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Cleveland RTA announced today the Cleveland State Line

http://www.riderta.com/news/csu-purchases-naming-rights-new-service-clifton-blvd

CLEVELAND – Cleveland State University

(link is external) has secured naming rights for a new bus rapid transit (BRT) line connecting CSU to West Shore communities. The Greater Cleveland Regional Transit Authority (RTA) expects to begin service in November.

Meet the new Cleveland State Line

The new route will offer commuters an upgraded ride on new, specially-designed vehicles fully branded for CSU. Stations connect commuters traveling from the downtown campus through Cleveland’s West Side along Clifton Boulevard, with branch routes connecting multiple West Shore communities.

The Cleveland State Line will provide students and passengers with a faster and more reliable commute. The line will replace 55 family of routes with specially designed, 60-foot articulated buses and increased travel speeds. It will double ridership capacity. During rush hour, riders will wait no more than 10 minutes for a bus at any stop on the line.

The Cleveland State Line incorporates many of the convenience features of RTA’s first bus-rapid transit service, the HealthLine, which travels along Euclid Avenue from Public Square to the Louis Stokes Station at Windermere in East Cleveland. These features include consolidated stops, a dedicated transit lane, an enhanced streetscape and a new traffic signal system.

CSU students -- 500,000 rides this year

"We are excited to be part of this new transportation route to the West Side,” said CSU President Ronald Berkman. “More than 14,000 CSU students receive the RTA U-Pass each semester, and collectively, they’ve already taken a half million trips this year. A significant number of them commute from west of downtown Cleveland. This new transportation option will provide a fast, comfortable and convenient way to get to campus, while serving the larger transportation needs of West Shore commuters.”

The Cleveland State Line will serve customers along Clifton Boulevard with 19 new stations, and will also feature special CSU-branded stops in Bay Village, Westlake, Rocky River, Fairview Park, Lakewood and Cleveland.

The contract calls for CSU sponsorship of a total vehicle graphic package on 16 custom-designed buses to be used on all trips. The CSU logo is woven in the fabric for the approximate 950 seat backs on all vehicles, and CSU identification will be prominently displayed at the 32 new bus stations or stops on Clifton Boulevard. CSU branding will be featured at 243 stops and shelters along the route and in related materials.

RTA + CSU, long-time partners

“RTA and CSU have collaborated for years and continue to expand on an ideal partnership,” said RTA CEO and General Manager Joe Calabrese. “Starting with the U-Pass program for CSU students and extending to the trolley network, sponsorship of two HealthLine stations, the completion of the Stephanie Tubbs Jones Transit Center and a lease with Megabus, this collaboration showcases how public entities can work together to benefit students and the Greater Cleveland community.”

Since 2008, RTA has initiated several other public-private partnerships with Cleveland organizations to sponsor new or enhanced services, including the HealthLine and free downtown trolleys.

“Now that CSU has secured the naming rights, we are advancing the revitalization of Cleveland’s transit landscape into suburban communities. Through these partnerships, together we are investing in the future of Cleveland and Northeast Ohio,” Calabrese said.

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Got to ride on 3252 on Friday morning while riding the 26. Are the 3250-and-up series an option batch to go with the original order of 23 artics? I'm wondering if these might actually be the artics dedicated for the 55/Cleveland State Line service. Judging by the photo on the RTA website, I'm guessing that 3200-3215 are the dedicated CSU buses.

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A few of my favorite shots from my visit to the RTA system last week:

19782684903_8f116564e2_t.jpg 19782737933_28ab9ceb15_t.jpg 19780986694_45ac485925_t.jpg 20409802791_b63cde754d_t.jpg 20215599390_d06ee81405_t.jpg 20409781901_063603db0e_t.jpg 19782735413_b5e75907f7_t.jpg 20403631505_907f6187e1_t.jpg 20215561030_7b4dc05f7e_t.jpg 19780988324_bf2cd15df0_t.jpg

I did see quite a few Gillig BRTPlus roaming about during the morning peak, however they were always a block away from me, so I didn't bother trying to get pics. (I wanted to focus on the LFWs and eventually to be replaced Opus "trolleys")

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"Greater Cleveland’s RTA is now adding bus services to Edgewater Park every Saturday. The services at this stop began on Saturday at the eastern section of the park.

RTA says the buses will pull off the West Shoreway at the main entrance to the park on West 73rd Street then continue along the entrance ramp.

The Cleveland State line already makes trips to the western part of the park Monday through Saturday.

RTA is testing this service and says it may either be increased or discontinued, depending on how many people ride the bus on this new route.

This new service at Edgewater Park’s eastern section is part of the change of services that began on March 12 when a total of 21 route timetables were set for the Cleveland State Line. "  -wkyc.com

Source: http://www.wkyc.com/news/rta-adds-another-edgewater-park-bus-line-for-saturday-rides/423637463

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The 51's lines are to be renamed the MetroHealth Line and use new MetroHealth liveried Gilligs.

http://www.riderta.com/news/sept-21-2017-rta-and-metrohealth-partner-rebrand-51-bus-line

 

 

Brookpark Station also had some work on it finished this past summer, unfortuneatly there are no good photos of the new exterior, just renders.

http://www.riderta.com/majorprojects/brookpark

Not sure if they still use the pedestrian level crossing and ramp at the southern end of the platform.

Edited by Straypuft
photos typo
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I just had a terrible thought about the Blue and Green lines, With the Breda LRV's becoming too old, the Blue and Green lines could be turned into BRT routes with minimal "upgrading" of their respective routes, BRT would be cheaper than buying new trains, they would need to turn the tracks into roadways all the way to most likely East 55 Station either terminating there or taking to city streets to express to Tower City.

I love city trains but Do not want to see anything like this happening.

 

The Red line would most likely stay a train route with all the past decades work put into upgrading stations.

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21 hours ago, Straypuft said:

I love city trains but Do not want to see anything like this happening.

 

I agree. Ripping up tracks is too much, especially with the Red Line sharing part of the route. Imagine if buses and heavy rail rapid-transit trains share the same lanes? They just don't fit in.

Something else that would be much better: convert the Red Line to low-floor platforms and then order low-floor LRVs to replace the Tokyu cars as well as the Bredas. AFAIK, ridership on the Red Line isn't high enough to warrant the need for heavy-rail cars; those trains are empty most of the time (as many YouTube clips show) and the infrastructure is largely similar to that of the Blue/Green lines except for the current high-level platforms.

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6 hours ago, Transit geek said:

I agree. Ripping up tracks is too much, especially with the Red Line sharing part of the route. Imagine if buses and heavy rail rapid-transit trains share the same lanes? They just don't fit in.

Something else that would be much better: convert the Red Line to low-floor platforms and then order low-floor LRVs to replace the Tokyu cars as well as the Bredas. AFAIK, ridership on the Red Line isn't high enough to warrant the need for heavy-rail cars; those trains are empty most of the time (as many YouTube clips show) and the infrastructure is largely similar to that of the Blue/Green lines except for the current high-level platforms.

Redoing the red line stations would mean throwing away all the money they put into it, stations rebuilt in the last 15 years would have to be rebuilt to have low platforms, not just platforms, but escalators and elevators. It could put the entire red line out of service for up to a year while they did all of that. RTA just doesnt have the money to do all of this on top of buying new LRV's, After the Public Square fiasco, I can see RTA being overlooked for federal funding for quite a few years.

 

There might have been some talk about dual level rail cars a while back, but it couldnt work in the harsh winters of NE Ohio, sidewalk/road salt would just work its way into the mechanisms that raise and lower stairs and could cause many malfunctions. 

 

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14 hours ago, Straypuft said:

Redoing the red line stations would mean throwing away all the money they put into it, stations rebuilt in the last 15 years would have to be rebuilt to have low platforms, not just platforms, but escalators and elevators. It could put the entire red line out of service for up to a year while they did all of that. RTA just doesnt have the money to do all of this on top of buying new LRV's, After the Public Square fiasco, I can see RTA being overlooked for federal funding for quite a few years.

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A possible (but equally, if not more unwieldy) alternative to lowering the platforms would be to raise the trackbed to facilitate level boarding of low-floor LRVs.

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San Francisco's large order of high floor LRVs creates an opportunity for Cleveland when it comes time to replace the  current Breda LRVs. This SF model will be catalogued for some time. There are alternatives to salt for melting snow and ice, so the stair mechanism might not pose a problem. 

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