BIKE: Re: Rail Issues

[Nawdry]

Well, since Patrick's latest rant specifically targets me (I guess I give 
him nightmares or something), I suppose I'll have to take a small piece of 
the small piece of time available to me between jobs to respond.  Comments 
below...

At 10/26/2004 11:45 , Patrick Goetz <pgoetz> wrote:
>-----------------
>Moving on, in a WTF? move, Tom Delay (yes, that Tom Delay) helped
>organize a conference in Houston to explore alternative technologies for
>expanding the Houston rail system.  I'm quoting Delay here; note the
>promise to help Houston Metro in the future.
>(http://www.chron.com/cs/CDA/ssistory.mpl/metropolitan/2858748)
>
>  > DeLay, the keynote speaker at Wednesday's session, said transportation
>  > projects need to be designed to meet the needs of the public, not the
>  > desires of planners.
>  >
>  > "Unfortunately our transportation policy, and spending in particular,
>  > is still governed by an outdated vision," DeLay told the audience of
>  > about 100. "This past year, the city of Houston — after a long, hard
>  > struggle — installed the same old mass-transit system that was
>  > installed in Calgary, Canada, the year I was born: 1947.
>  >
>  > "It seems to me Houston can do better."
>  >
>  > The majority leader suggested Metro "needs an infusion of vision and
>  > innovation" and commended its leaders for putting together the
>  > technology forum.
>  >
>  > "I'm hoping this summit, and the information that comes out of it, will
>  > keep the minds open at Metro," he said. "This is important work you are
>  > doing, and I look forward to helping you do it in the future."
>  >
>
>Subscribers to Lyndon Henry's PTP bulletin will notice that Henry,
>perhaps the single most influential advocate for traditional 19th
>century rail in Austin, referred to this conference as the "'gadget
>transit' forum" and refers to Houston mayor Bill White as a "top rail
>foe" for making the following statement:
>
>  > Metro should consider abandoning light rail for another transit mode
>if it
>  > could provide better service or cost less, Houston's mayor said Thursday
>  > at the second day of a forum examining 11 alternative systems.
>  >
>
>And this despite the fact that Bill White was a strong supporter the
>referendum authorizing Houston's light rail system!  Calling
>technologies such as the highly economical mini-metro subway being built
>in Copenhagen (discussed on this list previously) and the wildy
>successful KL monorail "gadget" transit is perverse even by Henry's
>bizarrely twisted standards.

This was indeed a "gadget transit" forum, and seems clearly part of a 
political effort to assuage far-right, anti-transit, pro-highway gorillas 
like DeLay and Eckels, who are eager to derail Metro's voter-approved LRT 
expansion program, and who, according to reports, prodded Metro to sponsor 
this latest quest for the Holy Gadget.  At this stage, I think there is a 
certain amount of "gadgetry" in the totally automated Copenhagen 
"mini-metro", but this doesn't necessarily mean this isn't an appropriate 
mode for the right application.  I do have some skepticism about the 
efficacy of totally automated, driverless operation, but then Patrick has 
expressed some, too, lately.  But more and more of these systems seem to 
working effectively, so time will tell if this is the best kind of choice 
for a totally grade-separated system.

What I think Houston's Road Warriors and "Anything But Light Rail" 
crusaders hope to achieve is to steer "fixed-guideway" transit development 
into the most expensive and ineffective path possible - particularly to get 
anything not on rubber tires up off the urban surface and out of the way of 
their beloved roadway systems.  Rail rapid transit is not by definition 
"ineffective", but it is certainly barely accessible, or inaccessible, to 
the limited resources available to most American cities, and inappropriate 
for the task of interconnecting this nation's typically sprawling 
urban-suburban areas.

But Houston's Road Warriors seem to have in mind far more "gadgety" gadgets 
than Copenhagen's mini-metro.  Exotic transit gadgets are particularly 
appealing to the many in the Road Warrior camp because they're not only 
expensive, but malfunction-prone, and in any case suitable for the role of 
short, glitzy, expensive urban showpieces rather than extensive systems 
which would start offering real alternatives to the pervasive highway system.

And as for "traditional 19th century rail" ... let me point out that 
monorails date from the EARLY 19th century - thus PRE-DATING urban light 
electric railway technology, which dates from the LATE 19th century.  Both 
modes have seen lots of technological advancement since, and (unlike 
obsessive monorail fanatics) transportation planners tend to see a place 
for these and many other modes in the proper applications.


>A commuter rail line running on a single
>track shared with freight, from mostly nowhere to mostly nowhere, a few
>times a day is a gadget, for heaven's sake.


I won't get into arguing over speculation as to how effective the proposed 
"commuter" line will be.  Call it a "gadget" if you like, but it does use 
well-proven and relatively low-cost, financially accessible technology, and 
and I think it makes good use of an existing asset - the railway line.


>Henry and his cadre of 19th
>century rail nuts appear to have every intention of surpassing Fox News
>in the politically motivated obfuscation department; from calling BRT
>advocate Fred Gilliam a rail supporter to calling subway, monorail, and
>elevated rail systems "gadget transit".  Of course astute readers will
>recall that this is the same group which refers to appeals to elementary
>Newtonian mechanics as "technobabble".  Do we really need to know
>anything else about their mental acuity and problem solving abilities?


Gee, Patrick, you must have skipped your hallucination medication, since I 
have never either considered or called "elementary Newtonian mechanics" 
"technobabble".  (Am I running for office or something? This is sorta like 
responding to Bush-Cheney attack ads...)

>A "gadget" technology is one, like Houston's disasterous LRT system,
>which can't do the job it was designed to do (see article posted below
>for the "last straw" of LRT in Houston).  This is why thinking folks in
>Houston, from right wing conservative demagogues to liberal do-gooders,
>are trying to identify a technology which will solve their
>transportation dilemma.  JUST FOR ENGAGING IN THE EXERCISE OF STUDYING
>ALTERNATIVE TECHNOLOGIES, Henry -- again, the single most influential
>public transportation consultant in the city of Austin and Karl
>Rove-like mastermind behind the failed 2002 Rapid Transit Project

Holy Moly!  ME, the "Karl Rove-like mastermind behind the failed 2002 Rapid 
Transit Project"...?    Yikes!  Patrick's starting to sound like he's 
competing with Lyndon Larouche (that OTHER famous Lyndon) for the Gold 
Medal in the Most Bizarre Political Perceptions and Convoluted Paranoid 
Plots category.


>-- and
>his disciples refer to conference participants as "gadgeteers" and "rail
>foes".  I simply don't understand where these people (Henry & Co.) are
>coming from.  What on earth is their motive?  I don't think they're
>being payed off by the highway lobby, although they probably deserve to
>be in the same way Bush should be getting stipends from Osama Bin Laden
>for all he's done to further the cause of world Islamic terrorism.  They
>claim to favor public transit, but then do almost everything they can to
>stimy -- not just the deployment of -- but even the STUDY of affective
>pubic transit solutions!  What in the hell is going on here?  Are they
>just crazies who, like Nero in Rome, came to power in corrupt times?
>Inquiring minds would like to get to the bottom of this.  One thing is
>nearly certain, though: as long as Lee "Aggie" Walker, Fred "BRT"
>Gilliam, and Lyndon "techobabble" Henry are running things in Austin,
>we're not going to get a transit system which can change land use and
>provide a real alternative to the private motor vehicle.
>Meanwhile, the poor folks in Houston are getting a real taste of just
>how effective LRT is in a crunch.  It should be noted that the Chicago
>El, a fully grade-separated Metro technology similar to what I've
>advocating; what Henry would call "gadget" technology (since it's not an
>at-grade 19th-century LRT choo-choo), has been successfully delivering
>baseball fans to and from Cubs games for almost 100 years.  Lyndon can
>try and spin this any way he likes; I lived 2 blocks from Wrigley field
>for several years and can assure list readers that most fans would NOT
>have a way of getting to games without the El.  Wrigley field, the
>oldest baseball park in the country, is surrounded by high density urban
>residential and commercial buildings with only city street road access.
>   The afternoon trains in the Summer are packed to capacity every game
>day.  Unlike the Houston LRT, the El is an effective special events
>transportation system and has been day after day, all Summer, every
>Summer, for decades.  I simply can't fathom how anyone could be so
>confused about what works and what doesn't, it really boggles the mind.

Well, most of the above makes entertaining reading (not often I somehow get 
associated with Osama bin Laden AND Nero in the same commentary), so I'll 
leave it without comment, except to note that the Houston's LRT MAY indeed 
have some extraordinary design problems downtown.  It's the ONLY modern 
light rail system in the country, or the world for that matter, which gets 
shut down during some special events (not all) because of problems of 
pedestrian safety (i.e., crowds on the tracks).  Bad idea.  Dallas's DART 
doesn't have to shut down.  Nor do LRT lines in Denver, Salt Lake City, St. 
Louis, San Francisco, San Diego, Portland ....  (The New Orleans streetcar 
system shuts down during Mardi Gras, but that's one night a year.)  This 
tells me that somebody in Houston might not have designed something 
right.  I could elaborate, but will leave it for now.

However, let me point out that no transit system is totally immune from 
design flaws.  The Las Vegas monorail remains TOTALLY shut down, for weeks 
now, and according to today's Las Vegas Sun, there's "no reopening in 
sight...."  See article below.

LH


http://www.lasvegassun.com/sunbin/stories/lv-other/2004/oct/26/517723801.html

LAS VEGAS SUN
October 26, 2004

No reopening in sight for monorail

By Stephen Curran

The Las Vegas Monorail, out of service since an industrial-sized washer
fell from a moving train last month, remains closed with no re-opening
date in sight, county inspectors said Monday.

The Clark County Building Division, which has authority over the monorail,
is still conducting a series of tests to determine what caused the washer,
which is used to secure the drive shaft, to fall off.

No one was injured in the Sept. 8 incident, in which the two-pound washer
fell about 25 feet near the Bally's/Paris platform.

It is the second long-term closure since the system opened to the public
July 15, after a string of glitches pushed back the opening date more than
six months. The first closure, which occurred less than a week before the
washer fell off, was prompted by a 60-pound wheel assembly that fell from
a moving train and lasted six days.

The washer, with a 6-inch diameter, was part of a flange system used to
secure the drive shaft. A bolt held in place by the washer also broke, but
the flange kept the drive shaft from falling again.

Ron Lynn, the Clark County building official, said engineers with the
county and the monorail's Canadian builder, Bombardier Inc., have
positioned sophisticated sensors used to measure structural weaknesses
throughout the nine monorail cars but have not arrived at a conclusive
cause of the failures.

Todd Walker, a spokesman for the monorail, was unavailable for
comment Monday but said Friday that there is no target date for re-
opening.

The county has put one full-time engineer on the project and another five
who work on a part-time basis, Lynn said.

Transit System Management, the company that runs the monorail, will be
billed $75 an hour for each engineer who inspects the trains, Lynn had
said.

Previous estimates have put the monorail's losses at about $85,000 in
ticket sales each day the system is closed.

Monorail officials have also enlisted Exponent, a third-party safety
consulting firm, to investigate the problems.

Engineers working on the project are reluctant to speculate on when the
system could be ready again, as possible fixes could create entirely new
safety scenarios, Dave Durkee, the county's principal engineer on the
project, said.

"Every single change that is made has another consequent effect on the
system," Durkee said. "There's no sense fixing one component if you're
going to break another component. That's the state that we're in right
now."