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| From the Our Salem Existing Conditions |
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| Current Cherriots system (frequent service routes in red?) |
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| Population and 1/2 mile distance to frequent service lines via Redditor AVargas |
Look at how much we squander housing proximity to our frequent transit lines! This totally shows the disconnect we have between housing and transit. Only on Lancaster is there much of a connection. Conversely, everything else is pretty much autoist and car-dependent.
3 comments:
1. The Redditor maps contradict your point. The frequent service IS going to most of the areas with higher density population. Not every area, but most of them. Explain why you call this "squandering".
2. Like every transit district, there are limited resources. With the HB2017 funds, the district made the choice to provide extended hour service on the weekdays and provide Saturday service (and hopefully Sunday service if the state revenues actually come in as hoped for). That's a choice, and you can argue that a different choice would have been to instead increase frequency on the weekdays but not provide weekend service.
You seem to be arguing against a point not at all made here.
If I understand you right, you seem to think this post is an argument that Cherriots has deployed "frequent service" lines in the wrong places.
That is not at all the argument. The argument here is more about zoning, with a focus on the City rather than on Cherriots.
The argument instead is that we don't have enough residential housing near south Commercial and in the west Salem flats and elsewhere along the high requency routes (except for the Lancaster one). See this post, for example.
The original point was that the Our Salem map overstated access to transit and that the reddit map did a better job.
Sorry the post wasn't clear enough!
When you compare the Salem-Keizer population density (3,117 persons/square mile) to other cities in the US, Salem-Keizer ranks 59th out of 496 urbanized areas. That's a higher density than Eugene and Corvallis (both with large universities and their students). Portland's density is higher than Salem-Keizer (3528 persons/square mile), but only 13% higher.
But ignoring the numbers for the moment, looking at satellite images of housing along Commercial, I see a substantial amount of apartment complexes, particularly south of Hilfiker SE. Most are two-story apartments. But I'm seeing more attached dwellings, like those on Madras (east of Commercial) that are like row houses and within a short walk of a transit stop at Commercial and Madras. Those are the developments that the Salem market supports. For those who want a more central city / walk everywhere housing, the downtown is supplying more of that type each year.
Lastly, regarding what you call "the west Salem flats".... residents there don't like the connotation of that name and prefer it called the Edgewater district.
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