Saint Louis Public Transport

As part of an effort to close my other blog and move all of its transit-related posts over here, I will make Saint Louis's transit review on #Urban. Operated by Metro Saint Louis, Madison County Transit, and Saint Charles Area Transit, public transit in Saint Louis is...OK. On this trip I road the MetroLink Blue Line on the shared segment from Grand to Civic Center, and the MetroBus #70 Grand from Grand & Cherokee to Grand MetroLink Station. Both of these lines help form Saint Louis's measly frequent network, consisting of 5 lines. (These are the #11 Chippewa, #70 Grand, #99 Downtown Trolley, Red Line, and Blue Line.) Frequent transit is basically transit that runs so often you don't need a schedule to use it. The general definition is every 15 minutes or better, 7 days a week, for more than just peak hours, and in both directions. However, this being Saint Louis, they have no service at all fitting that description, so I changed the Saint Louis frequency definition to every 20 minutes, and all of the criteria listed above. Anyway, on to the reviews. The # 70 Grand is Saint Louis's busiest bus route, running along a very urban corridor. The line gets about 8,000 riders per weekday. Service is quite frequent, and my bus came very promptly. Bus stops are alright, with many just being a sign saying "MetroBus" and the stop ID, website, and route number(s). Some stops also had benches or shelters of varying quality, which unlike in Chicago, were NOT all in uniform design. The #70 Grand, in addition to using the standard Gillig Phantom and Gillig Low-Floor buses, also uses ex-Ottawa New Flyer D60LF buses, which are the first articulated buses in Metro Saint Louis's history! One problem with all the buses, though, is that only major stops are announced, as opposed to the CTA which announces every single stop on the line. Fares are currently paid through an archaic system of cash, transfers, and little paper-y passes, but the Saint Louis region is FINALLY attempting a smart card, the Gateway Card. The card will roll out very soon, and readers can already be seen at MetroLink stations, and on MetroBus fareboxes. Although I rode only the shared section of MetroLink between Grand and Civic Center stations, I DID ride on a Blue Line train, so I will refer to it as the "Blue Line". Service is relatively frequent on both the Blue and Red Lines, and schedules are fixed so that on even Sundays, the shared section gets headways of exactly 10 minutes between trains. The trains are OK, with MetroLink using Siemens SD400 and SD460 LRVs. Although technically a "light rail", MetroLink has a lot of metro-like features, such as no street running sections whatsoever, and a very "rapid" feel. The only street running sections are at level crossings, and those are mostly on the Red Line only segments on the Missouri and Illinois sides. One major problem I have is that there are not nearly enough stations in the more transit oriented inner ring suburbs, or in Saint Louis City. I would propose infill stations at Compton, Jefferson, Sarah, 71st (East Saint Louis), and Carlyle (Belleville). Vocals are non existent, with announcements made by the driver, which is not so good. At Civic Center, a HUGE transit center exists, where one can transfer between both frequent MetroLink lines, 16 infrequent MetroBus lines, 2 frequent MetroBus lines, 5 infrequent Madison County Transit lines, Greyhound intercity buses, and Amtrak intercity trains. An OK system, with room for improvement.

West University City

While the most exciting, central part of University City is definitely the Delmar Loop, there are other very urban, nice areas as well. The area I would call "West University City" is roughly between Hanley Road and North & South Road on Delmar Boulevard. While one would not expect this area to be very urban, The entire area was filled with apartments, urban houses, townhouses, duplexes, and even a few small mixed-use buildings. At the corner of North & South and Delmar, there was even a small, walkable, 1950's era business district, with mixed use buildings! Almost all businesses were local, and small offices sat above said businesses. The area is close(ish) to the frequent MetroLink Blue Line stations at Clayton and Forsyth, and has immediate access to the infrequent MetroBus #47 Hanley, #66 Clayton-Airport, and #97 Delmar, so West University City has OK transit access. A really cool neighborhood!

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http://urbantransit.webs.com/apps/blog/ 

Downtown

Downtown Saint Louis, though far from its former glory, has begun to pick up again. The population in 2000 was a mere 806 people, and has exploded to its current 3,721 inhabitants. Many new businesses can be seen, especially on Washington Avenue. However, due to being in Saint Louis, Downtown has many abandoned buildings, empty storefronts, decrepit properties, etc. Transit is good, with quite a few frequent transit lines! (These consist of the MetroLink Blue and Red Lines, and the MetroBus #11 Chippewa and #99 Downtown Circulator. However, there is always the problem of excessive parking, this being Saint Louis. When a lot becomes vacant downtown, the immediate course of action was to turn the space into surface parking. This means that what was once continuous  good, mixed-use, transit and pedestrian friendly development became marred by ugly patches of evil surface parking. An important development in this story is a downtown supermarket, Culinaria by Schnucks having recently opened, destroying Downtown's previous reputation as a food desert. A good are, with potential to be even more!

Cherokee Street

Like Chicago's "Community Areas", Saint Louis has official neighborhoods that are often groups of two or more unofficial neighborhoods. Some unofficial neighborhoods get divided along official neighborhood boundaries. This is the case of Cherokee Street. Divided by Marine Villa, Gravois Park, Benton Park, and Benton Park West all the way from Grand to Broadway, it is an extremely socioeconomically and culturally diverse neighborhood. From Broadway to Jefferson, most of it is in a historic district, with very upscale old apartments, homes, duplexes, etc. and very nice, hipster antique stores. This area is richer than the rest of the street, and is pretty nice. From Jefferson to about Nebraska the area is very Latino, with many bodegas, restaurants, etc. dotting the street. Past Nebraska, the area has far less business and becomes more residential, as well as more African-American and less Latino. After it hits Grand, it sort of becomes the southernmost edge of Tower Grove South. There is an extremely diverse range of housing stock and business variety, with housing dominated by turn of the century urban houses and two-flats. Businesses range from upscale antique shops to light industry to markets to print-shops. Transit-wise, the #73 Carondelet runs right down Cherokee Street, but is not very frequent. The #10 Gravois-Lindell, #30 Soulard, and #40 Broadway serve the area, but aren't very frequent either. The #11 Chippewa and #70 Grand also serve the area, and are quite frequent. A pretty good neighborhood, with a lot of diversity!