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Tom & Tess: Suburbanites
Tom and Tess live in Ft. Mitchell, in the Sunnymede subdivision. Both are in their late 30’s. Tom works at Cinergy downtown, in Atrium Two, while Tess works at the Aquarium in Newport. Their daughter Gwen goes to Beechwood (5th grade), while son David attends Covington Catholic (9th grade). "What are your plans, today?" Tom says. "Well, during lunch hour I’ll go to Sak’s. I need a dress for the party next week. If I don’t find it there, I’ll try Dillard’s when I’m off work." "Sounds good to me", notes Tom. "I’ll stop at The Party Source on the way home, to pick up the stuff for our party next week. I’ll see you at home for dinner. "Remember the Reds game on Saturday, Tom-no working for you this weekend!" "Yeah, Tess, I know we promised to take the kids to another game. This is our 10th this season, isn’t it? Oh, well, it’s an easy day on the river. How about a stop at the Aquarium and Millennium Monument afterwards? We can see those strange new Amazon fish they got in, and eat at the Millennium Restaurant for a nice view." "Great idea, Tom—let’s do it all!" This sounds like a lot of downtown activity for suburbanites, doesn’t it? Neither Tom nor Tess would have bothered with all this 10 years ago. So what changed? THE SKY LOOP. Tess recalls:
"It was about 2003 when they started building the Sky Loop, and we thought it was a waste of money at first. I remember saying ‘I never shop downtown—too hard to park, never enough time at lunch, too far to walk, and after work, Cincinnati rolls up, so crime is a worry.’ Boy, how that Sky Loop changed things! "Yeah, it sure did," says Tom. "You used to drive to Kenwood Towne Center for all your fashion choices, and the downtown stores catered only to the nearby office workers and the poorer neighborhoods around downtown. Now the fashion center IS downtown, and there are few poor areas near downtown. Most people in the nearby neigborhoods got jobs in all the new downtown businesses that grew up once the Sky Loop brought everybody downtown again." "Tom, I remember one of the big surprises about the Sky Loop was how many of the poor and disabled found work near where they lived. Everybody thought the Sky Loop was going to help downtown by bringing us suburban dwellers in, but few recognized how much more accessible jobs would become for those who lived in the urban area because they couldn’t afford the suburbs."
"Remember the traffic nightmare at Reds and Bengal’s games? We used to go to all the Bengal’s games "cause we had season tickets, but hated the 40 minutes it took to get out of the garage. We went to only one or two Reds games a year, ‘cause we parked in Covington and walked the Suspension Bridge, and it was often cold, or raining, or just too much bother. Now it’s easy to park and ride the Sky Loop directly to the stadium concourse!" So what is this Sky Loop, that helped downtown so much? It’s called Personal Rapid Transit, or PRT, for short. It goes in a series of loops, actually, in Covington, Newport and Cincinnati, covering the riverfront and downtown areas. Tom doesn’t park in downtown Cincinnati anymore. He parks, on a monthly basis, at the Northern Kentucky Convention Center garage, then uses his Sky Loop card (he could use Visa or Mastercard) to open the front car in the Sky Loop line at the garage. He punches in Station 26, which takes him directly to the Atrium Two station, in the lobby.
Tess will drive to the Aquarium’s huge garage, but then pick up a Sky Loop car to Sak’s, Station 32. Sak’s installed this as part of the original Sky Loop system, seeing its value from the beginning. Its sales doubled in three years after the Sky Loop was installed. The Bengals, Reds, Cincinnati and Hamilton County all got together in 2001, and realized the Sky Loop was the answer to the riverfront development problem. The area between the two stadiums was still one big parking lot, as it wasn’t practical to spend $108,000,000 for 7,500 parking spaces, used only on 90 game days a year. Studies showed that about half of the spaces were close enough to downtown office buildings for workers to walk (on pretty days), and downtown shopping wouldn’t be helped at all, as shoppers weren’t about to park on 2nd Street and walk to 6th Street and back with packages. The Sky Loop created the tie between riverfront parking and downtown offices and stores. By installing large Sky Loop stations on all sides of the riverfront garages, many workers parked there and took a Sky Loop car to work or shop. Other parking garages in or near downtown, underutilized before the Sky Loop because they were too far from where people worked, also filled up when Sky Loop stations were installed nearby. What has been happening gradually, since the Sky Loop was built, is that parking garages on expensive sites in the downtown areas on both sides of the river are being replaced with more productive uses. The Sky Loop cars fit five to a single auto space when idle in the system. However, most Sky Loop cars are circulating throughout the day, so they take up little space compared to autos. So in total, fewer auto spaces are needed now downtown, as all auto garages stay close to full.
Jack & Merry: Urban Dwellers Jack and Merry live in Newport at 6th & Saratoga, within a block of the Sky Loop station at the Millennium Monument. They are in their 50’s. Jack is a cook at a Covington restaurant. Merry is in a wheelchair, as she was injured in an auto accident many years ago that left her unable to walk. Jack takes the Sky Loop to Station 1 at Rivercenter, only a block from work.
How the downtown and riverfront have changed! The three city downtown area is now one of the strongest in the United States. However, this didn’t happen overnight. In 2002, when the new stadiums were finished in Cincinnati, and the Northern Kentucky Convention Center, Newport Aquarium, Newport on the Levee, Millennium Monument, and Underground Railroad Museum were all finally open, the initial result was a huge increase in tourist traffic, which created near gridlock in the riverfront and downtown areas on both sides of the river. The Sky Loop was planned by then, but the PRT prototype was still in its three year test phase. The riverfront parking garage was planned, but still just a big parking lot. Air quality had gotten worse in the summer with all the added tourist traffic, so EPA declared our area in violation, and further Federal highway funds were suspended, so we had to find a way to get autos out of downtown. Downtown shopping continued to decline, as shoppers just couldn’t get there easily, and nobody wanted to fight downtown traffic. Office buildings were finding it harder to get downtown office workers. It was too much hassle getting in and out of downtown, parking was getting more expensive, and unemployment was still so low that workers preferred suburban jobs, which were plentiful. Leadership on both sides of the river saw the Sky Loop as the way to solve most of these problems:
Financing the Sky Loop The big question was financing. It was estimated the entire initial 9 mile Sky Loop system would cost about $70,000,000. In addition, a full scale prototype had to be built first, as no affordable PRT had yet been built anywhere in the world, and we were to be first. This would cost about $25,000,000. How could these sums be raised? Up to 1999, all mass transit systems had been viewed as economic losers, so a money game was played with the Federal Transit Administration. Federal rules required the use of "proven technology," which meant highways, busses and light rail. Elevated rail systems had been left out, so the few built were in Las Vegas (private funds, short systems between casinos) and a handful of short demonstration systems with large vehicles and on line stations. These were no more convenient than light rail or the bus, so few people rode them. However, nobody thought much about who would use these systems, they just focused on how to get the money. The Sky Loop was conceived as a truly new transit system, designed to replace the auto in congested settings. Only a personal vehicle, with off line stations, would meet the needs of our downtown area. The guideway was small, could run over sidewalks, inside buildings, or attach to buildings, and would not interfere with auto traffic. It would also not require a new bridge over the Ohio River, nor need to use a lane of traffic on an existing bridge.
These places—where people wanted to go—were identified as "stakeholders" in the Sky Loop. It meant they should invest in the Sky Loop. This included office buildings, major retail stores, the Reds and Bengals, hotels, the Newport Aquarium, Millennium Monument, Cincinnati and Northern Kentucky Convention Centers, etc. The three cities (Cincinnati, Covington, Newport) and three counties (Hamilton, Kenton, Campbell) were also considered stakeholders, as the Sky Loop would reduce the need for other infrastructure—public parking garages, road improvements, etc. Three problems had to be addressed. The first problem was the capital cost. For this, it was decided that financing by the stakeholders should equal at least 50% of the total capital cost. Once this money was committed, the public/private entity that was to build the Sky Loop asked the Federal Transit Administration to fund the other 50%. Local Congressmen, who had followed the Sky Loop’s development, found this fairly easy, because the entire project had been designed and developed first (utilizing only minimal Federal funds for design), and the only remaining hurdle was the final 50%. An FTA program for new transit technology, which PRT certainly was, provided the remaining 50% financing. The second problem was the annual operating cost, including debt service. It was recognized that the public was used to cheap, subsidized public transit, and the goal of the Sky Loop would be to make it a profitable enterprise. So a public campaign, designed to demonstrate that using the Sky Loop would save everyone time and money over using your auto, was funded by the stakeholders, starting a year before the Sky Loop was finished. As a result, the public accepted the idea that spending $50.00 per month on a Sky Loop card was well worth it, as more than half this amount was saved just on cheaper parking, and the Sky Loop offered unlimited access to the entire downtown area. However, many of the stakeholders also believed that providing a ticket on the Sky Loop, for shopping their store or working at their company, was smart business, and thus provided either free or reduced price Sky Loop tickets or monthly Sky Loop cards. In the end, between the public acceptance of the Sky Loop and the stakeholders’ support, the Sky Loop became profitable after its first year of operation. Benefits of Being First The third problem was how to get PRT off the ground, which required financing of a full scale prototype, to cost $25,000,000. Once the stakeholders realized the potential of the Sky Loop, the immediate problem became how to handle this prototype. Other cities were also looking at PRT, but there was no city yet willing to commit to the prototype cost. It was recognized we would have to be first. We became majority owners in the PRT company, and agreed to pay 80% of the prototype cost, providing the PRT company could raise the other 20% from its local investor base. Our compensation for this investment was to receive 70% of the profits derived from the sale of all PRT systems by the PRT company. As we were giving birth to a multibillion dollar industry worldwide, the profits were anticipated to be substantial as PRT caught on. This income has been growing steadily each year, and is now used by the Sky Loop Corporation for expansion of our lines beyond the riverfront/downtown area. Prepared by: Chip Tappan
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"Yes, that was a
surprise. The cars, seating up to 3 adults, gave everyone the ability to get
around the downtown and riverfront areas, on both sides of the river, and
everyone had their privacy. This was why both rich and poor, and all in
between, use the Sky Loop. It is just so convenient for everyone!" 
After work, Tom will
take a Sky Loop car from Atrium Two to Station 15, which serves Newport’s
Riverboat Row, but is less than a two block walk to the Party Source.
He’ll do his shopping, then walk back to Station 15, and hop a Sky Loop
car to his garage. Plans are in the works to extend a branch of the Sky Loop to
the Party Source and Bellevue shopping area, paid for by the retailers, of
course. It should be completed in a year or two. 
Merry loves the Sky
Loop, as it gives her complete freedom to move around town, without dependence
upon the special buses that used to run for the handicapped. These buses were
very expensive, and when TANK and SORTA became the Sky Loop operators, this was
one of the bigger savings to the bus lines. There were never enough of them
either, so it was hard for the handicapped to work. Most of Merry’s
friends in wheelchairs who want to work now are doing so—in the downtown
area! The Sky Loop cars are all accessible for the handicapped, as they
accommodate her wheelchair and one other person, just by raising two thirds of
the bench seat. Sitting sideways in a wheelchair also proved safer than sitting
forwards, in the event of a sudden stop.
It was decided early
that the key was getting as many people as possible to ride the Sky Loop rather
than drive around the downtown and riverfront area. If most people were able to
park in one place for the day or night, and then go wherever they want in the
area on the Sky Loop, then parking garages could be wherever it was cheapest
and easiest to have them, not near particular offices, stores or tourist
centers. The Sky Loop would connect these garages with the places people wanted
to go.
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