Now THIS (//%22http://www.tulsaworld.com/news/article.aspx?subjectID=11&articleID=20080516_16_A1_hStree849585%22) I like:
quote:
The specifics of the council's streets proposal have not been released because it is being reviewed by the city's Finance Department. Councilors must call for a special election no later than 5 p.m. May 29 to make the July ballot.
But it is known that the maintenance component will involve multiple citywide funding sources, including using existing sales tax streams and an increase in property taxes.
The widening component would work differently.
As planned, voters would decide whether to authorize the city to create a special assessment district program and provide $62 million in bond funding to implement it.
If you live in an area that needs widening then maybe you can decide if it's worth paying a little
extra for the convenience. If it's not worth it then maybe you can alter your commute times by 15 minutes and save us all a few tens of millions.
What's that CL? Common sense in government? Must've been a typo!
[}:)]
I think it's a great idea.
Tell me about it. It's interesting that Eagleton, by far the most conservative of this bunch (or any bunch), isn't wholeheartedly for it.
Actually, he's just looking out for the peeps in his district. Very unCoburneseque.
I certainly like separating street widening from street repair. Repair is necessary. Widening streets in the far reaches of the city is folly. It benefits no one, except the homebuilders who rely on sprawl for their quick, cheap bucks. ...All the while causing a steady and ever increasing drain of tax dollars from Tulsa.
Street widening on the fringes increases costs to maintain more lanes. It also increases the costs for providing police and fire protection for sprawling areas, and additional utilities to serve widely dispersed, low-density housing.
While benefiting a small number of Tulsa residents, these roads are our gifts to the suburban communities that boom thanks to the streets we build (and maintain).
I think that if the City Council had read all the recommendations that were given them (by the Complete the Streets Committee, et al), they might have realized that widening more streets is never the solution...but increasing funding for transit is a real solution to our problems.
We don't need more and wider streets, we need more transit options. We need zoning laws that support pedestrian oriented and transit oriented development. If you reduce the number of vehicle miles travelled, you don't need to widen streets. You also don't need to repair them as often.
If this is the result of all those community meetings and recommnedations from experts... somebody left a big chunk of the solution on the editing room floor.
Why?
quote:
I certainly like separating street widening from street repair. Repair is necessary. Widening streets in the far reaches of the city is folly. It benefits no one, except the homebuilders who rely on sprawl for their quick, cheap bucks. ...All the while causing a steady and ever increasing drain of tax dollars from Tulsa.
Street widening on the fringes increases costs to maintain more lanes. It also increases the costs for providing police and fire protection for sprawling areas, and additional utilities to serve widely dispersed, low-density housing.
While benefiting a small number of Tulsa residents, these roads are our gifts to the suburban communities that boom thanks to the streets we build (and maintain).
I think that if the City Council had read all the recommendations that were given them (by the Complete the Streets Committee, et al), they might have realized that widening more streets is never the solution...but increasing funding for transit is a real solution to our problems.
We don't need more and wider streets, we need more transit options. We need zoning laws that support pedestrian oriented and transit oriented development. If you reduce the number of vehicle miles travelled, you don't need to widen streets. You also don't need to repair them as often.
This brought a tear to my eye!
Wait a minute Ponder. They pay for those streets as well. We aren't shouldering the whole load. If we look at it totally that way then we all start turning against each other (moreso than now anyway). Yeah, at first glance not widening them at all makes sense but not really. The district assessment is a fair thing to me but not widening at all is not.
I would note that it is not right that 101st between Yale and Memorial has only two lanes and a deep ditch on each side for firetrucks to respond for emergencies. If traffic is heavy or an accident occurs, there is no way for them to respond. Honestly? The developers and city politicians who foisted this abomination on us should be hunted down and forced to join in the assessment.
quote:
Originally posted by PonderInc
I certainly like separating street widening from street repair. Repair is necessary. Widening streets in the far reaches of the city is folly. It benefits no one, except the homebuilders who rely on sprawl for their quick, cheap bucks. ...All the while causing a steady and ever increasing drain of tax dollars from Tulsa.
Street widening on the fringes increases costs to maintain more lanes. It also increases the costs for providing police and fire protection for sprawling areas, and additional utilities to serve widely dispersed, low-density housing.
While benefiting a small number of Tulsa residents, these roads are our gifts to the suburban communities that boom thanks to the streets we build (and maintain).
I think that if the City Council had read all the recommendations that were given them (by the Complete the Streets Committee, et al), they might have realized that widening more streets is never the solution...but increasing funding for transit is a real solution to our problems.
We don't need more and wider streets, we need more transit options. We need zoning laws that support pedestrian oriented and transit oriented development. If you reduce the number of vehicle miles travelled, you don't need to widen streets. You also don't need to repair them as often.
If this is the result of all those community meetings and recommnedations from experts... somebody left a big chunk of the solution on the editing room floor.
Why?
Tulsa's borders where growth occurs are now constrained. I don't think that is going to be an issue. And really out on the outskirts of town you run into a lot of county roads, which Tulsa can't do anything about. Dist 8 still needs a ton of roads widened though, and we'll get them.
this road tax needs to be tied to a state bill to earmark funds to fix the BA and IDL. It is those roads that most people complain about and Tulsa can't fix. I'm SICK of hearing about OKC getting entire highways REROUTED and Tulsa's main state and federal highways are literally turning to gravel.
quote:
Originally posted by waterboy
Wait a minute Ponder. They pay for those streets as well. We aren't shouldering the whole load. If we look at it totally that way then we all start turning against each other (moreso than now anyway). Yeah, at first glance not widening them at all makes sense but not really. The district assessment is a fair thing to me but not widening at all is not.
I would note that it is not right that 101st between Yale and Sheridan has only two lanes and a deep ditch on each side for those firetrucks to respond for emergencies. If traffic is heavy or an accident occurs, there is no way for them to respond. Honestly? The developers and city politicians who foisted this abomination on us should be hunted down and forced to join in the assessment.
One glaring thing I noticed about 25 years ago was that OKC had all these four lane, separated roads out in the middle of nowhere.
Now that there are housing additions in those formerly barren areas, there aren't traffic problems because there really was some proactive planning. Tulsa has always seemed to build the addition first then follow up with the necessary infrastructure to get traffic to flow right about 10 to 20 years later.
Proactive planning with the ability to walk in and force the landowner to hand over right of way before the prices escalated from demand.
The Special Assesment district could work if the Public Diswerks director worked om it hard enough. Had 71st between Memorial and Garnett been under that funding mechanism, it would have led to a better traffic situation.
It's up to landowners and developers (promoters)adjacent to street expansion to pony up more of the lion's share. They benefit directly from tax expenditures.
In the old daze, the city would engage in trade offs for street access and widening, sewar, drainage and even zoning and site work. But it was dealing with the devil. Not me per se but the government.[:O]
I have a really really out there idea, don't know if it has any merit...but should Tulsa de-annex some of itself? Are there growing communitites that would gladdly take the new utility customers or sales tax revenue(if there is any included) for the responsibility of the roads?
What are the drawbacks of de-annexing parts of Tulsa that have effectivly become a part of other communities?
Lets hear em!
quote:
Originally posted by mrhaskellok
I have a really really out there idea, don't know if it has any merit...but should Tulsa de-annex some of itself? Are there growing communitites that would gladdly take the new utility customers or sales tax revenue(if there is any included) for the responsibility of the roads?
What are the drawbacks of de-annexing parts of Tulsa that have effectivly become a part of other communities?
Lets hear em!
Great idea. De annex Riverside drive from 96th street to downtown and let Kaiser and Warren take charge. Warren already de annexed the areas around St. Francis. The only difference is the school system and the street improvement costs were bore by the taxpayers not their 5013c.
Asking everyone to pay for improvements downtown and then telling the existing "outlying areas" to pay for their own improvements will only result in a "We v.s. Them" mentality. Areas south of about 51st Street might asked to be de-annexed and then tell the rest of Tulsa to get by without the sales tax and property tax income they generate. (I'm trying to be polite.)
Road repairs and road widening are two different issues but both are important. I doubt mass transit will fix the traffic on S. Memorial. The shopping there pretty much requires private transportation. I invite any downtowners to take a trip down Memorial on a nice Saturday anytime from late morning 'til early evening. When WalMart moved from 91st to 111th and Memorial, all that happened was the traffic jam moved two miles farther south.
A look at Google maps will show that a lot of the new development in S.E. Tulsa, Bixby, and Broken Arrow is similar in density to mid-town. Not high rise apartments but also not what I would call spacious. Many places don't have space between houses wide enough for a driveway to put the garage at the rear of the house. One problem for effective mass transit is that not everyone works downtown. If they did, the housing density would support mass transit with some park-and-ride lots.
Perhaps developers should be required to put money into an (escrow?) account to pay for infrastructure improvements including the main arterials. Of course that cost would be passed on to the buyers. The real cost, including infrastructure would then determine what got developed and what didn't.
Not having wide roads has not stopped development. It just generates
quote:
Originally posted by Conan71
quote:
Originally posted by waterboy
Wait a minute Ponder. They pay for those streets as well. We aren't shouldering the whole load. If we look at it totally that way then we all start turning against each other (moreso than now anyway). Yeah, at first glance not widening them at all makes sense but not really. The district assessment is a fair thing to me but not widening at all is not.
I would note that it is not right that 101st between Yale and Sheridan has only two lanes and a deep ditch on each side for those firetrucks to respond for emergencies. If traffic is heavy or an accident occurs, there is no way for them to respond. Honestly? The developers and city politicians who foisted this abomination on us should be hunted down and forced to join in the assessment.
One glaring thing I noticed about 25 years ago was that OKC had all these four lane, separated roads out in the middle of nowhere.
Now that there are housing additions in those formerly barren areas, there aren't traffic problems because there really was some proactive planning. Tulsa has always seemed to build the addition first then follow up with the necessary infrastructure to get traffic to flow right about 10 to 20 years later.
Well Tulsa TRIED to do that, but no one wanted to live in East Tulsa, so you have this nice 4 lane 21st st going to no where.
quote:
Originally posted by Red Arrow
Perhaps developers should be required to put money into an (escrow?) account to pay for infrastructure improvements including the main arterials. Of course that cost would be passed on to the buyers. The real cost, including infrastructure would then determine what got developed and what didn't.
That's called an impact fee (//%22http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Impact_fee%22). It's a very commonly used growth management tool, used by
most states since the 1950s and 60s. Much like TIFs (//%22http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tax_increment_financing%22) , Oklahoma has been slow to adopt this common (even mundane) tool. To date, the state legislature has not adopted enabling legislation for impact fees. This means that any city that adopts an impact fee ordinance
might be overstepping it's authority. You are right though, those fees are indeed passed directly onto the buyers of new homes. The fees help moderate the pace of development at the periphery of a region.
Considering no impact fees were ever collected in south Tulsa at the time of development, I think asking homeowners if they want a special assessment to pay for those improvements now is a reasonable alternative. In fact, it's more or less the same thing.
quote:
Originally posted by inteller
Well Tulsa TRIED to do that, but no one wanted to live in East Tulsa, so you have this nice 4 lane 21st st going to no where.
Keen observation, Inteller. It's like they
thought Tulsa was going to grow that direction but it didn't. So now we have overbuilt intersections in one part of town (East) and people squawking for improvements in another (South).
Back in the late 60's, City leaders believed the area was going to take off ala Southland and wanted to insure good traffic flow. Eastland Mall was destroyed by a developer and engineer not foreseeing the enormous expense associated with duplicating Southland's underground delivery docks. The city had agreed to enhance accessability from the region with good streets. There may have been a housing explosion in the early 70's out east were there not big outcroppings of limestone in the immediate area. Adjacent areas would be ideal for batting cages, golf ranges, go carts, amusement park, etc but not for anything needing excavation. Construction came to a dead stop for many years. Development costs were too high compared with the school district and the demographics and that is why the growth went elsewhere. The timing was never that good either. Had there been a perfect world, Eastland would have been the second Mall in Tulsa and helped to drive better schools and better neighborhoods in that corridor.
It all took place before the days when rock, limestone, was seen as an issue. That is what cost the developer and the city the eastside potential of adding to our economic base. When Mel Simon or Debartelo made a deal on the mall in like 84(?). Terry Young coupled it with a road improvement. The first neighborhood street south of Eastland wins worst street in Tulsa year after year. Its like a ski mogul slope with holes.
On a final note, Rob Phillips seems to be doing a really good job with resurrecting Eastland into a multi use facility. That would justify good streets leading down 21st.
Chicken Little - I haven't figured out the quote thing yet (see newbie status). I cannot totally disagree with your statement that the assessment would be the same as an initial impact fee but I cannot totally agree either. Most home owners in our area near 111th and Memorial are not the original owners. An assessment now would be similar to a car manufacturer coming to a buyer of a used car saying the original buyer of the car did not pay enough, would you now like to pay more for the privilege of protection of recalls due to original design defects? When my parents bought here (1971), the lots were big and not conducive to heavy traffic. Since then, the lots have become smaller and the streets severly overloaded. In fact, Memorial was two lanes south of the RR tracks near 41st Street and it was not a big deal. Large traffic volume businesss have been added. The design has changed to small lots. Had the design stayed at large residential lots, the streets may have been adequate. This is not the "high density downtown goal" of this forum in general but that is not what my parents bought into. They wanted to live a bit farther out and were willing to drive 7 miles to the nearest big grocery store. It's now 1/2 mile to the WalMart traffic jam.
In spite of all this I am in favor of a good mass transit system, especially rail where the ridership will justify the initial expense. Let me know when the real (steel wheels on steel rails and electric motors)trolley will provide transportation to the (coming)attractions downtown from this part of town. I won't hold my breath.
If you care to research my background, Google "Septa route 101"
It appears I gained citizenship with a subsequent post.
You are right Redarrow, paying a special assessment is not EXACTLY like an impact fee. There are several differences on both the plus and minus side.
A vote for an assessment district would be voluntary, whereas impact fees would be passed on to a buyer automatically. It sounds like a choice, and in some ways it is. But it's also probably true that if your initial purchase price reflected the TRUE costs of new roads (and schools, and sewer plants, and fire stations, etc.) then you might have seriously considered purchasing in an older, "built up", part of town.
You are right that an assessment today would be a surcharge levied after the fact, sometimes years after the house was built and on people who had nothing to do with the "sprouting" of this area. But the reality is this: a) What you see is what you get. If you bought in an area with traffic problems and crowded schools and then expected the city to come along and fix those problems at no additional charge, then I think you might have had some unreasonable expectations; and, b) Expecting ALL Tulsans to bear an equal share to fix your problem is only reasonable because it is consistent with past bond issues. Is it fair? Many Tulsans made home buying decisions that consciously considered schools, traffic, commute times, etc. Do they deserve to be charged extra to fix problems in a distant place that is not well-planned?
You often hear things like, "I looked in this part of town, but bought in another part because I could get MORE house", i.e., square footage costs were lower. Well, is that because the cost of housing construction is 30% LOWER in a certain part of town? Or is it because, in part, the infrastructure investments needed to make your booming neighborhood sustainable have not yet been made. You could've spent a lot more and bought around Elliot or Lee and been five minutes from work. I'm not scolding, all I'm saying is that there are REASONS why south Tulsa is cheaper than midtown and it has little to do with how cute the houses are.
Lastly, I think that mass transit options are needed, too. And the $100 million or so we'd spend on road widenings in this bond issues is, ironically, almost exactly the amount of money we'd need to startup and grow a better transit system for ALL of us. If it's a choice between widening streets in distant part of town and getting a better bus system, I'm going to vote for buses.
Tulsa had a (real) trolley system until about 1936. Decisions which can now be determined to be incorrect dismanteled that system. A special assessment district could be assigned to the areas which would directly benefit from improved mass transit. As you said, what you see is what you get, no mass transit. You want it, you buy it.
I don't work downtown. I don't attend sporting events. I am not a theater fan. I prefer to eat at home. I know someone will tell me to get a life but I enjoy what I do. It just doesn't involve downtown. There were no traffic problems here 30 years ago. Memorial south of 51st street was 55 MPH with one stop light at about 81st street. My parents wanted a big lot, cuteness of the house had nothing to do with it. In fact, they bought less house for 30% more money than the one we left in PA. People told us the cost of living was less in Tulsa than near Philadelphia. We determined the standard of living was less. I have to admit that Bixby schools had a better reputation than Tulsa. Based on my sister's experience, I am glad she didn't go to Tulsa schools, Bixby was a year behind what we left in PA. I would hate to think of the (lack of) education she would have received in Tulsa School District. I was already in college so local schools were not an issue for me. In spite of some initial complaints, the Tulsa area is now my home and I have no desire to return to PA. Using your reasoning, do I deserve to be charged extra to fix problems in a distant place (downtown) that made bad mass transit decisions decades ago? I think not. Life stopped being fair in 1st grade.
A mass transit system that benefited "all" would have to inlcude "distant" southeast Tulsa. Routes would need to include major employment centers like American Airlines, not just downtown Tulsa. Buses are generally considered to be a ride of necessity, not choice. Rail is a ride of choice. Gasoline prices are making mass transit a necessity for ever higher income levels. Rail is a better choice when the ridership will support the higher initial investment. Over the long run, rail can be less expensive than buses. Consider the cost of fuel for buses v.s. electric powered rail and the life expectancy of buses compared to rail vehicles. Air pollution and noise are another factor in favor of electric powered rail. I know that most local electricity is generated using natural gas. If you want to use buses to benefit "all", you will still need to widen the streets in S.E. Tulsa to make the buses a viable alternative to automobiles. Given a choice between being stuck in traffic in a bus or my car, I will probably choose my car. I believe that $100 Million of buses will not solve the Tulsa transportation problem, especially not for "all". The proposals I have seen so far are just an expensive "toy" for downtown. I will support them as long as the rest of Tulsa supports improvements to my life. FWIW, most of my shopping is within Tulsa city limits even though I actually reside in the northern limits of Bixby.
Finally, I want to thank you for keeping this an honest discussion of differences of opinion rather than the name calling I have seen on other threads.
quote:
Originally posted by Red Arrow
Using your reasoning, do I deserve to be charged extra to fix problems in a distant place (downtown) that made bad mass transit decisions decades ago? I think not. Life stopped being fair in 1st grade.
Both arguments make some sense. But the above quote illustrates the problem. Neither do those of us near downtown care to pay for the excesses of developers who built two lane roads with ditches on each side that don't allow for emergency vehicles to even respond safely but reduced the cost of construction allowing housing to proliferate in those areas. I haven't been to shop in Woodland Hills area for at least a decade.
And we don't care to keep maintaining, improving and adding to the nuisance expressways that carry many of you to our long ago paid for amenities and job opportunities downtown. Even though you personally don't go downtown, many use the hospitals, government buildings, office buildings, and shopping areas we provide access to. We don't need an expressway to reach them. If more suburbans lived your lifestyle we could then eliminate the ribbons of crumbling asphalt altogether.
So we sink or swim together. I am guessing that the expressways will remain paid for in part by my neighborhood and hoping that far south neighborhoods will pony up for basic infrastructure that they need to be safe and convenient. But the realist in me says we'll continue to pay for the poor planning out south AND the ribbons of crumbling asphalt.