joethejalapeno

Former RTA GM's letter in today's PD: http://www.cleveland.com/letters/plaindealer/index.ssf?/base/opinion/1217061117229130.xml&coll=2 P.S.- When I rode the Red Line to the airport today, the farebox wouldn't take my single. A woman in the front rows changed it for me. She did the same for at least two more riders, saying she had laundry quarters to get rid of. I assume otherwise we would have ridden free. I don't know who she was, but RTA can thank her for not adding another $3.00 to its $20M deficit.

Would anyone who attended the charette on the University Circle rapid station rehab like to share what their impressions were?

Mr Masek, is it true that Community Circulators, at least as long as they continue to run, can be waved down at any point along the route? That was always our understanding, but a driver this evening did not seem to agree.

Well, biodiesel can be made from fast food fry oil, or from crops like soy. I should point out that there were stories in past months about demand for crops to make biofuels causing grain shortages for hungry developing countries, so better to try to make it from waste like fryer oil. Here was a PD story about a local biodiesel plant. http://www.cleveland.com/green/index.ssf?/green/more/0421story.html Generally, people run blends that are only part biodiesel, mixed with petrodiesel. That still is cleaner and cheaper than 100% petrodiesel, in proportion to how much biodiesel is in the blend. If RTA contracted with a plant like the one in the story to fuel its fleet, the plant would have economies to scale up considerably.

Generally encouraged by the level of debate on this thread. I'm watching Al Gore on Meet the Press right now. One day all our vehicles, public and private, will be green. Right now, I take it most RTA rubber-tire buses are diesel, correct? Well, it's my understanding that any diesel engine can, perhaps with minimal conversion process, run on biodiesel. My understanding is RTA would be willing to switch buses to biodiesel if enough fuel supply were available, but they've had trouble identifying a sufficient supply. Does anyone know anything about this? Surely biodiesel is cheaper that petrodiesel and if a supply were found this would save RTA money right away - as I said conversion of the vehicle to run on bio-d is minimal and inexpensive. Would improve air quality problems that are causing childhood asthma as so on. Perhaps one day the vehicles will all run on fuel cells or whatever, but we need solution for *now*. Anybody have comment?

Why not think Federal since this is a national problem? PUBLIC TRANSIT EMERGENCY RELIEF ACT OF 2008 All mass transit agencies in the country eligible for a one-time operating stimulus subsidy based on last year's number of riders served. I have already emailed Tubbs Jones, Brown and Voinovich. Focus on Voinovich; he has urban roots yet may be able to persuade Republicans. http://voinovich.senate.gov/public/index.cfm http://tubbsjones.house.gov/ http://kucinich.house.gov/ http://sutton.house.gov/main/ http://brown.senate.gov/contact/