Goals:
The Urban Project is currently developing two video projects in association with independent filmmaker James Scott:
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A PBS documentary on the future of rapid rail in the Midwest: The goal is a 1-hour special, featuring a nationally known narrator and expert commentators on issues of
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A Graduate Course in Public Policy Studies: Under a $45,000 grant from the BNSF Foundation, the Urban Project is creating a 15-part on-line course for graduate students and government and rail officials around the U.S. seeking continuing education in the future of U.S. rail transportation, including high-speed passenger service and freight.
In cooperation with the Higher Education Consortium of St. Louis, and in consultation with experts from relevant disciplines, we are in the process of filming and collecting 20 hours of High Definition documentary-style video for the course. Illustrations will focus on the corridor between Chicago, St. Louis, and Kansas City.
The need for these projects: By 2050, U.S. population is expected to rise by 100 million, dramatically increasing demand for transportation. At the same time, worldwide demand for carbon-based energy supplies will rise exponentially, driving costs for moving goods and people dramatically higher.
At the moment, however, innovation in energy-efficient rail transportation is dominated by other countries, leaving America in danger of being shut out of an enormous worldwide market. Under these circumstances, the need for greatly expanded research and development of rail technologies and corridors is urgent, as are initiatives to improve graduate education and public awareness.
Project oversight:
Project Director: Donald Stump, Co-Chair of the Urban Project, Saint Louis University
Film Director and Producer: James Scott, independent filmmaker and Director of the Film Studies Program, Saint Louis University
Project Manager: Robert Cropf, Chair of the Department of Public Policy Studies and Co-Chair of the Urban Project, Saint Louis University
Local Broadcasting Producer: Dennis Riggs, Executive Director, HEC TV
Public Policy Advisors: Robert Cropf and John Hicks, Transportation Development Analyst, St. Louis County
Environmental Advisors: John Hicks and David Crossley, Professor of Geophysics, Earth and Atmospheric Sciences Department, Saint Louis University
Engineering Advisor: John Woolschlager, Chair of the Civil Engineering Department, Saint Louis University
Law and Legislative Advisors: Peter Salsich, Professor of Law; Monica Eppinger, Assistant Professor of
Law and Anthropology; Dana Malkus, Assistant Professor of Clinical Law, Saint Louis University
Topics of the 15-week graduate course:
The Promise of Rail
1. Introduction: The role of the railways in future national development and the difficulties to be overcome.
2. Economic costs and benefits: The promise of growth; the role of private and public partnerships in the redevelopment of rail; issues of capital investment, operating costs, and maintenance.
3. Environmental costs and benefits: Advantages for sustainable energy use and reduced greenhouse emissions; the perceived hazards of environmental degradation such as noise, spills, and disruption of animal habitats.
4. Engineering and development challenges: The degradation of the rail networks in the “freeway” era and the need for new corridors, train designs, electrical grids, tracks, and safety and environmental safeguards.
5. Engineering and development solutions: New technologies involving train sets, track designs, convenience and safety features; efficient inter-modal connections between heavy rail, trucking systems, light rail, auto, air, and bus transportation; examples from U.S., Europe, Japan, and China.
Challenges in Rail Redevelopment and Urban Planning
6. Public regulation of land use: Zoning; residential and commercial encroachments on rights of way; dangerous public access-points to tracks and crossings; difficulties in negotiating changing laws and local ordinances as lines run through multiple jurisdictions.
7. Location and design of hubs: Effective interfaces between freight and passenger corridors and other urban infrastructure.
8. Relation to other carriers: The place of heavy rail, light rail, trucks, planes, and automobiles in a maximally effective and energy-efficient transportation system
9. Competition for track: Overcoming difficulties caused by the incompatibility between low-speed freight and high-speed passenger service
10. Private regulation of land use: Easements; insurance and actuarial costs to cover toxic spills and collisions with other trains, other vehicles, and pedestrians.
Politics of Rail Redevelopment and Implications for Public Policy
11. Political issues: Difficulties in arranging municipal, state, regional, and federal cooperation and overcoming popular resistance to spending for a large public-works project.
12. Competing demographics: Urban, suburban, and rural populations and their differing political and economic interests; environmental impacts involving light, noise, spills, diesel emissions, and the segmentation of property and animal habitats.
13. Competing sites of authority: Mechanisms for negotiating new or expanded rights of way and allocating land for hubs in sequential and overlapping jurisdictions.
14. Needs for legislation: Current obstacles in law and the mechanisms of governmental oversight.
15. Conclusion: The redevelopment of rail in the corridor between St. Louis and Chicago as a case study in the principles covered in the course.
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