Smart Transportation in Uptown Innovation Corridor

Uptown Cincinnati, in early 1900s, was formulated as a center of educational and medical center of the Cincinnati region. The University of Cincinnati expanded its campus and Cincinnati General Hospital was established, which was renamed University of Cincinnati Medical Center later. Good Samaritan Hospital was also established.

This map shows what changes made between 1891 and 1935 in Uptown Cincinnati. You can interact with the map by moving the slides.

The major change in Uptown Cincinnati in late 1900s was construction of new interstate highways, I-71 and I-75. Those two highways changed the structure of this area and Martin Luther King Drive connected those two highways across Uptown Cincinnati. In addition, extensions of University of Cincinnati, UC Health, Cincinnati Children's Hospital, Trihealth Hospital and Cincinnati Zoo led growth of the area as a second largest employment center in the Cincinnati region.

This map shows what changes made between 1935 and 1990 in Uptown Cincinnati. You can interact with the map by moving the slides.

In 2014, Uptown Consortium and the City of Cincinnati teamed together to create the MLK Reading Road Corridor Study. Through this plan there was a conceptual site plan created as well as a Capital Improvement Plan. The plan also suggested three phases of development projects. The study provides strategic plans to be completed within 5 years, 10 years and 20 years. These plans became the basic concept of the latest site plan of Uptown Cincinnati.

Check out the strategic plans in the map.

For more information, check out the final study report  HERE .

Uptown Innovation Corridor Plan was introduced in 2018. It includes new development of residential, office, research institutes, hotels, and retails to reform Uptown Cincinnati as a new innovation and technology hub. According to Uptown Consortium, more than 1.1 million square feet of new space totaling more than $1 billion of investment has been completed or is currently underway. When fully implemented, the Corridor master plan anticipates $2.5 billion of project investment, more than 3.5 million square feet of mixed-use development (research, office, clinical, residential, hotel, and retail) and 7,500 jobs.

In the fall of 2018, we conducted surveys of people who live and work in uptown to learn about their travel behaviors, and what they think about the current system. They also asked how willing people would be to use alternate means of transportation if the system was improved. 

People commute mostly for work and school in this area. And 54% of people drive although 18% use public transit system.

Home zip codes of the workers are various although work zip codes are concentrated near Uptown area. This means that Uptown Cincinnati attract people from outside of the Uptown area and is an employment center of the Cincinnati region. In addition, this picture of home location distribution emphasizes the need of multimodal transportation system in this area.

This scenario emphasizes accessibility to more jobs. There are multiple large medical and research institutes in Uptown area and the hub should be located with high accessibility to those job centers.

The red grids indicate the most suitable location of the multi-modal transportation hub with high accessibility to jobs. According to the model result, the area around the intersection of MLK and Reading Road is the most suitable for the transit hub.

You can click grids in the maps to see the model results and suitability scores.

The second scenario is designed to find the best location of multi-modal transportation hub with high connectivity to existing transit opportunities. This scenario assumes that the transportation hub should be located in a place where existing transportation facilities and routes can be connected. The red grids indicate the most suitable locations that have high connectivity to pedestrian street, bus routes and stops, and red bike stations and routes.

This scenario shows the area around the intersection of University Avenue and Eden Avenue as the most suitable location for the hub.

You can click grids in the maps to see the model results and suitability scores.

- Ganesh Raman

A major aspect of design for the current studio is the navigation through a transport hub where people coming to the hub and make decisions on where to go to transport them from the hub to their destination. Thus, the objectives of the people visiting the space are clear, the form of the building introduces the perception of being in a constant flux of motion within the building through the typology of the architectural form, geometry of the spaces intended for circulation and therefore the emotion of the people navigating through the building. The author’s design vision for the design of the transport hub is to translate the physics of dissemination of kinetic energy in motion as a static representation of architecture for the premise of design of the transport hub that attracts and moves people from/to the focal point of its location – similar to the formation of a hurricane, centriole motion of an ice-skater. The organization is similar to the arrangement of iron filings around a magnet, with movement in repeating split-offset helical paths, similar to the formation of stars.

- Josiah Ebert

The major problem of the project was creating a series of interconnected pathways for the transit of different types such as cars, buses, bicycles, and pedestrians, while at the same time holding these pathways separate to increase the efficiency of movement and safety of different user groups within the space. To accomplish this, the designer created a central pedestrian promenade that ramps above and over a set of intersecting paths for vehicle transit. The vehicles are allowed to pass under the promenade, while a series of loading and unloading platforms both divide the vehicle lanes and become the link between them and the pedestrian pathway overhead. Finally, because of the simple method of pedestrian circulation, additional programmatic elements such as lounges, restaurants, and customer service are able to be slotted along the promenade path without interrupting the previously established efficiency of the circulation. These additional programs create alcoves and outcroppings from the path that offer points of repose for people without delaying their movement if they are in a hurry. 

- Grant Koniski

It’s the year 2035, autonomous cars dominate the market, 60% of people in urban areas use an autonomous car daily. A Hyperloop has been introduced on the East and West Coast, coming as far inland as Chicago. Cincinnati has been chosen as a mid-point for this Hyperloop. Many people rent autonomous cars daily; the cars come from a dispatch center and roam the streets taking rides and switching users efficiently. Once the cars are spent, they make their way back to the station. When the autonomous cars arrive, they drive up onto a hydraulic lift and are lifted into the vault where they can be charged and maintained if need be. From the vault, the cars are queued up onto the upper ring of the station by users and the programmed expected need. The cars are then on a rotating queue around the exterior of the building; the ring has lights under the car to tell you if it has been officially reserved or not; if not then you can rent the car straight out of the queue and pick it up on the ground floor. This allows the users to see their choice of cars while they experience the dining, exercise and green spaces.  

For securing the green transportation system in Uptown, it is important to improve connectivity to public transit system by walking and biking. The research team identified the connectivity problem in the area and provided some recommendations to improve it.

The research found that the connectivity for walkability is 67.3%, and is based on 0.25-mile walkability service area. The connectivity for bikeability is 100% (within UC Campus Area), and is based on 1-mile bikeability service area.

For better connectivity in Uptown area, the team provides some recommendations. Explore the map at the right to identify the solutions they suggest.

With advanced development of emerging technologies, the autonomous shuttle has been viewed as a disruptive transportation solution. It would offer ease of use and significant green mobility advantage over walking and biking modes while bring no inequality impact. The autonomous shuttle routes were expected to connect major medical and research intuitions and innovation industries, as well as major roadway infrastructures in the Uptown Cincinnati area. Two autonomous shuttles are proposed to serve the north part to MLK corridor (North Route) and south part to MLK (South Route). 

Martin Luther King Jr. Dr. is a highly connected, interwoven network of urban arterials in Uptown. The research team investigated the existing condition and problems that the street has and suggests two recommendation to improve the traffic in the area by investigating

• How changing or varying the speed limit on Martin Luther King Drive (Future Uptown Smart Corridor) affects travel time
• How geometric transformation of the intersection with fully actuated signal control design increase level of service in the intersection of MLK drive and Reading road

Outcomes of increasing or decreasing the speed limit based on volume to reduce congestion and number of stops can decrease que length and facilitate smooth traffic flow.

The result indicates that speed harmonization of 35 mph on Martin Luther King Jr. Drive can theoretically decrease travel time by minutes, which is massive for every-day commuters. It also has the most potential in stopping non-injury traffic accidents with average non-injury crash per mile per year by –31.3.