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Unless ridership is expressed in terms of meeting some sort of city goal, then it is meaningless. It's no different from saying that 14,000 rode a ride at Carowinds except in that context, those numbers are counted towards a goal of the owners, namely making a profit on their investment. Of course city transit isn't in the profit making business, but there should be some measurable goals that can be related to ridership. Unfortunately with CATS and it's supporters in government, ridership is simply stated with no context. And since it is falling, they have been quiet about even that.
Funding for transit lines is scarce for CATS not because of falling transit tax revenues as their current excuse goes these days, but because their plans don't achieve any goals the Federal government requires for funding transit. In fact the only reason the Feds funded the current line is because CATS and the city promised it would lead to lots of economic development. This obviously hasn't happened as by any measure the state of the city's economy has gotten much worse since it opened. CATS in not having any quantifiable measurements on this can be accused at failing at this goal since it was very willing to stand in line and raise its hand for credit when the economy here was doing well.
In any case it's a moot point as the FTA won't allow this kind of thing in funding decisions these days.
Unless ridership is expressed in terms of meeting some sort of city goal, then it is meaningless...
So what you're really saying is that it's meaningless to you, right?
The fact that 14K people are using the train suggests a benefit to the Charlotte metro public as a whole. Let's face it, if it wasn't better/easier/cheaper/more enjoyable than the other options folks have to get where they're going, they woulnd't be using it.
Can the goal for the city not simply be to offer an alternative mass-transit option for people wishing to travel Uptown? Why does it need to be loftier than that?
Funding for transit lines is scarce for CATS not because of falling transit tax revenues as their current excuse goes these days, but because their plans don't achieve any goals the Federal government requires for funding transit. In fact the only reason the Feds funded the current line is because CATS and the city promised it would lead to lots of economic development. This obviously hasn't happened as by any measure the state of the city's economy has gotten much worse since it opened. CATS in not having any quantifiable measurements on this can be accused at failing at this goal since it was very willing to stand in line and raise its hand for credit when the economy here was doing well.
In any case it's a moot point as the FTA won't allow this kind of thing in funding decisions these days.
Everything you wrote above is 100% bogus and you know it. As I’ve repeatedly pointed out to you a million times, they are now in the engineering/design stage of the Lynx extension. They design it, then go to the government and request the money. That will be completed in 2010 or 2011. They are exactly where they are supposed to be in the process.
It’s sad you won’t take the time educate yourself on CATS and the light rail process. As the saying goes “ignorance is bliss”.
And as for your continued false claim about there being no development on the line, I notice you didn’t try to refute my earlier post when I showed several recent light rail related developments. I suppose you think the other posters didn’t catch that????
Can the goal for the city not simply be to offer an alternative mass-transit option for people wishing to travel Uptown? Why does it need to be loftier than that?
Because it costs a great deal of money. You lose the opportunity to spend this resource elsewhere where it might do better good for the city as a whole. This is why you need to have a stated goal, then a way to achieve this goal. The concept of Lynx has been lets build it and assume something good will happen.
However even forgetting that, and using your theory, then what do you think should be an appropriate number for ridership and lets set that as a goal for CATS? As silly as that might sound, even this doesn't exist. The only valid comparison would be to look at cities that have built transit in the last 30 years to see what is going on, and in most cases, Lynx is not in the same league. And it is headed in the wrong direction.
Again, who decides where this money might be better spent? Define "better"?
One man's ceiling is another man's floor. No matter how the money gets spent, someone will always argue it could have been put to better use elsewhere.
Care to share some examples of how other cities have gone about implementing mass-transit systems, trains specifically, and where Charlotte is going so horribly wrong?
Would you believe NYC is interested in a light rail? It was announced today that a proposal to build a light rail system going from east to west across Forty Second Street will be introduced.
In spite of underground trains, buses galore, NYC sees the benefits of this system.
Just thought that this would be timely information, albeit not Charlotte.
Again, who decides where this money might be better spent? Define "better"?...
Right now, the federal government. Without their funding, nothing else gets built, which means, nothing else gets built because Charlotte is unable to meet their definition of better.
Of course Charlotte could pony up the cash to build it without any federal money, such as what they did in Houston, but that would require them to actually go themselves and ask the people to pay more taxes to build it. This is where the "better" decision would be thoroughly examined and it's my guess, there isn't one politician on the board who would actually go suggest this.
In asking what is "better" the ones paying the bills will want to know what happens if we don't build it. Nobody can answer that question because right now, the only thing they can say is OH, 14,000 people don't get to ride a train. That isn't going to be very convincing.
So I am not even going to bother to address what you posted since your first sentence was nothing more than in insult. That is where I stopped reading and is usually an indication of the level of the rest of the point. Nothing that I have posted warrented that type of attack but id does follow what I said would happen.
Well, if calling someone a "naysayer" is some big insult to you that you don't like, I guess that means I can count on you to quit calling ME a Pollyanna, right? After all, a Pollyanna is the direct opposite of a naysayer, so if one is insulting, than so is the other
Frankly, cityboi was just making an observation - a few people in Virginia Beach are very down on the light rail there, just like they were here - but that did not effect the huge success of our Lynx line, and hopefully won't there either.
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On the subject of a light rail
