{"id":803,"date":"2006-12-24T10:57:56","date_gmt":"2006-12-24T17:57:56","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/?p=803"},"modified":"2006-12-24T12:17:57","modified_gmt":"2006-12-24T19:17:57","slug":"not-just-any-fools-heavy-on-the-light-rail-propaganda-please","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/803\/not-just-any-fools-heavy-on-the-light-rail-propaganda-please\/","title":{"rendered":"Not just any fools: Heavy on the light rail propaganda, please . . ."},"content":{"rendered":"

Almost three years ago, The Goldwater Institute, a free-market think tank in Phoenix, published a devastating accounting of the light rail system now being built in Metropolitan Phoenix<\/a>:<\/p>\n

[The Maricopa Association of Governments]’s public transit plans deserve close scrutiny. Use of urban public transportation systems has been in decline since the end of World War II, when public transit provided 50 percent of urban travel. Last year, only three percent of urban travel in America was provided by public transit. This decline has occurred despite prodigious government efforts to prevent it. Governments now spend 30 to 40 times as much on public transit as for roadways. But evidence suggests that transit is not the most effective use of public transportation dollars.<\/p>\n

Of all the options in the public transit mix, light rail deserves the most scrutiny. Because it requires its own special track, it lacks the flexibility of buses, which use existing city streets. And because tracks would be constructed on existing city streets, light rail in the Phoenix region is actually projected to increase traffic congestion. Furthermore, in no city in America does light rail transit account for much more than one percent of urban person-miles of travel. The Phoenix light rail system is projected to account for only two-tenths of one percent of travel in the region.<\/p>\n

The average cost of light rail per passenger-mile is around $1.50, almost double the cost of bus transit, and five times the cost of automobile transportation per vehicle-mile. On average, taxpayers pay nearly 90 percent of the cost of light rail passenger travel, considerably more than for all other transit modes. Worst of all, light rail would do almost nothing to relieve traffic congestion. Because 80 percent of new light rail passengers in Maricopa County would be former bus passengers, light rail would remove less than one car in 1,000 from traffic.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

To my knowledge, no one has ever challenged the numbers in this report — perhaps because it is based entirely on Valley Metro’s own projections. The Arizona Republic<\/i> dismissed it with high-handed hand-waving, insisting — I kid you not — that people say that Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Almost three years ago, The Goldwater Institute, a free-market think tank in Phoenix, published a devastating accounting of the light rail system now being built in Metropolitan Phoenix: [The Maricopa Association of Governments]’s public transit plans deserve close scrutiny. Use of urban public transportation systems has been in decline since the end of World War […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_crdt_document":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[8,6,5],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-803","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"hentry","6":"category-investment","7":"category-marketing","8":"category-real-estate","10":"no-featured-image"},"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":16314,"url":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/16314\/kotkin-why-the-next-great-american-cities-arent-what-you-think\/","url_meta":{"origin":803,"position":0},"title":"Kotkin: “Why the next great American cities aren\u2019t what you think.”","author":"Greg Swann","date":"April 9, 2013","format":false,"excerpt":"Joel Kotkin at The Daily Beast:Once considered backwaters, these Sunbelt cities are quietly achieving a critical mass of well-educated residents. They are also becoming major magnets for immigrants. Over the past decade, the largest percentage growth in foreign-born population has occurred in sunbelt cities, led by Nashville, which has doubled\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Big Mother"","block_context":{"text":"Big Mother","link":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/category\/big-mother\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":4,"url":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/4\/notrailing-at-light-rail\/","url_meta":{"origin":803,"position":1},"title":"(not)Railing at light rail…","author":"Odysseus","date":"November 10, 2005","format":false,"excerpt":"The Arizona Republic blows warm, wet kisses at the light rail system currently (and essentially perpetually) under construction in Central Phoenix. It really doesn't do to gripe about this thing. It will happen, no matter how much it shouldn't. But the article itself is funny, presumably without intending to be.\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "General"","block_context":{"text":"General","link":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/category\/general\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":1404,"url":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/1404\/hey-can-i-hop-a-train-to-that-shack-shackpricescom-introduces-proximity-to-mass-transit-as-a-search-criterion\/","url_meta":{"origin":803,"position":2},"title":"Hey, can I hop a train to that shack? ShackPrices.com introduces proximity to mass transit as a search criterion","author":"Greg Swann","date":"May 10, 2007","format":false,"excerpt":"Correct me if I'm wrong, but I think the most innovative of the map-based real estate search portals is ShackPrices.com. A house is a house and a neighborhood is a neighborhood, but a home is a lifestyle, and ShackPrices is doing more than anyone else to integrate lifestyle data in\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Disintermediation"","block_context":{"text":"Disintermediation","link":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/category\/disintermediation\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":6336,"url":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/6336\/a-trolley-comes-to-phoenix-tendency-in-reporting-and-why-it-matters\/","url_meta":{"origin":803,"position":3},"title":"A trolley comes to Phoenix: Tendency in reporting and why it matters","author":"Greg Swann","date":"December 29, 2008","format":false,"excerpt":"So it's almost five days since I dropped the dime on the bribe gifts being thrust upon the contributors to AG. Has anyone publicly renounced them so far? We got to see Jay Thompson issue some tepid caveats about the gift products -- from our pages, not AG's. And we\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Blogging"","block_context":{"text":"Blogging","link":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/category\/blogging\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":47,"url":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/47\/corporate-welfare-in-phoenix\/","url_meta":{"origin":803,"position":4},"title":"Corporate welfare in Phoenix","author":"Odysseus","date":"January 25, 2006","format":false,"excerpt":"The Arizona Republic brings us another glowing puff piece on the beauty, the splendor, the wonder, the power and the glory of the forthcoming Trolley system:Funny thing about \"knowledge workers\": They don't like to drive. That's one of the reasons Thomas Gorny decided on a site along the future light-rail\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "General"","block_context":{"text":"General","link":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/category\/general\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":21,"url":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/21\/moondacity\/","url_meta":{"origin":803,"position":5},"title":"Moondacity…","author":"Odysseus","date":"December 6, 2005","format":false,"excerpt":"Jon Talton is the Arizona's Republic's house Socialist. He hates just about everything associated with free enterprise, but he makes up for it by waxing rhapsodic over any stray government boondoggle. He is convinced that Phoenix will continue to go down the toilet by growing and prospering until it dares\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "General"","block_context":{"text":"General","link":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/category\/general\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/803","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=803"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/803\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=803"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=803"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=803"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}