Dallas Area Rapid Transit's (DART) light rail system initially opened in 1996 with a 20 mile starter system that includes a segment in downtown Dallas. The existing system is currently being extended to the suburban cities of Plano, Richardson, and Garland with an additional 20 miles of track construction that will be finalized by 2003. Additional light rail lines to southeast Dallas and to the suburban cities of Farmers Branch, Carrollton, and Irving are nearing completion of preliminary engineering. Ultimately 93 miles of LRT lines are included in DART's System Plan (see Exhibit 1). All of these lines are currently planned to interline through the existing downtown Light Rail Transitway Mall, thereby decreasing the headway from 5 minutes to 2 minutes in 2008. DART contracted with Parsons Transportation Group to conduct an engineering study to determine the feasibility of operating shorter headways though the Transitway Mall and to determine if there would be any impacts to either traffic or LRT operations. The final report for the "Dallas CBD Transitway Mall Traffic Study" is included with this compendium paper for review. In summary, the results of the study indicate that very little impact to traffic operations would result from lowering the headway. However, at a 2 minute headway, the LRT operations would significantly deteriorate without implementation of a Transit Priority or Preemption system.
Abstract