* For example, POITRA created and maintained the public information websites for the Southeast Corridor MIS (TREX), the North Metro Major Investment Study (MIS) and the US36 Corridor MIS beginning in 1998. The Central Corridor Extension is part of the Regional Transportation District's (RTD) new FasTracks Project, which is advancing several corridors to the design phase.

Northwest Rail Corridor Mainline at Taxi 3 Photosimulations RTD FasTracks, Denver, Colorado The Northwest Rail Corridor is one of several proposed transit corridors in the Denver Regional Transportation District's (RTD) FasTracks program that have been evaluated as Environmental Evaluations (EE). Most of the corridors originate in downtown Denver's Union Terminal (DUT) and radiate out to the suburbs. POITRA Visual has provided several types of services on nearly all of these corridors at some point in their long histories.* The 41-mile Northwest Rail Corridor takes advantage of abandoned or little used heavy rail corridors running from DUT north to serve the towns of Broomfield, Louisville and Longmont. Because of interaction with commercial freight rail, a heavy commuter rail concept was proposed. Only Electric Multiple Units (EMU) and were evaluated as Diesel Multiple Units (DMU) were eliminated as an alternative earlier in the study. The proposed Northwest Rail commuter mainline passes the Taxi 3 Residential Development as it parallels a freight rail yard just north of DUT. Requests from current residents and the fact that additional residential units are planned prompted RTD to request photosimulation services from POITRA.

POITRA artists created custom 3D models of the EMU commuter vehicle with RTD marking combinations. POITRA often creates custom transit vehicles at no cost to the project.

Photosimulations | Mouse-over images below to toggle: E 1 2		2. Photosimulation of Proposed Commuter Line: EMU double track corridor including overhead catenary system and right-of-way fencing and featuring four car consists of Electric Multiple Unit (EMU) Vehicles.

The photograph used as the basis for this simulation was provided by the Engineer. The view was intended to illustrate the possible visual impacts as seen from the upper floors of the development. Poitra Visual helped us communicate effectively with the public and we highly recommend their services to others.” K.P., P.E. URS Corp Northwest Rail Project Manager In constructing the line some trees would need to be cleared and several buildings would be removed from the corridor. The Engineer wanted to show the view with and without the transit vehicles as the presence of the vehicles affects the view impact. It would not be possible to hide any of the background behind the large four car consists so an accurate background became the focus. Removing the buildings and trees in the simulation required restoring a newly exposed string of hopper rail cars, several rows of cars beyond them and a rail service building as they appear in the photograph. This was accomplished partly by traditional digital painting techniques and partly by using POITRA 3D model freight rail cars. Once the restored background was finished, POITRA artists placed 3D models of the proposed commuter tracks, right-of-way fences and catenary system were camera matched, lighted and composited with the base photograph. Our corridor simulation was complete. The same process was followed to place the POITRA model EMU vehicles on the tracks. The finished simulations were used in meetings with Fastracks public stakeholders and in the EIS document. BACK

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