PHILADELPHIA | Lowrise/General Developments Thread

[ScreamShatter]

Originally Posted by ebuilder

exactly. People don't just buy new cars every 4 years. It would take YEARS for the current fleet to be replaced and that is assuming people embrace the tech and are willing to pay for it. What is more likely to happen is this tech debuts in high end pricey cars that the masses cannot afford and many middle and lower class people will stick with regular cars for the foreseeable future. Also, driverless cars don't solve traffic problems- they just allow you to have a longer commute with less stress. IN fact, it will likely make traffic worse by encouraging people to move farther from job centers.

Regarding the driverless cars don't solve traffic problems or reduced commutes, that's to be debated. I've read theories that once mass adoption starts and fewer drivers on the road, that the driverless cars will be able to drive much closer to each other than humans can. Interstates basically would become like railroads for cars with the cars all being separated by inches or feet rather than 100s of feet and that will make it where the car trains can drive faster, reduce congestion, etc.

I'm not saying any of that is true or comes to be. I'm just reiterating that is very difficult to predict how the technology would transform every day life and then how that would impact development or our ways of life.

[Milksteak]

Originally Posted by ebuilder

IN fact, it will likely make traffic worse by encouraging people to move farther from job centers.

This is something I've wondered about for a while. When I moved to the burbs from the city years ago, Uber and Lyft were really more of a San Francisco heavily urban centric thing...now I can catch an Uber from my door at any time of the day or night and get into the city easily (although it is still a bit expensive). Once they roll out driverless cars and costs are cut down, I wonder if there will be a shift back to the burbs. It's not the same as being in the middle of it all, but it will be almost as convenient.

[Busy Bee]

Interstates basically would become like railroads for cars with the cars all being separated by inches or feet rather than 100s of feet and that will make it where the car trains can drive faster

Wait, where are you driving on a congested interstate where the cars are staying hundreds of feet away from each other??? Let me know and I'll tell that to the a-hole 3 feet behind me next time

[ebuilder]

Originally Posted by ScreamShatter

Regarding the driverless cars don't solve traffic problems or reduced commutes, that's to be debated. I've read theories that once mass adoption starts and fewer drivers on the road, that the driverless cars will be able to drive much closer to each other than humans can. Interstates basically would become like railroads for cars with the cars all being separated by inches or feet rather than 100s of feet and that will make it where the car trains can drive faster, reduce congestion, etc.

I'm not saying any of that is true or comes to be. I'm just reiterating that is very difficult to predict how the technology would transform every day life and then how that would impact development or our ways of life.

No one who designs roads or studies traffic would ever make any such claims about driverless cars. Tech addicts believe the source of EVERY problem is the fact that a computer isn't doing something. The notion that congestion is based on human error makes no sense whatsoever. Congestion is about capacity and volume of cars- it doesn't matter who is driving the car. You can replace all humans with bots and 76 will still be jammed. Human drivers are already pretty adept and driving only a few feet behind the another car. When volume is low, humans have already figured out how to drive faster and better utilize the open space. Even if we believe the pie in the sky utopian vision of how this all looks what is being promised is an era of near 24/7 congestion where computer driven cars are spaced 6in apart and area roadways are packed to max capacity at all times in the name of "efficiency".

[ebuilder]

Originally Posted by Milksteak

This is something I've wondered about for a while. When I moved to the burbs from the city years ago, Uber and Lyft were really more of a San Francisco heavily urban centric thing...now I can catch an Uber from my door at any time of the day or night and get into the city easily (although it is still a bit expensive). Once they roll out driverless cars and costs are cut down, I wonder if there will be a shift back to the burbs. It's not the same as being in the middle of it all, but it will be almost as convenient.

I think anyone who assumes Uber and Lyft want to ditch drivers in order to make rides cheaper should rethink that. How about they need driverless cars just to make the current model profitable. Neither can make any money at current prices and usage levels.

[AbortedWalrus]

Originally Posted by ebuilder

No one who designs roads or studies traffic would ever make any such claims about driverless cars. Tech addicts believe the source of EVERY problem is the fact that a computer isn't doing something. The notion that congestion is based on human error makes no sense whatsoever. Congestion is about capacity and volume of cars- it doesn't matter who is driving the car. You can replace all humans with bots and 76 will still be jammed. Human drivers are already pretty adept and driving only a few feet behind the another car. When volume is low, humans have already figured out how to drive faster and better utilize the open space. Even if we believe the pie in the sky utopian vision of how this all looks what is being promised is an era of near 24/7 congestion where computer driven cars are spaced 6in apart and area roadways are packed to max capacity at all times in the name of "efficiency".

There are so many factors you're not accounting for here and I think it's leading you to make a mistake in the ability of the self-driving cars to reduce congestion. Self driving cars have reaction times to sudden breaking events that are 1/3 those of drivers in a best case scenario for human drivers. That's a difference of 20 meters of stopping distance.

Self-driving cars also have perfect lane discipline, in that they do not drift between the lines in their lane but drive in a relatively perfect line. The maximum allowable width for a vehicle is 8.5 feet which includes oversized vehicles, but for standard vehicles it is 8 feet, whereas highway lane width is standardized at 12 feet. Taking 2 feet from the shoulder and reducing lane widths by 3-4 feet in congested areas would allow for formation of a third lane on most two lane highways.

So we can have cars follow each other more close, drive more closely together due to elimination of lane drift which may allow for more lanes. A third benefit is that the cars will accelerate more uniformly eliminating phantom traffic jams entirely.

Self-driving cars can also operate at speeds much greater than humans due to their reaction times, which increases the total throughput volume of highways. There will also be drastically reduced congestion in urban areas due to the fact that no one will be circling for parking. The car will simply drop you off and then pick up the next passenger, or proceed to some remote location for storage.

Of course, one of the largest savings in traffic will be the near elimination of traffic accidents. All of these things will be further improved with inter-car communication protocols that the SAE is finalizing. Unfortunately we will not reap all of these benefits until all human driven cars are off the roads.

Related to self-driving car adoption, I don't think the hurdles to adoption are as large as people think they will be, particularly due to the lower cost to consumers they will represent. Many people are viewing traditional ownership models for self-driving cars, but that is not necessarily the model manufacturers are pursuing. Instead you will likely lease access ridership rather than owning a vehicle. A single car can realistically service at the very minimum of 5 times the amount of riders they do now, due to the amount of time they spend idle. This model will lead to drastically lowered costs per user. The average US citizen spends $8500 a year on their cars, and it's a low bar for a program that leases access to rides to come in significantly under that amount due to optimizing the road time of the vehicles. Think of it like a giant Uber/Lyft service maintained by car manufacturers. Prices won't go up. People will likely first eliminate second vehicles in favor of such ride sharing, and once their existing vehicle ages out they'll likely shift over entirely. Once enough drivers start shifting over the upward pressure on car insurance rates for human drivers will push more and more drivers into self-driving car adoption.

It will still take a decade or two, but that's fine because we don't need massive adoption immediately to reap immediate benefits for things like parking and some forms of reduced congestion. If you can eliminate 10% of the cars on the street in the first 5 years the benefits would be incredible.

And I think that's enough of a derail on this thread from me!

[El Duderino]

can we talk about this in the transportation thread instead? while an interesting discussion, we don’t need multiple pages of conjecture to talk about what may or may not happen at some unclear point in the future, especially since it’s veered from the project-specific focus.

in old city low rise news, the National is almost at full height (exterior walls are going up on the top floor) and the steel is two floors up at 218 Arch St. 401 Race is slowly coming into focus as well, so it will be interesting to see what happens in this vicinity when these hundreds of units deliver.

[City Wide]

Originally Posted by ebuilder

reduced frequency but not loss in capacity because the trolley's will hold more people. Once they drop the # of stops it's going to be more like real light rail- not a bus on wheels. I.e. people will actually need to look at scheduled times before showing up at a stop instead of going to nearest corner and knowing a trolley will show up within 5 min.

I understand what you're are saying, and most likely any new capacity will be taken up very quickly by increased ridership; these routes really do provide a easy and convenient method to get into the Penn/Drexel area and CC -----the same way as happened with the 'new' Kawasaki's were introduced almost 30 years ago.

I disagree with your assessment that on street trolleys, even if certain other possibilities like trolley control of traffic lights come to pass, will ever be able to run on anything like a schedule. Baltimore, Chester, Lancaster, and Woodland Ave's are local city streets, full of local traffic, deliveries and the like. Chester Ave has more stop signs then lights and tech isn't going to change that. Plus I believe the ridership wants the trolleys to function like buses, but better. There's something very positive to say about being able to walk a couple blocks and expect a trolley to come within 5 to 10 minutes. Isn't mass transit suppose to serve the ridership and not the other way around?

SEPTA says that 5 of their 10 most used routes are from the west Philly trolley runs and that success should be built on and not just managed. I'm very surprised and pleased that SEPTA is considering more then just replacing the existing trolleys, and seemingly is actually looking at the whole system. Great news, and I hope the dream doesn't get lost in the system and the federal mess.

Personally I wish SEPTA had even bigger dreams, such as trying to figure out how to add additional trolley routes using the 40th St. portal, such as on Spruce St. (another one of SEPTA's high use bus routes)and a route to the zoo. What about a tunnel under Chestnut St. for the trolleys to run through in CC; that would free up west Market St. so an additional station could be added without great headaches and huge expense, and maybe the trolleys could extend their routes further then just the present ending point around 13th St. Maybe there would be a way to include the Delaware river front/Penn's Landing. Could/will any of that happen, sure its doubtful, but without the dream and a way to even consider such 'big plans' they certainly aren't going to happen

[iheartphilly]

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[frbrown]

Demolition of Wash n' Lube was has begun at 4125 Chestnut

Demolition of “Wash ‘n Lube” car wash has begun on the 4100 block of Chestnut Street to make room for a pre-fab 6-story 130-unit apartment building (see rendering below). The new construction is “by right”, which means it didn’t have to go through zoning or community approval. Nevertheless, the plan for the proposed building at 4125 Chestnut Street was presented at September’s Spruce Hill Community Association zoning meeting as a heads up for the community.

As a reminder here is the Civic Design Review for that project

[Londonee]

Originally Posted by Milksteak

This is something I've wondered about for a while. When I moved to the burbs from the city years ago, Uber and Lyft were really more of a San Francisco heavily urban centric thing...now I can catch an Uber from my door at any time of the day or night and get into the city easily (although it is still a bit expensive). Once they roll out driverless cars and costs are cut down, I wonder if there will be a shift back to the burbs. It's not the same as being in the middle of it all, but it will be almost as convenient.

I guess? I live in Fitler Square and my office is on Walnut St. My commute is 10 minutes door to door and involves zero carbon footprint, a lovely walk through Rittenhouse Square, getting an espresso at a wonderful cafe, zero $$, and me getting much needed exercise. Even if we're in a traffic-less, driver-less utopia in 15 years and outward expansion continues, and say you buy a lame McMansion in the rapidly developing Thorndale area, to get to the same point on the map will still take you 55minutes and cost you $$. Sure you don't have to wrestle with the anxiety of traffic and you'll be able to do work in the car, but i wouldn't put outward expansion "almost as convenient" as living in the middle of everything. As long as there's stuff in the city, there's always going to be significant value of living in the middle of it.

[PHL10]

Originally Posted by Londonee

I guess? I live in Fitler Square and my office is on Walnut St. My commute is 10 minutes door to door and involves zero carbon footprint, a lovely walk through Rittenhouse Square, getting an espresso at a wonderful cafe, zero $$, and me getting much needed exercise. Even if we're in a traffic-less, driver-less utopia in 15 years and outward expansion continues, and say you buy a lame McMansion in the rapidly developing Thorndale area, to get to the same point on the map will still take you 55minutes and cost you $$. Sure you don't have to wrestle with the anxiety of traffic and you'll be able to do work in the car, but i wouldn't put outward expansion "almost as convenient" as living in the middle of everything. As long as there's stuff in the city, there's always going to be significant value of living in the middle of it.

I understand the point that Milksteak was making but his last sentence about it being almost as convenient was a bit overstated. He/she has obviously spent time living in the City but it really comes down to lifestyle choice, which you nicely outlined in your anecdote. There's a difference between living there and visiting there which seems something suburbanites sometimes don't get.

I once witnessed a guy from Cherry Hill trying to convince someone living in Fishtown that he was more from Philadelphia than the Fishtowner because it took him less time to get to Center City. If the only reason one would want to live in the City is that they are closer to bars, then I guess that logic may make sense.

[ScreamShatter]

Originally Posted by ebuilder

No one who designs roads or studies traffic would ever make any such claims about driverless cars. Tech addicts believe the source of EVERY problem is the fact that a computer isn't doing something. The notion that congestion is based on human error makes no sense whatsoever. Congestion is about capacity and volume of cars- it doesn't matter who is driving the car. You can replace all humans with bots and 76 will still be jammed. Human drivers are already pretty adept and driving only a few feet behind the another car. When volume is low, humans have already figured out how to drive faster and better utilize the open space. Even if we believe the pie in the sky utopian vision of how this all looks what is being promised is an era of near 24/7 congestion where computer driven cars are spaced 6in apart and area roadways are packed to max capacity at all times in the name of "efficiency".

The guy who wrote that was the former CEO of either Ford or Chrysler. He laid out a pretty detailed vision for how lanes of traffics would change and whatnot.

Again, I'm not saying that is what is going to happen. But I am saying that no one on here can predict the impacts of driverless cars on society. So there's no point in planning life around it now when we don't know if and when it'll even be adopted. It may end up being a total negative thing for the city. It may not. No one knows how human behavior will change.

[ebuilder]

Originally Posted by ScreamShatter

The guy who wrote that was the former CEO of either Ford or Chrysler. He laid out a pretty detailed vision for how lanes of traffics would change and whatnot.

Again, I'm not saying that is what is going to happen. But I am saying that no one on here can predict the impacts of driverless cars on society. So there's no point in planning life around it now when we don't know if and when it'll even be adopted. It may end up being a total negative thing for the city. It may not. No one knows how human behavior will change.

One thing we do know- the expansion of ride sharing in the city has done NOTHING to curb congestion. The fact that many thousands of people are using the convenience of ride sharing and not searching for parking spots hasn't turned CC Philly into some sort of pedestrian Utopia. Instead what you have is dozens of cars per hour stopping traffic to look for people, board people or to let people out. Just because people aren't in personal cars doesn't change the fact that they are in cars. And a parked car isn't clogging up traffic- it's not a bad thing for a car to be parked. Can't wait for the future when autonomous cars are circling town 24/7 and there is never an expanse of 10 feet of asphalt to be seen in town.

[ebuilder]

Originally Posted by City Wide

I understand what you're are saying, and most likely any new capacity will be taken up very quickly by increased ridership; these routes really do provide a easy and convenient method to get into the Penn/Drexel area and CC -----the same way as happened with the 'new' Kawasaki's were introduced almost 30 years ago.

I disagree with your assessment that on street trolleys, even if certain other possibilities like trolley control of traffic lights come to pass, will ever be able to run on anything like a schedule. Baltimore, Chester, Lancaster, and Woodland Ave's are local city streets, full of local traffic, deliveries and the like. Chester Ave has more stop signs then lights and tech isn't going to change that. Plus I believe the ridership wants the trolleys to function like buses, but better. There's something very positive to say about being able to walk a couple blocks and expect a trolley to come within 5 to 10 minutes. Isn't mass transit suppose to serve the ridership and not the other way around?

SEPTA says that 5 of their 10 most used routes are from the west Philly trolley runs and that success should be built on and not just managed. I'm very surprised and pleased that SEPTA is considering more then just replacing the existing trolleys, and seemingly is actually looking at the whole system. Great news, and I hope the dream doesn't get lost in the system and the federal mess.

Personally I wish SEPTA had even bigger dreams, such as trying to figure out how to add additional trolley routes using the 40th St. portal, such as on Spruce St. (another one of SEPTA's high use bus routes)and a route to the zoo. What about a tunnel under Chestnut St. for the trolleys to run through in CC; that would free up west Market St. so an additional station could be added without great headaches and huge expense, and maybe the trolleys could extend their routes further then just the present ending point around 13th St. Maybe there would be a way to include the Delaware river front/Penn's Landing. Could/will any of that happen, sure its doubtful, but without the dream and a way to even consider such 'big plans' they certainly aren't going to happen

Everything that runs has a schedule, even buses. Outside of the tunnel the trolleys currently operate just like buses which is different from most light rail in the country. Even LR that comingles with traffic typically have dedicated stops and schedules that should be used as a guide. During rush hour there probably wont be a huge difference from current frequency, BUT the fact that stops may be 4+ blocks apart means people will need to get more familiar with scheduled departure times since you can't just walk to any corner and hop on.

if there was an unlimited pot of money surely we could get a whole of new things but unfortunately that's not the case.

[tsarstruck]

Originally Posted by ebuilder

And a parked car isn't clogging up traffic- it's not a bad thing for a car to be parked. Can't wait for the future when autonomous cars are circling town 24/7 and there is never an expanse of 10 feet of asphalt to be seen in town.

Last I checked, traffic was pretty much at a standstill at all of those lanes devoted to street parking. There is a lot of real estate in Philadelphia sitting useless under parked cars in the city, real estate that can be repurposed for better pedestrian and biking amenities, for loading and pickup zones, and in some cases additional traffic lanes.

That said, I think the point that autonomous cars won't be a panacea for congestion is 100% right. Sure, being able to drive closer together will offer great throughput, but that throughput will just induce greater demand. Additionally, taking some of the pain out of a long driving commute will definitely inspire people to weigh the cost/benefits of living further out differently.

I see the first wave of autonomous vehicles being a negative for cities and sprawl: it will allow less painful commutes, but without sufficient adoption it won't allow the close-driving effect to increase throughput. The second wave, when truly autonomous cars can make hailing a very cheap self-driven car viable, is when you'll see lots of people give up their privately owned cars. The benefit of that--for capacity to improve the streetscape and for significantly reducing NIMBY opposition to density--is going to be huge.

[iheartphilly]

I'm not sure I buy all the hype with autonomous driving vehicles. How many inputs will the computer process and will it save time on the commute for all drivers. As long as there are stop lights, stop signs, and other traffic slowing mechanisms, everyone on the road is a slave to these measure. So, I'm not sold that it will improve efficiency and throughput. Maybe less aggravation for the driver/rider since the computer AI will take all the driving variables that the sensor/radar/driving technology can pick up and process in place of the human brain. One thing I do like about the sell is that it should cut down on accidents cause by human drivers. AI driving safety is one of the big selling points.

[iheartphilly]

Originally Posted by CCGuy

We shall see, but the total cost of ownership of your own car vs an autonomous driving car share service will be less for most people (based in avg miles driven). Computers are cheap and getting cheaper. Shared insurance pools will lower costs even more. I disagree that the general public will not be comfortable being chauffeured around- by a safer, autonomous, driver than the typical cab driver of today. Ford and other car companies see this shared fleet - reoccurring revenue, as the business model of the future. To sum up- this will be cheaper, safer, and better for the environment. For urban areas this makes total sense.

Not true. I read that it adds 100k in technology, including the AI computer on top of the price of a car.

https://assets.kpmg.com/content/dam/...s-vehicles.pdf

[City Wide]

Originally Posted by CCGuy

We shall see, but the total cost of ownership of your own car vs an autonomous driving car share service will be less for most people (based in avg miles driven). Computers are cheap and getting cheaper. Shared insurance pools will lower costs even more. I disagree that the general public will not be comfortable being chauffeured around- by a safer, autonomous, driver than the typical cab driver of today. Ford and other car companies see this shared fleet - reoccurring revenue, as the business model of the future. To sum up- this will be cheaper, safer, and better for the environment. For urban areas this makes total sense.

Just to give a sense of my age, I grew up with 3 or 4 channels of B&W TV. And since then there has been a regular drum beat of promises about how the future will be---. Much of the change is better, but few if any of what I'd call major life altering innovations. The computer driven world might very well turn out to be such a innovation, but that industry is still young. Communication has generally gotten much better and very much more affordable. I'd love to see half of the claims of driverless cars come into being, but I'm doubtful. We seem driven as a culture to become more and more private (I don't know how social media fits into that model) and I just don't see many people willingly giving up their own personal cars, regardless of who is driving. And as long as people drive their cars from X to Y, there will be a need to park them. I can't imagine many people being willing to send their cars miles away to park and then actually have to plan ahead to some degree to have use of their car.

None of that possible promise should slow down trying very hard to improve public mass transit in the here and now.

I'm still waiting for all the cities to be built on the sea bed!

[Knight Hospitaller]

^ or colonies on the Moon.