Category: Planes Trains and Automobiles
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In Memory Of Lives Sacrificed For The “Greater Good”
The nation’s political class is currently paralyzed with rage over people dying of vaping. Ignoring the fact that vaping has likely saved thousands of lives by helping people stop smoking, and more people never start – never mind! A death toll in single digits, almost entirely from using home-made vaping fluids or the occasional extremely…
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Overpowered By Awful
I just finished spending a year and a half riding the Vomit Comet (aka “the Green Line”) to work and back most days. At its best, it was a serviceable ride. At its most middling, it was crowded with free-loading University kids and, early on cold mornings, homeless people curled up sleeping on the chairs.…
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An Idea Whose Time Should Not Come
When you’re a Republican, especially in a bluish-purple place like Minnesota, you hope you can vote for Republicans who’ll hold the line on taxes – even to the minimal level of not proposing new ones. Sadly, we’re disappointed – as I discussed with Liz Mair on the show over the weekend. Senator Howe is proposing…
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Train In…Yep, Vain
The advocates of high-speed rail to Chicago have changed their minds; they now want another low-speed train for a total of two per day.Conspicuously left unasked: where are the photos of the throngs of people left standing on the train platforms because there’s no room on the existing train? Is there actually a demand for a…
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Ideas
Joe Doakes from Como Park emails: I can’t believe how self-centered and thoughtless Christmas shoppers are. I’m trying to back out of my parking space and pedestrians walk right behind me! Don’t they see me backing up? They’re as bad as the drivers who back out of their parking spot when I’m trying to walk…
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The Carnage Continues Apace
The Green Line (aka “The Vomit Comet” – ride it late on a weekend night or early on a weekend morning to find out what that means. Or…don’t) has claimed its second life this year: The crash occurred at Syndicate Street and University Avenue about 4:30 p.m., according to Metro Transit spokesman Howie Padilla. Two…
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Dispatches From Never-Never Land
A friend of the blog writes: Oh, boy. I think we know why this person isn’t a business owner. I just think about my own job on this. Imagine your nurse showing up late or leaving early because she biked. Imagine morale amongst the co-workers who don’t have that luxury to bike, but have kids…
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The Power Of “No“
The most powerful word in the free market is “no”. With the simple word “no”, each individual consumer votes every day on the products and services they do or, vastly more often, don’t want to spend their scarce, precious resources on. Were it not for the word “no”, cell phones would still weigh 2 pounds…
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Spirit Of America
Joe Doakes from Como Park emails: https://www.popularmechanics.com/cars/car-technology/a21272157/aerodynamics-car-science/ The reason all cars look the same is aerodynamics, which matter to fuel efficiency, which is mandated by the government. I’d gladly give up a few miles per gallon if I could have my ’67 Mustang back, only with less rust and a modern reliable engine. Give…
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The Rightful Owners
Former Iron Range legislator Carly Melin (who has since gone on to the great non-profit sinecure reward that awaits all DFL legislators) on the protests at the Blue Line on Fort Snelling yesterday: The same people who oppose public transit are mad that public transit was disrupted by a demonstration and even though those demonstrators…
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Trivia Question
Question: which is longer – the last four minutes of an NBA playoff game, or four minutes of Metro Transit time? Answer: yes.
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This Is What $1.4 Billion Of Government Work Gets You
It used to be that when you waited for the Green Line train, a little billboard on the platform told you how many minutes away the next train was. Today? The time is nice, if you have a schedule and the trains are on time (which you don’t and they’re not). The track number? There’s one…
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2.1 Billion Doesn’t Getcha What It Used To
Green Line train derailed yesterday. While rolling down a flat street with a midday-sized cargo of passengers. How do you even do that? Hey, good luck, Super Bowl fans! You’ll have this turkey on wheels all to yourself.
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Line In The Sand
Some things I will never, ever do: Vote for a Metro Democrat Buy a Windows phone Own a “driverless car“. The first is common sense; I’d no more vote for one of them than Hector Maduro. The second seems just good sense. The last? It’s unamerican: These days, Real Americans don’t much go to sea…
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The Twin Cities: A Huge Government Toy Box
News broke earlier this week that mere Minnesotans without Super Bowl tickets will be barred from the Met Council’s train lines on Super Bowl Sunday: Metro Transit is the best way to reach downtown Minneapolis with expanded schedules on key routes for local commuters and additional schedules for Super Bowl related events. That includes unlimited…
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Creative Clash
Distort the economy of a sector, an industry or a city to benefit an industry, a policy or a class of people, and you’re going to cause unintended consequences – almost all of them bad, at least for someone. Fifteen years ago, the NPR-listening, Whole Foods-Shopping, Volvo-driving set nodded and snapped their fingers to the…
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Never Waste A Crisis
Joe Doakes from Como Park emails: If the dams break, if Houston is washed away, if the earth is scraped clean . . . what a wonderful opportunity for urban planners to rebuild ‘the right way.’ Tear up all freeways and residential streets. Replace them with bike trails and light rail. Mail and deliveries…
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How To Protest The Met Council
One of the reasons that Black Lives Matter gives to justify their tactic of blocking freeways is that the inconvenience suffered by the “white” (?) motorists shoiuld put them in mind of the inconveniences suffered by black people. Fair enough! The Met Council is making it incredibly difficult to be a commuter in the Twin…
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The Golden Age Of Car Design…
…is about ten years behind us. And it’s government’s fault. As usual.
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On April 2, It’s Not Funny Anymore
A regular reader writes: If only all of the transit oriented development projects that have destroyed neighborhoods had been just an April Fool’s day joke… Alas, the other 364 days a year, the government of Saint Paul and the Met Council are as funny as chemotherapy.
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The Green Line Of Death: All Is Proceeding Exactly As Predicted
Two years after it first “rolled” out, the results of the “Green Line” train between the downtowns are, put diplomatically, “mixed”: As Metro Transit’s $957 million Green Line project marked its second anniversary on June 14, even die-hard transit advocates acknowledge jobs, housing and commercial development have been a mixed bag. “I think we’re on…
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Home To Roost
Ten years ago, the transit-happy left pointed to the DC Metro as an example of how urban mass transit could be done. In particular, they said? It was less of a money pit than anticipated. Unmentioned (except from the right): they shaved money by deferring maintenance. Equipment and facilities that were supposed to have a…
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State Of The Union Depot
Two years ago, Saint Paul re-opened the Union Depot after a $240 million taxpayer-financed facelift. Now comes news that Christos – a long-time anchor restaurant in the Depot’s lobby, since back the day when the Depot itself was the anchor, ifYouGetMyDrift, is likely bailing. OK, restaurants come and go – although it’s weird to think…
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The Gore Line And The Rail Of Death Line
Yet another pedestrian has been killed along the Rail Of Death Line from downtown Minneapolis to the Airport. I’ll urge prayers for his family and the people in his life. This follows on two more train-pedestrian accidents on the Rail of Death Line, as well as the Gore Line through Saint Paul, last month. If It Saves Even One Life…:That…
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The Metrocrat Butcher’s Bill
Joe Doakes from Como Park emails: Another victim of The Death Train. Joe Doakes If we save even one life…