I am guessing that there will probably be "no new taxes." Even if there were new taxes, they would probably just take more from the already poor. I think that if there was a way to get big businesses involved, the only important part of our society, then we could get some more funding for our failing systems. However, if legislatures in Oregon as well as the nation keep voting against taking care of the little guy, I do not see this happening any time soon.

Oregon should take a stand, but it is doubtful that we will.

-erc: Revolutionary

Here's a wild idea, instead of throwing every transportation dollar at light rail, trams and gondolas (which only benefit City of Portland), we divert some of that to fixing the roads?

Sorry, when I hear the "We can't fix anything without new taxes" refrain, these public transport projects seem to continue just fine under the current tax structure.

Steve,

Most of our transportation dollars are coming from Federal sources, earmarked for specific things (highways, arterials, maintenance, modernization, transit) and matched at a state or reginal level at varying percentages. Access to sources for builing transit has a nationwide dollar amount set in congress. Since fewer communities are going for transit, there's an even greater return on investment and much easier access to funds. In other words, it's not like folks don't know we need road fixing, it's that the dollars coming from Uncle Sam can only be spent on certain things. And everyone's going for road money.

And, I think, transit dollars over time are better spent. They reduce congestion, save on wear, and free up what limited maintenance money there is. Interesting fact: One third of people travelling the I-84 corridor between Portland and Gresham during rush hour are on light rail. One third. That's 2 lanes of highway traffic and added congestion saved. Money well spent, I think.

Jesse, et al

The infrastructure talked about in this article is not just about roads and bridges, so I want to both respond and comment futher on the original article.

We do have matching Federal dollars for Highways and Roads, but our gas tax is the major, base source of our transportation budget in Oregon. As gas prices go up, we will see a decrease in that revenue, making the revenue problem worse. On a regional basis, I think that money spent on mass transit in the Portland/Metro - 3 County area is fine, but we have no choice but to use existing roads in the rest of the State. While a bus or two might be practical in the cities of Bend or Medford, there is no where else east of the Cascades or south of Eugene where mass transit is really practical at this time. We can't ignore the crumbling bridge while waiting for the bus to come - I can't do my work from any conceivable mass transit option.

In the bigger sense of what this article is about, I can't help but compare America to the Roman Empire. They built with stone, we built with particle board and asphalt shingles. Our downhill tumble into wreck and ruin will happen much faster than their's did. We don't need any external Vandals to do the work; we just need a few years, a failing roof, and some rain.

The broader issue is the upward pull on money, leaving the hands of the working class, and disappearing into the hands of the wealthy corporate owner class.

The one issue underlying the Social Security private fund concept is that the working class would be forced to give money to the corporations (called investing), but rather than build up capital that could be passed onto the next generation, the capital would be used to buy an annuity. An annuity is a contract to pay a monthly amount to a person so long as they shall live, but at the end of the contract, the company keeps all the money. In other words, every dollar spent on private accounts moves from workers to corporate owners - sucking every cent from the workers.

The same is happening with oil. While prices are set by market dynamics, does it really cost oil companies any more to produce oil? NO. Texaco/Chevron gets a lot of its oil from the Gulf of Mexico. Did production costs go up there? Maybe a little due to weather and aging equipment? Did the price charged for that oil go up? YES. Because there is a bidding war between American, China and the rest of Asia, Europe, etc. Is that bidding war manipulated by the International Corporations? I don't really know, but it is an interesting question after having seen what Enron did to energy costs in California. So, it doesn't really cost more to deliver the oil, but the price is way up. What is the dynamic of the money? The workers give more to the corporations. An unearned benefit. A dynamic that acts to suck out the money from the working class and pass it up to the corporate ownership class.

And so on. It not just crumbling bridges, roads, and buildings. Our society is crumbling due to the wealth transfer that is underway.

Glad to read On a regional basis, I think that money spent on mass transit in the Portland/Metro - 3 County area is fine.

I recall in the late 1990s there were complaints that "nobody" would ride light rail. I believe Jesse's statistics to the contrary.

More than that, my niece graduated from Linfield a few years ago, got a good job in downtown Portland, and after a year or so moved to Washington County. She and her husband now live in a condo a couple blocks from a MAX station. She takes MAX to and from work and so doesn't drive her car except on weekends or to go shopping, visit friends, etc.

I am well aware there are places in large sections of Oregon where transit may be impractical. But I am also aware of some of the inflamatory rhetoric on this issue over the years. And the jist of the 1990s rhetoric was that EVERYONE would rather drive than take public transit. It implied that those young people like my niece would never exist and thus West Side Light Rail was a dumb idea.

It is wiser to advocate for one's view of an issue using concrete serious rhetoric rather than inflamatory rhetoric which may (in the immortal words of Ed Rollins) "not exactly be on message with the truth".

I am having a hard time understanding what SocSec reform and BigOil have to do with crumbling bridges (unless this is a general slam to everything that doesn't surrender total control to government.) I don't think I ever said public transport is not a good thing. My issue is with funding it to the exclusion of everything else.

Almost every public transport project in Portland finds money, even the marginal ones like the tram (do we really need to subsidize transport to $1M condos?) and the gondola (same for doctors at OHSU.) Yet our fix for the Sellwood Bridge - lower the weight limit until it becomes a pedestrian bridge.

"Greasy Neil" got his start by taking the Mt Hood Freeway money and diverting it back to the Transit Mall, so it is possible to fairly allocate tax dollars, if there is a desire to. I only ask we consider the needs of the majority (sorry, Jeese, I am having a hard time reconciling your ridership stats) who need to go places public transport doesn't.

If new infrastructure is paid for by those who make it necessary, it will not burden present inhabitants, and unsustainable growth will be reduced.

As for highways, it will not be long before we can't afford the energy to either run our vehicles or keep roads paved. The infrastructure we need is rail transportation and localized economy.

Jesse wrote: And, I think, transit dollars over time are better spent. They reduce congestion, save on wear, and free up what limited maintenance money there is. Interesting fact: One third of people travelling the I-84 corridor between Portland and Gresham during rush hour are on light rail. One third.

More Interesting Fact: Most of those people would be in busses if we hadn't wasteed about a billion on that section of Vera's toy train. Little known fact: About 2/3 of light rail riders would be on busses if rail hadn't been built and the buses stopped. Second fact: some other people quit taking transit when rail came in because it is less convient than bus - it's stops are twice as far apart, most people have to endure an additional transfer or two and is is not faster. I have seen calims that these lost riders cancel out the new riders that were atractd to rail. In othewr words there may have been NO INCREASE IN TRANSIT USE FOR THAT BILLION.

A billion in road work probably would have solved the US26 congestion problem. And a few other problems too.

That's 2 lanes of highway traffic and added congestion saved. Money well spent, I think.

Not really, it's ZERO traffic lanes saved because those people would be in a small number of buses and the added lanes would have cured our congestion in that corredor. But the idiot from New York knew what was best for us: emulate Los Angelas

jim

Yes, every public transport project finds money. And every bridge project. How long was transit in the works before it was funded? Streetcar? St. John's Bridge? Hawthorne Bridge? We're still talking about tagged dollars and a lot of time. If we are raising issue with where and how those get tagged, I'm all for the discussion.

Our gas tax has been flat since 1991. Every west coast state surrounding us has a) a higher gas tax and b) a sales tax on vehicles. Couple those issues with a rise in transit ridership and fuel economy--both good things I think--and we are left with an underfunded transportation budget and shrinking resources. Our best solution: maximize return on investment. Build transit, reduce miles traveled, stem expensive modernization and building increased maintenance needs. And, find another investor (OHSU in the tram & Streetcar, Port of Portland for Marine Drive, Neighborhood Associations for speed bumps) who can match funds. And, spend as many dollars as you can to keep up on maintenance. (The City has a $10M backlog on maintenance alone.)

(I apologize about my stats. They were not correct. I did my research and found "MAX carries 26 percent of afternoon rush hour commuters traveling from downtown in the Sunset Hwy. and Banfield Fwy. corridors." I got my stats on trimet ridership here.)

Jim,

Where did you find your info? I'd be interested in knowing. This page says that in 1998 before Westside MAX that only 14,300 bus trips were made in the area. With MAX, in 2002, 39,600 trips were made, 29,000 on MAX. Bus rides dropped only 700, and with accounting for natural transit growth I still don't see where the 29,000 come from if not from a greater experience and convenience on the MAX.

If new infrastructure is paid for by those who make it necessary, it will not burden present inhabitants, and unsustainable growth will be reduced.

<hr/>

Mr Civiletti

I believe I am paying gas, federal and state taxes already. In addition, I subsidize: - All the MAX riders who pay about 1/3 the actual cost of their ride.
- The mostly free tram rides and probably the free gondola rides also even though I get no benefit whatsoever. - Bike paths also even though bike riders pay absolutely nothing to build these.

So, I have no idea what you are trying to nuance.

"- Bike paths also even though bike riders pay absolutely nothing to build these."

Bullpucky. Bike riders are usually paying taxes as well (gas taxes, income taxes, sales taxes, etc.) that are used to go to pay for roads, bike paths, etc.

And if you're so worried about subsidizing other users, why not attack the wheelchair-using community... after all, your taxes are being used to make all those ramps at street corners... or why not go after pedestrians, because last I checked you didn't pay anything to license your right to walk, and yet all these sidewalks and crosswalks and ugh! ugh! Urgh! Hmmmph! Goddamn freeloading children and elderly folks! Must. Make. Them. Pay.

I was responding to Mr Civiletti's comment:

If new infrastructure is paid for by those who make it necessary, it will not burden present inhabitants, and unsustainable growth will be reduced.

I was countering his statement that infrastructure is only paid by those who make it necessary. So I think we are in agreement that bike-riders and non-bikers both pay for these paths.

Same with sidewalks and handicapped access which we include when we build new housing/floor space. No complaints.

My complaint is that we equalize funding amongst transit projects and freeway/bridge maintenance et al projects.

I have to plea ignorance about how we will reduce unsustainable growth by making users pay for every type of transport.

Steve,

My comment on infrastructure was aimed at Russell's original discussion of sanitary sewer construction. I do not believe that those who make new infrastructure necessary are paying for it, but that they SHOULD pay for it through system delivery charges that fully cover the cost of services. In Oregon it is illegal for school districts to charge SDCs for new school rooms [I'm with Senator Schrader in calling for change here]. Although SDCs are allowed for sewer construction, they don't cover the cost of new plants that are necessary only because of the need for increased capacity [which is what Russell was writing about]. No nuance here. I am anti-growth because it takes us farther away from sustainability.

I do support subsidies for mass transit because I see the single occupancy automobile as a disaster only beginning to be realized. Indeed, I am not anti-subsidy. I believe in subsidy for what is beneficial to society. Public education is beneficial, so I'm for subsidizing instruction. Growth is not beneficial, so I'm against subsidizing new classrooms. That may be construed as nuance, but it's actually pretty straightforward.

As for bikepaths, I think we should pay people to use them.

By the way, there's no need to call me "Mr." I'm a permanent juvenile.

Russell<,

You are substituting complaints about wasteful inefficient transit with complaints about transit. An often used method to argue an easier fictitious position.

Russell >Some fundamentals:<

Heavy trucks and studded tires cause the wear and tear on highway surfaces and bridges.<

Indeed. Unfortunately TriMet and Metro long ago abandoned the need to keep "Heavy trucks" (commerce) moving and we now have chaos with commerce mobility and rush hour congestion.

Commuter traffic creates congestion<

No, Metro does intentionally under the notion that if they make driving miserable people will get out of their cars.

More lanes and more highways create more traffic congestion. They no not reduce it.<

That's always been a farce and was debunked years ago. The premise is really quite pathetic on it's face.

So much so that it is like saying expanding "sewage treatment and water supply systems" capacities creates more shortages. They do not reduce it. Or how about, we shouldn't build more school because they will just fill up. Capacity is capacity. We either have enough or we don't. We either deliberately create a shortage or we don't.

No form of transportation functions without subsidy. Some of the subsidies are just better hidden, that's all.<

Yes, and some such as Light Rail, are monumentally wasteful, inefficient and devour the funds which would otherwise be used to accommodate the growth now being ignored.

In regard to bike path's. Oregon seems to pride itself on building excessive miles and miles of bike paths, (In many cases on both sides of roads and along sidewalks) which rarely or never get used. The sidewalks as well.

I'm all for bike riding/pedestrians and a reasonable effort to accommodate those modes but there is such a thing as insanity. Creating excess capacity for lesser used modes and spending billions on another (Light Rail) which 1% of commuters use while deliberately congesting the primary mode is insane.

Russell's packaging of the insanity in the wrapper of "there's no waste- we need more taxes" is not helping. He is exacerbating the problems we face.

We need to understand the basis of the disagreement on transportation funding. If highways full of cars are without problems, then subsidies for mass transit and bike travel are silly. Those who support rail and bicycle subsidies do so because they believe auto traffic is not a good thing, and becoming less good over time.

My take: when fossil fuel costs around $4/gallon [present dollar], we will be glad for every bit of alternative transit we have built. I think that price is very likely within 10 years and likely within five. Did I forget to mention global warming and the asthma epidemic?

Let's throw in some numbers

Here's the breakdown of funds from ODOT (there are other pots of money too). metro MTIP 2004-07

For 2004-07, ODOT is spending $76.6 million on building more roads ("capacity"), $98 million on preservation (fixing current roads), and $2.64 million on bikes and pedestrians. $99.6 million is also for OTIA projects, and these are "modernization" (i.e. building more roads/expanding current roads and bridges) projects. Along with bridge, operations, etc. costs we're looking at around $390 million for roads. Over the same time, we're looking at $428 million for transit.

So, yes, debate transit v. roads. But don't go ragging on bike lanes for costing much money, because they're comparatively nothing (e.g. the US 26 widening costs $32 million, more than ten times the total projects for bikes over five years).

Alex, Do you know what modernization means?

You said, "$99.6 million is also for OTIA projects, and these are "modernization" (i.e. building more roads/expanding current roads and bridges) projects""

Now this shows me you do not know. Modernization is not building more roads or more lanes. In fact "modernization", the scheme-word used to hide what is really going on, is actually lane reduction in many cases. "Traffic calming" and "boulevard making" where they take out traffic lanes and add bubble curbs, islands, bike lanes etc. So you can put that 100 million on the BS side and not road side.

You said "$390 million for roads. Over the same time, we're looking at $428 million for transit." Your numbers are skewed and incomplete but transit in the Metro area carries a minute percentage (smaller because of rail) of commuters yet spending has been heavily weighted towards rail and not "transit". TriMet is cutting bus service. There is no debate of road Vs transit. It's bad transit and bad spending devouring our ability to have good transit and adequate road capacity.
You say, "don't go ragging on bike lanes for costing much money, because they're comparatively nothing (e.g. the US 26 widening costs $32 million, more than ten times the total projects for bikes over five years)."

What a ridiculous comparison. Bike lanes (many of which are rarely or never used) also hog space and reduce the ability to have more travel lanes for automobiles and commerce. I know you like that but that is not a good thing for many reasons. Despite your predictions..

The 26 expansion is nothing but a parking lot project.

"Now this shows me you do not know. Modernization is not building more roads or more lanes."

Um, look at the projects. Some of them are reconstruction and not expansion projects. But in the list: $22 million to widen Sunnyside Road; $4.7 million to add a travel lane; $2.9 million for a new interchange; $4.7 million for a longer, wider bridge; $5.2 million for a 5 lane road.

Read, dude, read. And please provide us with complete numbers, happy to look at them...

And, um, bike lanes are definitely used. Bike commuting to downtown Portland has doubled over the past ten years, according to bridge counts.

Jim,

Where did you find your info? I'd be interested in knowing. This page says that in 1998 before Westside MAX that only 14,300 bus trips were made in the area. With MAX, in 2002, 39,600 trips were made, 29,000 on MAX. Bus rides dropped only 700, and with accounting for natural transit growth I still don't see where the 29,000 come from if not from a greater experience and convenience on the MAX.

What TriMet doesn't bother to tell you is that the industry reports "boardings", which is anytime someone steps on a transit vehicle, instead of trips, or people, served. If you transfer from bus to rail, you have made a second boarding. Also, when you go home you will probably make two more boardings (with same transfers). So, many commuter make four or more boardings for one round trip.

When a rail line opens, TriMet reroutes the busses to force people onto rail, giving an instant doubling of boardings from those buss passengers. TriMet reports these as if they were new riders (or at least does nothing to help people understand where the numbers came from). That is why it looks like a lot of people use transit.

You can email TriMet from their web site and get the real numbers if you make it plain that you are looking for something like “how many PEOPLE make ROUND TRIPS on MAX each day”. Expect a BS answer first, then ask again to get the real data. You can also ask about transfers and the real number of daily users adjusted for transfers etc. Please share what you get.

Take any rail boarding number and divide by 2 to get round trips. Bus is more complex because of transfers.

As to portion of MAX riders that previously rode the bus that are now on rail, there is an article on a local web site, probably ORTEM.org, or OTI which mentions a survey that TriMet did in the early days of Max. The survey reportedly found that 2/3 of the riders previously rode the bus. Reportedly, TriMet chose to NOT repeat the survey.

It is pretty much obvious that when you make something harder to use, some people will quit using it. Max is harder to use because 1) many people have to walk further to a station 2) there is an extra transfer from bus to MAX for many riders 3) On the Banfield it is slower than the busses that it replaced. All of these are well known to reduce rider ship. I have not seen a firm number. On the other side MAX is nicer than a bus, so it will attract some people that would not ride a bus. Some critics claim that these two effects cancel each other and the net increase in transit usage due to rail is zero.

The OTI web site claims that the traffic counts on the Banfield DID NOT DECREASE when MAX opened, supporting the above hypophysis. Also supports the claim that MAX does not relieve congestion, one primary selling point.

Having said all that, it is my impression that TriMet’s market share has actually increased in the last 10 years (based on US Census data) by 1%. At that rate, the social engineers will have ½ of us out of our cars in only 500 years.

The cost breakdowns for each segment of the light rail system used to be on Tri-Met’s web site.

JK

Jim,

Where did you find your info? I'd be interested in knowing. This page says that in 1998 before Westside MAX that only 14,300 bus trips were made in the area. With MAX, in 2002, 39,600 trips were made, 29,000 on MAX. Bus rides dropped only 700, and with accounting for natural transit growth I still don't see where the 29,000 come from if not from a greater experience and convenience on the MAX.

a friend provided this:

See http://www.hevanet.com/oti/maxcounts98.htm.

Increases in west side are fictitious. First, it is impossible to distinguish between a west side trip and an east side trip and an airport trip because they all use the same track. East side and west side are one line so when does an east side trip become a west side trip? Airport overlaps the same track from Gateway to Beaverton Central.

Tri Met stopped taking a census, where trips were counted at each station (ons and offs). They don't do counts.

If Jesse would like to learn about ridership, he is welcome to join us when we do our next counts.

ODOT still does counts (they have counters at various locations and those counts are shown at the ODOT web site for the permanent counters on all the freeways in the metro area). All the counts show increases. If MAX were attracting riders, auto volumes would be dropping because registrations in the area are growing only a tad.

So where do the new riders come from??? They are shipped in by UFO's on contract with Mary Fetch of Tri Met.

Mel

Alex,

You said
"$22 million to widen Sunnyside Road; $4.7 million to add a travel lane; $2.9 million for a new interchange; $4.7 million for a longer, wider bridge; $5.2 million for a 5 lane road."

You started with 99 million in modernization and are now sighting a portion of that as road building. However these kinds of projects are addressing or lengthening choke points and not increasing corridoor capacity. Also these projects have all sorts of the things I mentioned earlier included, or buried, in them. The real road building portion of our transportation spending is exactly what one would expect in a system which is opposed to widening or building. Playing with the labels and numbers changes nothing and no case can be made that we have or are spending the portion of our resources we should on our roads.

According to the U.S. Census numbers, fewer than half of all people who commute to downtown Portland do so by single-occupant vehicle. Clearly, transit works when there's adequate investment and density (and pricing for parking).

Bill, That statement is a load of horse-pucky.

2000 US Census COMMUTING TO WORK
PORTLAND PMSA

Public transportation and taxis

2000 6.5% 1990 5.4% 1980 8.4%

http://www.heritage.org/Research/UrbanIssues/em832.cfm Census Shows Commuters are Rejecting Transit

http://www.publicpurpose.com/ut-usjtw95anal.htm Transit Work Trip Market Share Trends Downward in All US New Rail Cities

http://www.tppf.org/transit/trolley/fn.html US Census and National Ttransit database

http://www.hevanet.com/oti/sprawlreb.htm Why sprawl is good Portland. Transit accounts for only 2.8 percent of trips, with a mere 0.3 percent using MAX, and only about one percent of the Tri-Met's service area population is within walking distance of MAX stations.

http://www.qualitygrowth.org/toolkit_pdfs/Part1/Pt1_Transit.pdf

"TRANSIT" ....transit should not be seen as an alternative to expanding road capacity in meeting the demand for additional mobility. Instead, improvements in the capacity and efficiency of transit and road systems are complementary elements of a comprehensive approach to relieving congestion and meeting long-term transportation and environmental goals."

Actually, both of our statistics can be true -- you're using Portland PMSA counties, which includes Multnomah, Washington, Clackamas, Yamhill and Columbia in Oregon and Clark County in Washington. There's little argument that few people who live in Yamhill or Columbia County take transit.

BUT among those people who go to DOWNTOWN Portland, (maybe 150,000 people a day?) HALF of THOSE people are using transit or carpools or walking or biking.

So, 75,000 people a day = 4.16% of people in the six-county region (1.8 million people) and then another 2.4 % of folks who commute somewhere else take transit.

TomC, final comment - Your point is taken, but this is where I get confused. Why do we charge unique SDCs for people who build houses in addition to ongoing prop tax levies for parks, water bills and other taxes.

Then should we make everyone pay (at least the diff between fare and actual cost) for transit systems and bike lanes even if their employment doesn't allow them to take advantage of it. Perhaps, we can set fares at a point where they allow TriMet to break even (of course, this means $4 instead of $1.50 for fares.)

In the end, the market should decide. That is, if gas goes to $4.00/gal then this will drive people out of cars a lot faster than building a zillion miles of MAX.

For SDCs, houses should be charged what the actual cost to hook up with the sewer system is. If handling sewage goes up, then everyone using the system should share equally.

When you start arbitrarily levying SDC-like fees, there is too much opportunity for the well-connected to exploit them. As an example, fixed income people will never get a prop tax break, yet expensive condo developers inthe "right" neighborhoods who are the Mayor's friend - no problem.

Bill,

I don't buy your "downtown" numbers for a minute and certainly do not place the relevancy on them that you do.

How can you possibly roll right by the fact that over the twenty years 1980 to 2000 our share of commuters using transit went down? That is not a success story and should not be duplicated. Turn in your light rail fan club card. All things point to it being anti-transit.

Steve wrote:

"TomC, final comment - Your point is taken, but this is where I get confused. Why do we charge unique SDCs for people who build houses in addition to ongoing prop tax levies for parks, water bills and other taxes."

Government services have ongoing costs. Teachers must be paid, water pumped, parks maintained. Much tax money is used that way. We do pay property tax for school district capital improvment levies [if the voters approve]. Such levies could be smaller if SDCs for school building were allowed. In very few cases can governments pay for capital improvements out of income, sales, and property tax revenue [other than capitla improvement levies].

Theoretically, we could pay only one kind of tax to fund all government spending, but I doubt we could all agree on how that tax would be structured. Using several taxes and fees at different levels of government allows the payer to vary according to political will and ability to pay. It makes sense to many people that property tax would be used to fund firefighting and gas tax to fund transportation. Sin taxes [I consider gas tax one of these] can be used to discourage certain activities. I'd like to see a tax on using the word "Democrat" as an adjective.

Government would not cost much less if we had only one kind of tax, but paying would certainly be simpler.

Jessie refered to TriMet data. Here is my take on the TriMet data:

Trimet Claim: MAX carries 26%of afternoon rush-hour commuters traveling from downtown in the Sunset Hwy. and the Banfield Fwy. corridors.

Banfield is 3 lanes, so that statement says that MAX carries LESS THAN ONE FREEWAY LANE. That is consistent with the critics that I have read. Now recall that 2/3 of those people would be on the bus if MAX didn’t exist and you can get an idea of how much congestion relief we got for our billion dollars (actually a bit less $$ for the East side??) Lets calculate: 1/3 of 26% is 8.7%. That is the part of a three lane freeway that MAX equals, or about 26% of ONE LANE of the freeway. So, using your TriMet supplied data, one can see how ineffectual MAX is at relieving congestion. Of course some critics claim that the people who abandoned TriMet because MAX was less convenient canceled out that 1/3 of the riders who are new to MAX, so there might have been no net effect of spending almost 1 billion.

Trimet Claim: Between 1990 and 2001,TriMet ridership outpaced population growth and daily vehicle miles traveled.

By 1% in the last 10 years according to one critic, who uses US census ride to work data. If true, TriMet will have ½ of us out of our cars in only 500 years (no typo: 500 years)

Trimet Claim: Each weekday, MAX eliminates 65,000 car trips off our roads, easing traffic congestion and helping keep our air clean.

Well, no because 2/3 of those people would take the bus if MAX wasn’t around. So their claim should be MAX eliminates 22,000 car trips. (If MAX really netted any new people to transit - see above and earlier message)

Check out the videos on www.saveportland.com . One, Evaluation of Rail Transit Projects, is by a long time transit system auditor and CPA who has worked in various cities including LA and Portland. He gives a good look at transit terminolgy and the pros/cons of bus and rail. It is about a 30 minute RealMovie that you download and then play. It is a 19 meg file, so best if you have DSL/cable or else a spare hour.

JK

Russell,

Capacity is capacity. You dodged my point. I know different areas in the state have varying degrees of existing sewer capacities. Do you honestly think you needed to tell anyone that.

I was comparing capacity shortages and your ridiculous use of one of Mike Burton's favorite lines about not building freeways because they fill up.

Everyone in transportation knows that is the phoniest thing to come down the pike. There has never been a study to validate there was any induced demand. It was already there in neighborhood streets.

Think about it. I-205 swept up cars from parallel streets through neighborhoods and it is not full yet accept for the South end where it reduces to two lanes. ODOT numbers show that. Any bumper to bumper is due to choke points and lack of a West side freeway which should have been built years ago.

Where are you claiming the added 205 use came from? Some big surge in more trips or big increases in car registration? You have nothing but the same BS you probably heard from Burton and now because you repeated them someone else will also use them just like you. Fortunatley there are enough people who know the truth so it is more difficult for the BS to spread. You can't get away with it any more.
When you talk about "generating" more volume, show us from where this was generated. All data shows it was not from people formerly using transit. If everyone using transit in a corridor jumped into their cars and used that lane, it wouldn't be enough to fill a lane but we know that transit usage doesn't drop for various reasons and because Tri Met data verifies that.

Added volumes on freeways don't come from added registrations in the corridor because we don't add many registrations in a corridor each year.

So where do these volumes come from -- obviously from auto trips that were using neighborhood streets. Neighborhood streets like 82nd, Sandy, Barbur, are more dangerous so moving them to faster, safer freeways is a public good.

Originally, freeways were not supposed to be used for intra-urban traffic. But cities like Portland wanted to save money on arterials so they demanded entry and exit ramps do that short trips would use freeways and save cities the cost of building more and wider arterials.

At the time, one of the arguments used was safety.

On commuters. How lame is it for you to group carpool trips with transit? It's bad enough to recycle the old Mike Burton line about not building new freeways because they will just fill up but mingling numbers they way you do is laughable and the old TriMet game. Here's the numbers for folks to "decide for themselves" if our costly rail dominated transit has been a success. And at the end of consideration of the true numbers and track record anyone holding onto the TriMet interprtations either works there or is dishonest.

US Census Journey to work trips

                    Washington County        Multnomah            Portland

Drive alone 74.7% 62.7% 63.3%
Carpool 14.0% 11.6% 11.7% Vs. Bus 2.7% 10.9% 12.1% Rail 1.6% 1.2% 1.03%

Trend not good Portland area public transportation and taxis 2000 6.5%
1990 5.4%
1980 8.4%

"US Census Journey to work trips

Washington County Multnomah Portland Drive alone 74.7% 62.7% 63.3% Carpool 14.0% 11.6% 11.7% Vs. Bus 2.7% 10.9% 12.1% Rail 1.6% 1.2% 1.03%

Trend not good Portland area public transportation and taxis 2000 6.5% 1990 5.4% 1980 8.4%"

Richard: Lies, damn lies and statistics.

Picking and choosing among Census data to fit your POV is lame. To get an accurate picture, compare Portland-Vancouver Urbanized Area commute data from 1990 to 2000. You'll see that transit use went from 6.5% to 7.1% in that timeframe. Meanwhile, the drive alone rate dropped from 73.3% to 71.9%. Bicycling edged up .2%; small, but still an increase. If there are viable alternatives to the car, people will use them.

How wide do we make our freeways to eliminate congestion? Which neighborhoods do we eviserate to build more roads? It's very easy to say that we need more capacity, but where has this strategy worked for any length of time? Los Angeles? Phoenix? Houston? Chicago? Anywhere?

Quite the little tizzy fit Dan. You must work for TriMet and prefer we stay on track and have our region go down the drain.

Lies? Picking and choosing?

Hardly. It's the raw US census numbers. People can figure out what 1% or 2% of commuters using light rail means without you "explaining" things. Most people see it as wasting billions on something which carries too few commuters. It is you who pick and choose and Morphs statistics to fit your TriMet fantasies.

Bicycling edged up .2%< That's makes it somewhere hovering around a nano share. So what? 2/10's of one percent of relative nothing is still nothing.

If there are viable alternatives to the car, people will use them<. No one said people don't use any alternative modes. It's the numbers silly that matter and how we plan and spend for reality. Stick to the core subject.

How wide do we make our freeways to eliminate congestion?<

Get off the TriMet baloney. We're not going to "eliminate", but it can be much better with reality planning.

Which neighborhoods do we eviscerate to build more roads?< Now that's the usual dramatic punt. I'll be tougher now that the system has been neglected for decades and crazy infill has overcrowded much of the region. Doing nothing or more of the same so people like you don't get upset will only make things worse.

It's very easy to say that we need more capacity<

It's not "saying" it's math. You can ignore it because you hate cars, or something, and things will get worse in many ways already acknowledged by Metro themselves. I saved this from another blog. Metro head, Mike Burton's State of the Region Speech, 2000
Traffic congestion is bad and getting worse. It is a nightmare for commuters and it is choking freight mobility. There is no more clear illustration of our inability to meet growth needs than our failure to address our transportation needs. Within the transportation arena we are facing utter chaos."

Now is Metro full of lies? How could this be? We are the planning Mecca, right? Do you think we are facing chaos because we haven't built enough light rail or enough bike paths?

but where has this strategy worked for any length of time?< Everywhere including Portland until we stopped accommodating growth. Foolishly thinking it somehow would therefore not happen. San Antonio for instance has stayed the rational course. About the size as Portland area and they have two freeway circles, inner and outer, with multiple spokes spanning the area. Their freeways have access roads on both sides for businesses to limit short trip uses of freeways and it all works great. They have public transit too. Which works better due to an adequate road system and affordable routes and service levels. They did not waste billions on inefficient toy trains that do not work while recklessly ignoring their roads and cutting bus service. Or pretending bikes would pickup the slack.

Richard, this was the typical sprawl apologist, anti light rail vitrolic reply I expected from you. Since we're making gross generalizations, you must work for a developer or the automotive industry. You picked raw Census data from a couple of counties that helped you make your point, but if you look at the overall Portland Metropolitian area, as I did, your point falls apart.

I don't think "most" people think that light rail or the other investments the region has made in alternatives as a waste. You have nothing to base that statement on. The light rail system is still incomplete. Its mode share will increase as it further developed. The fact that people continue to move here, despite a lagging economy, says something about the type of city Portland has become and is trying to be. The auto-based transportation system is a failed experiment. It's way past time to build a rational, balanced transportation system that moves people, not merely cars. I'm a car enthuasiast, for the record. But I don't need my car for every trip I take, because I have options and I know how to use them.

Dan,

There is nothing more vitriolic that your lecture to continue the fast track towards what you preach is what we are to avoid.

The "chaos" we have achieved that Burton spoke of is the same as LA.

Your closed minded, blind opposition for all sprawl at the expense of everything else is insulting.

gross generalizations???????????

How is simply stating the light rail ridership gross generalization?

you must work for a developer or the automotive industry<<<

Oh is that the only people who need to get around our region for commerce, commuting and enjoyment?

You picked raw Census data from a couple of counties that helped you make your point<<<

It's the counties where we have rail and it's the ridership numbers. What would you prefer? Exclude those simple numbers from public consideration so you can continue your folly?

but if you look at the overall Portland Metropolitan area, as I did, your point falls apart.<<<

Huh?

I don't think "most" people think that light rail or the other investments the region has made in alternatives as a waste.<<<<

I guess you don't know we had some votes? To determine the waste factor we look math. Cost, ridership and alternatives. Yes it's a waste and always will be. Our bus system needs enhanced to serve more people more often and our roads need additional capacity. All according to math. Not TriMet snow jobs.

The light rail system is still incomplete. Its mode share will increase as it further developed.<<<<<

Oh ya throw a few more billions at it because Dan says so. What's ya got to back that share increase BS up with? What do you suppose the ridership of Clackamas County will be if the light rail is extended there? Should we not anticipate a duplication of the paltry 1.6% of commuters who use it in Washington County?

The fact that people continue to move here, despite a lagging economy, says something about the type of city Portland has become and is trying to be.<<<

Trying? Ya right. Just like if I were to take trip to SF and start driving towards Seattle. Every so often I could tell myself, "At least I am trying to get to SF"

The auto-based transportation system is a failed experiment.<<<

Only 85 percent of people enjoy it's freedom daily.

It's way past time to build a rational, balanced transportation system that moves people, not merely cars.<<<

Balanced? Nice buzz word. That's what we've been doing and why we have a transportation system in chaos. Why commerce mobility is hobbled, why our Port is hobbled and why our economy and commuters are suffering.

I'm a car enthusiast, for the record. But I don't need my car for every trip I take, because I have options and I know how to use them.<<<

So what. You'd have more options more parts of the day along with more people if we stop wasting money on rail. More frequent bus service for more people in more areas means more transit use and more options. There is no obstruction at all for expanded bus service outside commute hours. It's pure affordability. TriMet turns down requests for more service because they waste money on light rail which is enormously inefficient especially during non commute hours. The fact that it will never carry more than 1 or 2% of commuters flies right by you.

It's just too "vitriolic" for you to ponder and grasp.

My plan would call for a whole bunch of folks at TriMet, Metro and city planning departments to lose their jobs, as they have proven themselves to be a detriment to our region's livability and sustainability.

And before any more light rail, the Tram and Washington County commuter rail. Boondoggles all, which coincidentally will never be voted on. You know what a public vote is Dan?

As a preemptive strike. According to the census, all journey to work trips on rail (MAX and trolley) totaled 7,692. Work trips are the only times roads are congested. Each freeway carries over 5,000 per hour during the four hour peak period. Volumes per day for freeways range from 135,000 on I-217 to 145,000 on the Sunset,160,000 in I-5 north and south I-84. These are measurements at one point and do not count offs and ons.

A freeway lane (single lane) carries 2,500 per hour. We can add a lane for a fraction of the cost of a light rail.

Instead of relieving west side traffic by building the west side bypass, the politicians are building a commuter rail line between Wilsonville and Beaverton, a route so devoid of trips we wouldn't place a bus on it.

TriMet and Metro are planning more chaos.

Hey Richard,

Building more and more roads has led us to where we are in America. It's a pattern that has been repeated since the 1930s. Build roads without an equally effective transit system and the whole exercise is doomed to fail.

The general public (ie: voters) have made it pretty clear they don't want roads, either. How do think light rail came about? SE Portland residents didn't want the Mt. Hood Freeway shoved down their throats, nor any of the other freeways Robert Moses envisioned. The Westside Bypass was shot down in the same manner. Do you know what the public process is, Richard?

Dan,

You are likely a victim of decades of misinformation, nonsense and a poor education system.

Building more and more roads has led us to where we are in America. It's a pattern that has been repeated since the 1930s. Build roads without an equally effective transit system and the whole exercise is doomed to fail.<<

Besides being asinine, that's funny because in Portland we are not building roads while at the same time building an ineffective transit system. The worst possible course.

The general public (ie: voters) have made it pretty clear they don't want roads, either. How do think light rail came about? SE Portland residents didn't want the Mt. Hood Freeway shoved down their throats, nor any of the other freeways Robert Moses envisioned. The Westside Bypass was shot down in the same manner. Do you know what the public process is, Richard?<<<

Neil Goldschmidt killed the Mt. Hood freeway and set about creating the disaster we now have. Thanks Neil. I lived in SE Portland at the time and the freeway would have proven to be timely. The westside by-pass was shot down by the bureaucrats and transportation planning tone Goldschmidt created and which fostered the nonsense you align with. I guess we should abandon the I-5/99 connector and Dundee/Newberg bypass ideas as well? As they will just fill up? Instead we should raise taxes and build more light rail and bike paths?

Yes I do know what public process is. The best form is voting. As when we voted down more Light Rail twice. The so-called public process we have now is corrupt and retarded as TriMet and Metro dish out continuous misinformation to protect their planning world and avoid the blame and consequences they deserve. You are part of the problem.

Our road system is a failed experiment??? It is responsible for our economic prominence. Every bit of food Dan eats comes on a road in a vehicle to the store. Every stick of furniture in his house as well as the materials which comprise his house came by truck to the lumber yard and by a vehicle from the lumber yard, material provider to his house.

Light rail goes out of service all the time and very few people are effected. Can you imagine what would happen if we closed the freeways?

The census data showing how few riders there are on light rail aren't generalizations of out of context. They are specific to counties and the City of Portland. ODOT road volumes are specific, and independent since they are collected mechanically continuously.

The comment about an incomplete system is ridiculous. Adding a line to Clackamas Town Center will attract very few people from Gresham because the overall trip time would be an hour and a half. They would go from Gresham to downtown and back to Clackamas. If they build a line along I-205, the guy from Gresham can transfer and go along 1-205 and get off along 205. What does he do then??? The Census shows the origin and destination of all work trips. A minuscule amount originates along 205. He can take a car to the line but , then, he has no car when he gets off the train.

Richard,

If your willing to sacrifice your property and or property value for added road capacity, have at it. Most in the region are just not willing to sacrifice their neighborhood for larger and larger highways.

Could you specify an area that has built it way out of congestion by roads alone?

Look, paving the entire state could possible solve our problem but would anyone what to live here. We can do what the rest of the country did and build more roads and see, like a lunatic, if we get different results, or we can try a different way. If you have anything to offer other then the failed policy of more and more road building, lets hear it. If not then transit investment is the a viable alternative and has shown results world wide in creating more commuter friendly environments.

Craig,

What do I have to do start over because you didn't read my earlier posts?

If your willing to sacrifice your property and or property value for added road capacity, have at it.<<<<<

Sacrifice? If I did live in a new proposed road corridor my land would be condemned and bought.

The question is are we going to accommodate growth or not?

Most in the region are just not willing to sacrifice their neighborhood for larger and larger highways.<<

What do you mean larger and larger? Everything is this extreme picture by you folks as if we have no ability to provide anything else. Most in the region are not willing to sacrifice our livability for more or your dysfunction. Yes, we need more road capacity.

Could you specify an area that has built it way out of congestion by roads alone? <

What a typical Metro question. "built it's way OUT" of congestion and "alone".

More sloganeze and straw man BS. What do you mean "alone". I'm all for transit that works along with adequate roads and freeways. I have an earlier example of San Antonio but there are places all over the place which have good TRANSIT and adequate road capacity. Portland is not one of them.

Look, paving the entire state could possible solve our problem but would anyone what to live here.<<<

Well, that slogan was late coming. Meaningless of course as there is nothing to ever bring about paving our entire state. It hasn't even happened in NY or California.

That kind of stuff means nothing but that you have nothing to defend the horrible track record we have.

We can do what the rest of the country did and build more roads and see, like a lunatic, if we get different results, or we can try a different way.<

Rest of the country? Nice story telling. When do you start addressing reality?

If you have anything to offer other then the failed policy of more and more road building, lets hear it.<

I already did. Go back and read it. Adequate roads and GOOD transit. Not light rail.

If not then transit investment<<<

Unfortunately we have been transit wasting for twenty years and now we have the resulting chaos. I just hope some people pay somehow for what they have done here. Sooner rather than later.

is the a viable alternative and has shown results world wide in creating more commuter friendly environments<<<<

More commuter friendly? We have one of the fastest growing congestion problems in the country. What direction is that taking us?

Good transit is important. Our light rail is anti-transit. So is our land use planning and UGB. They are blind fallacies.

Those ridiculous slogans about congestion and paving everywhere kill me. The overcrowded ugliest seas of asphalt, concrete and roofs are inside the UGB and a product of recent planning. Our transportation system in the Portland area is in Chaos and just in case you missed it here again is the Metro expert saying so 5 years ago. Since then we have gotten more of the same chaos with shippers leaving our Port and gridlock happening more often.

Why don't just ONE of you, (Dan,Russell, Craig or ?) apply some of your keen analysis to Burton's statement?

Metro head, Mike Burton's State of the Region Speech, 2000 "Traffic congestion is bad and getting worse. It is a nightmare for commuters and it is choking freight mobility. There is no more clear illustration of our inability to meet growth needs than our failure to address our transportation needs. Within the transportation arena we are facing utter chaos."

Dan: Richard: Lies, damn lies and statistics.

Dan:: To get an accurate picture, compare Portland-Vancouver Urbanized Area commute data from 1990 to 2000. You'll see that transit use went from 6.5% to 7.1% in that timeframe.

OK, I’ll use that data: 0.6% increase in one DECADE. At that rate (0.06% per year) you’ll have 1/3 of the people out of their cras and onto transit in just 500 YEARS. Give it up - tranist is a massive costly failure.

Dan:: Meanwhile, the drive alone rate dropped from 73.3% to 71.9%.

OK, lets use this instead of the above: A 1.4% decrease in one DECADE. WOW! Much better (0.14% per year). At that rate you will get down to only 50% drive alone in just 157 years. WOW!

Dan:: Bicycling edged up .2%; small, but still an increase. If there are viable alternatives to the car, people will use them.

OK. 0.02% per YEAR - you’ll have a 1% market share in only 50 years. Still insignificant, but you can continue you delusions.

Dan:: How wide do we make our freeways to eliminate congestion? Which neighborhoods do we eviserate to build more roads?

Which neighborhoods do we destroy with rail? Which neighborhoods do we block off with rail? Rail is no better than roads here, except that roads are safer. Did I mention that rail kills people at about 3 times the rate of busses? (Per passenger-mile) (cars are about midway between bus & rail)

Dan:: It's very easy to say that we need more capacity, but where has this strategy worked for any length of time? Los Angeles? Phoenix? Houston? Chicago? Anywhere?

Most of these places quit building road capacity while their population increased due to the Luddite movement that began in the 70's with the “chicken little” stories of “Limits to Growth”, “The Population Bomb” and a coupe others that I forgot. Oregon is still suffering from trying to provide enough farmland to grow food for all those new people that never showed up. Our biggest farm crop is now nursery stuff. In some parts of the state farmers are PAID to NOT grow stuff. This, while Neil’s social engineers try to force us to live like rats in a cage and commute in cattle cars.

One Texas city did continue to build roads and today has some of the lowest congestion in the country for its size of city.

JK

Richard,

Again, show me a success story in the US? Most have gone the route of more and more roads which has led to nothing but more and more congestion, pollution and sprawl. Your offering nothing but tried and true failures.
We have subsidized trillions of dollars in highway and road building, the results are right in front of you but you won't see them.

We're not even close to being in a postion to judge the transit alternative because we still haven't begun to build a true transit system. Your comparing a 75 year trillion dollar subsidized road system to one or train lines.

Roads had their chance. Those who learned from the mistakes of other regions are moving on to alternatives, if you can't, then you have an entire country full of places that went the way your suggested, go for it.

I have seen several references to the induced demand fallacy here recently & I’ll take a stab at debunking it:

1.) I205 filled up. Yep it did. But it took about 20 years while the region’s population went through a MASSIVE increase. What do you expect? More people = more use of all infrastructure. Do you advocate not building more parks, schools, shopping centers, water lines and sewers too? Or just not building roads?

2) Before I205, 82nd was extremely congested. I205 relieved that. It still hasn’t reached the pervious level (based on my memory, not data).

3.) Since major congestion is at drive to / from work time, are you suggesting that if we build adequate road capacity, people would DRIVE TO WORK TWICE?

4) Suppose we doubled the capacity of the Banfield. Do you claim that twice as many people would suddenly come out of the woodwork to fill it up? If not then your theory is disproven.

The reality is that many more people would use it INSTEAD of parallel neighborhood streets such as Sandy, Knott, Halsey, more. A few people will make trips that they would have made at less convenient times and a small number of trips will be taken because the more efficient transpiration mode enables them. This will account for most (all) of the immediate increase in traffic and is GOOD.

More increase can be expected as METRO continues to shove density down our throats over the coming years.

A related note: Roads do require space, but so does light rail. About the same - one lane of road is about the same width as one track. Take a close look at Interstate ave or Burnside. There is now fence down the middle. Where you used to be able to cross at every street corner (legally - you could actually cross anywhere). Now you can only cross every few blocks.

The numbers posted here earlier show that MAX caries less than one lane of freeway. But it takes up the same space and costs many times more. I suspect that had we expanded the Banfield instead of building MAX, we would not have the current congestion problems and thus would have a more efficient transportation system.

Thank JK

Actually, induced demand is a fairly well documented occurrence.

When you give out more of something for free, people will consume more. How much more is up for debate, but most induced demand studies (yes, many of these are peer-reviewed, scientific studies) found induced demand to be 50-100% of new capacity over the long term.

An excellent summary is at: Todd Litman's site

So, stop talking in theory, and start addressing the scientific studies.

Since rail is such a bad transportation choice, who really wants it? Here is the answer: (this came to me from a source that I trust)

From the 1996 light rail election, here is a list of big contributors ($5000 and over) who were in favor of building light rail. Their contributions totaled $980,000 . All pro-rail contributions totaled over $1,156,340.

The light rail opponents spent about $110,000 and won.

<h2>NAME OF CONTRIBUTOR AMOUNT</h2>

Portland General Electric $52,500 Pacific Power $52,500 International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers $50,640 Fred Meyer $50.000 International Union of Operating Engineers $44,710 U.S. Bancorp $35,000 First Interstate Bank $30,000 Siemens Duewag Corporation $30,000 Oregon Public Employees Union $27,400 Legacy Health $25,000 Portland Trail Blazers $22,750 Local Union Legal Foundation $20,000 Parsons, Brinckerhoff, Quade & Douglas $20,000 Bridge Structural, & Ornamental Iron Workers $17,400 Sheet Metal Workers $16,350 Bank of America $15,000 Intel Corporation $15,000 Bricklayers & Allied Craftsmen $14,000 LTK Engineering Services $13,400 BRW Inc. $12,500 Middleton & Compauy $12,000 Greenbriar Company $10,000 Tom Walsh $10,000 Zummer Grinnel Frasca Partnership $10,000 Goldman Sachs & G.) $10,000 Nike, Inc $10,000 Kiewit Pacific $10,000 Morse Brothers $10,000 Union Pacific Railroad $10,000 Hanley Industrial properties $10,000 Bombardiere Corporation $10,000 City Center Parking $10,000 Obie Outdoor Advertising $10,000 OTAK Architects $10,000 Standard Insurance $10,000 U.S. West Communications $10,000 United Infrastructure $10,000

<h2>NAME OF CONTRIBUTOR AMOUNT</h2>

Amalgamated Tran it Union $8,100 Cement Masons $7,650 Hoffman Corporation $7,500 CH2M Hill $6,000 O'Brien Kreizberg $5,600 James Furman & Co- $5,000 Dames & Moore $5,000 Providence Health Systems $5,000 Slayden Construction $5,000 Kaiser Permanente $5,000 David Evans & Associates $5,000 Class PAC $5,000 CFI Pro Services $5,000 Davis, Wright, Tremaine $5,000 NW Natural Gas Co- $5,000 Zidell, Inc- $5,000 Stoel, Rives, Boley, Jones, & Gray $5,000 Yeon Properties $5,000 Pacific Gas Transmission $5,000 AT & T Wireless $5,000 Block 216 Partners $5,000 Keylorp Management $5,000

<hr/>

TOTAL, CONTRIBUTIONS OVER $5,000 $884,800 PERCENTAGE OF ALL CONTRIBUTIONS 76.5%

TOTAL, CONTRIBUTIONS OVER $1,000 $980,640 PERCENTAGE OF ALL CONTRIBUTIONS 84.8%

TOTAL, ALL CONTRIBUTIONS $1,156,340

Source: Records for Oregonians for Roads and Rails and for Oregonians for Local Control at Secretary of State's Office, Elections Division, Salem, Oregon.

Jeff,

What I observe is that if you're opposed to light rail, you'll find a way to bend your mind around statistics (even if you can't really bend the statistics around your argument) so that it looks like a boondoggle.<

Bend?

Cost + 1 to 2% ridership = boondoggle (or chaos as Mr Burton said)

I don't really want to read through Richard's frequent 600-word bursts<,

Of course not you rather toss out those worthless TriMet Metro mantras.

. Instead, I'll offer my brass tacks refutation:<<

I won't even repeat your little story about what you want to pick. It's so foolish, irrelevant and rediculous. You aren't responding to anything I said. I'm all for bike riding and transit. You on the other hand support our ineffective, inefficient anti-transit light rail because you don't know any better and are possibly delusional.

Cities that offer good public transportation do their citizens a service.<<

With bus service being cut, light rail hauling 1 to 2% of commuters, gridlock, and chaos you don't live in one.

As a citizen, I want that service.<<

Well then you better pull your head out of the TriMet sand so someday we may have it.

Richard wants to drive in from Tigard in his SUV,,,But why does he care if I don't want to have to dodge his Escalade?<<

It's people who have Esclades or any other vehicle, including commerce and fire trucks who are having to dodge your light rail boondoggle.

What, another delusional story teller who can't or won't analyze Burton's statement?

Craig

show me a success story in the US<<< I did San Antonio

We still haven't begun to build a true transit system.<<< That's because people can do more and want their cars and commerce can't use trasnit.

Roads had their chance. Those who learned from the mistakes of other regions are moving on to alternatives, if you can't, then you have an entire country full of places that went the way your suggested, go for it.<<<<

Ha. Now there's the big time delusional.
Next you'll be saying carsd and trucks are obsolete.

You guys just don't live in reality do you?

Still no comment on Burton?

Posted by: TransFacts: Actually, induced demand is a fairly well documented occurrence.

When you give out more of something for free, people will consume more. How much more is up for debate, but most induced demand studies (yes, many of these are peer-reviewed, scientific studies) found induced demand to be 50-100% of new capacity over the long term.

Gee,Access mag , published by University of California Transportation Center looked at this recently and found about 10% induced demand instead of 50-100%

An excellent summary is at: Todd Litman's site

So, stop talking in theory, and start addressing the scientific studies.

Scientific? Not when your reference starts out assuming externalities cost for driving is greater that its direct cost. That is pure greenie BS.

See above for real science.

Do you seriously believe that people would drive to work twice if the roads were less crowded? They didn’t used to before congestion became a problem. JK

1. A lot of peak-period driving isn't work commute related (I don't remember how much, but maybe 40%?)

2. The 1996 Measure wasn't just about Portland light rail. Here's the SUMMARY: Measure permits state to issue lottery revenue bonds to fund $375 million of state's share of cost to build Tri-Met Portland area "South North light rail," and to fund $115 million of $375 million "Transportation Equity Account." Establishes "Transportation Equity Account," payable to cities and counties for transportation projects outside Portland region, funded by lottery bonds, general fund, and other sources. Unobligated net revenues from lottery repay bonds. Bonds cannot be sold unless federal light rail matching funds become available. Other provisions.

What were the results? Multnomah County voted for Measure 32 by a 3-2 margin (154,000 to 107,000). Washington County voted for it. Clackamas voted against it. Benton and Lane Counties voted for it. The rest of the state voted against it. Overall, the measure went down 47-53%. So what happened? We built light rail in Multnomah County, where voters wanted it.

In 1998, we had a regional ballot measure on light rail. This time, Multnomah County supported it, while Washington and Clackamas did not. It went down 48-52%. So we didn't build light rail in Clackamas. Of course, some of the concerns voiced were about siting and routing, not about light rail, so we've tried to meet those concerns.

Let's compare that to what happened with the ballot effort to promote more roads. Well, in May 2000 we voted on whether to change trucking fees and increase gas taxes to pay for more roads (Measure 82). Voters voted 767,000 to 109,000 against the measure (87%), despite huge efforts of the trucking lobby and others to pass the measure.

So, half of voters are against more funding for light rail, and seven of eight are against more funding for roads.

And Littman was citing eight other studies. So ignore what he says, fine, but it's dishonest to use that to simply ignore the studies that he cites.

Richard,

A texas city?????? Game set and match :)

We can disagree, but either way your subsidized highway dream is over. The US is not going to support that kind of massive subsidized infrastructure development. If we agree that the country is going the privatization model then I don't see why HWY's wont go that way also. Anything large built in the future should pay for themselves. I just don't see privitized HWY's getting built for both livibility issues and as a business venture. They just take up way to much room compared to other modes. Driving will of course be the most popular mode for awhile but as gas prices rise, auto infrastructure declines our living arrangements will change to accomodate a more local lifestyle. Big Hwys are the thing of 1900's. Time to evolve.

Transfacts,

Overall, the measure went down 47-53%. So what happened? We built light rail in Multnomah County, where voters wanted it.<<<<

After they voted down one thing you came up with another, avoided the vote and now claim they voted for it. You may admire that but it is was dishonest, scurrilous and official maleficence. Airport MAX was a scheme involving no bid contract for Bechtel and is an absurdly wasteful line with no benefit. Cascade Station on that line is another failure of the Port, Metro and TriMet. Interstate had some of the most successful bus lines in the city. Now they don't and people have to transfer from their neighborhood buses to get on MAX. You know, the neighborhoods that aren't next to the rail tracks where people could get on a bus and ride all the way down town.

There is so much goofy stuff you folks have come up with.

Craig, You are on another planet or something. >>A texas city?????? Game set and match :)<<< Have you been to any of them? You must be a college kid or something. Austin was just named again one of the most livable cities. San Antonio is a great place with unbelievable livability, things to do and very affordable housing.

Highway dream is over<< Highways are reality. Go drive the midwest sometime and see the mass of goods in trucks on the roads. About the only place highways take a back seat is around here and our Port and commerce are suffering terribly for it. I guess that doesn't matter though since none of you but maybe Jim have talked about that either. Two of our three container shippers stopped coming here. Nice. We don't need them, right? We don't need better roads and freight rail either? Think about how ridiculous that really is folks.
Roads are used for EVERYTHING by almost everyone. The only trend in getting away from them is in your rather misguided mind. Unless on your planet bicycles are used for delivering goods and services. Big Hwys are the thing of 1900's. Time to evolve.<<
That's a good message for the Port, commerce and commuters.

The west side bypass was desired by the feds when they planned 205. The west side bypass was part of the 1960 long range plan. It was killed by Metro. The Parker Brinkerhoff report they used as cover is worth reading. Their description of the road conditions on the west side makes it clear that the people that wrote the report never visited Portland.

Parker Brinkerhoff builds light rail lines.

If the west side bypass were put to a vote on the west side, it would be a slam dunk. When former Sen. Eileen Qutub voted against a gas tax increase, she was afraid her constituency would be upset. I told her to explain that a gas tax increase wouldn't provide any money for things like the west side bypass, just money for transit. She went to a meeting of the Beaverton Chamber and said that. Then, she asked how many people were in favor of the west side bypass. Everyone in the room raised their hand.

Posted by: craig | March 22, 2005 07:41 PM: We can disagree, but either way your subsidized highway dream is over. The US is not going to support that kind of massive subsidized infrastructure development.

What subsidy? U.S highways are 95% (or so) funded from user taxes. That is NOT A SUBSIDY, it is a user fee. Some car hating Luddite anti-personal mobility groups have misrepresented this as a subsidy. You didn’t fall for their BS did you?

However, MASS TRANSIT IS SUBSIDIZED by about 80% (look at TriMet data) in Portland. Not showing in the TriMet numbers is the massive construction cost subsidies which come from property taxes via urban renewal money, gasolene taxes and other sources. Quit reading those greenie lies that leave out these little details.

If you want to claim external costs like the military and apply it to the automobile, remember that mass transit uses about the same energy as automobile. Every argument you make against automobiles here also applies to bus transit.

Craig: If we agree that the country is going the privatization model then I don't see why HWY's wont go that way also. Anything large built in the future should pay for themselves. I just don't see privitized HWY's getting built for both livibility issues and as a business venture. They just take up way to much room compared to other modes.

Highways take up less space than light rail since a lane of highway is about the same width as a track (with roadbed etc) and that lane of highway carries a lot more people than the light rail track. Alos what is your concern about taking up space. There are huge amounts of unused land in Oregon - 98% if I recall. Why do you want us to live like rats in a cage to protect 98% of Oregon which is unused? We Need Living Space! (A war was fought over this one. Millions died.)

Craig: Driving will of course be the most popular mode for awhile but as gas prices rise,

We are at about the upper limit of gas prices long term. It may take a few years for new sources to come on line, but at $30-60 per barrel, depending on who you listen to, there are massive supplies available. Also including gasolene from coal which was used by Hitler and South Africa. This is just waiting for economics. Bet you don’t believe in supply & demand.

Craig: auto infrastructure declines our living arrangements will change to accomodate a more local lifestyle

Are you hoping for a return to the lifestyle of a hundred years ago? Are you another closet Luddite?

Craig: Big Hwys are the thing of 1900's. Time to evolve.

Don’t count on people giving up their mobility. Open you eyes and look at Europe’s way of dealing with gas prices double or triple ours - they drive more efficient cars (and are abandoning mass transit just like non-peasents do everywhere.)

You can live the life of a serf, I don’t intend to. JK

Can I weigh in here? Wow, 56 commentz...is that a bluOR record (Kari, surely you can confirm)? Am I the only one surprised that this would raise such a heated debate?

Maybe I can raise a couple of new points and respond to some old.

1. Perspective is BADLY needed on the transit issue, and by that, I mean the perspective of living in other cities either PDX-size or larger. Then try to name me just ONE that doesn't have a congestion problem (OK, maybe not SanAntone, but can anybody name a second one?). I lived in London for 13 yrs. and the avg. speed in-city on a weekend for motor vehicles is 4 MPH (and that's with a pretty damn extensive transit system). And please don't anybody suggest London's solution ($9 per day "congestion charge" if you want to drive in central London)...it doesn't help.

2. Re: MAX, anybody know the stats or estimates for fare evasion? I am always struck by the number of young riders and the complete absence of fare-checkers. Besides the fact that the fare is ridiculously low (again, the perspective issue!) compared to other cities' transit charges, I don't think there is great compliance. Couldn't a few "conductors" pay for themselves many times over?

3. re: Westside bypass, as a WashCo. native, I was involved in STOP, the group that helped finally kill the bypass idea back in the 1980s. It was a bad idea then, and it's bad now. What farmland that's left in mid-western Washington Co. would have been decimated by this plan, and running a road from Hillsboro to I-5 would have increased sprawl, nothing more. Sure, the Beavy-Wilsonville light rail is a boondoggle now but maybe if gas prices keep skyrocketing and traffic snarling, a few of the suburbanites will get out of their gas-guzzling, studded (for rain) SUVs and smell the coffee.

Kudos to Russell for the original post, and let's hear more from rural Oregonians on their woes. As one who lives now on the coast, I can tell you that the infrastructure collapse he cites is real and only going to get worse in the near-term...

Andrew said

It was a bad idea then, and it's bad now. What farmland that's left in mid-western Washington Co. would have been decimated by this plan<

Much of it has since been devoured by the blind overcrowding of roofs, asphalt and concrete without regard for accommodating growth at all. Sprawl or otherwise.

and running a road from Hillsboro to I-5 would have increased sprawl, nothing more.<

That's absurd and melodramatic. It would have enabled better planning, less crowding, better transportation, better transit and better livability. That planning weed you've been smoking is causing delusions.

Sure, the Beavy-Wilsonville light rail is a boondoggle now but maybe if gas prices keep skyrocketing and traffic snarling, a few of the suburbanites will get out of their gas-guzzling, studded (for rain) SUVs and smell the coffee.<

So it's the old misery plan for Transit utopia. Tell me, suppose that is all a load of crap and all you have done is create misery and lesson livability? Does that mean we need more of the same boondoggle approach?

Regarding sprawl, is it your belief that expanding growth in any form is bad and must be avoided at all costs including the very livability you pretend to want?

Suppose expansion is with the high suburban livability people want? There's plenty of land all over the place. Between the valley and the coast it is nearly endless is every conceivable type. We live on some 3% of Oregon. Is that 60?

Richard:

My guess is that you never met a freeway you didn't like and that you were a big backer of M37 and opposed to any and all of Oregon's land use restrictions. Hey, if it's so bad here for you, why not move one state north or south?

The Westside bypass was killed off after an extensive (and comprehensive) debate in the '80s - there was no universal support for it then (and I doubt there's much more now). The Mt. Hood freeway went through a similar fate in the '70s and it probably saved most of SE Portland as a result.

Uncontrolled growth can be found virtually anywhere. Oregon's "controlled growth" (with all of its limitations) is what makes us unique...and a lot of us like it that way!

Too bad you ignore my original point about perspective, because it is EXACTLY what you lack...

Posted by: andrew | March 23, 2005 09:23 PM

Hey, if it's so bad here for you, why not move one state north or south?

Pardon us, some of us were born here. In my case over 60 years ago. Maybe you should be the one to leave if you don't like Portland before it became infested with planners and their fellow travelers.

They have steadily decreased our livability year by year. You can see it if you look: Jobs leaving town, highest unemployment rate in the country Shortest school year in the country (or threat of) Not enough police money to lock up car thieves. Gave $200 million to Homer & his ilk for the Pearl experiment. Giving another $200 million to increase congestion, pollution and block people's views via the N.Macadam project. Worst traffic congestion increase in the coutry. *Wasting $57 million (Multnomah county) last year in property taxes collected but used to support urban renewal areas like downtown Portland, while only pennies are available to Lents. Money should have been used for police, fire and schools in that order.

You will notice that I didn't even list the $2 billion toy train that has not reduced traffic congestion measurably.

(Kick Homer's theiving butt out of Oregon)

JK

Andrew,

You are following foolishness with no sense or regard for the larger countering detriments to the fallacy our land use and transportation planning represents.

Did you view Mike Burton's statement on how we have created chaos? The chaos he spoke of is not good chaos Andrew. It has tremendous costs which you apparently deem subordinate to the supposed benefits of stopping sprawl and trying to stop cars.

If you view the transportation chaos are merely inconvenience drivers of SUV's that demonstrates you have the same ignorance as the folks at TriMet and Metro.

Ignorance coupled with negligence means big trouble for our region while you fail to recognize or acknowledge any of the many adverse results from what you advocate.

It's pretty clear what folks like you choose to fill that hole where honest facts and legitimacy should be. It's the desire to dictate upon the masses your agenda and avoid public votes all costs. No votes for light rail. No votes for 2040 plans and high density overcrowding. No votes for commuter rail. You'd rather just dictate.

Just like Metro and Tri-Met scheming extremists you haven't earned any position to tells others to leave the State.

Personally I'd rather stick around and kick your agenda's ass and get a few of your dumber than dumber politicians thrown out of office as the house of cards they created falls apart.

The only problems M37 represents are the ones deliberately created to obstruct it's implementation.

That obstruction is further eroding your position as more and more folks see the out of the mainstream fringe your intolerant and obnoxious crowd represents. The vote on M37 in Multnomah County sent a message but it fell on deaf ears. So I look for more folks realizing who it is continually lining up against the majority of Oregonians who know exactly what they want. And it's not what you are selling. Or rather forcing down their throats by preventing any voting.

Uncontrolled growth can be found virtually anywhere. Oregon's "controlled growth" (with all of its limitations) is what makes us unique...and a lot of us like it that way!<<<<<<

Andrew, you have no perspective at all. You look through the loony peep hole they call planning around here. I don't care what you like or don't like.

The same as I don't care what TriMet or Metro or Homer William or the Oregonian with their perpetual bad advice have to say. They have built a house of cards with the help of people like you.

Now as it shakes before falling there is not enough money to sustain any of the dysfunction they will be soon be avoiding blame for.

Fun talking with you though.

Richard & Jim: So where else have you guys lived to conclude that Portland is SO bad? And don't talk to me about Mike Burton...I've known Mike for a long time (we were next-door neighbors in the early '80s) and I think you've twisted his comments greatly out of context. And if we get back to the original post here, I'm not at all "anti-car" but hold to a quaint notion (practiced in NY, Chicago, Philly and dozens of major cities worldwide) that off-road public transit has an important part to play in creating decent urban living. But I suppose pollution, waning energy supplies, road rage, traffic fatalities and the like are all non-issues to you...

uh PS Jim, I was born here also (45 yrs. ago at Emanual Hospital) but I just happen to dislike whinging native Oregonians like yourself who really don't realize how good we've got it here! Hence, my suggestion that you find someplace you like better and move THERE...

The argument over whether subsidies for mass transportation are wasted spending will be moot when the price of oil balloons and cars are left where they run dry. There will not be time, at that point, to develop new transportation infrastructure. We need to do that now when we can afford it. Those who expect some technological advance to bail us out of our oil addiction should do some quantitative analysis of just where all the energy we now use would come from when we can't afford oil anymore.

The nasty truth about oil supply and the US economy has been suppressed for a long time, but it finally going mainstream. Read in today's NYT: What Happens Once the Oil Runs Out? Then see ASPO

Andrew,

Mike Burton's comments out of context? Well here they are again for you to put them in context. Try and grasp that we now have the fastest increasing congestion in the country, our rail freight , trucking and commerce mobility are hindered and worsening and we have nothing on the table to correct it.

Metro head, Mike Burton's State of the Region Speech, 2000 Traffic congestion is bad and getting worse. It is a nightmare for commuters and it is choking freight mobility. There is no more clear illustration of our inability to meet growth needs than our failure to address our transportation needs.Within the transportation arena we are facing utter chaos."

Explain what you think "inability to meet growth needs" and "failure" means.

uh PS Jim, I was born here also (45 yrs. ago at Emanual Hospital) but I just happen to dislike whinging native Oregonians like yourself who really don't realize how good we've got it here! Hence, my suggestion that you find someplace you like better and move THERE...

Posted by: andrew | March 25, 2005 09:35 AM

And you don't remember how good it was before the planners/social engineers decided we need more density, more congestion, more pollution and welfare transportion for all (TriMet, who gets 80% of its fares from the taxpayer)

Why don't you just leave Portland for a paradise like LA which is Metro's model for Portland. Then the rest of us can live in an un polluted, low denstiy Portland.

ie: Don't feed me that leave if you don't like it crap - you are clearly on the wrong side

JK

Posted by: Tom Civiletti | March 25, 2005 09:55 AM

The argument over whether subsidies for mass transportation are wasted spending will be moot when the price of oil balloons and cars are left where they run dry. . . . .

Perhaps you didn't notice that busses run on oil too. And they use about the same amount per passenger mile as private cars. Oh, without busses to feed it, light rail is empty.

Then see ASPO That is a peak oil web site. You don't rally believe that BS do you?

Consider what will happen to oil supply when oil reaches, say $80/barrel - there will be more supply as sources that cost $60/ barrel come on line. That is how the world works, perhaps you didn't notice.

Perhaps you didn't hear that Hitler made gasolene form coal to run his evil empire. So did South Africa. PS: We have a lot of coal.

Also, hybrid cars may become very popular because they effective cut the cost of oil in half (right now thy are uneconomic), car pooling may increase.

What has little chance of increasing is traveling to work, standing up, jammed against a total stranger - ie: mass tranist.

Repat after me: "Peak oil is BS, chicken little types have been screaming 'we are running out of oil' for the last 100 years"

(did you know that the federal governmet created an agency to deal with the coming end of oil? That was about 100 years ago. USGS)

JK

A few points that have been left out of the discussion.

Texas - If the best argument you have in your bag is Texas transit policy, you have no arguments. First of all, Texas is almost as flat as a carpenter's level. Cost per mile of building roads in Texas is a small fraction of the costs per mile of roads where there are actual geological features on the landscape. Also, Texas is the most polluted state in the US of A. Any attempt to impose Texas-style pollution regulation policies in Oregon might literally result in armed insurrection in this state.

Capital transit project investment number play - Any attempts by people to compare annual transit budget figures and capital investment project budgets are nothing but incendiary rhetoric. The proper method of evaluating capital transit projects is by comparing annual transportation budgets and the investments divided by the number of years the capital investment if expected to be used. I'm new around here. I don't know the projected use of the light rail lines that have been build. I would expect it's something like 50-100 years. That's about average. So please divide that billion dollar number you guys keep batting people over the heads with and divide by what ever the number is between 50-100 years. Let's go low and say 50. That's 20 million per year investment. Gee... that doesn't seem as as bad an investment for a little progressive transit policy, does it?

Total cost of US car culture - To properly evaluate to cost of 85% of people driving to work, you must also include the cost of providing the fuel for this cars. That means the cost of US foreign policy to ensure the supply of foreign oil into US gas tanks must be included. I'm not even going to touch the whole peak oil discussion. Let's just look at the cost of defending US interest of continuing the flow of foreign oil into US cars. That's unarguable.

The West installed the Shah of Iran and Saddam Hussein into their respective states to preserve the supply of foreign oil, and ensured the stability of several other regimes in the region, like Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, etc, as well as nations we consider stabilizing influences in the region like Egypt, Jordan, etc. That includes having a western-based cultural foothold in the region - Israel. Western interaction in Muslim states in the oil-producing states are the cause for anti-Western terrorism movements there. Let's just throw the mullahs in Iran overthrowing the western Shah of Iran and Saddam Hussein's intransigence in the general category of anti-Western movements in the Middle East for simplicity.

So... what does this ad to the real costs of that 85% of Americans driving their cars to work? We can start with all that foreign aid to Isreal, Egypt, Jordan, and other oil producing states. Now add Gulf War I. That was to remove Saddam from Kuwaiti oil supplies. Now add 9/11. It was an attack who's object was driving the US military out of the bases they established in Saudi Arabia in Gulf War I. Now add the current Iraq war. Even if you buy the "building democracy in the Middle East" argument, the reason we are concerned with building a moderating influence in Middle East societies (where we could care less about Africa) is all that oil the Middle East is sitting on.

So, what are we talking about here? Roughly about a trillion dollars so far if you don't include any human costs at all....if you don't include any costs at all of weapon systems the US already had in it's inventories that were used in prosecuting those wars....if you don't include the damage to the US economy caused by the strikes on the WTC and the Pentagon....

See where I'm going here? Until the US embarks on a sensible, sustainable policy of depending only on energy sources we can produce here in the US, you have an utterly insane stack of costs you must include in the total real cost of US transportation policy. Fortunately, there's some real answers out there to end US dependence on foreign energy. Wind. Biodiesel from algae is a finished technolgy that can provide as much diesel fuel as we need from high oil content algaes that can be raised in the desert in brine ponds/lakes, as a sewage treatment technology, etc for about $2 a gallon...

Here's a link on the algae biodiesel tech... http://www.unh.edu/p2/biodiesel/article_alge.html

Anyway, you've got other options out there like various solar project, hydrogen, etc. too.

The point is, the real costs of US transportation policy is far, far higher than just the cost of the fuel, cars and roads. Projects that reduce the need for foreign oil exportation, like mass transit, therefore have far greater savings involved as well. It makes good economic sense to get this country off foreign oil. Mass transit policy is a far better economic investment than even most progressives gave it credit for here.

JK,

If you look here, Greenhouse Gas Pollution in the Stratosphere Due to Increasing Airplane Traffic, Effects On the Environment, you will see that buses use 1/3 the fuel of autos. They will also work better over the gravel roads that will suceed our unsustainable asphalt and concrete ones.

As for ASPO, yes, I believe that BS. You mistakedly think oil production level is based on dollars per barrel alone. It is not. High cost wells are generally those that require large anounts of energy [pumping, steam injection, etc.] to extract the oil. When the energy in exceeds the energy out, there is no use in pumping a well for fuel purposes. That is what peak oil is based on, not market price.

I suggest you pull your head out of the tar sands and take a serious look at the information on peak oil. It may not reinforce your world view, but it is a reality you will be dealing with soon.

Tom Civiletti Wrote: If you look here, Greenhouse Gas Pollution in the Stratosphere Due to Increasing Airplane Traffic, Effects On the Environment, you will see that buses use 1/3 the fuel of autos.

JK: About your reference: he is hardly a primary source (try the National Transport Energy Book by the Feds). Note his text above one chart in your reference:

Fuel consumption data for ground vehicles (buses) in a public transportation system obtained from the Campus Bus Service, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor

We were talking transit buses, not some sort of a campus shuttle bus. Quite different animals. Transit buses have trouble competing with cars for the following reason:

1, They are mostly empty, unlike the 80% your guy assumed. Look at TriMet buses anytime except rush hour, they are mostly empty, not even close to 20% let a lone 80%. Now consider rush hour: they start at the end of the line EMPTY, then pick up people on the trip to downtown. If everyone is going downtown (admittedly an extreme case, but it demonstrates one basic problem and is not that far from reality) then the bus will just fill up as it reaches downtown (if it fills earlier, then people are passed up at bus stops near downtown). In this example, the bus averages one-half full and that is at peak rush hour. New lets consider the return trip to pickup another load of commuters. It will be mostly empty! Now our average number of passengers is just ONE QUARTER OF its max load. Let me repeat that things are not really as bad as this example, but it shows the problem and may not be too far off of the real situation. If that average load of 80% used by you source were 3 times too high, then his bus would be the same as his car. Consider this: 1/3 of 80% is 26%. Not too far away form my extreme example of rush hour. Now add in the off rush hour when you frequently see buses with one or two passengers and you get a feel for the situation.

1. Buses travel to and from the storage yards, maintenance depots etc. These are trips with ZERO passenger miles. Unlike cars which almost always have at least one passenger (the driver) going where he wants to go,

3, Your source did not mention if he adjusted the car’s consumption for average occupancy.

I got real data from TriMet (annual fuel consumption and annual passenger miles - also did it for toy train). It is a simple matter to calculate the usage, then compare it to stickers on new cars (not SUVs etc). There is no dramatic difference between cars, bus and toy train on energy per passenger mile - they area all within 30% or so, not the 300% your guy claims. (BTW if you try this at home, be sure to discount the toy train electricity by the power plant conversion efficiency)

I guess I am going to have to formalize it and distribute it since so many people think that mass transit serves some useful purpose beyond welfare. You can find a summary of my data at: TriMet_vs_Car5.pdf

BTW, since your expert guy botched something so basic as getting the average load right, I suggest you not trust anything else in that report - he is probably out of his field, or just has a philosophy to sell.

Tom Civiletti Wrote: As for ASPO, yes, I believe that BS. You mistakedly think oil production level is based on dollars per barrel alone. It is not. High cost wells are generally those that require large anounts of energy [pumping, steam injection, etc.] to extract the oil. When the energy in exceeds the energy out, there is no use in pumping a well for fuel purposes.

JK: Huh? Bet you haven’t studied much science. Try this for enlightenment:

1. You borrow 80 barrels of oil (actually you probably purchase, but this is just an example)
2. You use that 80 barrels to get 100 barrels out of the ground.
3. You use 80 of those barrels of oil to replace the 80 that you borrowed.
4. You have 20 barrels left over to sell.

You will notice that we used 80 barrels of oil to get 20. It took four units of energy to produce one unit, but we got 20 BRAND NEW barrels NET. That is what counts NET output.

Without slogging thorough the ASPO BS, I’ll bet your source represented the above case as using 80 barrels to get 20, which is literally true but IRRELEVANT since it all came out of that one well. (Remember that these most of guys are basically politicians selling a political party line, not scientists. Just to be neutral, Republicans do this shit about abortion and the Ds do it about sustainability etc.)

As an aside, those of us that paid attention in science classes found out that such lousy efficiencies are common. For instance about 2/3 of the energy is wasted converting fuels to electricity. This loss is one reason that light rail doesn’t save energy (It is a bit better that car or bus but not much)
Another common occurrence, that chicken little keeps forgetting, is that mankind gets better at everything, including extraction of oil. And brand new energy sources.

Tom Civiletti Wrote: That is what peak oil is based on, not market price.

JK: Did I give you a little insight into two reasons that I think this is bunk. But don’t get me wrong, there may be a rough transition period.

You also appear to ignore efficiency measures which will come out of the woodwork if oil really reaches an all time high (inflation adjusted of course): 1. Smaller cars. 2. Hybrid cars. 3. Pure electric cars, charged at night with nuke/hydro energy (I leave out wind and solar due to their limited potential to supply the truly massive amounts of energy used to provide our standard of living.)

NOT AN OPTION: Mass transit, because is DOES NOT SAVE ANY ENERGY compared to modern cars. And if energy truly gets expensive, those cars will double, triple and quadruple in efficiency, far surpassing anything mass transit can ever hope for.

Tom Civiletti Wrote: I suggest you pull your head out of the tar sands and take a serious look at the information on peak oil. It may not reinforce your world view, but it is a reality you will be dealing with soon.

JK: I suggest that you learn a little science and logic. And quit listening to chicken little. (Didn’t you get the point of that story - manipulative people frequently scream doom to get your attention, labor or money. IE: to steal from you.) You are being stolen from.

JK

Posted by: afs: Total cost of US car culture - To properly evaluate to cost of 85% of people driving to work, you must also include the cost of providing the fuel for this cars. \

JK: So what? 1. Since 85% of the people drive, that is a case of 100% of the people subsidizing 85% of the people, Far better than 100% of the people subsidizing 2-10% of the people who use transit.

1. TRANST DOESN’T SAVE ENERGY, SO THAT WON’T HELP

Posted by: afs: That means the cost of US foreign policy to ensure the supply of foreign oil into US gas tanks must be included.

JK: Wrong. Once you recognize the lie of transit energy saving, then your whole position falls apart. Look at real data, not the BS put out by the greens. Try the Transportation Energy Data Book from the US Department of energy.

Posted by: afs: I'm not even going to touch the whole peak oil discussion. Let's just look at the cost of defending US interest of continuing the flow of foreign oil into US cars. That's unarguable.

The West installed the Shah of Iran and Saddam Hussein into their respective states to preserve the supply of foreign oil,

JK: Weren’t we self sufficient in energy at that time?

Posted by: afs: and ensured the stability of several other regimes in the region, like Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, etc, as well as nations we consider stabilizing influences in the region like Egypt, Jordan, etc. That includes having a western-based cultural foothold in the region - Israel. Western interaction in Muslim states in the oil-producing states are the cause for anti-Western terrorism movements there.

JK: Yeah, they were bastions of freedom and equality. World class women’s rights, right?.

Posted by: afs: Let's just throw the mullahs in Iran overthrowing the western Shah of Iran and Saddam Hussein's intransigence in the general category of anti-Western movements in the Middle East for simplicity.

So... what does this ad to the real costs of that 85% of Americans driving their cars to work? We can start with all that foreign aid to Isreal, Egypt, Jordan, and other oil producing states. Now add Gulf War I. That was to remove Saddam from Kuwaiti oil supplies. Now add 9/11. It was an attack who's object was driving the US military out of the bases they established in Saudi Arabia in Gulf War I. Now add the current Iraq war. Even if you buy the "building democracy in the Middle East" argument, the reason we are concerned with building a moderating influence in Middle East societies (where we could care less about Africa) is all that oil the Middle East is sitting on.So, what are we talking about here? Roughly about a trillion dollars so far if you don't include any human costs at all....if you don't include any costs at all of weapon systems the US already had in it's inventories that were used in prosecuting those wars....if you don't include the damage to the US economy caused by the strikes on the WTC and the Pentagon.... See where I'm going here? Until the US embarks on a sensible, sustainable policy of depending only on energy sources we can produce here in the US, you have an utterly insane stack of costs you must include in the total real cost of US transportation policy.

JKs: Ok, lets assume the US is energy independent for the sake af argument. Now what? Do we let Europe, Japan, Tiawan and the rest of the world crumble around us? Do you really believe we would let them sink?

Posted by: afs: Fortunately, there's some real answers out there to end US dependence on foreign energy. Wind. Biodiesel from algae is a finished technolgy that can provide as much diesel fuel as we need from high oil content algaes that can be raised in the desert in brine ponds/lakes, as a sewage treatment technology, etc for about $2 a gallon...

JK: How much land will that take up to provide for our needs? I have heard from a “reliable source” that one would have to cut down ALL of the forests in California to supply California gasolene for 9 months. If true, I suspect that biodiesel farms may take up a little too much land area.

Posted by: afs: Here's a link on the algae biodiesel tech... http://www.unh.edu/p2/biodiesel/article_alge.html

Anyway, you've got other options out there like various solar project, hydrogen, etc. too.

The point is, the real costs of US transportation policy is far, far higher than just the cost of the fuel, cars and roads. Projects that reduce the need for foreign oil exportation, like mass transit, therefore have far greater savings involved as well. It makes good economic sense to get this country off foreign oil. Mass transit policy is a far better economic investment than even most progressives gave it credit for here.

JK: AGAIN, MASS TRANSIT DOES NOT SAVE ENERGY!

JK

The problem with increasing oil production occurs when it takes 1 barrel of oil to produce 1 barrel of oil, a point many wells are now reaching. Saudi Arabia recently tried to increase production in response to short term shortage and was unable to do it. Also, increasing the production rate of a well beyond a certain point reduces significantly the total amount of oil that can be yielded by that well.

I realize that this is inconvenient information for libertarian, pro-sprawl, anti-government, anti-environmental, anti-sustainability types, but it is the way things are.

It is true that even public transportation will become much more expensive after peak oil. We will all stay a lot closer to home much of the time. And alternative energy sources, whether solar, geothermal, wind, nuclear [no thanks, I'll walk and wear a sweater] will not completely replace cheap oil.

Peak oil in the US occurred in the '70's. The world is getting close to the same condition now. No amount of refusal to face the situation will alter this. There is no technological fix, at least not to maintain the kind of lifestyle Americans now "enjoy." The auto will soon be history, as will air travel, which is obscenely energy inefficient.

Jim and JK are the ones ignorant of science. Unfortunately, they have lots of company in our nation.

JK - You've made a bunch of extreme assertions that you do not support with any evidence or data whatsoever. Until you provide some sort of evidence to support your extreme assertions, I'm not going to bother to respond to vast majority of them.

In regards to your statements regarding involvement in the Middle East if there had been no oil there, I simply point to US policy towards Africa. The only places in Africa the US cares about are those spots that have sizable amounts of some natural resource the US wants. If resources are lacking in a area, we don't care how bad the situation gets there. There was nothing the US wanted in Rwanda. There's nothing we want now in Sudan. The same would be true for Middle East states if there were no resources the US wanted. As far as the rest of the world, the US would always support economically developed countries because they are markets for US products. There's money to be made in Europe, Taiwan, Japan, etc.

All the costs of involvement in the conflicts in the Middle East are about getting gasoline for cars.

As for your reply on biodiesel from algae... I provided the link, and you commented on it without even reading the first page of the link I provided. That puts the rest of your rhetoric in proper context. You talk about a lot of stuff you haven't even made a minimum of effort to inform yourself about, JK. If you had looked at the first biodiesel from algae page, you would have learned that biodiesel from algae production would be ideally sited in some of the nations most undevelopable land. Places like Death Valley, the Salton Sea, and Nevada's Great Basin lands are ideal locations for building biodiesel algae brine ponds. All that land north of the Nevada test site that's useful for nothing is useful for algae biodiesel production. Producing biodiesel from algae is also being developed as a sewage treatment technolgy. So, I present a technology that requires wasteland and sewage to grow, and you, like most extremists, turn that into cutting down every tree in California, JK. That called lying, JK.

Whatever credibility you had in this discussion is gone now, JK. Move along.

rebellingboxer is the handle I use. afs is my initials. I use them pretty interchangably.

rebellingboxer is the handle I use. afs is my initials. I use them pretty interchangably.

Same here: messgaes usually signed JK, but in the name box I put jim

rebuttel of your points later. JK