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[quote user="CMStPnP"] System construction of DART light rail was accelerated by almost a decade and the system almost doubled in size due to a large Federal Grant from the Bush Administration (over a Billion dollars).    It's not a giant leap of logic from there to see that construction of DART light rail is at least a decade ahead of projected population growth in several areas which is impacting the analysis I am sure..      That should be a footnote to the analysis at least.      I would feel better measuring what the projected ridership is 10 years from today to the communities that got their light rail 5-10 years early as a result of that Federal Grant. Furthermore, the downtown portion of the DART light rail system is not yet complete.    DART plans to add another through route via Downtown Dallas at some point in the future which will increase downtown departure points and ridership in each day. [/quote] The percentage of people in the light rail service area using it has not changed materially since it opened, i..e. roughly 2.5 to 3 per cent.  Moreover, if it were not for the fact that many of the bus routes that formally ran downtown now run to DART rail stations and require a transfer to get downtown, the ridership on the light rail line might be less. Spending a $1 billion to build out a system before there is a market for it is not a wise investment.  It is certainly not one that a viable business organization would make. What do you think would have happened to Southwest Airlines if it had attempted to begin operations before there was a market for it?  And why should public transport be any different?  By the way, the Southwest story is so compelling that it has been a case study in many of the nation's leading business schools.     DART has talked about a second transit way through downtown Dallas since the get go.  It has not come about, in large part because of costs. The original plan was to have the red line run from the Mockingbird Station area to downtown via the former MKT route, and then loop through downtown in tunnels.  Unfortunately, or perhaps fortunately given the projected costs, the good citizens of the Park Cities objected.  They did not want trains running through their backyards.  Ironically, when the principal means of long distance travel in America was by passenger trains, they did not object to the fact that the Texas Special stopped in Highland Park.   As a matter of interest how long have you lived in Dallas?  And how often do you ride public transit?
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