gildone

I think the question is better phrased as whether or not extending the Hoosier State would improve the operating ratio such that a larger operating subsidy would not be necessary, or better yet, a smaller one. On a related note... since the Lake Shore Limited loses only $1.5 million per year, I have to wonder if having even one additional frequency there to spread out station and other costs more and improve crew utilization would result in both trains nearly breaking even. But, I don't know the math behind this stuff...

Letter to the editor in today's on-line PD: As upsetting as it is, I can't blame United Airlines for its recent decision to close its hub in Cleveland, nor should anyone else. The company simply acted as for-profit corporations are obliged to under the capitalist system which we claim to admire in this country. There is blame to be had, but it's on the state of Ohio and its current crop of elected officials who have an obligation to foresee changing transportation trends, take notice of troubling signs that lead to events like United's de-hubbing of Cleveland, and plan accordingly for the state's mobility. It's not news that airlines have been cutting flights for years. Ohio had some foresight when the Taft administration, with the support of the legislature at the time, created the Ohio Hub Plan to bring fast, frequent intercity rail service to Ohio and when the Strickland administration tried to begin implementing it with the 3C Corridor.... Read more at: http://blog.cleveland.com/letters/2014/02/letter_to_the_editor_899.html

^Good point. We generate a lot of waste heat in the US that could be recovered for energy generation purposes.

I would too. I could take the Red Line downtown, then walk out the back of Tower City to get on the CVSR, assuming they would use the old B&O station or something in that area.

It's not the economy, stupid; young people really are turning their backs on cars Lloyd Alter Treehugger http://www.treehugger.com/cars/its-not-economy-stupid-young-people-really-are-turning-their-backs-cars.html Excerpt: Longer term, the picture is consistent. People between the ages of 16 and 34 are driving a whole lot less. The cost of cars, parking, insurance and gas keep going up to the point that it becomes a serious burden, and that's not changing anytime soon. This started long before the smart phone revolution. However now, the picture has changed. If you want to get all anecdotal, my nephew has a very well paying job and can afford a car. But he lives near a streetcar line and would prefer to be on his phone on the streetcar than in a car stuck in traffic. When he needs one there's Zipcar or rental. Much of the time he bikes. He has made the choice that another car consultant describes in Bloomberg, In a wonderfully titled article: Gen Y Eschewing V-8 for 4G

US Army colonel: world is sleepwalking to a global energy crisis by Nafeez Mosaddeq Ahmed, originally published by The Guardian Earth Insight blog | Jan 21, 2014 A conference sponsored by a US military official convened experts in Washington DC and London warning that continued dependence on fossil fuels puts the world at risk of an unprecedented energy crunch that could inflame financial crisis and exacerbate dangerous climate change. http://www.theguardian.com/environment/earth-insight/2014/jan/17/peak-oil-oilandgascompanies

The most complete article on this is behind a paywall at the Financial Times, but these two sum it up. Ford is starting to think beyond cars. This is a HUGE shift in mentality for an American auto company: Ford Motor, which pioneered the affordable mass-produced motor car, is looking to play a bigger role in building public transport vehicles or integrating cities’ transport systems as it grapples with the growing challenge of helping people move around the world’s traffic-choked cities. Alan Mulally, Ford’s chief executive, said questions of “personal mobility” and “quality of life” were some of the “most important and exciting developments” around the world and simply providing more and more cars was “not going to work”. http://www.irishtimes.com/business/sectors/transport-and-tourism/ford-explores-personal-mobility-and-challenge-of-traffic-choked-cities-1.1655297 In a similar article, Mulally says not to assume that Ford would always be in the car business: http://www.irishtimes.com/business/sectors/transport-and-tourism/ford-explores-personal-mobility-and-challenge-of-traffic-choked-cities-1.1655297

I agree Bill. We have nothing to lose by organizing and making noise about this but a chance, even if slim, to change the conversation.

I had a feeling you'd say that :wink: But my point is still valid. We shouldn't slink away silently. This is an opportunity we need to seize.

I understand, but just because ODOT is intransigent and Kasich is clueless and ideological is no reason not to band together and start making some noise about this. If the American colonists just considered the Brits non-existent and did nothing else, we'd still be living under the Union Jack. This is an opportunity to raise the profile of the desperate need in this state for transportation alternatives.

...nothing really new here, except that the concept is being considered seriously by the Germans. My guess is the DoD has similar studies, but they are not being reported on (or leaked). They do, and it was reported in 2010 as well: http://peakgeneration.blogspot.com/2010/04/us-military-warns-of-severe-oil.html Just google: "US Joint Operations Command", "peak oil" somewhere in one of the links that comes up, you'll find a hotlink to the actual document.

Former BP geologist: peak oil is here and it will 'break economies' by Nafeez Mosaddeq Ahmed, originally published by The Guardian blog | Dec 23, 2013 A former British Petroleum (BP) geologist has warned that the age of cheap oil is long gone, bringing with it the danger of "continuous recession" and increased risk of conflict and hunger. At a lecture on 'Geohazards' earlier this month as part of the postgraduate Natural Hazards for Insurers course at University College London (UCL), Dr. Richard G. Miller, who worked for BP from 1985 before retiring in 2008, said that official data from the International Energy Agency (IEA), US Energy Information Administration (EIA), International Monetary Fund (IMF), among other sources, showed that conventional oil had most likely peaked around 2008.... Full article at: http://www.theguardian.com/environment/earth-insight/2013/dec/23/british-petroleum-geologist-peak-oil-break-economy-recession

Lots of compelling charts and such here. It's a bit of a long read, but worth it SNAKE OIL: Chapter 3 - A Treadmill to Hell by Richard Heinberg, originally published by Resilience.org | Oct 9, 2013 http://www.resilience.org/stories/2013-10-09/snake-oil-chapter-3-a-treadmill-to-hell The current fracking frenzy in the oil and gas fields of Texas, North Dakota, Oklahoma, Louisiana, Arkansas, Colorado, and Pennsylvania shows all the signs of being a boom in the classic sense. How do we know it’s not different this time, that it won’t end in a colossal bust? And if it is yet another instance of the same old story, how soon will the bust come? These are questions best answered by data—by realistic resource estimates, per-well production and decline rates, and reliable calculations of the number of possible drilling sites. Compiling these kinds of data is hard work and often requires access to expensive proprietary information. And the rewards are few: investors want good news... ...When discussing US shale gas production, it is always necessary to begin by acknowledging the industry’s accomplishments—as we have already done on more than one occasion in this book. Natural gas production in the United States is now higher than at any point in history, and shale gas currently makes up 40% of America’s total natural gas production. Considering how quickly the new technology has been deployed, this is an impressive achievement. Nevertheless, it turns out that high productivity shale gas plays are few and far between: just six plays account for 88% of total production. And, as noted at the end of Chapter 2, each play is in effect its own “resource pyramid,” characterized by a few small “sweet spots” surrounded by larger areas capable of only marginal productivity. Drillers invariably concentrate their efforts on the zones of highest productivity first. So, as time goes on and as drillers must stray ever further from sweet spots, the initial productivity of each new well drilled in the play tends to be lower than that of previous wells. The number of available drilling sites is always limited, and, once the play is saturated with wells, per-well decline rates will determine the play’s longevity. Hughes notes that individual shale gas well decline rates range from 80–95% after 36 months, in the top five US plays. The industry’s claim that America has 100 years of gas is based on the assumption that individual wells will continue to produce for 40 years, but given such steep decline rates, the data do not support this assumption... ...There were 341,678 operating gas wells in the United States in 2000, prior to the fracking revolution, representing more than a century of drilling efforts. In 2011, that number had swollen to 514,637.6 Here again is evidence that descent to lower levels of the “resource pyramid” ensures diminishing returns from increasing effort: since 1990 the average productivity per well has declined by 38%. The EIA reports these trends but still believes shale gas production rates can continue to grow. What would it take to make that happen? Only a drilling pace that’s utterly unprecedented can possibly suffice. In the 2005–2008 period, the industry roughly tripled the number of natural gas wells being drilled annually, as compared to 1990s’ rates. To produce the estimated US reserves of shale gas, the EIA calculates that 410,722 shale gas wells will have to be drilled.7 It takes a moment to mentally process the implications of drilling on that scale... Too much in this chapter to summarize here. It's a must read: http://www.resilience.org/stories/2013-10-09/snake-oil-chapter-3-a-treadmill-to-hell

Not sure about this. The date of the article is 8/9/13. But it says ferry service could begin as early as 2013 but the article refers to next year. I think they meant 2014, or the date of the article is wrong: Passenger ferry service discussion gains steam in NE Ohio There is renewed discussion that Northeast Ohio could be the home for passenger ferry service across Lake Erie and into Canada. The Cleveland-Cuyahoga County Port Authority is in discussion with officials in Port Stanley, Ontario, and the likelihood of the service is a greater possibility -- as quickly as 2013 -- after the Canadian federal government recently gave that community control of the port. "At this stage, we are working to get a business and operating plan done, which would put us in position to then look at where the funding could come from and be able to pin down the role that the public sector would play versus a private operator and how that could be a partnership and what that would look like," said Will Friedman, president and CEO of the Cleveland-Cuyahoga County Port Authority. He said the service would be mostly designed for both walk-on passengers and people who desired to bring along a vehicle... Read full article at: http://www.news-herald.com/general-news/20120130/passenger-ferry-service-discussion-gains-steam-in-ne-ohio

The Peak Oil Crisis: The Middle East in Context by Tom Whipple (retired CIA intelligence analyst) Key line from the article: Anyone who thinks that a short-lived burst of shale oil fracking in North Dakota and Texas is enough to counter the tides of history flowing across the Middle East simply does not understand the situation. A few key paragraphs: "Few of the Middle East’s manifold problems are so dramatic that they warrant much media attention, but taken together they are slowly taking a toll on the world’s oil supply. Last week the US’s Energy Information Administration reported that unplanned production and export outages, mostly in the Middle East, are now up to 2.8 million b/d and this was before the recent Libyan crisis took another 500,000 b/d off the market. Despite all the hype about America’s shale oil production, it still amounts to well less than half the unplanned drop in Middle Eastern production. "The International Energy Agency reported that production shortfalls this summer resulted in the world consuming about 2.2 million b/d more than it produced with the remainder coming from inventories. These are now thought to be down about 95 million barrels from recent levels. "World oil prices are now about $115 a barrel. Some of this is due to concerns about what will happen if we start bombing Syria, but the rest is due to slowly tightening supply/demand situation around the world. The Chinese are still growing their demand at prodigious rates and the world is still adding about 70 million new “oil consumers” to its population each year. Anyone who thinks that a short-lived burst of shale oil fracking in North Dakota and Texas is enough to counter the tides of history flowing across the Middle East understand the situation." Full Article at: http://www.resilience.org/stories/2013-09-05/the-peak-oil-crisis-middle-east-context

Whither Shale Oil?: Interview with David Hughes Full interview: http://www.resilience.org/stories/2013-08-13/whither-shale-oil-interview-with-david-hughes excerpt: "My estimate last year showed a peak in the Bakken in 2017 at nearly one million b/d, if you drilled 2,000 wells per year. But that was based on the EIA’s 2012 estimate of just under 12,000 well locations. Given the new EIA estimates of well locations I think the Bakken could reach the 2020 time range before declining. The Bakken is currently producing about 725,000 barrels per day from a little over 6000 wells (Figure 3). Right now the Bakken needs about 1440 wells per year just to offset field production decline (Figure 4). When the Bakken is going to peak depends on the number of well locations that are left and how fast you drill the wells. As you grow production, the number of wells you need simply to offset decline keeps on increasing. In every shale play I’ve looked at there are always sweet spots. Those inevitably get drilled first. So as the sweet spots are drilled off, drilling has to move into lower quality parts of the reservoir. Therefore you need an ever-escalating number of wells drilled just to offset field decline. So if the Bakken were to hit a million barrels/day of production, which it probably will, it will then likely need about 2000 wells drilled per year just to offset decline. So play that out: there are 20,000 locations remaining—optimistically. So we’re basically looking at 10 years or less for the Bakken—certainly not the rosy forecast, in terms of longevity, that comes out of places like CitiGroup."

Not true: http://www.theoildrum.com/node/10198

Texas can’t afford paved roads, replaces them with gravel Published time: August 20, 2013 20:43 Officials in Texas this week began converting 83 miles of asphalt road to unpaved lanes of gravel. Years of heavy truck travel has ravaged entire routes in south and west Texas, and going back to gravel is for now the only affordable answer. Representatives for the state’s transportation department told the Texas Tribune that construction would begin Monday on a project that involves tearing up over 80 miles of asphalt that has been severely damaged over the years due to heavy traffic brought on by even heavier machinery. An oil boom has caused an energy industry to emerge near the state’s southwest border with Mexico, but that extra business has also brought extra traffic. Now local roads ravaged by oil-industry trucks are far too damaged to be repaired by what resources the state has, and the solution officials saw as the most affordable involves serious downgrades. "Since paving roads is too expensive and there is not enough funding to repave them all, our only other option to make them safer is to turn them into gravel roads," Texas Department of Transportation spokesman David Glessner told the Tribune... Read more at: http://rt.com/usa/texas-gravel-asphalt-txdot-748/

Try using a sun shield. That's what I did-- the first time I'd ever done that at an RTA lot (and I won't again), but it may have given the thief(thieves) the cover they needed. Our car was recovered somewhere on W. 33rd street. At the impound lot on Quigley, where they towed it to, there were 3 or 4 other people picking up their stolen cars. I wonder how many cars get stolen in Cleveland every day?

Except we don't smoke anything. It was clean. They even left the spare change.

About a month ago, one of our cars was stolen from the Puritas RTS. I had been carpooling from there with a coworker (our office is in the exurbs, no way for transit to work for us, unfortunately). I filed a report with the RTA police. One of the officers mentioned that this has been a bit of problem with mid-1990s cars (like ours) at several stations and park-n-ride lots (even as far out as Westlake). I don't know how many thefts have occurred, so I can't comment on the precise definition of a "problem". On the plus side, the officers gave me a ride home, which I really appreciated. The car was recovered about a week later less the catalytic converter, the floor mats, and the ash tray as well as a few personal items. (If anyone can explain the ash tray to me, I'm all ears). Anyway, we still had comprehensive insurance on the car, so the insurance company paid for the repairs (catalytic converter, front half of exhaust, oxygen sensor, punched ignition) less our deductible. It appears the thieves used the car to haul something as there was a slight bit of damage to the interior door panel on one side. They also left $50 worth of gas in the tank... go figure. The officers said mid 1990s cars are likely being targeted because the newer cars are more difficult to steal and that the thieves are even taking Dodge Neons. That sounds pretty desperate, even for a thief, if you ask me ;-) Fortunately, it all worked out well for us. We were going to have to replace the car in 2-3 years anyway (150k+ miles), we were just in denial about it and, long story short, a friend of mine sold me a much newer car with low miles for less than trade-in value (Three days after the car was stolen he offered the car to me. Three days after I bought it, our stolen car was recovered). There was no way we were going to find a car at the price we paid, so I guess in a way it worked out. At least we didn't have to car shop... ;-)

^Biker16: start a thread elsewhere on this and we'll keep discussing. I probably shouldn't have chipped in when I did as I contributed to the derailing of the thread...

^Seems to me Republicans in Ohio used to be about devolving decisions down to local governments, or at least they claimed to be. This is just one more example of them not doing that. The decisions about local sales tax rates should be made at the local level, not by the Statehouse.

I don't know you so I don't judge your financial decisions. You don't know me, so please don't judge mine. Also, did you read the part where I said my job is in an automobile-centric exurb? That means I can't take transit to work. I use transit for other things, and not every day or even every week. Therefore, I don't need to know RTA's status every day or every week.

I agree with Ken about waiting to see until we hear back from the Legislative Services Commission, etc. However, I still disagree with reducing the county and transit sales taxes. Transit in Ohio needs to be expanded, and since the state isn't up to the task of changing its transportation policies, they should let the counties and transit agencies have the extra money. Counties need money too, especially since the state cut aid to local governments. biker16 wrote: Haven't you heard about all those treasury bonds that the Fed keeps buying because we can't find enough buyers for all the debt we're trying to sell? That's because several countries are already gradually reducing their US debt holdings. Why do you think the Fed stopped reporting the M3 money supply figure several years ago? The unfortunate reality is that we are already Greece, we just haven't felt it yet because the US dollar is, but only for the time being, the world's reserve currency. That reserve status is growing more and more precarious and anyone who thinks that it will never change is delusional. In 1900, for example, the British Pound was the world's reserve currency. Did anyone think then that would change by mid century? High debt from two world wars and the expense of maintaining its empire changed that. Sounds familiar if you ask me. Oops, I digressed. Any further discussion of this should probably be taken elsewhere...