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Originally Posted by
Tom Elmore
Ah yes, the old "The beatings will continue until morale improves" argument.
The reality is simple -- and is now irrefutably proven: Rail transit services bring the middle class back to transit. Only implementation of rail transit services has consistently increased ridership of connecting bus services.
The "flexibility of buses over rail" argument is just absurd. It's one of the lame arguments Ernest J. Istook trotted out when he sought to justify giving Salt Lake the meat of the watermelon and sticking us with the rind back in 1996. That "flexibility," which means "nobody has any idea where the trolley is at this moment," is precisely the problem with OKC's "trolleys" -- just as we warned back in 1996.
Rail reorients population distribution because of its permanency and reliability. That's why Salt Lake wanted it -- and that's why it's working like crazy in 20 or more other US cities that have brought it back over the last 20 years.
Rail is now, clearly, the "holy grail" of transit and transportation across the nation and throughout the world -- and Oklahoma City has more usable rail on the ground right now -- not some pie-in-the-sky "light rail" deal -- than nearly any other city in the West.
Oklahoma City is literally in the catbird seat. We have everything we need to make a knockout start -- except honest, straightforward leadership interested in the good of the people at large.
Well -- gee -- how about some sidetrack substitute, like "more Istook trolleys" or "Bus Rapid Transit?" The answer is crystal clear: You will never (never) see a train of any kind trying to "look like a bus..."
If we let these people beat us out of our rail assets, the excuse, then, will be, "Well, we coulda done it back there when we had our Union Station -- but now we can't afford it...."
What's that "other old saying?" -- "Fool me once, shame on you, fool me twice shame on me.....?"
Give me a break.
TOM ELMORE
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