[PLUG-TALK] Re: [PLUG] PLUG meeting

Carla Schroder pluglist at bratgrrl.com
Sat Dec 7 03:53:56 UTC 2002


On Friday 06 December 2002 16:50, David Mandel wrote:
> I find this discussion of public transportation interesting.
>
> What is especially interesting is how the discussion of
>
>     public transportation   compared to    private transportation
>
> is very much like discussions of
>
>     main frames             compared to    personal computing
>
>
> In both cases, it is sort of an efficient resource usage thing verse
> a personal freedom thing.  Even more interestingly, people don't
> always line up on the same sides on both issues.

Well, yes and no. The state of public transportation around here makes it a 
question of what is practical. There's a pretty large gap between what is 
possible, and what is feasible. Sure, a person can spend half a day getting 
to their destination- I doubt many will make it a habit. Even in situations 
where transit is adequate for traveling from thither to yon, other problems 
come up- If you need to carry a lot of stuff, public transit doesn't work. 

Personal safety and travel time are major issues. Granted, car crashes are 
common, but they don't hold the same terror quotient as being trapped in a 
train car with a gang of thugs, or scary smelly people yelling and waving 
their arms at who-knows-what. I wish I could bottle the exasperation of 
having to quit carrying a backpack on the back of a wheelchair because of 
thieves, and give certain naysayers a sip of reality.

I have a good laugh over the acceptance of pollution from buses and the Max. 
Hey Karl, thanks for killing off the fish with your flagrant use of 
electricity! Those trains run five minutes apart during peak hours- how much 
juice is that, anyway? How many fish are left flopping in the shallows?  Or 
munched in the turbines?

Bus pollution is huge. The trucking industry has been quite effective in 
staving off emission controls on big vehicles. Buses get 4- 6mpg. Diesel is a 
poor choice for buses. Diesels are most efficient for long steady hauls, not 
stop and start. I'll bet that pollution and fuel consumption from a bus is 
more than a fleet of modern cars carrying the same number of passengers. How 
many cars does a busload of riders really take off the road? If that's the 
goal, I don't think public transit has that much of an impact, a lot of 
transit users wouldn't own a car anyway. I'm just speculating, of course, it 
would interesting to see some data.

Cars are subsidized in ways that are not immediately apparent- health problems 
and environmental degradation from noise and pollution, for starters. Car 
owners don't even come close to paying their own way. I'll never forget when 
the I5- I90 connection was completed in Seattle several years ago, at a cost 
of nearly $2 billion. They could have paid people to stay home and not 
commute for quite a few years. Subsidizing transit is worthy. I'd feel like 
my taxes were better spent if they actually made an effort to collect fares 
on the MAX, fare enforcement is laughable.

I would love more and better public transit, good transit is in some ways 
freer than driving. Just go, sightsee, relax. It's a nice dream.
-- 
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Carla Schroder
Bratgrrl Computing
www.bratgrrl.com
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