Principles (Created April 5, 2005)
- Respond to and strengthen the character of defined neighborhoods, districts or sub-areas for each stop.
- Encourage transit infrastructure and stops to serve as a community amenity.
- Create visual and functional continuity through a system-wide design.
- Minimize physical disruption to the built environment of the proposed alignment.
- Promote the transit corridor to also serve as a pedestrian greenway.
Principle 1: Respond to and strengthen the character of defined neighborhoods, districts or sub-areas
for each stop.
- Promote the preservation of the unique and desirable characteristics of each neighborhood, district and sub-area.
- Design stops and line segments that respond to and preserve the important cultural, natural and historic resources.
- Utilize materials, signage, streetscape and street furniture which relate visually to the existing environment and adopted plans.
- Promote pedestrian connectivity to adjacent neighborhoods, districts and sub-areas through enhanced streetscape improvements to the stops.
- Identify existing destinations and potential development opportunities and provide for service to and from those destinations.
Principle 2: Encourage transit infrastructure and stops to serve as a community amenity.
- Promote a mix of uses and public spaces that draw the full spectrum of the area's diverse community and its visitors together.
- Encourage uses that engage pedestrians and generate an active environment.
- Provide outdoor public places to sit, eat, meet friends, read and enjoy the weather, shop, learn, play, browse, live, and work together.
- Provide visibility into street-level interiors for shopping and browsing.
- Plan for complementary land uses adjacent to stops.
- Plan for sufficient density to support social and economic vitality.
- Promote high-quality design in the architecture and urban design of stops for comfort, convenience, function and clarity.
- Create an identity at the stops that unifies neighborhoods, districts or sub-areas.
- Determine system as a background or foreground element.
- Determine if the streetcar system should blend into the surrounding architecture or if the system should stand out as a more unique element.
- Identify opportunities for public art enhancement.
- Encourage ties to the history of different neighborhoods, districts or sub-areas through public art.
- Integrate images and designs which articulate the character of the place.
- Facilitate participation of Arts and Science Council in the process.
- Identify specific opportunities for artist involvement.
- Integrate art into the system elements rather than as freestanding elements.
Principle 3: Create visual and functional continuity through a system-wide design.
- Design a system-wide identity/image through repetition of system elements as a means to maintain visual continuity from one neighborhood, district, or sub-area to another.
- Use similar design elements. (e.g. light poles, signage, seating, shelter design, street furniture, etc.)
- Promote coordination of system elements with future projects and sub-area plans to strengthen unified design solutions along the corridor.
- Design a system which is efficient, safe, convenient, understandable and easy to use.
- Provide shelter from inclement weather and natural elements at stop locations.
- Provide ADA accessibility.
- Provide a safe, secure well lit environment at the station locations and in areas of pedestrian activity leading to the stations.
- Avoid places for concealment (hedges, large shrubs, above ground transformers, signage, and shelters that are not transparent).
- Provide lighting and sidewalk improvements at identified street, sidewalk and parking areas adjacent to stations.
- Integrate pedestrian and bike circulation improvements.
- Develop distinctive and easily recognizable facilities and signage.
- Integrate transportation modes to promote cross use of transit facilities.
Principle 4: Minimize physical disruption to the built environment of the proposed alignment.
- Minimize construction period impacts to adjacent land uses and circulation systems.
- Minimize construction impacts (and costs) to adjacent utility systems
- Align track to best accommodate transit riders, adjacent activities, and proposed development areas.
- Visually and physically integrate Streetcar with other transportation modes.
- Accommodate inter-modal transfers.
- Provide for effective and efficient streetcar operations.
Principle 5: Promote the transit corridor to also serve as a pedestrian greenway.
- Promote the streetcar corridor as more than a transit opportunity, by designing it as an alternative pedestrian and bicycle system that connects to regional parks and open spaces.
- Promote streetcar corridor as a linear park system that connects the culture and history of the neighborhood, district or sub-area through public art, gardens walks and trails.
- Promote the creation of a system-wide landscape palette.
1. Streetcar stops
- Seating/leaning rails
- Bike racks
- Real time AVL message board
- Ticket vending (if not on-board)
- Streetcar system maps / Kiosks
- Litter receptacles
- Public art
2. Traction power
- Contact wire
3. Embedded track way design
- Dynamic envelope definition
- Rumble strip/traffic delineation
- Exclusive or shared use track-way
4. Inter-modal facilities and connections
- Bus parking and transfer areas
- Park and ride area
- Drop and ride area
5. Streetscape, landscape, lighting
- Pedestrian plazas and paths
- Materials, finishes, and construction
- Street trees, ornamental trees, shrubs, seasonal plantings
- Street lights, pedestrian scale lights, streetcar stop lighting, landscape lighting
6. Signage / Graphics between stops
- System route map and operations schedule
- Context map: landmarks, civic uses, destinations, attractions