  Bvos Member Username: Bvos Post Number: 1648 Registered: 10-2003 Posted From: 134.215.223.211 |
Once again, another great mass-transit article by Keith Schneider in the Metro Times: http://www.metrotimes.com/edit orial/story.asp?id=9379 | ||
Genesyxx Member Username: Genesyxx Post Number: 541 Registered: 02-2004 Posted From: 71.159.22.7 |
Does anyone else think that since we're the "Motor City" that there will be ABSOLUTELY NO OTHER FORMS OF TRANSPORTATION here? | ||
Danindc Member Username: Danindc Post Number: 1590 Registered: 10-2003 Posted From: 67.100.158.10 |
Tell that to Stuttgart! | ||
Detroitstar Member Username: Detroitstar Post Number: 77 Registered: 01-2006 Posted From: 35.8.144.6 |
I know I'm stating the obvious...but I just cant stop myself. Nobody's got big enough balls to step up to the plate and drop the money into a mass transit system, no matter where or no matter how big. | ||
Detroitplanner Member Username: Detroitplanner Post Number: 6 Registered: 04-2006 Posted From: 63.85.13.248 |
I don't know about great, he makes a lot of assumptions and threads things together loosely. Most of SEMCOG's plans have nothing to do with increasing capacity, but replacing what is currently there. I see him using Woodward as a way to bash government in General. All of the Cities he mentions as beacons are also sprawling; most far worse than Detroit. Reads like rich fake liberal drivel to me. | ||
Jsmyers Member Username: Jsmyers Post Number: 1787 Registered: 12-2003 Posted From: 209.131.7.68 |
Great editorial.
All of those cities are part of growing regions, of course they will get physically larger. We are a shrinking region, so it makes no sense to be expanding as we have been. | ||
River_rat Member Username: River_rat Post Number: 171 Registered: 02-2006 Posted From: 68.166.44.44 |
Wow! I expect to see steam locomotives pulling passenger cars down Woodward any day now! NOT. Get real. Detroit will not benefit (or get) mass transit until it does two things. 1, Stop crime 2. Eliminate inneffective and corrupt politicos. As the citizenry persists in electing oafs to office, persists in tolerating crime by accepting judges such as we have, and populating juries with apologists, 1. and 2. will not change and we won't get mass transit. End of story. | ||
Detroitplanner Member Username: Detroitplanner Post Number: 7 Registered: 04-2006 Posted From: 63.85.13.248 |
Js, he should be comparing us more to places like Cleveland, Buffalo, Rochester, Toledo, and other places. My point is he is comparing apples and oranges and is assuming that transit and regionalism is an important factor. There are places out there that are far more fragmented than Detroit, but have great transit. Look at Chicagoland for example. Is it perfect? No, but it is certainly better than most places for transit. In terms of regionalism, they have two SEMCOG types CATS AND NEPIC, as well as three major transit agencicies, hundereds of municipalities, more corruption than even Kwame gives us, the worst sprawl imaginable, and yet they can function transit. Chicago has nothing like Woodward, or any of our other great streets in terms of adapapibility for BRT/Streetcars. We have a lot of assets, he portrays the area as spending too much on sprawl, when 90 percent of what he says is being to build new, is actually to reconstruct and repair existing. I think he is painting a picture that feeds the flames of 'why can't Detroit see they are pissing in their well when we up here in Traverse City can see it and advise them"? He should concentrate on the problems of Traverse City instead of pointing out the problems of others. Its real easy for someone who lives in a 95 percent white republican city to talk about race relations. I'd like to see MLUI do something about it. Put their money where their and mouth feet are | ||
Jsmyers Member Username: Jsmyers Post Number: 1788 Registered: 12-2003 Posted From: 209.131.7.68 |
St. Louis? Actually, Cleveland is another good example in many ways, even if it was not used. Chicago is an interesting case. Because you are right that in many ways it is more fragmented. But the spirit of togetherness seems to hold greater Chicago toghether. Of course it has sprawl, it is growing up and out at the same time. But there is a choice that does not exist in Detroit, which is largely just spreading out. There is no growth, and little movement up. Since SEMCOG's organizational structure enables the worst kind of groupthink imaginable, the people get stuck with a virtually useless organization. I don't know much about CATS, but what I have seen has led me to believe that it is a cohesive organization. Chicago corruption? But river_rat told us that corrupt politicians are half our problem. How can Chicago be doing so well? Could it be...that...gasp....river_rat is wrong? SEMCOG goes to great lengths to make it look like most of the road money is going to "fix it first." A great percentage of it is, but nowhere near 90%. A lot of capacity expansions are treated as safety projects. New signals, turn lanes, wider shoulders, and boulevarded streets might make things safer, but they have a primary effect of increasing the capacity of the roadway. Similarly, a project like replacing a worn out 2 lane bridge with a new 4 lane bridge is often treated by SEMCOG as a repair of existing infrastructure. That is obviously only half true. Even if only 10% of our transportation money was going to expansion, that is still a huge problem IMO. We should not be expanding our infrastructure (and our future obligation to maintain it) when our population and economic base is getting smaller....unless that investment will help to improve our economy and attract residents. It is pretty obvious to many people, probably including Keith Schneider, that rapid transit is that investment, but that a new, high capacity, Wixom Road interchange is definitely not. | ||
Brandonz Member Username: Brandonz Post Number: 32 Registered: 04-2005 Posted From: 68.40.195.29 |
MLUI really needs to open a Detroit office ASAP... | ||
Ltorivia485 Member Username: Ltorivia485 Post Number: 2728 Registered: 08-2004 Posted From: 69.17.38.195 |
Seriously, Brandon. Why the hell are they are in Northern Michigan? They need to think SE Michigan. Another question: why can't the light rail system have electricity on the railings and not above the ground on freaken electricity lines? | ||
Trainman Member Username: Trainman Post Number: 87 Registered: 04-2006 Posted From: 152.163.100.8 |
Quote Nobody's got big enough balls to step up to the plate and drop the money into a mass transit system, no matter where or no matter how big. End of Quote This statement is not true. Detroit has the best mass transit system in the World. It's called the free enterprise system. It's best te defeat transit tax increases and this includes the August 8, 2006 SMART renewal which is a tax increase althrough called a renewal. Getting Mass Transit to work without taxpayer support is a no-brainer. The answer is for the users to pay and if they dont' then let them walk or call a cab. Mass transit taxes do not help the poor as one DYer falsely claimed in another post. I clear up all the myths about mass transit and show the public the facts in my website. Please ask for it if you want to learn the facts. | ||
Jasoncw Member Username: Jasoncw Post Number: 189 Registered: 07-2005 Posted From: 67.149.141.170 |
So that people don't get electricuted? | ||
Lmichigan Member Username: Lmichigan Post Number: 3969 Registered: 10-2003 Posted From: 24.11.154.56 |
Trainman, get out of here you f%cking crackhead, now. lol (Message edited by lmichigan on July 05, 2006) | ||
Ltorivia485 Member Username: Ltorivia485 Post Number: 2729 Registered: 08-2004 Posted From: 69.17.38.195 |
Jas, people can get electrocuted with down power lines too. Especially if lightning strikes them. | ||
Danindc Member Username: Danindc Post Number: 1591 Registered: 10-2003 Posted From: 67.100.158.10 |
Trainman, do you take a cab to and from work everyday? | ||
Iheartthed Member Username: Iheartthed Post Number: 129 Registered: 04-2006 Posted From: 64.131.176.232 |
New York got it right 100 years ago. | ||
Jasoncw Member Username: Jasoncw Post Number: 190 Registered: 07-2005 Posted From: 67.149.141.170 |
So you think they should be put on the ground to save the wind the trouble of knocking them down and endangering people? I think having the wires is just fine. | ||
Detroit313 Member Username: Detroit313 Post Number: 121 Registered: 02-2006 Posted From: 67.38.3.10 |
Yes, and New York also has a lot of political clout. Detroit needs more lobbiest in D.C. to secure more money for a rapid transit system. We can still be the Motor City...........trains have motors too. 313 | ||
Brandonz Member Username: Brandonz Post Number: 34 Registered: 04-2005 Posted From: 198.108.4.105 |
"Seriously, Brandon. Why the hell are they are in Northern Michigan? They need to think SE Michigan." Accident of history, I guess. MLUI seems to have been birthed out of sprawl battles in NW Michigan and gradually worked their way toward a statewide focus from there. Although I do find it incredibly odd that they have still have so great a presence in the small tourist towns of the NW, a Grand Rapids office, and a Lansing office, and no presence in our state's greatest (and probably most distressed) metropolitan region. We need their voice down here... those other areas are small potatoes in comparison. Kudos to MetroTimes for giving Schneider such a prominent forum, though. | ||
Fnemecek Member Username: Fnemecek Post Number: 1729 Registered: 12-2004 Posted From: 70.227.207.217 |
Yes, because Detroit is the only city on the planet with either crime or incompetent/corrupt politicians. | ||
River_rat Member Username: River_rat Post Number: 180 Registered: 02-2006 Posted From: 71.126.176.175 |
Fnemecek - Detroit isn't the only city with crime and incompetent and corrupt politicians but it has the most inept politicians, the perception (maybe reality) of the worst crime, and the Washington representation of Detroit is seen as totally irrelevent. Therefore, Detoit will get no $$$$ and have no rapid transit. I apologize for telling how it is. | ||
Danny Member Username: Danny Post Number: 4490 Registered: 02-2004 Posted From: 198.111.165.50 |
The suburbs are ready for mass transit, but not Detroit. If a white suburbanite says to KING KWAME and his CLOWNSIL folks. they would problably say " LET US THINK ABOUT IT." It's going to have too much talks, money and voting approvals to make the Woodward mass transit happens. Or it could die out. | ||
Detroit_stylin Member Username: Detroit_stylin Post Number: 2762 Registered: 10-2003 Posted From: 69.213.205.237 |
And how is that Gospel River_rat? Cause Time Magazine said so? | ||
Danindc Member Username: Danindc Post Number: 1595 Registered: 10-2003 Posted From: 67.100.158.10 |
Stabenow did manage to get $100 million for the AA-Detroit transit study. The problem now is two-fold: 1) a lack of political will on the local (county) level and 2) for as much as Michigan loves to tout its "local control", the current state Legislature will do everything it can to not invest money in transit in SE Michigan | ||
Erichp77 Member Username: Erichp77 Post Number: 182 Registered: 12-2003 Posted From: 68.248.3.236 |
On the contrary, I'm almost positive that Kwame had always been in support of light rail. The fact that Patterson is just now softing up to the idea is a major ice breaker alone. | ||
River_rat Member Username: River_rat Post Number: 182 Registered: 02-2006 Posted From: 71.126.176.175 |
Detroit stylin... No, because the Congress appropriates the money that makes any rapid mass transit possible and it won't come here because of the reasons I stated. | ||
Trainman Member Username: Trainman Post Number: 96 Registered: 04-2006 Posted From: 205.188.116.137 |
Our mass transit systems are generously funded by the taxpayers in southeast Michigan. Rail will work if we can fix and maintain our current mass transit system becuase this will attract more good jobs. It's money from jobs to pay at the fare-box or monthly passes that is the best answer to improve mass transit. |
