|
|
Few things are as unappealing to me as the prospect of riding across
Dallas on a bus or train, accompanied by a variety of unsavory strangers.
Mass transit is one of
many supposedly good ideas that
may not be good at all. Left-wing politicians love the idea of mass transit, because
it means greater control of our everyday lives and another way to raise money. Information about Amtrak -- all of it unfavorable -- is available here. Subsections on this page: Criminals, psychopaths, and unruly passengers The police state on wheels Health and safety concerns Unreliable drivers and unexpected delays Crowds Car pools High speed rail projects Houston's Metropolitan Transit Authority Dallas Area Rapid Transit Other related information Subsections on page two: Great promises never come to pass Mass transit comes with a hefty price tag Inefficiency Mass transit is unpopular Cost overruns and wasted taxpayer dollars Pork barrel politics An atmosphere of secrecy, corruption and graft Coercion The Indoctrination of a Captive Audience Criminals, psychopaths, and unruly passengers When you climb aboard any mass-transit venue, you share the ride -- knowingly or not -- with a number of nasty, smelly strangers, many of whom should be (or have been) in prison. Violent: National Guardsman thwarts Red Line robbery; 3 teens arrested. Three teens who attempted to rob a judo instructor with a replica gun at a CTA station got more than they bargained for, police say. It wasn't the judo teacher who taught them a lesson, authorities say, but an Army National Guardsman armed with a real gun. Also posted under guns save lives. DDOT Drivers Refuse To Work: 'They're Scared For Their Lives'. Henry Gaffney, spokesman for the D-DOT bus drivers union AFL-CIO Local 26, [said] this was not an organized maneuver by the union. Gaffney said it's a matter of bus drivers fearing for their safety, citing an incident that happened Thursday afternoon [11/3/2011]. "Our drivers are scared, they're scared for their lives. This has been an ongoing situation about security. I think yesterday kind of just topped it off, when one of my drivers was beat up by some teenagers down in the middle of Rosa Parks and it took the police almost 30 minutes to get there, in downtown Detroit," said Gaffney. Not even a baby can get in the way of scrap between two women. Nothing could get in the way of these two women and their beef — not even a baby. Straphangers watched in disbelief as two passengers viciously attacked each other on an L train recently, as a baby stroller belonging to one of them rolled out the door onto the platform. Authorities Ignoring another Black-on-white 'Hate Crime'. Like the three monkeys who see, hear and speak no evil, our authorities seem intent on ignoring the true nature of yet another black-on-white racial attack. In the New York City subway this past Sunday, 29-year-old Jason Fordell was attacked by a group of black men who taunted him for being white. Yet NYC police "are unsure" if the incident is a bias crime. The problem started when Fordell transferred to a crowded 4 train at 42nd street, where he encountered four black men who began harassing him. Delta Employees Attacked On MARTA Train. Two Delta Airlines employees were attacked on a MARTA train. MARTA police said they were investigating the incident. A witness said he watched the violent attack unfold Sunday [4/17/2011]. "We were intimidated. Everyone was terrified. People were trying to run, but there was nowhere to run," the man, who requested anonymity, told [WSB]'s Erica Byfield. Three arrested in Atlanta subway mugging. Authorities have arrested three suspects in the assault of two Delta Air Lines employees who were mugged and beaten on Atlanta's subway earlier this month. ... The suspects include a 16-year old male whose name is not being released because of his age and two brothers, Zantavious Sanchez Scott, 20, and Jarquez Scott, 19, MARTA police said. The Editor says... Wow, what a coincidence. My wife and I were going to name our son Zantavious, or perhaps Jarquez, but we settled for something more traditional at the last minute. Transit Violence: Violent acts, as well as the fear of violence, have a tremendous effect on transit systems. The most immediate, and irreversible effect is the physical, emotional and financial suffering of the victims and their families. But also detrimental to public transit are the resulting lost workdays, revenue decreases, equipment damages and negative impact on the public's decision to use mass transportation services. Metro Has A Lesson For Unruly Students. When the last bell rings, thousands of District schoolchildren make their way to the nearest Metro train — their school bus on rails — where many let loose a day's worth of bottled-up angst, energy and emotion. All that the tens of thousands of other riders want, in most instances, is a quiet trip home. Detroit's five most violent bus routes: Death threats, beatings and even stabbings are not uncommon on at least five of the city's bus routes, fueling a mix of fear and anger among drivers and riders who are clamoring for a police presence. Since the start of 2006, the first full year after Detroit cops stopped policing the buses, more than 50 people have been assaulted — five of them stabbed, according to drivers' reports obtained by The Detroit News. Girl involved in bus attack ordered to juvenile jail. The 15-year-old Robert Poole Middle School student whom prosecutors accused of sparking an attack on a city bus passenger in December was sentenced Wednesday to a juvenile jail until she turns 21 or the judge releases her. Vicious Sydney bashing horrifies family. The Canadian family of the wheelchair-bound man allegedly bashed with a metal bar in an unprovoked attack at a Sydney railway station is stunned by its brutality. Shellan Proden, the mother of the victim, was horrified to learn that two teens had allegedly hit her 35-year-old son with metal bars before running off with his wheelchair in the 11pm assault on Tuesday [3/9/2010]. The MTA must protect subway riders. In dismissing a lawsuit by a rape victim, Judge Kevin Kerrigan may have been technically correct in finding that transit workers did not violate procedures. But this does not negate that flawed procedures allowed this crime to take place. Man beheaded on Greyhound bus. A 40-year-old man is expected to be formally charged today [8/1/2008] after allegedly repeatedly stabbing, decapitating and then trying to eat parts of a young man who was sleeping next to him as they rode in the back of a Greyhound bus together. … Witnesses said the attacker, who police believe is not from Manitoba, also waved the man's severed head around after cutting it from his body.  Greyhound Scraps Ads After Beheading. Greyhound has scrapped an ad campaign that extolled the relaxing upside of bus travel after one of its passengers was accused of beheading and cannibalizing another traveler. Greyhound Kills 'Bus Rage' Campaign Following Beheading. If you're a bus company with an ad campaign that touts the fact nobody's ever heard of "bus rage" and them some freak goes and beheads a dude on the bus, you're quite likely to pull the campaign which is exactly what Greyhound did in light of last week's bus murder. Update: Vince Li found not criminally responsible for beheading on Greyhound bus. A man who believed he was following God's orders when he stabbed and beheaded a fellow passenger on a Greyhound bus in Manitoba has been found not criminally responsible. Justice John Scurfield said Vince Li's attack on Tim McLean last summer was "grotesque" and "barbaric" but "strongly suggestive of a mental disorder." ANOTHER crazy man with a knife! Man threatens beheading on bus. A harrowing bus ride from Fort McMurray is over for two brothers who feared they were going to be victims of a knife-wielding man in a manner similar to a gruesome attack last month in Manitoba. Threatened riders want their money back. A man who took a nerve-racking bus trip where he and his brother were threatened by a man with a knife is considering taking the bus company to court. Josh MacDougall and his brother Andrew were taken off a Greyhound bus Monday [8/18/2008] after a man allegedly threatened to cut their eyes out and behead them. The man was also harassing other passengers. This sounds a lot like 'bus rage' ... Woman beaten on bus. As Sarah Kreager, 26, tried to sit down on a Baltimore City bus Tuesday, police say, a middle-schooler told her she couldn't. When she attempted to take another seat, a middle-schooler wouldn't let her. Finally, according to police, Kreager just sat down. She was "immediately attacked" by nine students — three females and six males — from Robert Poole Middle School. … The suspects in the incident are black. The victim is white, according to the police report. Update: Hate crime charges rejected. Prosecutors in Baltimore have decided not to charge the nine middle school students accused in the beating of a 26-year-old woman on a city bus with a hate crime as a judge postponed their trial yesterday until Jan. 31. More 'bus rage' ... Surveillance Photos Released In Bus Attack. Maryland Transit Administration officials are investigating a second reported assault on a bus in the last week. Meanwhile, surveillance photos have been released and the bus driver has been taken off the road. Patrick Green and Robert Rothe told WBAL TV 11 News that they were antagonized and attacked after boarding the No. 64 bus late Monday night in south Baltimore. The Editor says... If the colors were reversed, these would be called hate crimes and Al Sharpton would be all over it. But as it is, it's just another miserable day on the stinkin' city bus. Philadelphia: Subway attack was to amuse, police say. The four teenagers who ambushed Sean Patrick Conroy in a subway concourse Wednesday [3/26/2008] chose their victim at random and attacked him for no other purpose than to amuse themselves, police said yesterday. … Police yesterday discounted robbery as a motive, and said the youths apparently launched the attack on a lark. The Editor says... If the victim had been black and the assailants had been white, the press would be having a "hate crime" field day. Man dead after beating on Center City SEPTA platform. A 36-year-old man died after being severely beaten by a gang of youths inside the SEPTA concourse near City Hall this afternoon, police said. One youth was taken into custody and police were still looking for three juveniles, possibly four, who fled the scene. Police: Subway attack was random. In a chilling confession in the murder of 36-year-old Sean Patrick Conroy, 16-year-old Kinta Stanton allegedly tells police that he and his friends went out randomly looking for somebody to beat up just for kicks. Philadelphia again: Subway Attack by Allah-shouting Assailant Caught on Tape. Police are asking the public for help in capturing a hammer-wielding attacker, who seemed to assault his prey for no apparent reason. On Monday night [9/8/2008], police released the video of the attack, in the hopes that someone can identify the man. Subway attack caught on tape. "According to the victim, the male continued to assault him and tried to throw him into the track area," said Det. Kenneth Roach of the Philadelphia Police Dept. Taylor told Action News last week that all throughout the attack, the man kept chanting something, and he distinctly recalled the word "Allah." Police were stunned that some 20 passengers onboard the train scattered, and did nothing to stop the attack. Police Near Arrest In SEPTA Hammer Attack. The attack caught on tape sent shivers down the spine of every SEPTA rider. Philadelphia police think they know who started hitting an unsuspecting subway passenger with a hammer last week. Serial Subway Groper Arrested Once Again. About two weeks after he was released from prison, Freddie Johnson boarded a crowded subway train in Manhattan and illegally rubbed up against a woman, authorities said. It is a fairly common crime on subways in New York. But this was no common criminal. Johnson has been arrested a staggering 53 times — the majority for groping women on the subway, police and prosecutors said. Women-only subway cars in 2008. The subway corporations serving South Korea's capital will introduce women-only cars next year to make rides more comfortable and free of groping male hands, a subway official said on Wednesday [10/30/2007]. "Sexual crimes happen frequently when the cars are packed and people are pressed against each other," the subway official said. The Editor says... When that takes effect, pity the female who -- for whatever reason -- rides the non-segregated train. Mexico City Rolls Out Women-Only Buses. Groping and verbal harassment is an exasperating reality for women using public transportation in this sprawling capital, where 22 million passengers cram onto subways and buses each day. Some men treat women so badly that the subway system has long had ladies-only cars during rush hour, with police segregating the sexes on the platforms. The Editor says... Does this have any relevance to American mass transit? Unfortunately, yes. Experience has shown that Mexicans bring various aspects of their culture with them when they come to the U.S. Seized on a bus: a baseball bat, six knives and two screwdrivers. A double-decker bus was commandeered by police to prevent a planned gang fight that would almost certainly have resulted in death, Scotland Yard said yesterday [5/19/2008]. Officers in Deptford, South London, arrested 24 teenagers aged between 14 and 18 and seized six knives, a claw hammer, a metal bar, a mallet, two wrench handles, a metal baseball bat, two screwdrivers, a corkscrew and a golf club. Saw Maniac in Subway Horror. "I screamed for help, 'Please help, please help me,'" Steinberg said. "The Transit Authority people heard me — they just looked. They never stopped to help me, and that disturbs me more than anything else. I begged for someone to call an ambulance and get this guy off me. "He just kept on stabbing me, and stabbing me and stabbing me, and the transit employees kept on working and working and working." Update: Man Pleads Guilty In Power Saw Attack. A man who sliced into a postal worker's chest with a power saw inside a subway station while other people fled for their lives pleaded guilty yesterday to second-degree assault. Tareyton Williams, 34, had been charged with attempted murder and faced up to 25 years in prison for the attack on Michael Steinberg last summer. He pleaded guilty in exchange for a sentence of 18 years in prison. Train Defecator Hunted. Police are searching for a man who has been defecating on trains across the country, causing around £60,000-worth of damage. The offender has struck on at least 30 trains since August, mainly in the South East, smearing excrement inside the carriages. Driver to face punishment for kicking kissing girls off bus. A transit agency chief apologized Wednesday to two lesbian teenagers who were kicked off a bus when a passenger complained about them kissing. "Removing the girls from the bus was not consistent with our policy," said TriMet General Manager Fred Hansen. "I want to reiterate that we welcome all riders on our system." Tired of being harassed on the CTA, women fight back. [Lillian] Matanmi is a member of the Rogers Park Young Women's Action Team, a group of teen and college-age women who have fought street harassment in their neighborhood, distributing thousands of posters to businesses and homes to encourage people to shoo away congregating men so girls and women can walk in peace. They successfully pushed for better street lighting in the Far North Side neighborhood. Now, the group has turned its attention to the "hey-babying" and other lewd language they hear on the CTA. The Bernard Goetz case: From 1984-1987, [Manhattan District Attorney Robert] Morgenthau pursued a vindictive prosecution against Bernard Goetz. Goetz ... at Christmastime, 1984, had defended himself against four 18- and 19-year-old black men attempting to rob him at midday in a subway car. Goetz, who had previously been mugged three times, and been brutally beaten the last time, shot each of the would-be robbers once. While seeking to put Goetz away for 30 years for attempted murder and illegal gun possession, Morgenthau treated the would-be muggers, all hardened thugs who had criminal records and were wanted on outstanding warrants, as if they were crime victims. Subway riders sealed in murder car. Nearly 30 petrified passengers were trapped on a Midtown hell train yesterday with a knife-wielding madman and the blood-soaked body of a straphanger he just stabbed to death in a senseless argument over a seat. The Bronx-bound D train came to a screeching halt at around 2 a.m. in the tunnel between the Rockefeller Center and Seventh Avenue stations when a rider yanked the emergency cord after watching the carnage unfold. The Editor says... How could that happen? Why are there so many psycho killers running around loose? Keep reading. The Killers Within. A time bomb began ticking in the mid-1970s, when the psychiatric and mental health professions went politically correct and identified the mentally ill as "victims" who required advocates. While patients in general do need assistance, the activists turned caring into political action that changed the American cityscape and endangered our well-being. Announcing in the mid-1970s that confining mental patients violated their civil rights, a cadre set to work to release as many patients as they could, resulting in the huge homeless phenomenon of the 1980s that remains with us now. Suddenly the streets of major cities and small towns hosted a permanent population of vagrants who harassed passersby and businesses. That's right -- many homeless people are insane and should be locked up. Brawl on the Metro: Where was the coverage? The fracas occurred near midnight on Aug. 6, and authorities said it involved as many as 70 people. It started at the Gallery Place Station and continued to the L'Enfant Plaza Station. There were arrests, and several people landed in the hospital. On deadline, The [Washington] Post gathered enough information for a news brief in Saturday's paper, and a short story was quickly posted online. Throughout Saturday, it was among the most-viewed stories on the Web site, signaling intense reader interest. But as the day wore on, some readers grew frustrated that there was nothing more. Police: 10-year-old gunshot victim shot himself during robbery. The 10-year-old boy who suffered a gunshot wound in the arm Tuesday night [8/17/2010] aboard a Metro Transit bus in Seattle accidentally shot himself during a robbery, police said. The boy, who is being treated at Harborview Medical Center, will likely face charges of robbery and a weapons violation when he is released from the hospital, police said. Woman fatally knifes thug in subway attack, then flees on F train. Several thugs tried to drag a woman off a Queens subway train Thursday night, but she fought back and fatally stabbed one of her tormenters before fleeing on another train, police said. The large group of men — perhaps as many as eight — surrounded the woman outside a chicken restaurant above the 21st St.-Queensbridge station about 9 p.m., police and a witness said. Subway slay rap for teen. The 16-year-old girl who fatally stabbed a man after he harassed her at a Queens subway station turned herself in yesterday [12/29/2009] and has been charged with manslaughter. But a lawyer for Cyan Brown said she is confident in her claim of self-defense in the knifing death of Thomas Winston, 29, last week. The Editor says... Here's the lesson to be learned from this incident: If you get mugged in the New York subway and you fight back, you — not your multiple attackers — will be charged with a felony. Warning: This video is replete with expletives and offensive language, such as you might expect to hear in the back of a city bus. You Tube video of AC Transit bus fight in Oakland. Man blows his nose, ends up in jail. The man arrested at the Ashby MARTA station Monday night remains in jail, waiting for a probation hearing. Alfred Murphy captured the attention of a MARTA police officer when he started blowing his nose — using paper towels from a MARTA maintenance cart. By the end of the night he was arrested on charges of hitting that police officer and another one. Beating Caught On Tape On New York City Subway Train. It's not even summer yet things are already heating up underground. A fight between passengers on a New York City subway train was uploaded to YouTube on Sunday [6/12/2011]. It is yet another example of the bizarre world that's beneath our feet. Mobs Attack on City Buses: Police. In two separate incidents, as many as 15 teens have stormed Chicago Transit Authority buses, attacked their victims and darted off with cell phones and other electronic devices, authorities said Tuesday [6/7/2011]. Both incidents were near the University of Illinois at Chicago campus, prompting city and campus authorities to issue community alerts. Bullets fly on crowded Queens subway train as two gangs brawl. Shots rang out on a crowded Queens subway train Thursday [6/9/2011], forcing riders to duck and run as two gangs brawled. Riders panicked when three shots erupted from the last cars of a Manhattan-bound A train at the Howard Beach station about 6:30 p.m. WCBS-TV seems very sympathetic with this gang of teenage armed robbers. Brazen Teenage Gang Robbing Straphangers During Rush Hour. Police are searching for teenage thugs targeting subway riders. There have been at least three armed attacks recently. CBS 2's Dave Carlin has seen pictures of the suspects and knows what they're after. A team of baby-faced bandits, young enough to still be in high school, is making life quite stressful in Gotham's underworld. Teen Punches Homeless Man on Red Line While Friends Videotape the Attack. More than 250,000 people have viewed an online video that appears to show a thug punching a homeless guy at a Chicago L stop. Shooting On Q111 Bus Another Sign Congress Must Do More To End Gun Violence. This is how Christmas in New York really began on Friday [12/2/2011], less than two days after the famous tree is lit at Rockefeller Center. This was a New York that had nothing to do with the tree lights and magic and romance of December and everything to do with a guy with a Ruger P85 on the Q111 bus in Queens. Semi-violent: MBTA: Be careful, crime is up on Boston subways. Pickpockets and other thieves coveting small, expensive carry-around electronic devices like iPods helped drive up crime on the Blue Line and other Boston area subway lines last year. Incidents in the category of larceny or theft increased from 506 to 699. ... Aggravated assaults dropped from 112 to 103, while robberies rose slightly, 183 to 207.  Panhandler who regularly works CTA Green Line arrested 178 times. Clarence Ervin had panhandled on CTA trains all night, and he looked like it. Cold and bleary-eyed, he said he was afraid of getting caught — a surprising sentiment for a man who has been arrested 178 times, according to police and court records. Ervin, 52, has amassed charges ranging from panhandling on trains and disorderly conduct to drug possession and assault and battery, the records show. Wall Street Intern Flips Out At The Conductor On Metro North. A woman traveling on Metro North flipped out after a conductor scolded her for having an allegedly loud and profane conversation. 'Apple picking' phone theft increasing on CTA. Hang on to your iPods when riding on the CTA. Chicago police say there is an increase in robberies targeting the devices. In addition, thieves have been stealing other electronic devices. According to The Chicago Tribune, 581 robberies were reported on CTA property in 2010. That's an average of 48 a month. Non-violent: Courtesy's Sad Substitute. For all the clackety-clack of the tracks and the distorted announcements crackling out of raspy speakers, trains are getting to be awfully quiet places. A decade ago Amtrak started designating "Quiet Cars" in which there was to be no cellphone yammering, no insect-like buzzing or muted thumping bleeding from headphones, no keening conversations. Now commuter lines are finally following suit. Silent Rage: "This is the quiet car!" The voice belonged to a woman glaring at my kids, ages 5 and 2, standing (quietly, I should add) next to the door. I ignored her and focused on snagging an empty spot on a packed Amtrak train — a miracle the day before Christmas — for our nuclear family with big luggage. (Why Amtrak can't figure out how to assign seats on its "reserved trains" like every major European rail company will have to be left for another day.) In any case, we weren't about to give ours up. The pitch went up a notch: "This is the QUIET car!!" "So be quiet." Ah, my wife to the rescue. Woman feels 'disrespected' after being kicked off train. A woman who got pulled of an Amtrak train by police after passengers complained she was speaking too loudly on a cell phone said she felt "disrespected" by the entire incident. Lakeysha Beard of Tigard was charged with disorderly conduct after police said she got into a "verbal altercation" with train passengers on Sunday [5/15/2011]. Passengers complained she refused to put down her cell phone and conductors had to stop the train in Salem, where police got involved. Nude Woman Bathes On NYC Subway Train. In this week's crazy NYC subway video series, a woman, nude from the waist down, sets up a wash station on the blue bench of a subway car and proceeds to take a camping-style shower. Lotto tickets bought with bags of coins lead to bust in massive Metro theft. A long-running scam to steal thousands of Metro riders' fares unraveled this week after a man in a police uniform driving a Jaguar bought thousands of Virginia lottery tickets with bags and bags of apparently stolen coins. A tip about the odd purchases led authorities to an extensive investigation involving GPS-tracked cars, surveillance videos from Woodbridge gas stations and money drops by an Alexandria underpass. The police state on wheels You would think violent crime would be extremely rare in the world of mass transit, with all the law enforcement personnel in attendance. You would be wrong. It's the worst of both worlds. NYC subway's anti-terror steps the new normal. New York's subway system, the largest in the country, has more than 465 far-flung stations, most with multiple entrances, and 800 miles of track that would stretch to Chicago if laid end to end. TSA Now Storming Public Places 8,000 Times a Year. Bus travelers were shocked when jackbooted TSA officers in black SWAT-style uniforms descended unannounced upon the Tampa Greyhound bus station in April with local, state and federal law enforcement agencies and federal bureaucrats in tow. ... The TSA clearly intends for these out-of-nowhere swarms by its officers at community transit centers, bus stops and public events to become a routine and accepted part of American life. NYC Subways Adding Dogs, Armed Officers. Teams of police officers equipped with submachine guns and bomb-sniffing dogs have become a part of the landscape of post-Sept. 11 New York, patrolling around Wall Street and such landmarks as the Empire State building. Similar squads are set to begin daily patrols of the busiest sections of the city subways this month, in what officials describe as a first for a U.S. mass transit system. Machine Gun-Toting Officers To Patrol NYC Subway. The NYPD is pulling out all the stops to beef up safety of the subways. On Thursday it launched a new anti-terror effort called "Operation Torch," but the cost of the program is raising some eyebrows. The NYPD's new firepower consists of cops with Mp5 submachine guns, rifles, body armor and bomb-sniffing dogs. New Operation to Put Heavily Armed Officers in Subways. In the first counterterrorism strategy of its kind in the nation, roving teams of New York City police officers armed with automatic rifles and accompanied by bomb-sniffing dogs will patrol the city's subway system daily, beginning next month, officials said on Friday [2/1/2008]. Under a tactical plan called Operation Torch, the officers will board trains and patrol platforms…. The Editor says... The subways must be really dangerous if the cops carry machine guns. What's next, fixed bayonets? Random Pat-Downs Turn PATCO Into Police State. Commuters who ride PATCO trains between southern New Jersey and Philadelphia should expect random searches of their clothing, pockets, bags and vehicles on their morning trip to work. Twelve Transportation Security Administration screeners, armed with an explosive-sniffing K-9, checked 663 commuter bags randomly selected from the morning rush at the Lindenwold station Tuesday [9/7/2010]. ... "We can conduct any kind of search we want," said [Delaware River Port Authority Police Chief David] McClintock. Airport-style searches are now spreading all over town. Metro Randomly Inspects Passengers' Bags. At Braddock Metro, one man was stopped for about 8 minutes because there was some sort of chemical substance on his bag. Police X-rayed the bag, finding nothing. They also took his identification and questioned him. Another woman, who did not object to the bag screening, was stopped for 45 seconds. She missed her train as her bag of Christmas presents was searched. All Metro stations to get surveillance cameras. Metro will install surveillance cameras outside all 86 rail stations in an effort to curtail rising crime, officials said Thursday [3/24/2011]. The project will be paid for with a $2.8 million grant from the Department of Homeland Security, Metro Transit Police Chief Michael Taborn said. The money will buy 153 color cameras. Boston transit police begin passenger ID stops. Although officials would release few details about the initiative, the identity checks will mark the first time local rail and subway passengers will be asked to produce identification and be questioned about their activities. Health and safety concerns Health: America is Burning. Two weeks ago, I visited New York City with my wife, who was interviewing at a local medical school located in the Bronx. I dropped her at the school. Since I was lacking a car, I hopped on a public bus, intending to take it to the local subway station. I have never been so frightened for my country in my life. The bus itself was fine; all the people on it had places to be. It was the subway station that was truly scary. The station itself looked like a bomb had hit it. Debris covered the shattered tile floor. The stench of vomit and urine permeated the place. Rust layered the tracks; wooden boards between the tracks moldered into dust. One sneeze, 150 colds for commuters. Tissues at the ready. A single sneeze in a busy area can end up infecting 150 people with a cold in just five minutes, new research suggests. An analysis of the germs unleashed from a single commuter's sneeze showed that within minutes they are being passed on via escalator handrails or seats on trains and underground carriages. At the busiest stations, one sneeze not smothered by a tissue or handkerchief will provide enough germs to infect another 150 commuters. Woman dies mysteriously on Via train; others sick. With hundreds of passengers aboard, many believed to be foreign tourists, a VIA Rail train remained under quarantine in a small northern Ontario town Friday afternoon after a 60-year-old woman was found dead in a passenger coach and six others complained of feeling unwell with a flu-like ailment. It was unclear, however, whether the two sets of circumstances were connected. Uneasy rider raises a stink. Tossed off a city bus for refusing to change her fragrance, a local woman believes she was unfairly singled out just for trying to smell nice. Natalie Kuhn was getting on her regular bus route yesterday, the No. 137 Dalhousie, when she said she was told by the driver he was no fan of her perfume, Very Irresistible by Givenchy, and she had to get off. Chicago Train Riders Breathing Highly Toxic Air. A devastating investigation by the Chicago Tribune is casting serious doubt on the environmental benefits of public transportation. Day after day, the Tribune reported on November 5, "thousands of commuters are breathing high levels of toxic diesel pollution trapped in Chicago's two major rail stations and even inside the trains they ride." Loose rat crawls up sleeping subway rider's leg. The nightmare of every subway rider was caught on video after a chubby sewer rat crawled up the leg of a sleeping straphanger on a No. 4 train in Brooklyn and came face-to-face with the man. Subway graffiti artist, 20, struck and killed by Manhattan-bound D train. Cans of spray paint were found near the body of a 20-year-old graffiti artist who was struck and killed by a subway in Brooklyn early Monday [5/16/2011], police said. The man, whose name wasn't immediately released, was hit by a Manhattan-bound D train at the 59th St. station. Transit officials said the motorman tried to stop the train just after 5 a.m., but couldn't bring it to a halt in time. The Editor says... Graffiti is included here a safety issue, not only because of the risk to the "artists" but also because of the paint fumes lingering in the subway tunnels. Safety: Spaghetti Dinner Leads To Full-Blown Brawl On NYC Subway Train. Who thought that eating spaghetti on a packed subway car could cause such problems? Well, it did. Sex Offender's Kidnap Attempt Stopped By Metro Commuters. Metro commuters stopped a teenage girl from being kidnapped by a registered sex offender Thursday afternoon [3/17/2011] in South Los Angeles. According to the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department, the attempted abduction occurred around 2 p.m. Thursday at the Avalon Green Line station. As many as 10 metro commuters stepped in to interrupt it before police arrived. Chatsworth crash's roots lie 20 years in Metrolink's past. The commuter line's founders gambled that the line could operate without an automatic braking system, interviews with safety experts and documents show. Metro is unsafe at any speed. With billions spent to build and expand Metro, the most important day-to-day task for the system's managers remains operating and maintaining it to ensure passenger safety. Despite huge taxpayer subsidies, 10 of the nation's 25 largest transit agencies have had to raise fares (as high as 33 percent in San Francisco and Boston) to cover looming deficits. But Metro has taken a slightly different route: It's deferred literally billions of dollars in needed maintenance while appeasing ever-escalating union wage and benefit demands. In Washington: Senators to Metro: Fix problem or face intervention. Four U.S. senators have told the chairman of the Washington area's subway system — the second largest in the country — that the recent string of accidents is unacceptable and direct federal intervention is possible if he fails to promptly fix the problems. Three Metro workers disciplined for 10-car Green Line train. Three Metro employees have been disciplined for allowing a 10-car train — two cars too many — to run on the Green Line last week. ... Such trains are a concern because rail platforms are built to hold a maximum of eight cars, leaving the remainder hanging into the tunnel and potentially exposing passengers to the dangerous third rail and tracks when doors open. MTA supervisors faked subway inspections. It's a disaster waiting to happen. NYC Transit supervisors falsified thousands of vital signal inspections across the subway system for years, leaving straphangers at risk for deadly collisions like the one that killed nine people in Washington, DC, The [New York] Post learned. Metro engineers lacked licenses. The lack of required engineering certification didn't prevent three high-level engineering managers from getting jobs at Washington's $2.2 billion transit operation. A previously undisclosed internal review at the Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority (Metro) found that three of its engineers did not have engineering certifications from Maryland, Virginia or the District. The French Fry's Revenge. I really don't understand how DC commuters continue to resist the allure of mass transit. There's the serene quiet found as you stand at the base of one of Metro's frozen escalators and gaze in wonder at the glimpse of daylight far in the distance. The tactile sense of community that exists on the Red and Orange lines during rush hours. And now, the system has announced the highest Metro crime rate in history, which takes some doing. Crime rates are down in Washington, DC and Fairfax County, VA yet Metro, which operates in both, has seen its crime rate skyrocket 12 percent in 2010. D-train riders surprised when opossum hitches ride. Early morning commuters had a furry surprise on their trip into Manhattan last week. Riders on a Manhattan-bound D train had to evacuate the car at around 4:30 a.m. on Friday morning [1/13/2012] after someone spotted the adorable — yet possibly dangerous — opossum taking a free ride, an MTA spokesman confirmed. Unreliable drivers and unexpected delays Driver walks off Greyhound bus in Missouri, stranding passengers. Greyhound officials located a driver on Monday [11/21/2011] who walked away from her bus in the middle of the night in rural Missouri, leaving 45 passengers stranded for about eight hours at a gas station, the company said. Protest closes 4 BART stations, leaving commuter crowd stranded. Market Street was choked with hundreds of pedestrians struggling to get home, stopping at each successive Bay Area Rapid Transit station entrance only to be turned away. ... The stations were closed for about two hours during a demonstration against alleged BART police brutality and a decision by agency officials last week to cut underground cellphone service in an effort to quell an earlier protest. In England... Muslim bus driver halts bus to pray. A Muslim bus driver told stunned passengers to get off so he could pray. The white Islamic convert rolled out his prayer mat in the aisle and knelt on the floor facing Mecca. Passengers watched in amazement as he held out his palms towards the sky, bowed his head and began to chant. … After a few minutes the driver calmly got up, opened the doors and asked everyone back on board. We can't stop the train because our GPS is broken. Passengers on a Southern [England] service from East Croydon were stunned when they were told that their stopping train would skip six stations and go direct to the end of the line in Caterham, Surrey. When they got there the driver said the reason was that the train had lost its satellite link. Power outages hit NYC subway. Searing heat wreaked havoc on travel plans for New Yorkers as power outages shut parts of LaGuardia International Airport and the city's subway system during the morning rush hour. Cell Phone Ban May Follow Massachusetts Trolley Crash. The head of the Boston-area transit authority said Saturday he'll ban all train and bus operators from even carrying cell phones on board after a trolley driver told police he was texting his girlfriend before a collision Friday. About 50 people were hurt in the underground crash in downtown Boston, though none of the injuries was life-threatening. Update; slightly off topic: Texting Trolley Driver Is Transgendered Male. The Boston-area transit authority trolley driver who allegedly slammed into another train while text-messaging his girlfriend Friday was hired as a minority because of his transgendered "female-to-male" status and had three speeding tickets on his driving record in recent years, ABC News has learned. Blackout Lesson: Keep the Gas Tank Full. For the 90 percent or more of commuters who use cars to get to work, this was the lesson — make sure there is always enough gasoline in the tank to get home. The blackout [of August 15, 2003] demonstrated the vulnerability of downtown areas that rely on electric urban rail. Big freeze kills dozens in Europe. The death toll from winter storms across Europe rose to more than 50 on Monday [12/21/2009] as transport chaos grew amid mounting anger over the failure of Eurostar high-speed trains. ... The breakdown of the Eurostar service under the Channel, linking London with Paris and Brussels, has symbolised Europe's suffering. After the nightmare of more than 2,000 people stuck in the tunnel when five trains broke down, tens of thousands more people have missed trains that have been cancelled since Friday night [12/18/2009]. Amtrak strikes again: 'Train from hell' arrives almost a day late. Pulling into Chicago almost a full day behind schedule, one Amtrak passenger recounted "the train from hell," and others are vowing they will never use the rail service again. Amtrak's California Zephyr arrived 19 hours late full of "tired, hungry and stinky" passengers, according to a story posted on WMAQ's Web site. Muslim bus driver pulls over and begins praying in the aisle. A Muslim bus driver stunned passengers by pulling over mid-route and beginning to pray in the aisle. The driver stopped the bus without warning before removing his shoes and, using a fluorescent jacket as a prayer mat, beginning to chant in Arabic. Metro fires bus driver after road rage incident. Metro on Wednesday [4/21/2010] fired a Metrobus driver who was arrested earlier this month after allegedly displaying a knife to a motorist while operating his bus, the latest transit driver let go after reports of misconduct. London Tube power failure forces passengers to escape through pitch black tunnels. Thousands of London Underground passengers were forced to leave trains and walk along tracks during one of the biggest power failures in the Tube network's history. More than 4,000 passengers were affected when five Tube trains broke down, leaving many claiming they were traumatised by having to walk through pitch black tunnels. Thousands of Tokyo Commuters Stranded as Quake Shuts Down Train Services. Tokyo's subway system, the world's busiest with about 8 million riders a day, shut down, leaving commuters to wait hours for taxis or search for somewhere to spend the night. Commuter trains serving the city and suburbs were also halted. Amtrak CEO ditches broken train to travel by car. Today's the big day for Amtrak's Wilmington train station. It is being renamed in honor of Vice President and former Delaware Senator Joe Biden following major renovations made possible with stimulus funds. One problem: the CEO of Amtrak got stuck on the train. ABC News Deputy Political Director & Political Reporter Michael Falcone tweeted at approximately 10 a.m. that the Acela train he was riding had been "delayed" in Baltimore and that he was sitting next to Amtrak CEO Joe Boardman. Indian train travels 980km in wrong direction... without any rail staff noticing. More than a thousand furious rail passengers stormed a station office after they noticed the train they were on had gone 980km in the wrong direction. As the packed service pulled into the Indian city of Warangal people on board went berserk as they realised they were five hours away from where they should have been and no staff on board had noticed. The Editor says... What does that tell you about the scenery in India? Three trains damaged, 300 riders trapped after piece falls from Metro train. About 300 Metro riders were stuck underground waiting in dark rail cars for more than two hours Tuesday morning [12/20/2011] and thousands more saw their commutes delayed after a piece of a train broke off, damaging two following trains and bringing the Blue and Orange lines to a standstill. Crowds Top 10 Scary Things About Living in Washington, D.C.. [#4] The Metro: Don't switch subway lines at Metro Center or Gallery Place at rush hour or be prepared to be confronted with a sea of humanity on the tiny platforms. Expect to be packed in like sardines during the day and share a car with inebriated patrons when the bars let out. And when they say there will be delays on the Red Line, they mean it. Standing room only plan for New York subway. In London seasoned Tube travellers jostle for the best place to stand on the platform to be first on to an overcrowded train. In Tokyo they employ packers — men in white gloves who stuff commuters into carriages. Now New Yorkers are to be subjected to the cleverest scheme yet designed to cram more commuters — known in the US as straphangers — on to the groaning subway system. The city's Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA) plans to lock the flip-down seats in almost half of the carriages during rush hour to prevent passengers from sitting down. London's Sweaty, Squashed Underground Riders Balk at $7 Fares. Deran Garabedian is so fed up with the London Underground's erratic service that he'd rather walk 30 minutes to work. He's incensed that fares are going up as much as a third next year. … The cheapest cash fare in central London will rise to 4 pounds ($7.45) on Jan. 1, the third straight increase exceeding the inflation rate. It compares with cash fares of $2 in New York, 1 euro ($1.27) in Berlin and 160 yen ($1.36) in Tokyo. How do they do it? In terms of punctuality, safety and price, the Tokyo subway system is arguably the world's model urban railway. But for overcrowding and groping, it must rank as one of the worst. At peak morning hours, some stations employ part-time platform staff to cram in passengers. With carriages filled on average to 183% of capacity at such times, bones are occasionally broken in the crush. Who wants to live in a society like that? Standing room only. Ripping out seats would ease crowding on trains, suggests public pending watchdog. Removing seating and allowing more passengers to stand would help ease congestion on packed trains, the National Audit Office suggested today [6/4/2010]. The public spending watchdog's report on rail passenger capacity recommended a 'reconfiguration' of carriages. The idea will appeal to train companies because it would be a cost effective way to transport more people but is likely to anger passengers. Third-world trains. Walk into Grand Central Terminal on a weekday afternoon, and you'll see some of the world's wealthiest workers girding themselves for a third-world commute. For the last month on Metro North's New Haven Line, "it's been short trains and long waits," as one commuter told me. Passengers crowd onto platforms in the morning to wait for trains that come late and then squeeze into standing-room cars for a slow ride, facing the same on the way home. Pol push to ban eating in the subway. A local lawmaker is pushing a bill to ban eating in the subway to help cut down on vermin — but the measure is already causing some straphangers to lose their lunch. "I eat most of my meals on the train!" said Nisse Greenberg, 25, between bites of a falafel sandwich yesterday on the N line. Houston's Metropolitan Transit Authority Metro chief asks DA to investigate document shredding. Metro Chairman David Wolff ... speaking in the Metropolitan Transit Authority's second news conference in as many days to respond to the open records request and subsequent court order, denied any connection between the agency's firing of its chief counsel and another lawyer this week and the discovery that Metro documents were shredded on Monday [2/22/2010]. State of Texas: Metro has been breaking the law for years. More problems for Metro: Texas officials say the troubled transit authority has failed to follow a state records and documents preservation law. That statute requires local government agencies to tell the state how long they will keep public records before destroying them. Officials with the Texas State Library and Archives Commission say Metro has failed to comply with state law since 1991. FTA: Metro plans $2.6 billion bond issuance. In countering a claim that Metro is not in good enough financial shape to afford construction of the University light rail line, the FTA has pointed to a strangely overlooked fact — the transit authority plans the sale of $2.6 billion in bonds. And, since the debt is not secured by sales tax proceeds, voter approval is not needed. Metro issues: from wedding to shredding. An executive of the Metropolitan Transit Authority's light-rail contractor is married to a high-ranking Metro official, a relationship that prompted the transit agency to try to isolate the official from the lucrative contract. Metro ordered to preserve documents, e-mail. A judge on Friday [3/5/2010] ordered the Metropolitan Transit Authority to preserve every document and e-mail produced within the agency until further hearings and a criminal investigation can examine allegations that Metro has destroyed documents of interest to the public. District Attorney investigating document destruction at Metro. District Judge Al Bennett laid down the law Friday [3/5/2010], ordering the embattled Metropolitan Transit Authority to stop shredding and start saving all of its documents. CEO of Metro accused of 'improper' relationship with employee. The president and CEO of the Metropolitan Transit Authority was accused in open court Wednesday of having an improper relationship with a female employee who works for him. That alleged relationship may include taxpayer-funded trips to Spain, additional compensation and benefits, and other items the public paid for with tax dollars, according to the attorney for former Houston Controller Lloyd Kelley. Critics blast Metro's $2.6 billion bond plan. The Metropolitan Transit Authority intends to issue an estimated $2.6 billion in bonds in the next four years to help pay for five new light rail lines, about four times the debt capacity voters authorized in a 2003 referendum, Metro officials confirmed Tuesday [2/9/2010]. Turbulence at Metro must not impede light rail work. With the Metropolitan Transit Authority embarking on a massive five-line light rail construction binge, the timing couldn't be worse for the eruption of an agency scandal and the ouster of its top lawyer. Mayor doubts funding for Uptown, University rail lines. Mayor Annise Parker cast doubt Wednesday on whether the Metropolitan Transit Authority has the money to pay for two planned light-rail lines that proponents say are critical to the success of the agency's plans. FBI helps investigate Metro's document shredding. The FBI confirmed Friday that it is helping the Harris County District Attorney's office in its ongoing investigation at Metro. This week a team of investigators from both the DA's office and the FBI descended upon Metro headquarters as a part a part of an ongoing criminal investigation looking into allegations of improperly shredded public documents. This bus has passed by here before. Cronyism, conflicts of interest, ethical lapses. There was something familiar about the allegations Metro's fired former general counsel Pauline Higgins hurled against agency CEO Frank Wilson in a lawsuit filed this week. Oh, yes. They've been made against Wilson before, by the State of New Jersey Commission of Investigation, in an exhaustive 150-page report juicily titled "E-ZPass: The Making of a Procurement Disaster." Dallas Area Rapid Transit Editor's comment: The one percent mass-transit sales tax in Dallas generates more than enough money to keep the trains and buses running, even if they're nearly empty, which they often are. I believe the primary purpose of the non-zero price of an all-day train ticket is to keep homeless people from living on the trains. The DART system has been built -- as far as I can tell, it isn't expanding. Every time there is a fare increase, it is just another tax increase to raise money for some other project. DART operates in a political climate that necessitates awarding "contracts to disadvantaged, minority and women-owned business enterprises." Some of the rapid transit executives have really nice offices, and there is a lot of money being spent on decorating the train stations. DART Rail: 10 Years and Growing. DART Rail ... [is] laying the groundwork for a $2.4 billion expansion that will more than double its size to just over 90 miles. [Do the math. That's about a thousand dollars per foot of track.] City Hall hears accusations of DART racial hiring. Allegations of hiring discrimination at the DART transit agency have now spilled over to Dallas City Hall. Community leaders, frustrated over the lack of action by DART officials are now asking Dallas City council members to investigate. Former DART employee Rebecca Williams is among at least five people who have filed federal discrimination complaints against their old bosses. Williams says she was fired after complaining about being ordered to hire Hispanics underqualified for the job. Runaway Train to Higher Taxes. [At the end of 2007] the Dallas Area Rapid Transit Authority announced that it would be $1 billion short of what is needed to meet existing building obligations. Assuming local taxpayers are hip to the notion of paying more on every purchase so they can cruise around — or subsidize others cruising around — in trains, it might be wise to consider how well this expanded rail network can be sustained in the future. Taxpayers should ask whether the apparently cash-strapped rail system fleecing them today will get better as it gets bigger. US Public Transport Operating Cost per Passenger Mile: Dallas has one of the least cost-effective public transportation systems at 78.9 cents per passenger mile. The recently opened DFW Airport Skylink train system cost $880 million to construct, making it perhaps the most costly mass transit system ever, in dollars per mile of track. Dallas has High Downtown Vacancies Despite Light Rail. The latest available data (9/1999) shows downtown Dallas to be among only four downtown areas with vacancy rates above 20 percent, at 32.0 percent, and second worst only to Oklahoma City. This situation has not improved since light rail was opened (June 1997). DART Gets $700 Million Federal Grant but Doesn't Go to Love Field. While discussing the exercise of the right of eminent domain regarding a DART station near Love Field, some Dallas City Council members raised an interesting question. Why is DART not going directly to the airport? It appears as though the ball was dropped in 2004 when it was learned that the $700 million grant to fund DART would be in jeopardy if the tunnel would be allowed. The 1999 Texas Transit Opportunity Analysis: Dallas Area Rapid Transit. The 1983 campaign for the DART tax referendum made impressive claims to the voters. Voters were told that DART trains were needed to reduce traffic congestion, and that within 25 years: • 160 miles (14 routes) of rail would be built, including a downtown subway. All of this was to be built for $17.8 million per mile. • 500,000 daily riders would be carried on DART buses and trains. • Over 50 percent of downtown commuters would ride DART services. As has become typical in transit, the results fell far short of the promises. … Voters were also told that without DART, Dallas traffic congestion would soon reach Houston levels and that traffic congestion would get increasingly worse without DART. In fact, with DART, traffic congestion in Dallas now equals that of Houston. … Because of its slow operating speed, DART's light rail provides no time savings relative to automobiles. Moreover, time savings with respect to buses are limited by the fact that light rail operates at virtually the same speed as DART's buses. Car pools Once Popular, Car Pools Go the Way of Hitchhiking. Remember the 1970s? Watergate, disco, oil embargoes and, of course, car-pooling. Many big companies organized group rides for their employees, and roughly one in four Americans who drove to work shared a ride with others. But now far more people are driving alone, as companies have spread out, Americans are wealthier and cars have become cheaper to own. The percentage of workers who car-pool has dropped by almost half since 1980, the first time the Census Bureau started systematically tracking the numbers, according to new data from the bureau. Impatient commuters form impromptu car pools: Traffic congestion has a growing number of commuters [in Houston] ignoring a basic rule from childhood: Never get in a car with strangers. The Carpool Canard: Car-sharing is hardly ever practicable. Human needs are too individualized and too unpredictable. The carpool movement is entirely collectivist, in fundamental principle and in form. Let it ride. Thanks to the government, you now can sit in a yellow car with complete strangers. This week, New York City is launching a one-year pilot program for giving people cab rides at discounted rates ($3 or $4 per passenger) from three select locations. The goal of the share-a-cab program, which is limited to weekdays (6 to 10 a.m.) is to "save money" for passengers, make more money for drivers and (of course) "help the environment." These things are to be achieved by putting New Yorkers who do not know each other in cars together. High speed rail projects Bulk of high-speed rail costs could fall to state. As California prepares to commit tens of billions of dollars to an ambitious high-speed rail line from San Francisco to Southern California, Congress' political will to provide the bulk of the funding is disappearing, leaving the possibility that the state could end up stuck with a crushing financial burden. State voters have agreed to issue more than $9 billion in bonds to build the system, but that's a fraction of the $43 billion projected tab for the initial phase. And those costs could swell to $65 billion or more, by some estimates. California should kill 'train to nowhere'. A wave of rational, common sense is sweeping the nation. Four states have rejected billions of dollars in federal money for high-speed rail construction, realizing long-term costs far outweigh wishful-thinking benefits. That's good news. The bad news is California political leaders, from Gov. Jerry Brown to Sen. Dianne Feinstein, want to spend the money wisely rejected by governors in Ohio, Wisconsin, Iowa and most recently Florida, for California's own proposed high-speed train. A Rail Boondoggle, Moving at High Speed. The Obama administration's enthusiasm for high-speed rail is a dispiriting example of government's inability to learn from past mistakes. Since 1971, the federal government has poured almost $35 billion in subsidies into Amtrak with few public benefits. At most, we've gotten negligible reductions — invisible and statistically insignificant — in congestion, oil use or greenhouse gases. What's mainly being provided is subsidized transportation for a small sliver of the population. In a country where 140 million people go to work every day, Amtrak has 78,000 daily passengers. All Aboard the T-Rex Express. President Obama is going to call for spending $53 billion over the next six years on high-speed railroads between major cities, with $8 billion in the 2012 budget. He touted the idea in the State of the Union and, indeed, has been pushing it since he took office. Taking us on a high-speed ride to the poorhouse. High-speed rail seemed like a good idea to the Chinese. They announced plans to spend $300 billion on a 16,000-mile HSR network in addition to bidding on a contract to bring HSR to the United States. On July 1, China's new G5001 Shanghai-Nanjing High-Speed Railway — the longest and fastest intercity rail line in the world — opened to much fanfare after being fast-tracked with government stimulus funds. (Sound familiar?) Debate Over High-Speed Rail Plan Intensifies. Proponents of the Obama Administration's high-speed rail initiative have been intensely busy promoting the project in recent weeks, but harsh requirements proposed by the White House are jeopardizing necessary cooperation from the railroad industry. High-speed rail: not much in other continent-sized countries. I've long been fascinated by high-speed rail lines and I have written about them before in this space. I would like to see high-speed rail service (higher than the current Acela speed) in the Boston-New York-Washington corridor, which seems well adapted to it. But I think proposals for high-speed rail in almost every other part of the country are crazy — likely to be hugely expensive and unlikely to attract substantial ridership. Rail Service Expansion Imperiled at State Level. Republicans running for governor in a handful of states could block, or significantly delay, one of President Obama's signature initiatives: his plan to expand the passenger rail system and to develop the nation's first bullet-train service. High-speed rail will take taxpayers for a ride. I have ridden the Shinkansen — Japan's bullet train — and, let me tell you, it's cool. But in their techno-envy, American advocates of high-speed passenger trains lose any sense of economic rigor. Yes, fast passenger trains may be awesome — but exactly why do we need them? Cars, buses and planes are already doing a good job of moving people around. If the purpose of high-speed rail is to create jobs, other infrastructure investment can do that. If the purpose is to save energy or limit greenhouse gases, then rail, which uses massive amounts of electricity, much of it presumably generated by coal-fired plants, may be inferior to air or car travel. New Midwest Governors Could Derail High-Speed Trains. Republicans Scott Walker of Wisconsin and John Kasich of Ohio, who won their races for governor Tuesday [11/2/2010], both have sharply criticized the high-speed passenger-rail projects championed by President Barack Obama. Their victories cast doubt on high-profile projects in their states that were awarded hundreds of billions of dollars in federal stimulus funds. California high-speed rail gets $624 million more. California received an additional $624 million to start building the $43 billion statewide high-speed rail system in the Central Valley — money that will likely be used to take the initial stretch of rail south to Bakersfield. Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood announced Thursday [12/9/2010] that $1.2 billion in federal high-speed rail funds allocated to Wisconsin and Ohio would be rerouted to other states. This train is bound for red ink ... really fast. Amid great fanfare, the Obama administration last week announced plans to spend $13 billion in "seed money" for 13 high-speed rail projects around the country — $8 billion in stimulus funding now with a promise to seek $5 billion more over the next five years. Among the projects being funded is the St. Louis-to-Chicago route, which will receive $1.1 billion. A relative pittance of $31 million went to Missouri to upgrade service between St. Louis and Kansas City. With apologies to futurists, people in the construction industry and rail buffs, investing $13 billion (or even $8 billion) in passenger railroads is a little like building a bridge to the 19th century. America's high-speed rail shambles: Where has all the money gone? This time last year, President Obama promised a brave new world for America's train spotters, committing $8 billion to fund 13 high-speed rail projects around the US. But 12 months later, where has all the money gone? The comically inept projects range from Ohio's (now abandoned) plan for a $400 million "high speed" train averaging just 39 mph, to Florida's 84 mile, $2.7 billion plan to link two cities that are only 90 minutes apart by road. Not to be outdone, Iowa managed to receive $1 billion for a line to Chicago that will be slower than the current bus service. But, even in such illustrious company, California's high speed shambles stands out: a "train to nowhere" costing $4.15 billion to connect the "unincorporated community" of Borden to the tiny town of Corcoran (combined pop. ∼25,000). The Little Engine That Could Chug Florida Straight Over the Cliff. Some of the same puffy Florida politicians who spent the runup to the midterm elections decrying federal stimulus money because it's running up the deficit ... look at them now. They're gimme-guys drooling over the extra $342 million headed to Florida for high-speed rail. High-speed trains are not an alternative to cars. High ticket prices mean that running a car is still the cheapest travel option for most people. The folly of high-speed rail, redux. Like so much of the [State of the Union] speech, the high-speed rail folly is recycled claptrap (he tossed it into last year's speech, too). The remarks will appease Big Labor and eco-radical social planners led by Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood, who'll have his grubby hands all over the high-speed rail slush fund faster than you can turn off your soon-to-be-banned cell phone. High-Speed Rail, Budget Buster. If the nation is going to reduce its out-of-control spending, the first step is to stop spending money on things we do not need. Despite President Obama's call in his State of the Union speech for linking 80 percent of the nation by high-speed rail, it is hard to imagine a more unnecessary program. The High-Speed-Rail Boondoggle. Key Republicans are rightly going after President Obama's $53 billion pie-on-the-tracks high-speed-rail schemes. House Transportation Committee chair Rep. John Mica (R., Fla.) calls it a "Soviet-style train system," while Railroads Subcommittee chair Rep. Bill Shuster (R., Pa.) says it's "insanity." These are strong comments, coming from officials who have in the past expressed support for rail projects. A $53 Billion High-Speed Rail Program to Nowhere. [Railroads Subcommittee Chairman Bill] Shuster was also critical of the manner in which the Administration has administered the program. "Selecting routes behind closed doors runs counter to the Administration's pledges of transparency. ... High-speed rail funding could become another political grab bag for the President. ... If the Obama Administration is serious about high-speed rail, they should stop throwing money at projects in the same failed manner." High-speed rail is a fast track to government waste. Vice President Biden, an avowed friend of good government, is giving it a bad name. With great fanfare, he went to Philadelphia last week to announce that the Obama administration proposes spending $53 billion over six years to construct a "national high-speed rail system." Translation: The administration would pay states $53 billion to build rail networks that would then lose money — lots — thereby aggravating the budget squeezes of the states or federal government, depending on which covered the deficits. It's the Bullet Train ... to Nowhere. Hailed as a high-speed road to the future, a jobs program and a symbol of America's dedication to innovation, President Obama proposed Monday spending $8 billion on a bullet train — a down payment on a nationwide network that will cost $58 billion over the next six years. But in the one state where the federal high-speed rail project is underway, critics say money is being misspent, ridership studies are inflated, the route is politically corrupted and the system will never be self supporting. Runaway Trains: Obama's high-speed rail plan is a fiscal pipedream. We suppose every President is entitled to a pipedream, but President Obama's vow in his State of the Union address that 80% of Americans should have access to high-speed rail in 25 years is a doozy. Vice President Joe Biden has followed up by proposing $53 billion in high-speed rail funding over the next six years. Seriously? 41% Favor High-Speed Rail Plan, 46% Oppose. Voters aren't paying much attention to the president's plan for building a high-speed rail system, but there is a huge partisan gap in perceptions of the plan. A new Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey finds that, overall, 41% of Likely Voters favor the plan and 46% are opposed. High-Speed Rail, Budget Buster. If the nation is going to reduce its out-of-control spending, the first step is to stop spending money on things we do not need. Despite President Obama's call in his State of the Union speech for linking 80 percent of the nation by high-speed rail, it is hard to imagine a more unnecessary program. High-Speed Pork. President Obama's high-speed-rail proposal will, over the course of six years, pour $53 million of taxpayer money into a megaproject that produces little value for the vast majority of Americans. It uses the classic pork-barrel strategy of starting a program small and then expanding it after Congress, prodded by special-interest groups, is fully committed. What Big Government Can Do. A business entity that suckers people with ridiculous promises that can never be kept will be sued for fraud. Government, on the other hand, does this all the time, with complete impunity. Virtually every action Big Government takes produces an obligation against future generations. For example, Obama's budget continues his weird obsession with spending billions on "high-speed rail." Whatever other functions high-speed rail might serve, you must understand that it is also an obligation. If we followed Obama's plan of spending $53 billion to develop a massive high-speed rail network, future politicians would be obliged to keep spending on it forever, no matter how much money it might lose. Florida Governor Joins Two More in Rejecting Federal High-Speed Rail Spending. Florida Gov. Rick Scott is canceling a proposed high-speed train line between Orlando and Tampa, rejecting more than $2 billion from the federal government in a move echoing decisions by Republican governors in Ohio and Wisconsin. Scott said Wednesday [2/16/2011] the proposal is too costly for Florida and could put the state's taxpayers on the hook for roughly $3 billion, while ridership is unlikely to pay for the operating cost, meaning the state would have to pump even more money into the line each year. Florida Gov. Scott Cancels Tampa-Orlando High-Speed Train. Florida Gov. Rick Scott is canceling a proposed high-speed train line between Orlando and Tampa, rejecting more than $2 billion from the federal government. Obama budget gives light rail $200 million. President Obama's 2012 budget proposal on Monday allocated $200 million to the Central Corridor light-rail line. The federal money is necessary to make the project go forward, Tim Busse, University of Minnesota Services spokesman, said. A lost cause: The high-speed rail race. President Obama's fiscal 2012 budget includes $8 billion for high-speed rail next year and $53 billion over six years. In the president's view, the United States needs to spend big on high-speed rail so that we can catch up with Europe, Japan — and you-know-who. "China is building faster trains and newer airports," the president warned in his State of the Union address. But of all the reasons to build high-speed rail in the United States, keeping up with the international Joneses may be one of the worst. Florida's Scott Defends Rejection of Rail Funds as LaHood Cries 'Baloney'. Florida Governor Rick Scott, defending his rejection of $2.4 billion from the Obama administration for a high-speed rail project, said the program would have been a bad deal for taxpayers. Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood rejected Scott's criticism as "baloney." High Speed to Insolvency. Florida's new Republican governor, Rick Scott, has joined Ohio's (John Kasich) and Wisconsin's (Scott Walker) in rejecting federal incentives — more than $2 billion in Florida's case — to begin a high-speed rail project. ... Washington, disdaining the decisions of Ohio and Wisconsin voters, replied that it will find states that will waste the money. California will. Although prostrate from its own profligacy, it will sink tens of billions of its own taxpayers' money in the 616-mile San Francisco to San Diego line. Supposedly 39 million people will eagerly pay much more than an airfare in order to travel slower. Money Train. [California's] proposed high-speed rail system serves as a perfect example of the gap between the promise of transformational liberalism and the reality of big government. Taxpayers everywhere should pay attention, because the project has already been granted $3.2 billion in federal funds, mostly through Obama's economic stimulus package — and its backers hope to gobble up billions more over the next decade. High-speed rail line 'will cost every family in the country £1,000'. Every family in the country will have to shell out £1,000 to pay for a high-speed rail line that only the rich will use, campaigners claimed last night. The TaxPayers' Alliance spoke out as Transport Secretary Philip Hammond defied countryside campaigners as he launched a consultation on the hugely expensive project. President Obama Busts the Budget for Pie-in-the-Sky Amtrak and "Livability" Proposals. While the President promises high-speed rail (HSR) service (top speeds of at least 150 mph), most of his projects involve signal and track improvements on privately owned freight rail systems that would provide marginal improvements in the Amtrak service sharing those tracks. As Heritage has noted, the President's HSR plan is best characterized as an exercise to benefit Amtrak and for-profit freight railroads, which received 55 percent of the so-called HSR rail money included in the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act. Despite his State of the Union proclamation to spend $56 billion on HSR over five years, the President's transportation budget offers no such plan. John Galt vs. Bamtrak. "U.S. Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood announced Friday that $2.4 billion in high-speed rail funding intended for Florida will be sent to other states after the state Supreme Court upheld Gov. Rick Scott's decision to reject the money," the Associated Press reports from Tallahassee. ... Why was the federal government trying to force this boondoggle on the Sunshine State? If Florida doesn't want the money, why not return it to the Treasury rather than throw it at boondoggles in other states? High-speed derailed. Florida's Supreme Court on Friday [3/4/2011] dealt a serious blow to President Obama's $53 billion high-speed rail pet project. The seven jurists sided unanimously with Republican Gov. Rick Scott's right to forgo $2.4 billion in federal taxpayer-backed grants the Obama administration wanted to blow on an 84-mile train track linking Tampa and Orlando. More and more, Republican governors are rejecting this type of federal bribe in the name of fiscal responsibility. Obama's Edifice Complex. What do most Americans come across every day that is the legacy of one President? One more clue: think Dwight Eisenhower. Bingo! The highway system was created and promoted by Eisenhower and has outlasted his mortal self. Does Obama want to create a monument to his own Presidency, miles wide and sprawling across the nation for all of us to behold? Could Obama leave a similar edifice behind — say a high speed rail network costing taxpayers tens of billions of dollars? He has been forcefully trying to get this past Congress and past recalcitrant Governors worried about the real-world viability of high-speed rail networks across America. These high speed rail projects would be a disaster. The Bullet Train to Bankruptcy. [Scroll down] Just this week, a new report raised even more questions about plans to pay for the [California high speed rail] project: Compared with the plan the voters passed, the authors found, costs have doubled to $66 billion, and the scope of the project has been dramatically reduced. If built according to the original specs, the project would have the potential to almost double the state's bonded indebtedness, to $200 billion or more. This would cost each of California's 40 million residents $275 to $320 annually for 30 years. Californians question high-speed rail. "Californians have a reputation for questioning authority. And increasingly, they appear to be questioning the High-Speed Rail Authority, which voters empowered in 2008 to issue $9.95 billion in bonds and build the nation's largest such system. Opposition hasn't reached critical mass — not yet. But it is broad, and it includes Republicans, some Democrats, community groups, local governments, fiscal conservatives, and neighborhood preservationists. Time to sidetrack high-speed rail. An astute journalist in the 20th century once defined public relations as "organized lying." Keep that in mind as a barrage of news features and op-ed columns extolling the benefits of President Obama's high-speed-rail initiatives appear in coming days. Indeed, some of Washington's largest and most ruthless public-relations firms are spearheading the effort to revive rail, and no wonder. Billions of taxpayer dollars are on the turntable and likely to be picked up by foreign companies like Canada's Bombardier and Germany's Siemens. Gangsta Wrap. [Q]: What's so wrong about high-speed rail? [A]: Two things: Inevitable cost overruns and long-term operating losses that require long-term government subsidies. It's no wonder that governors in three states have turned down multi-billion-dollar grants. They love free money, but they don't want to be on the hook for all the extra money later. Everything I've read so far about the project in California suggests that people will someday be building statues honoring all of the governors who refused the money. Most long trips will be both faster and cheaper by air. Most short trips will be as fast or faster, and much cheaper, by car. Just imagine a family of four shelling out over $800 for the round trip between Los Angeles and San Francisco. High Speed Delusion. Last Tuesday, March 22nd, saw two Obama high speed rail shills, hapless Illinois Governor Quinn and the loyal, ebullient, camera centric Illinois Senator Dick Durbin, shamelessly announcing with pride, the next phase of the so called Chicago to St Louis High Speed Rail project. The new $1.2 billion phase is to run from Bloomington, IL to Dwight IL, a distance of 58.5 miles of what could only be described as the "Billion Dollar Train to Nowhere." Folks, that amounts to a mere $20,618,556 per mile, with an estimated heart stopping speed of 110 mph. Google Map estimates driving between these destinations to be 1 hour 10 minutes. This breakthrough rail line will take only 32 minutes, assuming your actual destination in either Bloomington or Dwight is the train station itself. California high-speed rail: The next stop is bankruptcy. Like most large public infrastructure projects, the California high-speed rail project was sold to the public based on false promises, exaggerated benefits and lowball cost estimates. Before the election, the cost of the project was estimated at $33 billion for the Los Angeles/Anaheim to San Francisco portion, and an additional $7 billion for the spurs to San Diego and Sacramento. Voters narrowly passed a $9.95 billion bond in 2008, and the federal government and private investors were supposed to cover the remaining $30 billion. High-Speed Derail. China's technology of the future has become a boondoggle of the present, piling up debt and resulting in the arrest of the minister of railways. Maybe it's that last part we should be copying. Philly to New York trains to become nation's fastest. Amtrak was awarded $450 million on Monday [5/9/2011] for major improvements that will make Philadelphia-to-New-York trains the fastest in the country. The money was part of $2 billion for high-speed rail projects awarded Monday by the U.S. Department of Transportation, after the new governor of Florida rejected the money earlier this year. The Editor says... In other words, they're determined to spend the money somewhere, so you might as well poke your nose into the trough. US awards $2bn for high-speed rail upgrades. The US government has awarded $2bn (£1.2bn) for high-speed rail in critical corridors, after Florida's Republican governor declined the funds. The projects will boost rail services between Washington DC to Boston, as well as in the mid-west and California. California High-Speed Rail Still on Track to Nowhere. The nonpartisan Legislative Analyst's Office (LAO) in California has released a devastating report on the California High-Speed Rail project. The report highlights the follies of the project managers and the crippling fiscal impact the project will continue to have on state and federal-level coffers. The California High-Speed Rail Act, which is now in its 15th year since being passed in 1996, established the California High-Speed Rail Authority (HSRA) and detailed a plan to establish high-speed rail in California by 2020. The project has been bogged down by numerous delays and constant calls for additional funding. Fast Train To Hell. If the president wants to spend public money that helps the US compete, wasting it on a massively expensive and ineffective national high speed rail system, it is almost a high crime. ... Investing in rail is like building livery stables when automobiles took over highways. California's high-speed train wreck. California's much-vaunted high-speed rail project is, to put it bluntly, a train wreck. Intended to demonstrate the state's commitment to sustainable, cutting-edge transportation systems, and to show that the U.S. can build rail networks as sophisticated as those in Europe and Asia, it is instead a monument to the ways poor planning, mismanagement and political interference can screw up major public works. The insane California high-speed rail project. I have been appalled by the Obama administration's obstinate insistence on spending $3.6 billion of stimulus on the high-speed rail project in California, and I become more appalled the more I learn about it. The latest report of the state Legislative Analyst's Office makes clear that this is crazy. California voters approved $9 billion in bonds to pay for the high-speed rail project ... but the 2009 estimate of the total cost of the first phase, from Anaheim to San Francisco, is $43 billion. The state's High-Speed Rail Administration, whose members are appointed by the governor and not subject to legislative confirmation or any further state oversight[,] has agreed to spend $5.5 billion on a high-speed segment from Borden to Corcoran in the Central Valley — the high-speed train to nowhere — and the feds have resisted spending it elsewhere. Derail High-Speed Spending. President Obama won't put high-speed rail on the block to ease the debt crisis. He insists we need to keep up with China. But its rail has become a $300 billion boondoggle. Yes, that's billion with a b. China's Railway Ministry continues to lose money and is now an eye-popping $267 billion in the hole. The Editor says... Competition with other countries is sometimes used as a means of generating support -- in our sports-saturated society -- for projects with very high price tags and little or no benefit. For example, the Superconducting Supercollider, the Space Shuttle, and now high-speed railroads. Two high-speed bullet train coaches fall off bridge in eastern China. Thirty-two people were killed and 191 injured when two high-speed bullet trains slammed into one another in eastern China Saturday [7/23/2011], causing several cars to derail and fall off a bridge. A power outage triggered by a lightning strike caused one train to stall — only for another to ram into its rear, the state-run Xinhua news agency reported. Signal design flaw blamed for deadly high-speed rail crash in China. A weekend train collision that killed 39 people in eastern China was caused by design flaws in railway signal equipment, the state-run Xinhua news agency reported Thursday [7/28/2011]. The signal system failed to turn a green light to red after it was struck by lightening, [sic] causing a high-speed train Saturday to plough into the back of bullet train near Wenzhou in Zheijian province, the report said, citing an investigation by the Shanghai Railway Bureau. Chinese bullet trains pulled over 'flaws'. A state-owned Chinese train manufacturer said on Friday it is recalling 54 bullet trains being used on a new high-speed rail link between Beijing and Shanghai because of "flaws". Chicago-to-Detroit high-speed rail 'positioned' to receive stimulus funds. The Obama administration said Friday [3/20/2009] that a Chicago-to-Detroit high-speed rail plan is "well positioned" to receive federal stimulus funding, according to a state lawmaker. Michigan House Speaker Pro Tem Pam Byrnes said the description came from Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood during a day of meetings at the White House on the stimulus plan. Public Transit Gets Stimulated. Greens are lining up at the stimulus trough to fund a wish list of alternative-energy boondoggles. But an old green favorite — public transit — is also looking to sneak a few million through the back door while the gettin' is good. Sen. Harry Reid's Vegas-to-L.A. train has gotten the headlines, but with a staggering $8 billion in stimulus set aside for public transit, every pol with a pet rail program is looking to bring home the bacon. Vegas, Midwest seek the $8 billion for fast trains. The Republicans attacking President Barack Obama's economic stimulus package point to a project they dub the "Sin Express" — a high speed rail link between Anaheim, Calif., site of Disneyland, and Las Vegas. The Boondoggle Express. The largest construction boondoggle in recorded human history continues to unfold in the Central Valley of California. The initial segment of Obama's pet project, a high-speed rail line from Merced to Bakersfield, just had its first announced cost overrun. With costs jumping from $7.1 billion to a staggering $13.9 billion, the project now has doubled in price even before a single shovelful of earth is turned. Now that is the seat-of-the-pants, lets just make up a number, government contracting that the Democrats and the unions so dearly love. California bullet train funding slashed by House panel. The fortunes of California's high-speed rail project, which would connect Southern California to the Bay Area with a 220 mph train, took a big financial hit Thursday afternoon [9/8/2011], when a congressional panel slashed the Federal Railroad Administration budget. Hi-speed train to financial ruin in California. Federal spending for high-speed rail is coming under close Congressional scrutiny. Both political parties have begun to recognize the enormous capital costs required for another Solyndra style payoff; in this case the billions of Federal dollars needed to fund a lucrative union-only jobs program. Are China's high-speed trains heading off the rails? China's expanding network of ultramodern high-speed trains has come under growing scrutiny here over costs and because of concerns that builders ignored safety standards in the quest to build faster trains in record time. The trains, a symbol of the country's rapid development, have drawn praise from President Obama. But what began in February with the firing and detention of the country's top railway official has spiraled into a corruption investigation that has raised questions about the project's future. A High-Speed Rail Mirage. [Scroll down] Most of Obama's plan should really be called "moderate-speed rail," as it would upgrade existing freight lines to run passenger trains at top speeds of 110 mph. At around $5 million per mile, the total cost would come close to $50 billion. Not satisfied with moderate-speed trains, California says it wants half of all federal funds so it can build brand-new 220-mph rail lines. But it's unlikely other states will settle for the slower trains if California gets the faster ones. Building fast trains nationwide would cost at least $500 billion. This article appeared in the Detroit Free Press on August 3, 2009. Are Proposals For High-speed Rail a Boondoggle? On June 17, the Federal Railroad Administration asked states for proposals for spending $8 billion of stimulus money that Congress allocated to high-speed rail. This raises a question: Would you pay $1,000 so that someone — probably not you — can ride high-speed trains less than 60 miles a year? That's what the FRA's high-speed rail plan is going to cost: at least $90 billion or $1,000 for every federal income taxpayer. This article appeared in the Gainesville Sun on June 18, 2009. High Speed Spending. As of this writing, $99 will get you from Washington to New York in two hours and fifty minutes on Amtrak's high-speed train, while $49 pays for a moderate-speed train ride that takes three hours and fifteen minutes. Meanwhile, relatively unsubsidized and energy-efficient buses cost $20 for a four-hour-and-fifteen-minute trip with leather seats and free Wi-Fi. Airfares start at $119 for a one-hour flight. Few people who pay their own way will spend an extra $79 to save an hour and twenty-five minutes of their time. We Can't Afford the Luxury of High-speed Rail. This past Tuesday [9/28/2010], Amtrak proposed to spend more than $100 billion increasing the top speeds of trains in its Boston-to-Washington corridor from 150 to 220 miles per hour. In August, Secretary of Transportation Ray LaHood estimated that President Obama's proposal to extend high-speed rail to other parts of the country will cost at least $500 billion. No one knows where this money will come from, but President Obama argues that we need to spend it because high-speed rail will have a "transformative effect" on the American economy. In fact, all it will do is drag the economy down. The Editor says... Maybe that's exactly the "transformative effect" Obama seeks. High-Speed Rail: The Wrong Road for America. [Scroll down] Planners have predicted that a proposed line in Florida would use more energy and emit more of some pollutants than all of the cars it would take off the road. California planners forecast that high-speed rail would reduce pollution and greenhouse gas emissions by a mere 0.7 to 1.5 percent -- but only if ridership reached the high end of projected levels. Lower ridership would nullify energy savings and pollution reductions. High-Speed Rail Costly for California. California high-speed-rail proposal approved by voters in 2008 has strayed so far above original cost estimates and so far under ridership estimates that one key transportation analyst is calling it the greatest scam to hit the state — ever. "The California high-speed-rail project is on track to be the biggest boondoggle in the state's history, and for California, that is saying something," said Adam Summers, a policy analyst with the Reason Foundation. "The project's planning and viability have been dubious from the beginning." Congress, Governors Nix Obama's High-speed Trains. Dead. Kaput. Through. ... That, I think, is a fair description of the Obama administration's attempt to build high-speed rail lines across America. It hasn't failed because of a lack of willingness to pony up money. The Obama Democrats' February 2009 stimulus package included $8 billion for high-speed rail projects. The Democratic Congress appropriated another $2.5 billion. But Congress is turning off the spigot. Bullet train cost estimates rise to $98.5 billion. California's bullet train will cost an estimated $98.5 billion to build over the next 22 years, a price nearly double any previous projection and one likely to trigger political sticker shock, according to a business plan scheduled to be unveiled Tuesday [11/1/2011]. In a key change, the state has decided to stretch out the construction schedule by 13 years, completing the Southern California-to-Bay Area high speed rail in 2033 rather than 2020. Bullet train's $98-billion cost could be its biggest obstacle. The ambitious plan to connect Anaheim and San Francisco with high-speed trains has encountered plenty of obstacles, including intensifying resistance from wealthy and poor communities lying in the track's path. High Speed Rail Costs Balloon to $100 Billion. Nearly $100 billion. That's what High Speed Rail is now going to cost California taxpayers -- more than double the costs initially promised by the proponents of Prop 1A, which contained the initial taxpayer financing for the project. Congress about to kill high-speed train program. Congress voted Thursday [11/17/2011] to kill funds for President Barack Obama's signature high-speed rail program, but the initiative may have some life in it still. Californians would reject bullet train in revote, polls finds. The estimated price tag for the 520-mile system between San Francisco and Los Angeles is now $98 billion to $117 billion — at least triple the initial projection of $33 billion and over double a more recent estimate of $43 billion. Planners have extended the construction deadline from 2020 to 2033. "If there were a revote, its chances of passage given this poll are not very good," said Mark DiCamillo, director of the Field Poll. Take this bullet train. Please. So, the California High-Speed Rail Authority was wrong. The bullet trains from Anaheim and Los Angeles to San Francisco will not cost $34 billion as originally estimated, or $43 billion as the authority insisted just two years ago, but closer to $100 billion. Critics say the agency's new $98.5-billion estimate is low, and the authority admits it might go as high as $117.6 billion, but for sake of argument call the cost $100 billion. The authority is offering us less for more. The original system included Sacramento and San Diego. They are not part of this estimate. Detroit light-rail line plan scrapped for city, suburban buses. The death of the light-rail plan brings an end to about four years of intensive effort by the city, private developers and nonprofit groups to create what was widely viewed as the most promising attempt in decades for a light-rail system to Detroit. Bullet train's travel-time mandate adds to ballooning of costs. California's proposed bullet train will need to soar over small towns on towering viaducts, split rich farm fields diagonally and burrow for miles under mountains for a simple reason: It has no time to spare. In the fine print of a 2008 voter-approved measure funding the project was a little-noticed requirement that trains be able to rocket from Union Station in downtown Los Angeles to San Francisco in no more than two hours and 40 minutes. High-Speed Railroad Job. If politicians are good for anything, it ought to be reading polls. Yet there was Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood last week telling Congress that California's high-speed railroad is "not a cheap project" but "the people in California want this." What people would that be? According to the latest Field poll, two-thirds of Californians want a new referendum on the project. Plan to use Amtrak as fallback for high-speed rail criticized. When the Obama administration gave California $3.4 billion in startup money for a high-speed rail system, it insisted on a guarantee that the project would not become a white elephant — something critics could brand as a train to nowhere. The first section of track had to run down the spine of the Central Valley and have another use, should the rest of the bullet train project collapse. Those requirements are now at the center of an intensifying political battle... The governor can strong-arm companies with the state's new Thermageddon Law. California To Pay For High Speed Rail With Extortion. The governor told ABC 7's "Eyewitness Newsmakers" program that environmental impact fees paid by industries that emit large amounts of greenhouse gas will help fund the big train project. Getting Nowhere, Very Fast. California has a huge state debt and Washington has a huge national debt. But that does not discourage either Governor Jerry Brown or President Barack Obama from wanting to launch a very costly high-speed rail system. Most of us might be a little skittish about spending money if we were teetering on the brink of bankruptcy. But the beauty of politics is that it is all other people's money, including among those other people generations yet unborn. Other related information USA Urbanized Areas over 500,000: a statistical comparison of population, land area and density trends using data from 1990 and 2000. Planes, Trains ... and Buses? It's the new face of bus travel. After years as the ugly stepchild of intercity transportation — thanks to its long-held reputation as unfriendly, uncomfortable and tawdry — bus travel is bouncing back. Rails Won't Save America. Rising gas prices and concerns about greenhouse gases have stimulated calls to build more rail transit lines in urban areas, increase subsidies to Amtrak, and construct a large-scale intercity high-speed rail system. These megaprojects will cost hundreds of billions of dollars, but they won't save energy or significantly reduce greenhouse gas emissions. "As urban growth and transportation expert Randal O'Toole notes in his recent book The Best Laid Plans, the New York City subway is the only rail transit line in the country that carries as many people as a single freeway lane." 
|
|
Document location http://www.akdart.com/enviro31.html Updated January 31, 2012. Page design by Andrew K. Dart ©2012 |