What differences do you think are salient?

It’s funny that the new MTA corridor studies basically looked at a bunch of routes and were like “yeah on these route even buses that are slow and unreliable are at capacity, so that seems like a good place to upgrade” while the dumbest people in the city go “we don’t need this, nobody takes the [route that is completely different]”

Yeah, while it is true that prohibiting development around our rail infrastructure has been a huge failure, this is a solvable problem as evidenced by the Owings Mills development

Nonsense, the bureaucratic process strangles completely routine public works projects for asinine reasons, and we should demand better.

We’d be better off with a one bullshit boring tunnel and two subway tunnels than none of those things

The red line has an existing grade separated right-of-way through W. Baltimore. You also have a lot of zero-car/low income households providing stronger support than an equally dense neighborhood elsewhere.

The Section west of Edmondson Village is of dubious value in terms of residents, but otherwise it does go through downtown and some of the densest neighborhoods.

The problems with the red line is that the new tunnel two blocks south of the Subway downtown is a lot of $ to not connect directly.

Likewise the walkshed in Canton is reduced a lot by running along Boston St

EDIT:

I would absolutely change the alignment if we have to start from scratch.

However, IF the bipartisan Infrastructure bill’s provision that Van Hollen put in to fast track previously approved projects like the Red Line pays off, I would really like to implore the the citizens of Baltimore NOT to look the gift horse in the mouth, because it could take years off of the time to implementation and tons of other planning related costs.

That time, money, and personnel can be used for the north-south project.

Transit lines reinforce one another to create a network greater than the sum of its parts, so a subway from Towson to Port Covington should not be seen as competitor with the Red Line in anything but their order in terms of priority.

They’re literally perpendicular, and they intersect at their midpoints to form a hub and spoke network connecting the richest and poorest neighborhoods alike with the lion’s share of the jobs, medical facilities, higher education, and recreation in the city.

EDIT 2:

Unlike the overstretched 40-mile light rail lines they are building in the postwar sprawl of LA and Seattle, these are <15 miles AND, with the exception of the Highway to Nowhere (featuring a dedicated right of away pre-built) and Woodlawn, almost entirely built through pre-war foot and streetcar-oriented development.

The vast majority of the built structures from that era still there (for better or worse)

I did a 4th grade science project on Robert Goddard, a pioneering rocket scientist who also had this idea. I thought it was cool, but I was worried you’d get sucked out if it crashes

If you took any of Baltimore’s “main streets” (fells, federal hill, Hamilton, etc.) and plopped them in the mountains or on the shore there would be like one lifestyle magazine feature per month and the houses would cost 2x.

If they were in DC or Boston they would be 4x

Might as well take advantage of the discount!

This is great, having someone from the outside with experience in down-on-their-luck places (instead of just some overpaid SF or NYC hacks) sounds nice

I can see why people get mad, then. Especially versus parking tickets.

But complaining about predatory tow companies is a bit like complaining that there are sharks in the ocean.

Just because they’re out to get you, doesn’t mean you’re not responsible for where you swim

Oh my bad, you’re right - brain totally read in the word parking after you said charges, and that wasn’t there.

Do you pay the towing company anything or is like a bounty system?

I got hit by one of those tow tracks camping outside a new apartment building in South Baltimore. I’m broke as shit so that hurt. But play stupid games, win stupid prizes I guess.

But, like of course parking is going to be more expensive in the city, asphalt is at a higher premium. Philly parking is definitely more expensive than parking in King of Prussia