Keep your eye on Mpls. light transit

[sooblue]

The next few months should be very interesting up hear in the mini-apple.
The new light rail system (thank goodness its light) is starting to test the track and cars.
So far the city opperators have found that,

People, just cross the tracks WHERE EVER THEY WANT TO!! (Ya oly)

People, don't stop crossing when the train is coming. (ok Lena)

People, park their cars ON THE TRACK and leave them there when they have a FAST errand to do. ( Oly, where did our car go?) ( I don't know Lena but that fender over there looks familiar)

The first run, the engineer should go down the tracks with his window open and a long flat slat sticking out. Everyone within six feet of the tracks get hit in the head with the stick like a slap across the face. Whack Whack Whack Whack Whack Whack Whack Whack !
It'd sound like a baseball card in the spokes of a bicycle. [:D][:D]

AHHH Minnesota.
Sooblue

[Anonymous]

As funny as sooblue's post was he should have put it in the humor thread. [:)]

I am still laughing over it. [:D]

All I can say is . . . whack, whack, whack. [:D] [:D] [:D]

[redflasher1]

Very funny. What is NOT funny is the cost of this boondoggle here in Minneapolis. Millions and millions of tax dollars are going into this farce that got shoved down our throats by our former "Governor" Jesse the fat body no mind Ventura.

The only thing this will be good for is the teen aged gang members to travel from points in downtown Minneapolis thru south Minneapolis to the Mall of America where they will continue to menace customers.

[Puckdropper]

We went to Minneapolis once... I've never seen so many merges and exits lefts in my life! The highway system is in confusing shape. Were they drunk building that thing?

whack whack whack... lol

[mudchicken]

You have now witnessed the light rail version of a "drive-by slapping".... Unfortunately, common sense appears to be leaving Minnesota along with most of its industry.

SooBlue: Start placing bets that the legal lizzards will be falling over each other to file lawsuits after the first train-auto and train-pedestrian incidents on the contention that nobody told the public about the risks....

[redflasher1]

to Puckdropper

The freeway system in Minnesota was built 30 years ago as a two lane each direction slow speed highway. Then they added a another stretch from downtown out to the West which was obsolete before it was completed. Most of the commuters are single person cars and rush hour lasts from 5 am to midnite. We also have traffic lights that are supposed to control access to major routes. Most people ignore those. Winter commute for me can last 2 hours or more to go 28 miles on major roads. And we have the drivers that get in the left lane and go 1 mph BELOW the speed limit. There is so much sprawl in the metro Mpls/St Paul area that light rail will NEVER work. We do have a fairly efficient bus system here already.

[CG9602]

A couple thoughts here:

1. Look at systems such as the commuter system around Chicago. It's heavy rail, not light rail, but it is a system, a network, with spokes and a "hub." One single line, instead of a network, pretty much guarantees that the line will be a "boondoggle."

2. How do they expect to finance this? Again, look at Chicago. Correct me if I'm wrong, but is there not some sort of tax set aside for the maintenance of the lines through each county in the METRA system? Isn't there sopme sort of funding by which part of each county's sales tax is used for the maintenance and upkeep of the lines in that county?

3. I look at this one single route, and I think that the way to have successful commuter rail, be it light rail ("trollies') or regular rail, is to set up a network of routes, with numerous departures each day on each of the routes. Setting up just one route, like the "North Star" corridor, without making it possible to go to other places via the commuter train, almost ensures that it will be a failure. Sorry to be preaching to the choir here, but you gotta have a network, not just one little route[V]

[sooblue]

Hi Peoples,
I just grabbed the last post but intend to reply to a few.

First jhhtrainsplanes,
I would have put my topic in the humor thread but its no darn joke.
There was a time when sensible, as in common sense, kind, as in give ya the shirt off their back, people lived in Minneapolis. Midwesterners all and in the highest sense.
That was when I could drive from upper Nordeast clear across town in just 20 min.
Road rage was what happened when your cars radiator froze (as you were driving it) and the temp was down to -45 and there was a wind-chill below -65.
( You stood there and beat heck out of YOUR car for quiten on ya!! )
Then just as you gave it the last meaningful whack [B)] someone would pull up and say " hi there need a lift " and you'd answer " ya its a cold one aint it?", "ya that's for sure" they'd say and off you'd go.
Those days are GONE !

To redflasher,
I have to disagree with you about the light rail system being a boondoggle. I know it seems that it is but it’s the one thing that makes sense.
Our road system was never planed to carry the traffic that we have now. Why you can't even widen the roads out any further then they are now, unless we start taking homes (and that isn't going to fly) So we have to start giving people choices that make sense. More buses ? bumper to bumper buses are just trains on rubber.

Something that most people don't know, even those living in MN. is that MPLS and St Paul had one of the best light rail systems in the country and the biggest west of Chicago. That is until one day about 50 years ago when there was a real boondoggle. That was the scraping of the streetcars and the beginning of busses.
Did you know that the New Jersey transit system just in this last year started to replace the fine cars that they bought from US in the fifties? We had the top of the line most up to date fresh out of the box cars and a rail system that went from almost Stillwater to all the way out to lake Minnitonka. It was a grand system that would have updated just fine. That is why we had the road system that we have today. The light rail took the load.
We ripped it up ! and went to busses. We should have had both.
We can again but we have to start some where. The minnehaha corridor is just the start. If we support it the line will grow and maybe some day I'll drive up to a park and ride south of Mpls and hop onto a monorail and travel right down the middle of 35 right on into downtown Mpls. and transfer to a bus or a wem people mover or take a ride over to the mall of America or who knows what else will be in that area
BECAUSE the minnehaha corridor made it more attractive to some developer.
We'll have to wait and see what happens.

Mpls/St Paul is a microcosm of the once proud rail system that this country had.
Rails to everywhere now everywhere tore up. [:(!]
If you want to rebuild you have to start where it will get the most immediate use without over extending yourself.
When/if the whole plan gets completed it will make a big dent in our traffic.
I know there are still sensible Minnesota’s living here who will ride instead of drive and I know that about 1/4 of the population of Mpls. would rather ride then drive because they stink at driving and are tired of getting the HORN and the finger !

Finally,
Stay tuned to the further adventures of Lena and OLE.
will they find all the pieces of their car ?
will they be whacked by a six-foot stick ?
Will they ever find their favorite fishing hole again in lake Minnetonka?
( Oh yha, OLE marked the side of his boat with the chalk that Lena gave him ).
Sooblue

QUOTE: Originally posted by CG9602

A couple thoughts here:

[Anonymous]

Refreshing - to see the red lights flash, the crossing arms come down and a light rail test train cross in front of me.
It is always very easy to beat our city and state up. . . but how many more lanes of highway can we add to carry the load of humans.
Usually the people who talk about "the punks" riding to the Mall of America, have never visited it or taken the bus. It is a great place to take walks . . the exercise would do us all good.

[Mikeygaw]

soo, i know how you feel. Philly seems to be about thirty years behind everyone else. And people wonder why so many are leaving this city...

[redflasher1]

As far as writing about the "punks" or riding a bus : I have a bit of intimate knowledge having worn a badge in the Metro Minnesota area for 25 years full time and worked part time for transit police before retiring 10 years ago and starting new career.

The Northstar Corridor to St Cloud makes sense to me since it would use/share existing right of way.

And, I also remember the trolleys in Minneapolis/St Paul. Very quaint.

And I have also been to the Mall of America several times including entertaining clients there.

[jchnhtfd]

Oddly enough I lived in Minneapolis as a little brat, more decades ago than I will admit. And I remember well the trolleys, all over town. They were a terrific way to get around, particularly when it got a bit chilly out. It was a really dumb move to eliminate them...

What's to be done about idiots walking if front of the cars, or parking on the tracks? I like the stick idea... !

[sooblue]

When Mpls. pulled the plug on our trolley system and went to buses it was done with an eye to modernizing. With 20/20 hindsight you can see how much of a mistake it was. However there is more to the story then we will ever know. I have always smelled a scandel in the move to buses.
Now, with an eye to modernizing I would like to see the new system get (literally) off the ground.
I'd like to some day ride a fast monorail right down the center of our main hwys.
I'd run people movers through all the skyways, in the likeness of Disney world.
and to entice ridership I would endever to make it a fun thing to take to work or play.
I firmly believe that if it is convenient. easy. and fun, it will draw a crowd.
Anyway we're starting over, lets do it right from the start.
Sooblue