Most street operation would be in downtown Dayton, where speeds would be restricted to 25 mph or less. Elsewhere, full 60 mph speeds would be attained in practice. The average speed for a through trip from Dayton to Centerville would be 35 mph, allowing for dwell time of 15 seconds at each station, Higher average speeds, exceeding 40 mph could be obtained through the use of express or skip-stop scheduling. Service would be provided at all times except early morning hours when freight service could continue to be provided for industrial customers. The estimated annual benefits to riders and the public at large would be almost double the equivalent annual cost of the initial investment.
Construction can proceed in stages.
Quantifiable future benefits would exceed this additional cost by a substantial margin. If you came upon Darrek Jones' Miami Valley Rail Authority website via a search engine, it might take awhile before you realize that this professional looking web address is a parody. Maybe the fact that a quarter-century after the DART article appeared in The Third Rail , Dayton still runs on rubber. The Third Rail and The Third Rail logo are trademarks of The Composing Stack Inc. . Materials with other copyrights are used by permission.