Obama plans to be engaged in urban affairs/"White House Office on Urban Policy" (Chicago: income, maintenance)

[Lookout Kid]

You get the nation you build.

[Lookout Kid]

Originally Posted by Attrill

Maybe not Minneapolis, but St. Louis, Milwaukee, and Indianapolis are definitely viable. HSR rail would basically be an improvement on existing rail service, and would be faster and more reliable than driving or flying. Although if the TSA could get their act together flying might be faster.

There was a high-speed rail proposal floated around ten years ago that connected (from east to west) Detroit, Chicago, Milwaukee, Madison, and the Twin Cities. From a regional planning perspective, we need to start bypassing airports for these short trips.

[dontcallmeshirley]

How is it a very good program when ther have been more MURDERS in the Chicago city limits in 2008 that deaths in the WAR in all of 2008. Yeah, it's working like a charm.

Originally Posted by via chicago

Actually, yes. Cease Fire is a very good program and is one of the few that has had a real impact in the community in preventing violence and conflicts before they begin. You should read up on it; the Tribune had an excellent piece in their Sunday magazine a few months back.

I don't understand how people could not see this as a good thing. Urban areas, issues, and infrastructure have been largely been ignored by the federal government for some time now. Having an urban-minded president is a HUGE asset to Chicago and other metropolitan cities.

[dontcallmeshirley]

How about the Death Penalty.

Originally Posted by Brandwein

So which is better?

Cease Fire or Midnight Basketball?

[Drover]

Originally Posted by Attrill

Maybe not Minneapolis, but St. Louis, Milwaukee, and Indianapolis are definitely viable. HSR rail would basically be an improvement on existing rail service, and would be faster and more reliable than driving or flying. Although if the TSA could get their act together flying might be faster.

Rail has the big advantage of being located downtown as well - many business travelers can save time by not having to get out to Midway or O'Hare.

I don't know that it would be faster and more reliable than flying to STL. Driving, probably; but it only takes about 4 hours to drive from downtown Chicago to downtown St. Louis. By the time you get to the station, plan enough time for check-in, board, travel, unboard, collect your luggage, and find your way to your final destination, how much faster would HSR be versus flying or even driving?

As for Milwaukee, the existing Amtrak line takes 90 minutes. How much faster do you need to get there?

[dontcallmeshirley]

hmmmmm......this seems like it belongs in the "politics" forum

[Attrill]

Originally Posted by Drover

I don't know that it would be faster and more reliable than flying to STL. Driving, probably; but it only takes about 4 hours to drive from downtown Chicago to downtown St. Louis. By the time you get to the station, plan enough time for check-in, board, travel, unboard, collect your luggage, and find your way to your final destination, how much faster would HSR be versus flying or even driving?

As for Milwaukee, the existing Amtrak line takes 90 minutes. How much faster do you need to get there?

Chicago to St Louis can be driven in 4 hours - at midnight on a Sunday. Most of the time it is about 5, and up to 6 hours. The biggest time savings I've found about traveling by train is how fast check in is. It cuts a good half hour off of both ends of a trip (and you don't have to deal with worrying about being bumped if you aren't there early enough). I can't remember the last time I checked a bag for a flight or train trip.

As I said, if the TSA could get their act together flying for short trips might make sense again, but right now having to check in half an hour before flights and then go through security adds a good chunk of time to a flight. I can drive to Indy in 3.5 hours from downtown, but to fly I need to plan on arriving at the airport 45-60 minutes beforehand just to get through security and check in. I haven't had to do that on Acela or European and Japanese HSR.

Rail service is also a lot more reliable than air travel. Only 70-75% of flights are actually on time, and just a little weather can throw a wrench into everything. I've found foreign HSR and even regular Amtrak to be much more reliable than flights.

How long would I like it to take to get to Milwaukee? When I used to have to go up there twice a week 5 minutes would have been about right. Milwaukee will probably be rolled into the Chicago MSA in the next census, and a commute shorter than 90 minutes would help business in both cities.

Security, airline check in requirements, and trips from downtown add a couple hours onto any business flier in Chicago - rail starts out with a 45-90 advantage over flying for time. Driving times vary drastically according to traffic, road construction and weather - and you can't get much work done while driving. Having riden HSR on a regular basis in other countries, and used Acela quite a few times, I think that rail can offer a lot of advantages for any trips within 500 miles.

[eevee]

Originally Posted by dontcallmeshirley

hmmmmm......this seems like it belongs in the "politics" forum

**YAWN** you whine too much. take it up w/ the mods about why your thread was deleted and stop being such a damn baby about it!

[Lookout Kid]

Originally Posted by dontcallmeshirley

How is it a very good program when ther have been more MURDERS in the Chicago city limits in 2008 that deaths in the WAR in all of 2008. Yeah, it's working like a charm.

****, not this one again. We've anhililated that comparison about 150 times on this forum. It's just stupid.

[hsw]

Trains between cities are rarely useful to most business travelers...

Loop-like Central Business Dts in any city tend to have a few financial firms, law firms, etc...

But most large and mid-sized cos. in any major urban region in US tend to be based in suburban office parks (even 30-40% of hedge fund industry in NYC is in suburban Greenwich)....even in "old" regions like NYC or Bos or Phila....and slightly less old, but even more car-centric, regions like Detroit or StLouis or Cleveland....

Most business travelers would welcome higher airfares to reduce annoying leisure traveler traffic; fewer flts to resort destinations and more flts to relevant business centers....less traffic congestion at airports and in skies if airlines price fares for business travelers...perhaps a deep recession will accomplish these efficiencies in business air travel