Light Rail - the amazing government kluge

Only my own political naïveté led me to ever think that the insane idea of "light rail transit" would not be implemented in the Twin Cities. It was a joke, I thought... that resurrection of an antiquated mode of transportation was even being proposed. Insane, I thought, that we might return to the past... to times of lines of cars waiting at railroad crossings, and to glossing over inevitable and crushing collisions. How could we be so addled as to again travel (by other modes) to wait at a few rail stations that led to a few limited destinations? Could cities that junked elaborate streetcar systems, return, not to that workable system, but to an LRT system that doesn't even come close to the utility of streetcars?

I've been amazed to watch the powers that be actually foist that pinnacle of inutility, LRT, onto the citizenry of the Twin Cities. The federal government, whose insanity answers to nobody, made it possible, and massive lobbying and promotion by governmental agencies and labor unions made it happen. No, the taxpayers weren't consulted; it was pushed down our throats. It has been an idea that, even by government boondoggle standards, sets a new standard for unbelievable. It is the transportation equivalent of communicating by string stretched between cans (even if the cans and strings have been modernized).

Even before the orginal line was completed, from downtown to the Mall of America, the promotion of more lines began. Like all railroad lines, they are virtually worthless unless the network is widespread. Billions of dollars in constuction still only serves a few people to a few destinations, in a straight line. The latest promotion is to "rail" University avenue between Minneapolis and St. Paul. What makes University avenue
perfect for a light rail project?

• University is a broad boulevard that was once a grand thoroughfare... until freeways sucked business away.
• University isn't a very busy street, so LRT can carve out the center section.
• University is home to a burgeoning immigrant business community, with no political clout and easy to push around.

Will LRT "revitalize" University avenue? Not for the current residents, but It damned sure will for someone. Even though talk has only recently appeared about the University LRT, city politicians are planning the future of the area. One might think that a mode of transportation should service the people who are paying for it... that a system on University avenue should improve life for those around there. Quite the opposite will be true, and we're already seeing how that will happen. Here's a quote from the St. Paul mayor's office:

"...higher-density development is a better match for a future mass-transit line than big-box retail stores."

That quote was on the occasion of approving construction of a Super Target "big-box" store on University (which has others), but with the warning that other big stores will be discouraged. Makes sense. If you go to a big store to buy a bunch of stuff, you sure can't haul it home on LRT. Can't haul much of anything on LRT, can you? The University LRT is already dictating the future of the area it will infest. The area will have to change to fit light rail. That is, of course, the secret to any sort of success for light rail... that government will force the area along the rails into something that "fits" light rail. They'll force out unacceptable residents and businesses, and lure others in with subsidies.

Mayor Coleman: "the city will work "aggressively" to encourage transit-oriented development there "

More from the mayor... St. Paul would move to protect small businesses and workers and to make the city's main commercial corridor home to living-wage jobs and small businesses.

If you think for a minute that he's talking about the current small businesses and workers, then you've been sucked in precisely as he wanted. LRT doesn't match the needs of the current small businesses along University, and many won't be able to remain there. Some will move or be destroyed just during the construction upheaval. Others on streets that cross University will find their traffic destroyed.

LRT along University will be a major upheaval... an even bigger boondoggle than the current line. University crosses major north/south streets... Snelling, Lexington, and Dale. Will the heavy traffic on those streets stop for the trains? Or will more massive overpasses be built, like the convoluted one where LRT crosses Lake street?

Light Rail Transit is all about FORCE. It's a transportation system that would never be CHOSEN, because it's antiquated, intrustive, inconvenient, expensive, and destructive. Only a government would even consider light rail for urban use. LRT is a KLUGE (kludge, bodge, boat anchor, etc.). Back in the old inelegant days of early computers, we often programmed innovative kluges, to get things done that computers weren't designed to do. Our kluges were valuable only because there were no alternatives, and they soon became obsolete as the industry understood more about what was needed, and built solutions in.

In naval parlance, a kludge is equipment which worked ashore, but never aboard a ship. It hence came to refer to clutter, especially that which may impede shipboard operations. In naval usage the name comes from the sound a substantial kludge makes hitting the water when tossed overboard.

In the not-too-distant future, the University Avenue Light Rail Transit will be built, fail miserably, be propped up several times with more force and more taxpayer money, and then be unceremoniously ripped up and paved over... and we won't even get to hear the giant "KLUGE" sound of it hitting the water. The saddest remaining trace will be all of the thousands of people whose lives were turned upside down for the biggest boondoggle in Twin Cities history. Mayors Coleman and Ryback will be gone. There will be nobody to point a finger at, except that amorphous "government".