It’s not so much that gas has now reached $4 a gallon; it’s that $5 a gallon is not difficult to imagine at all. Escalating gas prices, combined with a heightened sense of awareness of instability in the Middle East and a growing desire to be more environmentally friendly, could be the combination that forces us to re-think transportation policies.
As is often the case, crisis prompts change. In this case, the personal inconvenience of the price of fuel tops geo-politics and social consciousness.
In Connecticut, we have been floundering with the lack of a consistent transportation policy for more than a decade. There is still no solution in sight, but there is a growing consensus that the future is in mass transit rather than one car for every driver. The choice however is not that simple.
The state’s new transportation commissioner has a background in mass transit. A clear signal the political leadership wants to move in that direction, but it is not clear anyone has really thought of what that might mean, or if they have, has taken the time to explain to the voters what it would cost.
For most - mass transit is synonymous with trains, but even in Fairfield County, where thousands of commuters take trains every day to work in New York City, many in the region have no use for our most sophisticated mass transit system simply because the train doesn’t go anywhere they need to be.
The truth is - for every one person who needs to get from Bridgeport to Manhattan there are hundreds more who need to get to places that aren’t served by the rails. To get them using mass transportation you have to be able to deliver them within walking distance of where they are going.
If Connecticut is to be the rail Utopia of the world, hundreds of spurs and train cars to ride them, would have to be created on the shoreline to maximize the potential of that system. If the rest of the state were to follow the shoreline’s lead, several new main lines would have to be created to serve high employment areas. This would take years to develop and billions of dollars, but no one is willing to say so out loud.
Those who advocate for more rail tend to think in terms of old patterns of work and social behavior. The pattern of living in the suburbs and commuting to the city for work has been replaced. Far more people live in a suburb and commute to a suburb. Families share child care responsibilities with day care centers and school systems, making personal schedules unpredictable. Mass transit, in its perfect form may be convenient, but in the reality of everyday life, it is not practical.
Car pooling, buses, cars with high fuel efficiency, bikes and telecommuting are probably the more realistic approaches to the growing transportation crisis since it is being fueled more by higher gasoline prices than concerns about inadequate infrastructure.
Politicians advocating for big city or European style public transportation systems built around trains have to level with the voters. It is a solution that would take a generation to achieve at a cost that is well beyond the scope of any existing state or federal source of money to pay for it.
So where does the first dollar come from and whose backyard will be the first to be taken for new rail lines? Everyone likes trains, but these are the fundamental questions that have prevented the development of a statewide train system for the last 100 years.
As published in the Hartford Business Journal.
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4 comments:
Actually there have been several stakeholder groups that have voiced the need for an improved mass transit/transportation system over the past decade. These groups have also assigned preliminatry funding needs with the projects needed to complete such a system. Lead by the state's Transportation Strategy Board, which statutorily dictates the state's transportation strategy and policy, these recommendations have been abundant. Simply put, it isn't the plans or recommendations of how to develop such a system that have lacked, rather it is the willingness of the politicians to accept what is needed to address these needs. The fact is that what has gotten in the way of Connecticut enacting a comprehensive transportation policy are (1) politics and (2) money. That is: too much politics and not enough money. In 2005 and 2006 our state's leaders began to take the steps needed to overcome this and implement a commuter-friendly transportation system (this includes the development of commuter rail service along the I91 corridor, enhanced bus service to/from major employment centers, and improved rail service along the shoreline). However, implementation of these projects and services are not done overnight, they require time (lots of time, decades in some cases). In addition, the state hasn't been served by our DOT in moving these projects forward. We can only hope that the new commissioner (1)understands that this must change and (2) is an agent of making this change. My fingers are crossed.
Perhaps our way of life in the suburbs is what needs to become a thing in the past. Starting in post-war times, people left downtowns across the country en masse, leaving the empty hulls that only today are just starting to recover with a new influx of young people. You argue that trains are not a reasonable solution because of people living in the suburbs and the distance they live from one another and from jobs in other suburbs. That may be true, but maybe it's not the trains that must be abandoned, but the suburbs that must be refitted or downsized as people re-condense. Everything about the suburbs is based on cheap oil and easy do-it-yourself transportation. No bus, trolley, train, or carpool can keep up with the endless cul-de-sacs and the labyrinthine streets that are designed to isolate, not unite. We all need to take a step back right now and look at how we live, and what changes we can make that are better for our lives, our health, and most importantly, the environment. The suburban living pattern shouldn't stop all thoughts of rail--rail should be yet another reason for people to recongeal around downtowns, transit developments, and other, denser urban neighborhoods.
Another way is for private businesses to help support mass transit by arranging for employee shuttles to and from the train station. Some large companies already do this but more need to so this can work.
If we just expect the state to pay for it all, this will fail. Businesses need to step up, too.
I cannot help but laugh when people start talking of "recondensing" into downtown, transit oriented developments. Oh, I'll just pick up my family, leave our nice little suburban home and school system, and move to the nearest city....NOT. Never going to happen, even with gasoline at 20 dollars a gallon. Anyone remember the American dream of home ownership? Raising a family on a nice little peice of land? Mass transit will fail horribly if we expect the public to mass-uproot so they can save a few bucks on gas by taking a bus or train from some sardine can hi-rise building in the city.
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