Monthly Archives: August 2007

When the I-35W bridge collapsed in Minneapolis, the city closed the adjacent 10th Avenue bridge so rescue workers could use it to recover injured people and bodies. Now that all the missing people have been found, the city plans to reopen it tomorrow — with two fewer traffic lanes.

10th Avenue Bridge with pre-collapse I-35W in background.
Wikipedia photo.

Originally, the bridge had four 11-foot traffic lanes, 11.5 feet for bikes, and 8 feet for pedestrians. The reopened bridge will have 12 feet for bikes, 8 feet for pedestrians, a new 11-foot pedestrian lane for viewing the collapsed bridge, and two 15-foot lanes for auto traffic.
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Here are some heartwarming examples of how public transit helps build a sense of community as compared with those soul-destroying automobiles.

A family of tourists got on a Portland light-rail train looking forward to a day of seeing all the sights that can be seen within walking distance of one of Portland’s rail lines. But then they heard someone shouting “the foulest of epithets” in the back of the car.

The shouter moved closer to them, pulled a collapsible rifle out of a duffle bag and quickly assembled it while muttering something about “not appreciating” the fact that another passenger had told him he shouldn’t bring a gun on board. Everyone held their breath, but nothing more happened until the next stop, when a uniformed officer escorted the man off the train.

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Forbes reports on a new study that claims that residents of Houston face the most expensive commutes in the country. This is based on a study by the Brookings Institution, but commissioned by the notoriously anti-auto Surface Transportation Policy Partnership (STPP). Unfortunately, the study itself is not yet available on the web.

But it is interesting that having more money to spend on travel is portrayed as a bad thing. “What really takes a beating is your wallet,” says Forbes. Of course Houstonians spend more: they have more to spend.

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Some people criticized me last week for assuming that all the electricity needed for rail transit came from coal. This was a valid criticism, though less so than you might think. The last major hydroelectric dam in the Northwest was built in the early 1970s, but the first light-rail lines were built after 1980. So none of the incremental energy needed to power light rail came from hydroelectric sources. Wind power, maybe, but not hydro.

I am working on a revised version of my report on greenhouse gases and rail transit. To be fair, I will include both the assumption that electric power comes from coal and that it comes from a mix of sources. I’ll also try to show why, in most states at least, coal will be the source of power for any new electric rail lines. And I’ll compare transit with SUVs as well as conventional cars. I don’t expect these changes will greatly improve the outcome for rail transit, but we will see.

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Congress appropriated money to replace the I-35W bridge that collapsed in Minnesota, but not to increase capacity or add light rail to the bridge. The Minnesota Department of Transportation estimates that each day the replacement is delayed costs Minnesota travelers more than $400,000.

Yet Minneapolis Mayor Rybak is willing to delay the reconstruction by a few months, or a few years, so they can put a light-rail line on the new bridge.

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