Opinion

Fulton, Shelton: Light rail outlook in the Sun Belt: Full steam ahead

Eduardo Trevino, who works in the Medical Center, sold his car because he prefers to travel to his destinations using the Metro Rail and his bicycle. ﻿ Eduardo Trevino, who works in the Medical Center, sold his car because he prefers to travel to his destinations using the Metro Rail and his bicycle. ﻿ Photo: Marie D. De Jesus, Staff Photo: Marie D. De Jesus, Staff Image 1 of / 3 Caption Close Fulton, Shelton: Light rail outlook in the Sun Belt: Full steam ahead 1 / 3 Back to Gallery

Rail tracks are being laid in the unlikeliest of places.

Phoenix voters recently approved a transportation tax hike to provide decades of funding for new light rail lines. Dallas has more miles of light rail than any other city in the country. Los Angeles's rapidly expanding light rail system has more riders per day than any other city in the nation except Boston.

Houston now carries more light rail riders per mile - the typical measure of success - than any other place except for Boston and San Francisco. Denver is building a light rail system second only to L.A. in size and breadth and renovating its historic downtown train station in the process.

Such growth follows the success of mature light rail systems in Portland and San Diego and the surprise hit of light rails in Salt Lake City. And almost all of these cities have built, or are building, light rail connections to their major airports.

What explains all this light rail in the auto-oriented South and West?

The short answer: Light rail is a lot faster than a bus but doesn't cost nearly as much to build as a subway.

"Light rail" is a broad term that means a passenger rail system with tram-style cars - as opposed to "heavy rail" subways as in New York and Washington, D.C. - that runs on its own right of way, usually at street level.

Many cities are looking to light rail to connect other transportation modes and far-flung nodes of activity. Phoenix's light rail, for example, connects downtown with Arizona State University in Tempe and Sky Harbor Airport. Las Vegas has a monorail along the Strip but is talking about a rail line to the airport. This light rail boom is often part of broad rethinking of urban environments. Dallas built a cap over a depressed section of a freeway and used the space to build the popular Klyde Warren Park. Houston is talking about tearing down a stretch of freeway on the edge of its downtown.

So is the Sun Belt giving up on cars? Hardly. Most people in Sun Belt suburbs still have no choice but to travel by car, and all the major Sun Belt cities are planning major freeway construction or expansion. But something else is happening simultaneously. Major urban areas in the Sun Belt are experiencing growing demand for housing and activities in their downtown cores. Well-designed light rail systems can be catalysts for the development of denser, more walkable and bicycle-friendly neighborhoods. Because rails require a much smaller footprint than roads, cities have found new space during construction of light rail to improve sidewalks, add bikeways and create car-free public spaces.

Light rail systems have their detractors, who argue that buses can carry people more cheaply, or that light rail investment shouldn't be used to fuel real estate speculation near stations and along lines. Still others say all transportation money should be invested in roads because most people drive most places.

To answer those objections: First, all transportation investments fuel real estate investment; that's why there's a gas station and a 7-11 at every freeway exit. Second, a bus rapid transit line on a separate right-of-way costs almost as much as a light rail line, and the ride isn't nearly as comfortable. And light rail lines can expand transportation capacity in a crowded urban location at a much lower cost than new roads because their smaller footprint requires less disruptive construction.

There are obvious limits to what light rail can do for cities as spread out as Sun Belt metropolises. But, rather than focusing on the conflict between highways and transit, it's more important to focus on how to weave these elements together to create the best possible transportation systems. Roads and rail are just different parts of networks that, if built cohesively, can provide interconnected, intermodal mobility in the urban cores and the periphery of even the most sprawling metros.

That's the mindset of many people in the Southwest. At the same time that L.A. is expanding its light rail lines, Mayor Eric Garcetti has proposed a new strategy to repurpose boulevards around the city and areas along the L.A. River into pedestrian- and bike-friendly spaces. As Houston expanded two light rail lines this summer, it completely revamped its bus routes, vastly increasing transit accessibility for hundreds of thousands of residents at little additional cost. Salt Lake City and other Utah municipalities are jointly building a system that combines regional highways, rail, streetcars and bus rapid transit.

If you look carefully at the autobound cities of the South and West, you'll see that leaders and residents are considering metro transportation networks that serve drivers, riders and walkers all at the same time.

No wonder there is so much laying down of tracks, and so much support for it.

Fulton is director of the Kinder Institute for Urban Research at Rice University and former Planning Director for the city of San Diego. Shelton is a post-doctoral fellow at the Kinder Institute. Fulton and Shelton wrote this for Zocalo Public Square, zocalopublicsquare.org.