June 1 marks the 40th anniversary of the first day of operation for the Toledo Area Regional Transit Authority (TARTA). To celebrate that milestone TARTA is offering a discount to riders.

2011 TARTA Bluebird Bus

“To honor our 40 years of providing transportation services, TARTA is reducing fares on all of its services to 40 cents beginning Wednesday, June 1, through Friday, June 3, to say thank you to our riders who have patronized TARTA through four decades of change and development,” said James K. Gee, TARTA’s General Manager in a release.

The 40-cent fares will be available to riders of regularly scheduled service along all routes; Toledo Area Regional Paratransit Service (TARPS) for the disabled; and Call-A-Ride, door-to-door service in suburban communities.

Since TARTA drivers do not make change, Gee suggests for riders to take full advantage of the reduced fare they should have the correct change.

TARTA was formed when the privately owned and operated Community Traction Company (CTC) was experiencing economic difficulties. CTC had been in operation 50 years, it let its transportation franchise expire January 21, 1971.

TARTA became Ohio’s first regional transit authority with its first buses going into operation June 1, 1971. Voters approved a one-mill property levy just prior to CTC ceasing operation to fund the new public transit system.

TARTA buses along Summit Street in the 1970s

The original transit members were Toledo, Sylvania, Ottawa Hills, Rossford and Spencer and Sylvania townships. Perrysburg joined in 1974, Maumee in 1979 and Waterville in 1981 according to the release.

In early 1982 TARTA opened the Downtown Toledo transit “Loop” with five stations. The “Loop,” still in existence, allows a passenger to transfer between nearly all of TARTA’s routes.

Plans were discussed last November to study eliminating the “Loop,” substituting instead a single transit facility in the Downtown area, as called for in TARTA’s Comprehensive Operations Analysis (COA) released in March 2009. The new station could be located along a portion of the median and eastbound lanes of Jackson Street between Superior and Huron streets. This area would be closed to through traffic. The two westbound lanes of Jackson Street would be converted into two-way traffic.

According to TARTA, under this proposal, buses would stop at various locations Downtown, but the existing stations would be eliminated on Jefferson Avenue and Erie, Jackson and Summit streets.

TARPS was formed in 1989 to provide door-to-door, call-ahead scheduled service to the transportation challenged. It was operated for TARTA initially by a contract service provider. In September 2008, TARPS was incorporated completely into TARTA. TARPS usage has doubled in the past three years, and TARPS’ 2010 ridership marked 14 consecutive years of record usage.

A new TARPS headquarters and garage facility in South Toledo is scheduled to open this fall.

Call-A-Ride on-demand service with phone-ahead scheduling began as an experiment in Perrysburg in 2002 and was made permanent a year later. Since then, the service has been expanded to all of the suburban areas served by TARTA – Maumee, Sylvania, Sylvania Township, Rossford, Waterville, Ottawa Hills and Spencer Township.

The COA’s final recommendations call for the merging of the suburban Call-A-Ride services, enabling riders in one suburban location to ride Call-A-Ride to adjoining suburban communities without changing buses. Eventually, TARPS and Call-A-Ride services will be merged, allowing suburban riders to schedule service in advance and establish continuing subscription service.

After receiving a federal grant in 2001, TARTA became the nation’s first transit service to put stations in a minor league baseball park. The grant enabled TARTA to construct two transit stations at Fifth Third Field in Downtown, allowing TARTA to offer the Muddy™ Shuttle from select locations to Toledo Mud Hens games.

When the Huntington Center opened downtown in 2009, TARTA also began offering Walleye™ Shuttle service for hockey fans.

“TARTA’s future is bright. Recommendations made by the COA are moving closer to becoming reality,” Gee said. “Today’s TARTA is a far cry from the service that took over from Community Traction 40 years ago, and the TARTA of tomorrow will be just as different. The one constant throughout is the continuing need for public transportation in our area and around the country.”

TARTA can be contacted by calling 419-243-RIDE (7433) or visiting its Web site, www.tarta.com.

Tags: Lucas County, TARTA, Toledo, Transportation

This entry was posted on Friday, May 27th, 2011 at 8:17 pm and is filed under Community, Transportation.
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A traffic planning, design and engineering professional is scheduled to present his ideas about planning “complete streets” to accommodate all types of traffic at the 2011 Transportation Summit hosted April 8 by the Toledo Metropolitan Area Council of Governments (TMACOG).

John LaPlante of T. Y. Lin International

“There is a lot of interest in the region for planning for all types of streets that work well for bicycles and pedestrians as well as cars, trucks and transit buses,” said Diane Reamer-Evans, transportation project manager for TMACOG. “We took an opportunity to bring in someone who has worked in this field to discuss it.”

John LaPlante, director of traffic engineering for T. Y. Lin International in Chicago, will be here to make a presentation titled, “Retrofitting for Complete Streets: Accommodating Bicycles and More,” on Friday morning at the summit.

“Complete streets can be done and it doesn’t have to cost a lot of money. It’s all about making streets more useable and safer for all kinds of traffic,” LaPlante said.

“It’s also about policy and institutional change. Agencies responsible for streets have to believe they want complete streets for all users.”

A complete street is a road designed to be safe for drivers of all types of vehicles including bicyclists, and pedestrians of all ages and abilities, according to a book on the subject authored by LaPlante and Barbara McCann.

The complete streets concept focuses not just on individual roads, but on changing the decision-making and design process so that all users are routinely considered during the planning, designing, building and operating all roadways. Transportation projects typically begin with an automobile-oriented problem, according to LaPlante.

Speed is one of the major components of safe traffic. Maintain a target speed that’s safest for the roadway by designing streets and timing traffic lights to get vehicles to go the speed you want them to travel, he explained.

For example, design streets with 10-foot traffic lanes not 12-foot lanes to allow for safe bicycle traffic in special lanes designed for them. The best place for bikes is on streets designed for them, making it part of the transportation system, LaPlante said.

“The complete streets concept is about more than allocation of street space,” he said.

Chicago is ahead of the curve earning a silver rating (second highest) for bicycle traffic with 100 miles of bicycle lanes on streets and another 100 miles of bike paths including a 20-mile trail along the lakefront and river, said LaPlante, who served the City of Chicago for 30 years in various transportation positions including chief traffic engineer and acting commissioner of the Department of Transportation.

“We need to get Toledo and the surrounding communities involved in it,” he said.

LaPlante has been involved in several national committees that have addressed the issues of bicycle travel and safety. He has prepared bicycle plans for a number of Midwest cities and has taught courses in bicycle facility design in Michigan, Minnesota and Wisconsin.

The Transportation Summit will include a morning panel discussion addressing road reconstruction alternatives for stretching dollars moderated by Robin Whitney, commissioner of the City of Toledo Division of Engineering Services. That discussion will be followed by LaPlante’s presentation.

After lunch, Todd Audet, deputy director of Ohio Department of Transportation District 2, is scheduled to present the keynote address titled, “Transportation Looking Forward.”

The Transportation Summit is a forum for discussing the transportation of goods and people in Northwest Ohio and Southeast Michigan, according to TMACOG officials.

Transportation planners, community leaders, engineers, economic development professionals and contractors interested in regional transportation are expected to participate in the annual event.

Professional engineers attending the event will qualify for Certified Professional Development credits and certified planners will be eligible for Certification Maintenance credits.

Tags: City of Toledo, Complete Street, John LaPlante, ODOT, TMACOG, Transportation

This entry was posted on Tuesday, April 5th, 2011 at 10:59 am and is filed under Community, Transportation.
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Holiday travelers in the Midwest braced for snow and ice from a storm Dec. 24 that was expected to deliver a rare white Christmas to Nashville and possibly Atlanta before rolling into the Northeast.

A day after the most densely populated parts of the county got a break from the weather, several inches of snow were expected across parts of the heartland. Up to 8 inches could fall in Iowa and 6 inches in Illinois and Minnesota, with forecasters warning drivers about snow-covered roads and limited visibility.

The storm was expected to crawl south into Tennessee on Saturday, then possibly move north on Dec. 26. Winter weather advisories were in effect from North Dakota into Kentucky.

“People that are going to Grandma’s house,” warned Bobby Boyd, a meteorologist for the National Weather Service in Nashville, “need to get going.”

In Georgia, the National Weather Service said 1 to 3 inches of snow could fall across metro Atlanta on Dec. 25. Most of north Georgia, including the Atlanta area, are under a Winter Weather Advisory for snow until at least 1 p.m. Dec. 26, according to the National Weather Service. If the forecast holds, it would be the first time since 1993 that snow fell on Christmas in Atlanta, the weather service said. The last time there was measurable snowfall on Christmas Day was in 1882, when one-third of an inch of snow blanketed the city.

Fair weather helped make the holiday sojourn a not-so-painful experience in much of the country Dec. 23, even with more people on the move than last year.

Eric and Tatiana Chodkowski, of Boston, were driving with their kids, ages 2 and 4, to see relatives in New York. They said forecasts for snow on Dec. 26 made them wonder whether they’d make it back then, as planned. They deemed the roads congested but manageable Dec. 23, and most people found the nation’s airports to be the same way.

Planes took off into windy but accommodating skies at New York’s LaGuardia Airport as Steve Kent prepared to fly to Denver for a family ski trip, scoffing at the puny lines.

“I don’t find it that difficult,” he said. “I think Thanksgiving is harder.”

At airports, the long security lines feared over Thanksgiving, when practically everyone is on the move the same day, never materialized, and aren’t expected to now. The spread-out nature of the year-end holidays means things won’t be quite so cramped.

Travelers may notice that airport screeners are taking a closer look at empty insulated beverage containers like thermoses because air carriers have been alerted about a potential terror tactic involving them, an administration official said.

The official, who spoke Dec. 23 on condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive security matters, stressed that there is no intelligence about an active terror plot. The Homeland Security Department regularly alerts law enforcement about evolving terror tactics.

The Air Transport Association expects 44.3 million people on U.S. flights between Dec. 16 and Jan. 5 — up 3 percent over the same period a year ago but still below pre-recession travel volume. The average ticket price is $421, up by 5 percent.

The Vino Volo Wine Room at Detroit Metropolitan Airport is benefiting from more travelers, manager Mark Del Duco said Thursday.

“The Christmas mood is more there this year than last,” he said, estimating that sales are up 10 percent this season compared with last year as financially confident travelers spend more freely.

Mike Lukosavich, of Harrison Township, Mich., was surprised the first leg of his trip was moving so smoothly when he stopped at rest area on the Ohio Turnpike in Elmore, Ohio, near Toledo.

He, his wife and their 8-month-old daughter were heading to see family in Parkersburg, W.Va. His only headache came when he saw the gas price of about $3 a gallon.

“It’s something you have to do to see the family,” said Lukosavich, 33.

The AAA has expected overall travel to rise about 3 percent this year, with more than 92 million people planning to go more than 50 miles sometime between now and Jan. 2. More than 90 percent said they would be driving.

Maria Romero, a cashier at the Chevron Food Mart just off Interstate 15 in Barstow, Calif., said she has seen an increase in travelers there, especially families and people from out of state.

“It’s wonderful. We need it,” she said. “The busier, the better.”

Some travelers weren’t thrilled about their mode of transportation. Anthony Lauro joined nearly 100 people lined up Thursday morning for a Montreal-bound coach at the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey’s bus terminal in midtown Manhattan. He faced an eight-hour ride to see his fiancee there.

“Flying to Canada is astronomically overpriced,” he said.

Helping matters is that the most densely populated parts of the country got a break from the weather Dec. 23 with rain finally stopping in California and a few days away in the East.

But predictions of Friday’s storm concerned travelers in the Midwest.

Steve Brown, 50, of Elm Creek, Neb., left Tuesday afternoon and drove all night to beat the storm as it worked its way east. Brown, a grain hauler, was taking his two children to see his mother on the Ohio dairy farm where he grew up.

“I had orders to come home or she was going to come get me,” Brown said at the Elmore rest area, where adults filled up on coffee while kids, traveling in pajamas, loaded up on Tater Tots.

After record-breaking snow falls in the East and a treacherous Christmas travel season last year, the ways weather can mess up travel seem to be on plenty of minds.

At LaGuardia, Mike and Martha Lee Mellis waited to fly to Aspen, Colo., with their three young sons. They dreaded a repeat of last winter’s ski trip, when a snowstorm hit while they were transferring in Chicago on their way home.

“We had to return via Philadelphia, and I had to rent a car and drive everybody home at 11 at night,” Mike Mellis recalled.

His wife had been trying to forget, saying, “I’ve blocked it all out.”

Contributing to this report were Associated Press writers Karen Hawkins in Chicago; Warren Levinson and Verena Dobnik in New York City; Geoff Mulvihill in Haddonfield, N.J.; David Goodman in Detroit; Eileen Sullivan and Samantha Bomkamp in Washington; Lucas L. Johnson II in Nashville, Tenn.; Michelle Price in Phoenix; Mark Pratt in Boston; and John Seewer in Elmore, Ohio.

Tags: Holidays, Transportation, Travel

This entry was posted on Saturday, December 25th, 2010 at 11:08 am and is filed under Arts and Life, Holidays.
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CSX Corporation showed off the Northwest Ohio Intermodal Terminal in North Baltimore to local media with a tour of the nearly completed facilities Nov. 12.

Some construction continues on the $175 million project on 500 acres along state Route 18 just west of North Baltimore. The terminal is scheduled to open for business by the end of the first quarter in 2011, according to Peter Craig, terminal superintendent for CSX.

Wide-span cranes on tracks will lift 40,000-pound containers while loading and unloading trains and trucks.

“It’s the greatest intermodal project going in North America,” Craig said.

It is part of the $842 million National Gateway project undertaken by CSX in several states that also includes intermodal terminals in Chambersburg, Pa., and Pittsburgh. An existing terminal in Columbus will be expanded as part of the project.

The intermodal rail project will offer a more efficient link for East Coast ports to growing markets in the Midwest. The Northwest Ohio terminal is designed to improve the flow of freight, create hundreds of jobs and support distribution facilities in the region, according to CSX.

The intermodal terminal will handle containers coming from ports on the East Coast, such as Baltimore, that are shipped west across Pennsylvania and Ohio on CSX trains.

Those trains could be unloaded at this terminal where containers would be loaded onto other trains heading west or south or trucks delivering containers of cargo to local destinations.

The terminal will provide a direct rail link to Chicago or bypass Chicago for direct shipment to the West Coast. The bypass will allow containers to get through Chicago faster and reduce transit time to the West Coast, Craig said.

“Customers will determine the best way to use this facility,” said Craig, who hosted potential customers for the facility at the terminal. He said they were very impressed with the facility and its potential for business.

Craig said that transshipping business would be the core of the terminal where they will move containers from train to train, train to truck and truck to train. The typical service area for such a facility is a 75-to-100-mile radius but that could be expanded based on demand, he said.

CSX reports that the terminal will handle 25 trains per day and move more than 630,000 containers and trailers per year. Craig expects the facility to handle 75 to 80 trucks daily, calling it a “modest forecast.”

“The volume will be determined by customers using the facility,” he said.

Double-stacked containers on trains could reduce the number of trucks on the highways as one train can carry the load of more than 280 trucks.

Craig said the containers, weighing up to 44,000 pounds, would contain mostly consumer and household goods, food and paper products and would be transported by trains and trucks. During the first year of operation, CSX expects more than 20,000 lifts to serve local markets including Toledo, Findlay, Napoleon, Fostoria and Bowling Green.

The five wide-span cranes will service eight processing tracks from 500 to 3,000 feet long, two straddle lanes, one truck lane and five container stacks of four high. The cranes will move from 15 to 30 containers per hour, Craig said.

The cranes are operated by one operator located in a small booth 100 feet above the ground. Crane operators will have a comfort station located outside the control booth for breaks, he said.

CSX will hire and train about 48 crane operators to work at the facility. The operators will be trained in a $700,000 simulator located in a 40-foot container on the site.

Jamie Watkins, operations manager for the terminal, is training on the simulator and actual cranes. She will help teach the incoming crane operators how to load and unload the containers from the booth using two joystick controls.

CSX has hired one manager locally and is relocating 12 additional people. It has made job offers to 80 prospective employees from about 2,700 candidates who applied for positions, Craig said.

The first round of employees will begin work in December. As many as 200 workers would be employed at the terminal by CSX and vendors working there when it opens, Craig said.

The $842 million National Gateway is a public-private partnership, with CSX providing $400 million of the development with $60 million for clearance projects. The balance includes $30 million in federal funds, $20 million from State of Ohio and $10 million from the Ohio Department of Development.

Craig said that 80 percent of the National Gateway project’s costs are already committed.

The National Gateway would provide nearly $1.7 billion in public benefits in Ohio by reducing carbon dioxide emissions by almost 2 million tons, saving $350 million in logistics costs for the state, reducing the state’s highway congestion and lowering highway maintenance costs, enhancing rail transportation infrastructure and expanding potential rail market access, according to CSX.

Tags: CSX, Intermodal, National Gateway, North Baltimore, Transportation

This entry was posted on Friday, November 19th, 2010 at 8:49 pm and is filed under Intermodal, Toledo Business Link.
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Toledo led the rail passenger increase in Ohio where the demand for passenger rail transportation grew with 14 percent more people riding Amtrak trains in fiscal year 2010.

The biggest ridership gain was in Toledo where 65,667 passengers got on or off Amtrak trains at the historic Union Station, which represented a 21 percent increase over the previous year.

The increase of more than 18,500 passengers in Ohio helped Amtrak set a new annual ridership record of 28.7 million passengers for the fiscal year that ended Sept. 30. Amtrak reported national ridership increased by 37 percent in 2010.

Nearly 147,000 passengers boarded trains in Ohio during fiscal year 2010 compared to 128,174 passengers in 2009. Ridership increased 12 percent in Cleveland to 44,075 passengers in 2010.

Toledo is one of the busiest passenger stops in Ohio, according to a news release for Amtrak.

A significant number of the 65,667 passengers from Toledo traveled to Chicago, an important destination for Amtrak. It offers two trains daily each way between Toledo and Chicago with rates ranging from $35 to $68 for one-way adult coach tickets.

Other passengers boarded eastbound trains from Toledo to New York and Boston for $98 to $196 and to Washington, D.C., from $67 to $131 each way, according to Amtrak.

The Lakeshore Limited Service from Chicago to New York and Boston, with stops in Ohio’s Bryan, Toledo, Sandusky, Elyria, Cleveland and Alliance, was upgraded with refurbished dining cars within the past year, according to Amtrak.

Amtrak is considering service upgrades to the Capitol Limited Service to Washington, D.C., that would include a new connection to Harrisburg, Pa., and New York for direct service without changing trains in Pittsburgh.

Tags: Amtrak, Trains, Transportation, Wheels

This entry was posted on Saturday, October 30th, 2010 at 6:34 am and is filed under Wheels.
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Work begins Aug. 2 on the Interstate 75 and 475 Interchange project that will take three years to complete the modernization of the 40-year-old interstate system in Toledo by the Ohio Department of Transportation (ODOT).

“This is a great project that will do important things for the community. We work for and with you together to manage it the best we can,” said David Dysard, deputy director of ODOT District 2 at a public meeting held July 27 at the Sanger Branch of the Toledo-Lucas County Public Library.

The update project will widen I-475 in both directions from I-75 to Rushland Avenue, close existing on and off ramps at Central and Upton avenues and Jackman Road, reconstruct the Douglas Road ramps and build a new interchange at ProMedica Parkway for better access to Toledo Hospital and that area.

The update project will widen I-475 in both directions from I-75 to Rushland Avenue, close existing on and off ramps at Central and Upton Avenues, and Jackman Road, reconstruct the Douglas Road ramps and build a new interchange at ProMedica Parkway for better access to Toledo Hospital and that area.

The $63.9 million construction project will take three years to complete with the majority of the work completed in late 2012, and resurfacing and bridge painting in 2013, according to ODOT officials.

Two lanes will remain open to traffic on I-475 from 6 a.m. to 10 p.m. daily and be reduced to one lane at night during construction. The Monroe Street onramp to eastbound I-475 will be closed Aug. 2 to eliminate merging traffic into the construction lanes.

The update project will feature a new full-diamond interchange at ProMedica Parkway with a bridge over I-475 just north of Central. Access to Toledo Hospital will be maintained during construction as exit 19 off eastbound I-475 to Central and ProMedica Parkway will remain open until the new interchange opens in late 2011 or early 2012.

The ProMedica Parkway Interchange will replace the onramps to I-475 from Central and Upton avenues, as well as the Jackman Road exit.

The Upton/Kelly ramp to eastbound I-475 will be closed permanently in August. The onramp from Upton to westbound I-475 will be closed when the new ProMedica interchange is opened in 2011 or 2012.

Upton will be reduced to one lane in each direction from Georgia to Central for bridge construction beginning in August through 2012. Central will be reduced to one lane in each direction from Jackman to Upton for bridge construction during that same period.

The Jackman Road exit off Westbound I-475 will be closed permanently after the opening of the new ProMedica Parkway interchange.

The Sherbrooke Road Bridge over I-475 will be closed for rebuilding from August 2010 to 2012 as part of the project.

The Douglas Road eastbound onramp and westbound offramp for I-475 will be closed for nine to 12 months beginning in the fall of 2010 or spring of 2011, said Dysard.

The Auburn and Central avenues and Douglas Road bridge abutments were moved last year to accommodate this project and the bridges will remain open during the I-475 construction. The current traffic configuration for the I-75 and I-475 interchange will be maintained in existing lanes and shoulders.

The ramps from eastbound I-475 to Jeep Parkway and from North Cove Boulevard to westbound I-475 will be closed in August through completion of that section in 2012.

The project will reconfigure the I-75 and I-475 interchange by adding another lane to the ramps from southbound I-75 to westbound I-475 and from eastbound I-475 to northbound I-75.

However, these new lanes won’t be accessible until the future I-75 widening project is completed. Dysard said they don’t have funding yet for the I-75 project planned from LaGrange Street to I-280.

A construction speed limit of 50 mph will be maintained on I-475 during the project.

The speed limit will be enforced by the Ohio State Highway Patrol and Toledo Police, according to Toledo Police Chief Mike Navarre.

ODOT officials stressed the importance of drivers slowing down and refraining from using cell phones in the construction zones for safety issues.

The I-75 and I-475 Interchange update will be constructed by a local firm and workers, creating and maintaining jobs in the Toledo area.

The project was awarded to the E.S. Wagner Company of Oregon, which submitted a bid of $63.9 million for it.

The project will be built on a five-day workweek schedule with Saturday serving as a makeup day.

“We will be hiring some full- and part-time union contractors for this project,” said John Wagner, vice president of E.S. Wagner.

Wagner said the construction project is one of the largest highway projects the firm has undertaken. The company is involved in the widening of Wheeling Street in Oregon for ODOT.

A groundbreaking ceremony for the interstate update project was scheduled July 30 at Kelly Avenue and Bigelow Street in Toledo near the onramp to eastbound I-475.

Tags: Transportation

This entry was posted on Thursday, July 29th, 2010 at 4:21 pm and is filed under Community, Transportation, Wheels.
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Ohio gasoline prices have gone up 6 cents in the last week, mirroring a recent increase in oil prices.

According to a survey from auto club AAA, the Oil Price Information Service and Wright Express, Ohio’s current average price for regular-grade gasoline is $2.71 per gallon, up from $2.65 June 14.

Oil has jumped from $64 a barrel on May 25 to the neighborhood of $80 as fears have eased that a debt crisis in Europe will put the brakes on global economic growth.

Ohio gas is 3 cents cheaper than the current national average for regular, $2.74 a gallon. One year ago, the state’s motorists were paying a little less for gas, $2.66 on average.

Tags: AAA, gas prices, Transportation

This entry was posted on Tuesday, June 22nd, 2010 at 8:44 am and is filed under Community, Transportation.
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