must Be Addressed.īut really, it's consultants rigging the process at every single step of the way. The consultancies are happy to produce sand-bagged "alternatives" in in the form of Powerpoint slides with glaringly fraudulent "comparative budgets" and "costs and benefits" to keep things on track. Back a decade ago when I used to waste my time attending "public meeting" whitewash events I got to witness agency staff and consultants actively coaching "the public" to the worst and most expensive outcome - road subways under at-grade rail and "split" grade separations with tons of road and utility work - every time.īuying off local politicians is an absolute screaming bargain - invest like single thousands of dollars, reap hundreds of millions. " It's mostly up to the surrounding communities to choose something for which they can find sufficient political support and funding." Pretty much every dollar comes from "transit" budgets while making actual regional transportation far worse and even if you want to quibble about that, the insane rent-seeking expenditure of Other People's Money on bullshit "choices" doubles or triples the cost any public transportation agency that served public interests would even consider, meaning 1/2 to 1/3 or maybe even 1/4 of the grade separations are built from "grade separation" budgets ( it doesn't matter whether the cash comes from a county, the regional MTC slush piles, California, or the feds - the cash for "grade separations" cash is incinerated not building grade separations.) "but doesn't make the choices or pay for the separations." "Caltrain" (the husk host body for the consultant parasites) makes up secret "requirements" (literally secret - they took their engineering standards off the web, such is their value) which actively work against rail service on the corridor, inflate capital capital costs by high tens to to multiple hundreds of millions of dollars for every single trivial grade crossing, cause decades of delay, and end up fucking over the "communities" along the line in every way - disruption, higher maintenance, poor service, poor connectivity, lower accessibility - forever.Ĭlem's The Exploding Cost of Grade Separations is the tip of the iceberg. Yes, and they're all - EVERY SINGLE ONE OF THEM - absolutely terrible requirements, pulled directly out of the rear ends of consultants who have no aims but to maximize cost. " "AFAIK, Caltrain has a lot of requirements"
Any dream of covering or "capping" the trench (with more dreams of more fabulous things atop the cover or covers) as an excuse to wave away flooding ignores that somewhere, somehow, water will be physically admitted. And so much for trenching, the backup for the unrealistic and ridiculously demanding Peninsula residents that are rare, true, actual NIMBYs about Caltrain and other rail service on that route. Also, and this may be more particularly your objection, that the occasional hazard from flooding during heavier rains is added to the other costs as well as complexity of hybrid crossings (more common name) that involve changes from ground level for both the railroads and the roadways (grade changes divided or "split" among both rights-of-way).
FLOODED UNDERPASS IN MILLBRAE FULL
Rather, you might be objecting to underpasses, period, be they full underpasses, with the railroad at ground level (at-grade), or partial but deeper than here (with the tracks less elevated or raised). Your use of "only" above indicates the height of the tracks, and thus the depth of the roadway underneath with respect to ground level, should be increased normally or ordinarily. "Poor 'split' grade separation designs that only marginally lower the height of the tracks compared to fully elevated tracks are sure to kill again if Caltrain and surrounding communities continue to build more of them."
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