New City Branch Proposal

[25Hz]

Ah, interesting.

Well, if we used low floor trolley buses, you would only need a very low platform to bring people to floor height. Ventilation improvements could probably be wrought with some fans on the existing ventilation shafts, and you would of course put in lighting and such. Stations in the covered area could be made by digging down and making room for a stairwell and elevator for each direction at each station. The line would terminate with a loop at the eastern extremity of the covered section. Cannot go farther since someone built a parking garage in the way across 21st street. You could build a ramp and go down pennsylvania ave to callowhill, then wherever you want to go ( i thought convention center was a good idea).

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I see the only logical eastern terminus for this ROW's main route as a TBD point south of Market (Walnut/Locust? Bainbridge?) via 12th and 13th Streets. To maximize the utility of the ROW, I think more than one route will have to use it.

The biggest shame about this ROW is that its not ideally suited as a catch-all for the number of routes that would need to use it to be worth pursuing; it does not come close enough to the central business district. That said, ideally you would ramp into it from each route that intersects with/nears it with key routings west and north (2, 32, 33, 48, 38, 15) which would turn from its point of intersection eastward until it turns down 12th/13th to a turnback south of Market. However, you could not then abandon those routes current routings past its intersection with the City Branch to the south and east, as they each serve a different vital route. This means duplication of routing North/West of the city branch on all those routes which would use it, which I don't see as justifiable on more than one or two routes, which in turn does not justify the project. Perhaps it would be easier to justify if it were simply used as an express routing with no associated capital spent on ramps or local stops between 27th and 13th, but the duplication limitation remains.

All-in-all, this is a very difficult nut to crack in terms of a realistic solution.