This is, of course, a reference to adding lanes to highways and major roads instead of adding light rail corridors in the Twin Cities area. I believe in this. Each new Light Rail track costs more than the previous one.
The Green Line that was just finished cost taxpayers over $1,000,000,000 to build (I apologized for the lack of specific numbers). The Blue Line, as it is now known, cost almost $1,000,000,000 to build and the Bottineau Line, which is an extension of the Blue Line is expected to cost over $1,250,000,000 to build between now and about 2020. The Southwest Line is also slated for somewhere in the same range. This is money that WE WILL NEVER SEE AGAIN. The Line while in operation DOES NOT make money, it loses money on each and every fare, to the tune of 2:1 ratio.
Proponents claim it is needed to serve people in underserved neighborhoods. The Hiawatha (now Blue) Line travelled along a road with the nearest residential areas more than a block away. There was no unfilled need. It has resulted in new construction, which was what they were aiming for, but even with that new construction it will never be able to create enough ridership to not cost more than it makes. The trains can't hold enough people to make a profit. This is also true of the Northstar Line Commuter Rail, by the way. The Central (now Green) Line travels down the middle of University Ave and has, in one month of operation, resulted in more train-car collisions than the Blue line has had in several years. It also loses money and has the added bonus of eliminating A LOT of parking in front of businesses causing it to be economically detrimental to the areas served. There are few places to add new housing, so it can't do the same social engineering that the Blue line did.
Future lines include the extended Blue (Bottineau) and Green (Southwest) Lines as well as another Red Line on the end of the Green Line (maybe we could call it the Santa Claus line) and a possible line to the middle of a farm field in Washington County. Bottineau would connect Target Field and the Target Center to Target's campus in Brooklyn Park (shouldn't that be called the Red Line?). The Southwest Line connects downtown to Eden Prairie, because we all know how much the rich people on that course use public transit.
So I don't want tax dollars spent on dumb projects. I drive, so sue me. I don't like that my vehicle and gas taxes to go projects that at the least don't make my driving experience better and at worst make commuting a headache. I don't like throwing good money after bad. I favor using taxes charged to drivers to improve the drive. So "Lanes not Trains" works for me, to a point.
I try to think rather than follow blindly. I know that an acre is 43,560 square feet. I know that lanes are around a rod in width (16.5 feet) and a lane-mile uses about 2 acres. If you add a lane each direction you are adding about 4 acres per mile to a road or highway. Through North Minneapolis there is a section of I-94 that it 5 lanes in each direction, or about 20 acres per mile, about 1/32 of a square mile per mile. It is actually quite a bit more than that because of median width and side vegetation areas. That is a lot of acreage used on one road. If all highways were 5 lanes each direction it would be FANTASTIC for driving, but you would have to displace a lot of people from their homes. I know this can't be the right answer.
My objective in writing this post is not to provide the ultimate solution to all problems. I think it is important for all involved to think about the future. While I don't think trains are the answer I also realize that you can't just keep adding lanes forever. I have witnessed the opening of lanes and the heaven it creates, for a few years. I have also seen expanded roads become jammed again. I know that part of this is due to people changing their route from unexpanded roads to the newly expanded roads and that some of the new congestion would go away if we expanded all of the highways like they need. I also know that at some point we will need more new lanes as population grows.
One solution I heard while in college was for people to work from home in small communities away from city cores. This was a great idea and it would work NOW if employers didn't distrust employees working from home and if employees working from home actually wouldn't give employers a reason to distrust them. I have a home office that I have been working from for about 8 years without any problem. 5 of them have been working for myself.
Now it is your turn. Think about what you could do to make things better. The country is in need of your brain, in gear. After you think, go out and act.
No comments:
Post a Comment