Shirly Temple Inagurates PCC

Enlistment Bonus Goes to the Car

So many times I've heard that people are excited to get enlistment bonuses so that they can get a new car. And now I know the reason why, because army bases are notoriously inaccessible by transit. More from Imagine DC.

Having served four years in the United States Army, I can assure all of you that I find most military bases damn near impossible to get to and get around without a car. Absolutely horrible. Why do think so many bases are surrounded by car dealerships? Every soldier needs a car. And every base at which I've been stationed, sergeants and petty officers warn their troops about getting ripped off by said car salesmen. I was once in a battalion where I was required to attend a briefing specific to this matter!

Stealin the Bus

Heh. Some kids like the thrill of the route:

James Harris loves public buses so much, he stole one from a Miami-Dade depot last month and, wearing a genuine uniform, chauffeured unsuspecting fare-paying passengers around South Beach for hours, police and government officials said Thursday.

Via Planetizen

Slow Boat to China

Another day, another China HSR expansion post somewhere in the blogosphere. When are we going to learn? Why are we sitting around doing nothing? What are we waiting for? I got an email from a reader a few weeks ago about our sloooow timeline for projects in this country. So here are some of his thoughts: J.M. Carter and the Slow Boat to China (Slightly edited for continuity and links to projects included)

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I would like to comment on the sad state of affairs that exists in this country re: the time it takes to get things done. There was a time when we could rebuild a battered and bloodied aircraft carrier in a matter of days and send it back into battle. Now, with the light rail "industry" generally we seem to be falling farther and farther behind other nations when it comes to constructing anything to do with rail transit.

Couple of examples right now:

Phoenix, Valley Metro light rail. The line running north on 19th Av. is to be extended an additional 3 1/2 miles with 3 new stations. This is less than 20,000 feet of wire and rail and maybe a substation. How long to do it? From mid '08 to sometime in '12 or as much as 4 1/2 years!

Salt Lake City, UTA Trax light rail. Just announced the start of construction on the 5 mile line to West Valley City with 4 stations. This is less than 30,000 feet in length. How long? This is maybe a joke from John Inglish, the top guy, but would you believe he actually says by '15? That's 7 1/2 years, depending on how far into '15 they go with it.

I would seriously consider applying for a job as timekeeper on both of these projects. Almost any other country could do either in less than 2 years, using the standards now applicable in the trade. The problem in public transit today is not just the knuckleheads in the FTA but rather the lack of funding and slow construction timelines in cities that already have plans for expansion. China is building heavy rail subways all over the place while India is doing the same as a close second to them. Any doubt as to where the wave of the future is now?

This really is something both the "industry" and the nation should feel frightened about. In an area where the feds -with their total overview of things-( as well as having the moneybags as leverage) really should be demanding and setting some standards, nothing is being done about absurd costs and time spans. Again and again you hear the refrain "local conditions" and "prevailing supply and demand." Have you ever heard of any US project taking a look offshore to see how others do some of these things that we are so slow with? Hell no. We just laugh at "the French" and ignore any and all innovations others have made and used successfully.

Take the proposed extension of Charlotte's new light rail line. Won't be ready until 2014 or even later (the date keeps changing) but it is at least 5-6 years away. 300 miles to the northeast in Norfolk, one of the very few bright spots in the current light rail scene, they are building a new line that- while a bit shorter than Charlotte's- is very similar to it in many ways and will even use the same S70 LRVs. Scheduled to be completed in 2010 at a cost only about a quarter of the Charlotte's Line.

If the FTA had any brains at all they would be waving this one around and demanding that it become a kind of standard for other systems. Norfolk shows it can be done quickly and right and some of these other buffoons should pay attention and maybe pay a visit.

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PT: Seems to me that we should be allowed to put light rail and streetcar lines back into streets that had them before. Why we need all these crazy huge environmental impact statements to put streetcars back in the streets many of them created is beyond me.

Thanks again J.M.

VMT & Foreign Oil

So watching the Pickens commercial below gave me a thought. He was discussing dependence on foreign oil and showed some percentages of how much we import. So I went to the data. In terms of foreign oil I went to the Energy Information Administration and pulled an excel chart for historic crude oil imports and production. Since its monthly I averaged 1970,1990, and 2005. T Boone uses current 2008 to say 70% but the most recent transportation data is from 2005. So foreign crude imports went from 12% to 44% to 66% of the total U.S. supply.

Then I went to the BTS and found the Vehicle Miles Traveled (VMT) charts and put the totals together. A word of caution from the last chart I put up. Correlation doesn't necessarily mean causation, but I thought this was interesting and more relative. If anything I hope it starts some discussion on how this oil dependence is related to our auto dependence.
Perhaps its also related to this: Spending on highways over transit from PIRG.

I'm going to go out on a limb here and say that our transportation policy has led us to this predicament. I believe we all knew this, but its always good to have charts right? Thoughts?

Transfer of Wealth IV

Here's Boone Pickens' commercial on getting off of foreign oil. I saw it today while I was watching the news. It covers the same topic of wealth transfer that we've discussed here previously. I don't know about the whole switching to natural gas for cars but I feel like the electrification would be good, especially as I've said before for freight, rail, and trolleybuses.

Beijing Opens Three Rail Lines in Time for Olympics

Two subways and an airport rail link are now open for business while China starts trying to cut pollution before the games. I hope that they can clear the air, at least for the Marathoner's sake.

The new links, built at a total cost of 22.3 billion yuan ($3.2 billion), increased the number of metro lines in the Chinese capital to eight and the total length of track to 200 kilometers from the current 142 km.

Gas Tax Holiday Talk Dead

Good. This was the dumbest idea ever! First the highway trust fund which funds transportation and transit projects is going into the red this year anyways. Second the transit fund could hold out for the next year but the administration proposed channeling money to the highway fund which would bankrupt the transit fund. A gas tax holiday would mean a lot less money from the highway fund which would almost guaranty the transit fund's death. Dumb idea proposed by people who aren't looking for solution but political expediency. I'm sure it thrilled Mary "Bikes Aren't Transportation" Peters to no end.

Group in Sacramento Shuts Down Road Expansion

No more automatic expansion. The judge found that the road expansion was pre-ordained and alternatives and impacts weren't looked at closely enough.

Neighbors Advocating Sustainable Transportation (NAST) and the Environmental Council of Sacramento (ECOS) filed the suit because CalTrans’ analysis of the project’s air pollution and climate change impacts was inadequate, and the project did not consider options that did not involve widening the freeway.

Some key points:

1. Did not complete a Vehicle Miles Traveled count and associated air quality impacts from increased VMT

2. Did not look at a range of alternatives including a transit alternative to meet their goals.

3. Did not adequately address ghg emissions as a result of the freeway widening.

This is interesting because it might make Caltrans think twice before just pushing through with freeway expansion. It's been a push through since the 1950's that the only alternative was road widening. I'd be interested to see how this affects other projects around the state if at all.

We already have a fabulous rapid-transit system…

…it’s called the freeway! That's what a board member of the Central Ohio Transit Agency said in Columbus. How do these guys get appointed to a transit board if they don't even like transit? It also seems to be an Ohio thing. Stephan Louis was on the Board of SORTA, Cincinnati's transit agency. From a 2006 Citybeat Article:

Someone who signed his name as Stephan Louis replied, "Good points throughout your piece. With me sitting on pivotal boards, rail won't likely happen here for some time, but not necessarily. In either event, the city of Cinn. is unlikely to remain in the top 25 metros by 2010."

If you read the article, he denies what he said, but its all on the internets. Can't hide from that.