KJP

Thought you all might enjoy this .... http://members.cox.net/peepersken/Piechartcompare.pdf (just a 6K download) Which was based on this ....

There was most definitely an attack on interurban and streetcar systems by GM et al going back to the 1920s. Ironically, at the time, the streetcar and interurban systems were portrayed as the big bad guys, as part of powerful, money-grubbing corporate syndicates that had to be broken up. When rail operations were forcibly divorced from their eletrical utility and real estate sectors by the courts during the New Deal, the rail side was the easiest to chop. Public roads were viewed as the way to free citizens from the shackles of greedy corporations. So the fading condition of streetcars by the 1950s may not have been the cause, but the effect. Funny how the pendulum swings, not to a happy medium, but to the opposite extreme....

I thought it was superb, so I e-mailed to the Cleveland TOD discussion group.

http://www.masstransitmag.com/article/article.jsp?siteSection=3&id=1455 Land Purchase Is OKd for Transportation Hub in Los Angeles Updated: August 29th, 2006 12:17 PM PDT The Los Angeles Times The city's plan to build one of the largest transit centers in Southern California cleared a major obstacle Monday. The Orange County Transportation Authority approved an agreement to buy 13 1/2 acres between Angel Stadium and the Arrowhead Pond from the county for $32.5 million. Plans call for the county's largest bus terminal, a parking structure, platforms for Amtrak and Metrolink trains, and room to add tracks for high-speed rail, officials said. The center will be owned by the authority but built by the city, which hopes to partner with a private developer. No cost estimate or construction timetable was available, city officials said. ###

A Northeast Ohio native has been named president & CEO of Amtrak. So when are the daylight trains a-coming? But I don't like the fact he comes from UP -- perhaps the most anti-passenger railroad in the U.S. ______________________ NATIONAL RAILROAD PASSENGER CORPORATION 60 Massachusetts Avenue, NE, Washington DC 20002 tel 202 906.3860 fax 202 906.3306 [email protected] FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE August 29, 2006 ATK-06-061 Contact: Media Relations 202-906-3860 VETERAN RAIL AND INDUSTRIAL EXECUTIVE ALEXANDER KUMMANT APPOINTED AMTRAK PRESIDENT AND CEO WASHINGTON - The Amtrak Board of Directors today appointed Alexander Kummant as President and CEO. The veteran railroad and industrial executive will assume duties September 12. Kummant previously served as a Regional Vice President of the Union Pacific Railroad, overseeing 6,000 transportation, engineering, construction, mechanical, and other employees supporting an 8,000-mile rail network. He also served as the Union Pacific's Vice President and General Manager of Industrial Products, a $2 billion revenue business. In leading both units, Kummant was responsible for substantially improved customer service, on- time delivery of client products, and significant gains in financial and operational performance. Additionally at Union Pacific, Kummant held the role of Vice President of Premium Operations, overseeing the intermodal and automotive network performance. Most recently, Kummant served as the Executive Vice President and Chief Marketing Officer of Komatsu America Corporation, a division of the second largest supplier of construction equipment worldwide. He has a continuing record as an adaptable change agent in diverse environments. Kummant's first job on the railroad came at age 18 in Lorain, Ohio, working on a track crew for the Lake Terminal Railroad at the U.S. Steel Lorain Works. "Alex Kummant has the outstanding credentials and experience to lead a changing Amtrak that is more customer-focused and fiscally responsible," said Amtrak Chairman David M. Laney. "His appointment fulfills the board's commitment to select an extraordinarily strong and capable leader for Amtrak's future, building on the growing national desire for more and improved passenger rail service." Kummant fills a position that has been held by David J. Hughes on an interim basis since November 2005. Formerly Chief Engineer of Amtrak, Hughes will continue to serve with the railroad in a yet to be specified capacity. "For the past nine months, David Hughes has stepped in and performed exceptionally in leading our strategic reforms and operational improvements," said Laney. "On behalf of the Amtrak Board of Directors, he has our deepest admiration and respect, and we are delighted that he will continue to play an important role in Amtrak's future." A native of Ohio, Kummant holds a B.S. degree in mechanical engineering from Case Western Reserve University, a Master's degree in manufacturing engineering from Carnegie Mellon University and an M.B.A. from Stanford University. He is married to Kathleen Regan Kummant, a former senior executive with the Santa Fe and BNSF railroads. The Board of Directors of Amtrak was assisted in its search by the Washington D.C. office of Heidrick & Struggles, Inc. About Amtrak Amtrak provides intercity passenger rail services to more than 500 destinations in 46 states on a 22,000-mile route system. For schedules, fares and information, passengers may call 800-USA-RAIL or visit Amtrak.com. ###

I haven't seen what the grant is for either, but $898,000 isn't anywhere enough to extend service north from Independence to downtown. It's probably enough for preliminary engineering, but that's not what the grant sounded like it was for. CVSR is still trying to negotiate with CSX and NS to cross their tracks that come down the Big Creek Valley and go into the steel mills. That's going to be a toughie, because the crossing is at grade, the CSX and NS freight tracks are long and slow, and there's some serious liability insurance issues involved here. An alternative may be to grade-separate the crossings, but that gets very expensive (something in the $20 million to $40 million neighborhood).

Apparently some are -- looks pretty forlorn! In fact, I was surprised to see that much decay in that 'hood. Great grit, tho!

I know this has probably been floating around in cyburbia since forever, but I don't give a rat's patooty. I'm posting it anyway! ______________________________ 5 Winning Smart Ass Answers For 2006 ! Smart Ass Answer #5: A flight attendant was stationed at the departure gate to check tickets. As a man approached, she extended her hand for the ticket and he opened his trench coat and flashed at her. Without missing a beat....she said, "Sir, I need to see your ticket not your stub." ***************** ! Smart Ass Answer #4: A lady was picking through the frozen turkeys at the grocery store, but she couldn't find one big enough for her family. She asked a stock boy, "Do these turkeys get any bigger?" The stock boy replied, "No ma'am, they're dead." ******************* Smart Ass Answer #3: The cop got out of his car and the kid who was stopped for speeding rolled down his window. "I've been waiting for you all day," the cop said. The kid replied, "Yeah, well I got here as fast as I could." When the cop finally stopped laughing, he sent the kid on his way without a ticket. ******************* Smart Ass Answer #2: A truck driver was driving along on the freeway. A sign comes up that reads, "Low Bridge Ahead." Before he knows it, the bridge is right ahead of him and he gets stuck under the bridge. Cars are backed up for miles. Finally, a police car comes up. The cop gets out of his car and walks to the truck driver, puts his hands on his hips and says, "Got stuck, huh?" The truck driver says, "No, I was delivering this bridge and ran out of gas." ******************* #1 SMART ASS ANSWER OF THE YEAR 2005....................... A college teacher reminds her class of tomorrow's final exam. "Now class, I won't tolerate any excuses for your not being here tomorrow. I might consider a nuclear attack or a serious personal injury or illness, or a death in your immediate family! , but that's it, no other excuses whatsoever!" A smart ass guy in the back of the room raised his hand and asked, "What would you say if tomorrow I said I was suffering from complete and utter sexual exhaustion?" The entire class is reduced to laughter and snickering. When silence was restored, the teacher smiled knowingly at the student, shaking her head and sweetly said "Well, I guess you'd have to write the exam with your other hand."

I also find them helpful to silence the crabbing of political gadflies who frequently call during each and every election season! And when they invent a fly swatter for these gadflies, I will be among the first in line to buy one.

Check out: http://www.gcbl.org They updated info on the West Shore Corridor proposal, including using a write-up of mine for a project description.

In addition to the story above, here's some pictures of opening-day events from the Urban St. Louis website (plus some video links at the end!).... The new leg of the MetroLink system is the green-only portion at the lower left: LinkFest and the activities at the Shrewsbury station: Some of the communities along the route set up shop at LinkFest. This was across Lansdowne on the closed River des Peres Blvd. handing out little Metro coolers: The spaces in the entrance driveway were full. People were stopping in the driveway hoping to find someone pulling out...but there were plenty of spaces just up and around the corner: Now, about that subway tunnel -- two stations are in the subway, Skinker and U City/Big Bend... Below Skinker Boulevard: And above the Skinker station, some pedestrian-friendly, transit-supportive development is already starting to happen... Here's a couple of videos..... U City/Big Bend (trying to get the light sculpture): Skinker:

http://www.stltoday.com/stltoday/news/stories.nsf/stlouiscitycounty/story/709469BFABBC6CA1862571D6001730C8?OpenDocument Tunnel is gem of MetroLink project By Matthew Hathaway ST. LOUIS POST-DISPATCH 08/25/2006 MetroLink operator Tara Jackson approaches the Uinversity City/ Big Bend underground station Thursday afternoon on the new extension of the MetroLink line. (J.B. Forbes |/P-D) "For people (in construction), this is the kind of project that you're going to tell your children and grandchildren about." Jon Jacobsmeyer When Jon Jacobsmeyer attends today's grand opening of the new MetroLink extension, he'll be interested in riders' reaction to the one-mile tunnel between Big Bend and Forsyth boulevards. But any "oohs" and "ahhs" from passengers probably won't be as special as the reaction from Jacobsmeyer's two young daughters last week. They toured the barrel-vaulted tunnel and underground stations that their dad helped build during a party last week for contractors and their families. The girls insisted on taking three round-trips. "It was a little much," joked Jacobsmeyer, "but they got a kick out of it, and they got to see what their dad has been doing on all those nights and weekends." Jacobsmeyer is a project manager for general contractor McCarthy Building Cos., which was in charge of building one of the most difficult stretches of the new MetroLink extension: a 1.3-mile length of tracks from Kingsland Avenue in University City to Ritz-Carlton Drive in Clayton that included the extension's new Forsyth and University City-Big Bend stations. Jacobsmeyer, 42, of Chesterfield, lived and breathed the MetroLink tunnel from late 2002, when McCarthy was first bidding on the project, to when most major construction of the tunnel wrapped up in June 2005. And he put in a fair share of the 489,000 man-hours that McCarthy employees and subcontractors worked on the project. At peak construction time, he supervised more than 300 workers at the site. "Each one of them wanted to be involved in this project, and everyone put in their all," Jacobsmeyer said. "For people (in construction), this is the kind of project that you're going to tell your children and grandchildren about." At the insistence of politicians and nearby residents who feared that ground-level trains would increase noise and decrease property values, officials agreed to build about one mile of the extension underground, as deep as 45 feet under Forest Park Parkway. At about $95 million, it is the most expensive part of the $678 million extension, said Chris Poehler, Metro's project director for the extension. Jacobsmeyer said McCarthy's underground mile probably was the most complicated part of the project, too. Instead of burrowing underground like miners, crews ripped open Forest Park Parkway and dug a trench that in some places is 45 feet deep. Reinforced concrete shored up the tunnel walls, and massive precast concrete tops - some weighing up to 30 tons - covered the tunnel. If the tunnel was being built on open land, it would be a pretty straightforward project. Instead, the tunnel is sandwiched between homes, businesses and Washington University. Traffic remained open on some streets crossing over the parkway, and construction workers had little elbow room to move around. And there was plenty to move. To build the tunnel, Jacobsmeyer's crews had to dig up about 400,000 cubic yards of dirt, rock, old utility lines and - in a few places - untapped coal veins. It was enough dirt and debris to fill more than 20 dump trucks every hour for 12 hours each day, for about six months. As the dirt was departing, Jacobsmeyer said, the concrete was arriving - 66,000 cubic yards of it. That's equal to the contents of 7,300 concrete-mixing trucks. And then there were the massive 596 concrete tops that formed the tunnel's roof. Each had to be carried individually by flat-bed truck from a manufacturer in Illinois. Jacobsmeyer's work on the extension has been over for more than a year, and now the University of Missouri at Rolla graduate is supervising construction of an even bigger project: Pinnacle Entertainment's $480 million hotel and casino on Laclede's Landing. MetroLink grand opening events Today 11 a.m.: A progressive grand opening begins at the Forest Park-DeBaliviere station. A MetroLink train carrying area officials will leave that station at 11:12 a.m. and proceed to all the stations on the new line for grand opening ceremonies, arriving at the Shrewsbury station at 12:30 p.m. The first train open to the public will depart the Forest Park-DeBaliviere station at 12:15 p.m. (Only a safe number of people will be allowed on each platform. Metro recommends the public wait until later in the day to avoid the two-hour waits experienced in 1993, when the first line opened.) 1 p.m.: Grand opening at the Shrewsbury station. 2-8 p.m.: Community celebration across from the Shrewsbury station, including activities for children, music and fireworks at the end. MetroLink is offering free rides from 12:15 p.m. to 9 p.m. today and from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Sunday on the new Shrewsbury line. Regular fares will be charged for destinations beyond the Forest Park-DeBaliviere station. Regular service begins Monday. More information: www.metrostlouis.org

Obsessed? You mean like how Americans are so obsessed with their cars that we're willing to demolish our cities for them? Isolate entire classes of people in poverty in what's left of our cities? Enrich terrorists to keep our car-dependent lifestyles? Encourage more polluting cars while we swelter? I don't support light-rail because I want to live in 1953, but because I want to live to see 2053.

Lawsuits and enlisting city officials as part of the opposition. The only one I know of who has a chance of forcing a change in the plans is Ed Hauser, by using historic preservation (the Broadway Mills building) to force ODOT's hand.

Musky (or anyone else): Do you know if that pedestrian bridge is a standardized, prefabricated design from a manufacturer? I'm wondering because I can think of some local transit projects that would benefit from such a pedestrian bridge. If one were a standardized design, it might help reduce construction and installation costs.

Lakewood -- been there, but what's the best drive to get there? From downtown, go north on East 9th towards the Lake. Make a left onto Rt. 2 (aka the West Shoreway). Since the air show is in town at the lakefront airport, I would avoid the intersection of East 9th and the Shoreway/Route 2 at all cost. It gets gridlocked and traffic cops sometimes will send you in the exact opposite direction you wish to go just to clear the intersection. Instead, from downtown to Lakewood, take East 9th (or any other parallel streets like Ontario or West 3rd) north to Lakeside Avenue and turn left (west). Continue west on Lakeside and look for the direct access ramps to get on the Shoreway/Route 2. It's much simpler!

I think those are just the E-Line "trolleys" though. Still it's good to see. Note that rail ridership continues to pace the growth of transit usage in Greater Cleveland. One other ridership tidbit -- the number of people putting bikes on transit broke another record in July. According to ClevelandBikes: "RTA data identify over 8,000 bike trips were taken on RTA during spring and summer months (May-July), with more than 3,400 total bike trips in July representing a record."

And that was the one I liked the most!

Iraq?

I had a problem with his point because he said I should be asked to speak for all journalists, including those who are lazy and hype crazy. That's like me asking a mayor why politicians are corrupt and grandstand on issues, or asking an attorney why they chase ambulances, or asking a rural citizens why they're drunk and uneducated. If you don't have the ability to judge people one at a time, then spare us the offense of your shortcomings.

Awesome! I sent a copy to my co-workers who often repeat that line.

Think about this as a reason for having a permanent film center in Cleveland... Where else can you be so close to such a wide variety of natural/man-made settings that offer: + the flat, cornfield-studded Midwest; + the urbanized Northeast with rail transit, University Circle architecture, large apartment buildings etc.; + New England in Chagrin Falls; + Ghettos; + Eastern European settings in some parts of the city; + a large body of water that can easily serve as an ocean setting; + hilly, riverside industrial areas; + Appalachia (see the Cuyahoga Valley just north of downtown Akron); + plus all four seasons? ? ? Perhaps the only settings we can't offer are tropical, mountainous or desert -- but all can be simulated with green screens in the Convention Center and some CG!

You can now take a train downtown for a Tigers game! As the Free Press reported today, the Detroit Tigers are offering special ticket packages that include taking the Amtrak and a DDOT "trolley" bus from Oakland County to the game. This demonstrates the huge support that exists for convenient, quality transit. This announcement shows once again that regional business leaders want quality transit in Greater Detroit. An even bigger showing of support - the tickets are sold out! An estimated 400 tickets sold in under five hours!! Given the huge response, packages will be available for more games soon. Learn more about it - read the official press release at: http://detroit.tigers.mlb.com/NASApp/mlb/news/press_releases/press_release.jsp?ymd=20060728&content_id=1579436&vkey=pr_det&fext=.jsp&c_id=det or the Free Press article at: http://www.freep.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060728/BUSINESS06/607280436/1122 Excited about this idea? - One way to demonstrate your support is to get on the waiting list for tickets - call 313-983-6565. - You could also write a letter to the editor of the Detroit Free Press voicing your enthusiastic support - to [email protected]. - Ask other sports, cultural, and entertainment venues to do the same thing - using existing public transit. - Donate to and/or get involved with TRU to help us make this available for every game, concert, and special event downtown, plus for regular commuters! Excerpts from the Free Press article: This is about taking a real train and a trolley bus downtown to a Tigers game in Detroit, the City That Mass Transit Forgot, and then back to the Oakland County suburbs. No sitting in traffic and burning $3-per-gallon gasoline. No $20 parking lot fees. . . . If response to the Foxtown Tigers Train is strong, Ilitch said, he'd like to turn the concept into a year-round Foxtown Party Train, bringing groups from the suburbs into the city via Amtrak and DDOT for Red Wings games, or events at the Fox Theatre or Detroit Opera House. . . . The Foxtown Tigers Train was inspired in part by the overwhelming response to mass transit during Super Bowl week in February, when even 360 DDOT buses and 25 suburban SMART buses weren't enough to meet the demand from suburbanites eager to participate in the festivities. . . . "Maybe mass transit will get so popular here the trains will run on the hour like they do in other cities," Ilitch said. This message was sent by Transportation Riders United (TRU). TRU's mission is to improve transportation access and mobility in Greater Detroit by improving public transit. Visit www.detroittransit.org for more information about TRU and upcoming events.

Like we should ask you to speak for all drunken hicks as to why they say stupid things to incite fighting?

If Strickland wins, Proctor is gone. I can't state it more simply than that.