Honkin' Mad

New W. 7th St. bridge will change the Fort Worth skyline

@gdickson

The new West Seventh Street bridge is being assembled in a dirt field near the Clear Fork Trinity River. When the giant arches are ready for transport, they'll be moved to the river by special, crawling vehicles.

Video to be posted of Dallas-Fort Worth Regional Transportation Council meetings

@gdickson

Hundreds of millions of dollars are spent each year on transportation projects in Dallas-Fort Worth, and for many reasons it's difficult for the typical working stiff to keep track of the decision-making. For one thing, the Regional Transportation Council holds its meetings during business hours, which means much of the public can't attend. Anyway, things are about to get a little easier, thanks to a technology that many cities and counties discovered long ago. The RTC, which is an arm of the North Central Texas Council of Governments, will begin video taping its monthly proceedings in Arlington. To watch video of the meetings, go here. It won't be a live streaming video feed, but officials say the video should be posted within 24 hours. The recordings will begin with the RTC meeting this Thursday, although presumably it will be late Thursday or perhaps Friday before the video is posted.

Tomorrowland meets Texas - Futuristic freight system planned for I-35 corridor

@gdickson

Freight normally hauled by trucks could one day soon be shipped on an electric-powered, overhead guideway across Texas. It may seem like an idea more suitable for Tomorrowland – and artist renderings of the project do resemble Disney’s famed monorail system – but Texas officials are encouraging a privately-funded business to get the project up and running, perhaps within six years.

"We think it’s happening at just the right time in our country,” said Stephen Roop, an assistant director at Texas A&M University’s Texas Transportation Institute, and developer of the so-called Freight Shuttle concept. “It can operate in the air space of a highway median.”

Roop and his colleagues have formed Freight Shuttle International, a company that is cobbling together the estimated $2.5 billion needed to build the first leg of this futuristic transportation system. The guideways would be built within the existing right-of-way of Interstate 35, initially stretching about 250 miles from San Antonio to Waxahachie – but eventually extending north through Dallas-Fort Worth, and south to the Mexican border. Ultimately, Freight Shuttle guideways could be built on more than 2,000 miles of highway right-of-way across the state, he said.

The system would haul cargo of various sizes, packed in both intermodal containers and freight trailers. Terminals would be built at each end of the route, so that trucks could load and off-load their goods onto the Freight Shuttle guideways. The shipments would be placed on unmanned transporters powered by linear induction motors using electricity and a magnetic field. They would glide on steel wheels across the guideways at about 60 mph, Roop told members of the Tarrant Regional Transportation Coalition during a meeting Wednesday in Fort Worth.

Shippers would be able to get their goods across the state for pennies on the dollar compared to what it costs to haul freight in tractor-trailers, said Ken Allen, a retired logistics executive for grocery giant H-E-B Stores and chief executive officer of Freight Shuttle International’s operations unit. “We estimate it would be 25 percent cheaper than a very efficient trucking operation,” Allen said. For consumers, Allen added, “It probably amounts to a savings of 4 to 5 cents for a gallon of milk, and H-E-B sells probably three million gallons a week.”

The Texas Department of Transportation last year quietly put out a request for qualifications for the project. Six firms initially responded with a proposal for moving freight across the state without clogging up freeway lanes, but Freight Shuttle International emerged from the competition as the lone qualified candidate. The transportation department is close to approving a reservation of right-of-way agreement that would give Freight Shuttle International first dibs on the project. That document would give the company three years to arrange its financing and conduct an environmental study, Roop said. Another three years would be needed for construction, he said. Most of the work could be done in highway median space with minimal traffic disruptions.

The prospect of reducing truck traffic on the I-35 corridor excited several members of the Tarrant Regional Transportation Coalition. Tarrant County Judge Glen Whitley said he could envision moving people on trains in the highway right-of-way, too, instead of relying on railroad tracks owned and controlled by freight companies. “That right-of-way above the interstate is something that is beginning to be more attractive, especially given our negotiations with Union Pacific,” Whitley said. “If that would be possible, especially inside urban areas, that would be very intriguing along certain routes like LBJ, I-30 and I-20.”

A car that runs on air - Why didn't I think of that?

Check out this Discovery story about development of a car that runs on air. Future generations may wonder why it took us so long to figure out how to use this fuel.

Road trip! See roadside America on somebody else's dime - Motel 6 seeks 'correspondents' to travel the U.S. this summer

Anyone out there itching to see roadside America -- on somebody else's dime?

Motel 6 is putting out the call for three "open road correspondents," who would travel one of three classic routes July 16 to Sept. 3 - using social media to document the journey.

The hotel company's 50th anniversary contest also has a green angle; 'correspondents' will use environmentally-friendly vehicles and digital map applications, and will stay at Motel 6 locations that have been updated with recycled flooring, low-flow toilets and energy-efficient lighting.

The Carrollton-based Accor North America is accepting contest entries on its Facebook page.

Winners and one companion each will travel one of these three routes:

• Route 66 (Amarillo, Texas, to Santa Monica, Calif.)
• The Pacific Coast Highway (Tumwater, Wash., to Santa Barbara, Calif.)
• Southern Route (Austin, Texas, to Destin, Fla.)

Each prize package is valued at $6,000 and includes two third generation, 64GB, Wi-Fi enabled iPads, according to a Motel 6 press release.

Candidates are asked to submit a two-minute video by June 15, explaining what would make them a good correspondent.

Facebook fans will vote on finalists, then winners will be notified by July 6.

Candidates must be U.S. residents and at least 21 years old, with a valid driver's license.

@gdickson

Bus, train riders in Fort Worth, Dallas & Denton use Google for transit directions

It's now easier than even to get good directions for trip-planning using Google's transit search function. The Fort Worth Transportation Authority is the latest agency to share its data with the powerful online navigational aide.

@gdickson

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Huge fireball in North Texas sky was meteor, FAA confirms

11:30 p.m. update:

A reader in Shattuck, Okla., near where the panhandles of Texas and Oklahoma touch, said the meteor "is likely the largest and brightest I have observed in all my 63 years." The man, who asked that his name not be used, also said one of the photos published earlier in my blog may not be a geniune image taken tonight, but instead could be an archived image. I'm currently looking into that and will remove the image if it appears to be either a fake or otherwise misleading image. (Image was removed.) The reader from Shattuck, Okla., said he didn't hear a sound from his vantage in Oklahoma but when the object caught his attention it was due south of Shattuck and moving east-southeast "somewhat above the southern horizon."

"It moved very fast when you consider how distant it must have been from my position," he wrote in an email. However, the man's view was then briefly blocked by trees, and he was not able to follow it to the point where he could conclude it had extinguished. He described the arc as perhaps 75 to 90 degrees and "would have believed it if someone suggested it was 120 degrees or more." 

11 p.m. update:

Here is some police dashboard video from Little River-Academy in Central Texas that appears to show a meteor streaking across the sky. This video is from NBCDFW.com

@gdickson 

 

10:45 p.m. update:

"I saw it over Little Elm. It was too fast to get a picture, but when I saw it, it looked like a giant firework sparkler, with lots of sparks coming off.  The tail was much more broad an less long when I saw it."

- from a reader identified as A Facebook User.

10:40 p.m. update:

An image from Tully Hannah of Bridgeport, via WFAA

Social media and online websites are on fire with reports that a massive fireball streaked across the North Texas/Oklahoma sky after 8 p.m. Wednesday. The FAA has confirmed it was a meteor. Below is an image from "The Latest Worldwide Meteor/Meteorite News," also known as lunarmeteoritehunters.blogspot.com ... If you have video or a still shot of this object -- or even audio that you think contains the sonic boom that reportedly was heard across North Texas approximately 8:18 p.m. tonight -- please send a note to gdickson@star-telegram.com. I'll do my best to post your material here ...

@gdickson

Driverless cars could be on the streets in 10 years

Check out this fun article by Bloomberg Business Week forecasting that driverless cars -- those that can navigate all by themselves -- will be on the streets within 10 years. Will road rage and drunk driving become relics of the past, as smart cars gradually take over even the most basic tasks of getting around? Will future generations look back on the 20th and early 21st centuries as a savage era in which humans thought little of killing each other with metal missiles on wheels?

@gdickson

New online tool helps motorists navigate accidents, lane closures on North Tarrant Express project in Fort Worth area

The developer of the $2 billion-plus North Tarrant Express project has launched an online tool to help motorists get real-time information about not only traffic accidents but also construction-related lane closures in the 13-mile work zone.

The project on Loop 820 and Texas 121/183 in Northeast Tarrant County is expected to be completed in 2015. Some side work is already being done on the highways, and the direct connection between westbound Texas 183 and northbound Texas 121 in Bedford is permanently closed. But the real fun involving overnight movement of barriers and constant lane reroutings begins later in the summer.

With the new online tool, the idea is to give people up-to-the-minute information about traffic conditions on the corridor before they set out to travel through it, said Robert Hinkle, spokesman for NTE Mobility Partners, the consortium of developers working on the project.

The software was developed in a partnership with an online company that produces beatthetraffic.com, Hinkle said. The company normally charges viewers a subscription for real-time information, but in this case is making the information available at no cost to drivers, because NTE Mobility Partners paid a fee of a "couple thousand dollars," Hinkle said.

A mobile website for those who want to access the information with a smartphone will be released possible next week, officials said.

But officials at the North Tarrant Express plan to discourage motorists from looking up the information while driving.

"Plan before you go," he said. "Look it up before you leave the office, or before you leave home, and try not to throw your Blackberry up in front of your face" while driving.

-- Gordon Dickson, gdickson@star-telegram.com

Don't forget to potty before driving in winter weather

When the streets turn icy, it's not unusual for traffic to grind to a halt. During one particularly bad winter storm a few years ago, it took me more than two hours to go five miles. So if you're planning to be out on the Dallas-Fort Worth streets today, answer nature's call before getting behind the wheel.

And make sure any young'uns you'll be transporting do the same ...

 

Gordon.

Pic: nablopomo.ning.com