Opposition to Red Line Bus Rapid Transit route accelerates

No cement has been mixed or dirt turned over, no construction money secured or engineers hired, but pockets of resistance are bubbling in the first section of the city’s proposed Bus Rapid Transit system.

Northside residents who live near College Avenue have attended meetings and circulated an online petition to voice concern about the Red Line electric buses that would run as often as every 10 minutes from 66th Street in Broad Ripple to the University of Indianapolis on the Southside.

They are worried the route will devour parking spaces, consume turn lanes and entice drivers to speed through side streets to avoid  caravans of lane-hogging buses.

All for an eco-friendly, mass transit service they fear may attract few riders.

“This will transform the area aesthetically and economically with negative impacts on both ends,” said Brian McGuire, who wrote the petition and lives near 57th Street, just west of College.  “It will change College Avenue as we know it. I’m trying to figure out where is the ridership demand?”

The Red Line is planned to ultimately stretch 35 miles from Hamilton County to Greenwood in Johnson County. Proponents said it would get thousands of people to work quickly each day because it  would make stops near businesses that employ about 170,000 people at hospitals, colleges, Indianapolis public schools and large corporations Downtown.

Advocates tout the project as the type of pollution-reducing mass transportation system that will be needed in the future to cut the country's burning of fossil fuels and slow global warming. At the same time, advocates say, getting cars off the streets will ease traffic congestion and curtail the need to build and widen streets in the future, saving governments money.

But some skeptics say the project would unnecessarily make over the streetscape of a booming residential and business corridor on College north of 38th Street, and they fear the Red Line could be a boondoggle that car-happy Indianapolis residents will rarely use.

Like offensive and defensive lineman in football, the two sides already are assuming three-point stances at the Red Line of scrimmage.

The petition opposing the transit plan had 171 signatures Friday.  It  says the Red Line  is “cleverly packaged as progressive, socially conscious, and environmentally friendly; but don’t be fooled. The Red Line is a well-orchestrated scheme that allows developers to exploit a federal transportation grant at the expense of taxpayers.”

A competing petition by a group calling itself Residents for Effective Transit had 352 signatures.  “The Red Line Bus Rapid Transit project is a very innovative and effective solution to begin to bring Indianapolis into the 21st century of public transit,” the petition states.

Is the demand there?

The city's public transportation agency, IndyGo, which will run the Red Line, projects that 11,000 daily rides will be taken to start. Its planners say 6,400 fares are paid each day on nine IndyGo buses lines that follow the proposed Red Line route. Officials estimate that the speed, dependability and convenience of the Red Line would attract 5,000 more fares a day. Ridership would be expected to grow even further in the future as housing around the line and jobs increase, those officials estimate.

But the detractors find those estimates overly optimistic, given the city's historic love affair with car travel and relatively congestion-free streets. They note that the College Avenue bus lines and other lines that run through the Northside, such as the No. 18 Nora and No. 19 Castleton, are often empty or half-full.

"Other than rush hour, that College bus runs empty all day long," McGuire said, adding that expectations of new dwellings to “create ridership" are far-fetched. "Are they going to pull 11,000 riders out of midair?"

The electric buses in the $100 million first phase of the Red Line would run in bus-only lanes on a route that follows College Avenue, 38th Street, Meridian Street and Capitol Avenue. From Downtown the Red Line would head south on Virginia Avenue and Shelby Street. In all. the route would make about 28 stops.

IndyGo officials said the Red Line's biggest selling point will be the frequency and speed of buses.

Fewer stops than traditional bus routes, clear lanes and faster boarding will get the buses Downtown quicker, according to the Red Line plan. Train-station-like platforms, level with the buses' doors, would be built every one-third to 3 miles, some in the center lane on College. Tickets would be bought at the stations, not on the bus, to speed boarding. Left turns would be prohibited for cars on parts of College, and parking would be banned in spots throughout the route. Traffic signals could be manipulated to keep the buses moving through intersections.

A handful of other U.S. cities, including Cleveland, Ohio, and Grand Rapids, Mich., have Bus Rapid Transit lines up and running. Chicago is planning  a 17-mile BRT line on Ashland Avenue, its busiest bus route.

Parking, alternate routs worry residents

Some Red Line detractors in Broad Ripple decry that on-street parking spaces will be lost. They note that the BlueIndy electric car share program last year installed several charging stations on College Avenue, each with five spots reserved for the e-cars. Many residents and business were angered to suddenly find them in front of their proprieties without any advance warning.

IndyGo spokesman Bryan Luellen conceded that the lasting furor and suspicion over BlueIndy's rollout “has not made our job any easier.” But he said IndyGo has had dozens of public meetings and posted documents on its website explaining the project in detail because the agency doesn’t want the public caught off-guard. Several Northside neighborhood groups back the plan because of the economic development that could follow, IndyGo officials said.

“We have made a big deal about this to let people know about it and to show that the benefits outweigh the negatives,” he said.

Placing the bus station platforms in the center lane will reduce the loss of parking spots, Luellen said.  About 10 percent of parking spots on College will be taken. But on Meridian and Capitol, parking will be limited to one side of the street, cutting the spots there by half.

Brian O’Connor, 64, who signed the opponent's petition and lives in the Forest Hills neighborhood at 57th and Guilford streets, said he is worried drivers will speed down the side streets to avoid bus traffic.

“I think it will change the way people use College Avenue,” he said.

But IndyGo estimates that about 200 drivers a day will use other big streets instead of College during the afternoon rush hour, almost all veering to Keystone.

City leaders differ

It's not just some residents who are against the line. Democratic City-County Council member Joe Simpson, whose redrawn council district now includes the College and Meridian corridors, also doesn't like it.

"They are going to come in and rearrange our streets for people who are not from Indianapolis," Simpson said. "A few years ago we reconstructed 38th Street. Then we rearrange the streets for all these bike lanes, and now we are going to do it so people from Carmel don't have to drive? The people who live here aren't going to have anywhere to drive their cars anymore. It seems like this is not a benefit to the community."

Simpson said Indianapolis residents who don't own cars and work Downtown already take the bus to work. "I take the No. 17 all the time," Simpson said. Instead, Simpson said the first BRT line "should take the people where the jobs are, out in Hendricks County and some of these other counties with all the warehouse and factory jobs."

The Red Line is part of a larger $ 1 billion BRT proposal, called Indy Connect, for five routes that would crisscross the city. The Blue Line would go east to west from Cumberland to the Indianapolis International Airport near Plainfield and its nearly 30,000 jobs. No timetable has been set for funding or building the other lines.

Colleen Fanning, a newly elected council member who represents the north side of Broad Ripple and the northern edge of Marion County, said she supports the Red Line but said voices of dissent need to be heard.

"I truly believe it is a net positive, but if I am wrong, I am flexible," said Fanning, a Republican. "This is not change for change's sake. Not having reliable transportation is holding us back as a city. Change is always scary, but it frustrates me when people form an opinion with incorrect or incomplete information. That's why I am glad we can have a discussion."

Fanning said she agrees with IndyGo that riders will increase if residents can count on the bus being there and being there often.

"I hear it all the time from constituents: 'If I could depend on the bus I would ride it more,'" she said. "I'll ride it everyday myself if I only have to wait five or 10 minutes and it gets me there as fast as a car."

Fanning said the traffic won't be any worse on College with dedicated lanes.

"Cars get stuck behind the bus all the time now, and there are backups by cars turning left with no turn lanes," Fanning said. "This will actually improve the traffic flow."

Call Star reporter John Tuohy at (317) 444-6418. Follow him on Twitter: @john_tuohy.