Quote:
Originally Posted by LMich
When M-1 was wrangingly with DDOT's Woodward LRT, the very first iteration of the project had the line being a side-running streetcar from downtown to New Center, and then switching alignments to center-running up the rest of the way. The city then got M-1 to compromise to just having it side-running in the actual CBD (south of I-75/Fisher). So, the part through the central touristy areas (Downtown and/or Midtown and/or New Center) was always going to at least partially be a slow running streetcar and more a commuter kind of alignment north of the "old city." The three-mile portion through the inner/old city is really kind of a circulator, if seems, a kind of people mover expansion without actually expanding that actual system.
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The M-1 group has aways proposed building a streetcar, they still are. It's the city that wanted to change it into a light rail line and extend it, then dropped out of the project. Side running has always made sense for a streetcar line, center running has always made sense for a light rail line. I have no idea where the city's BRT will locate the bus lanes, and at this point in time, I really don't care.
But I would like to point out, even as a streetcar project, the M-1 group eventually places the streetcar tracks in the middle of the street to facilitate reversing the direction of the streetcar. As a happy result, if the city ever wanted to extend the tracks as a light rail line, the tracks are already in the middle of the street.