Now, what this town really needs is a gen-uine, bonafide, electried, six car monorail!
Posted on 12/14/2022 1:43:10 PM PST by Rummyfan
As a Minneapolis resident I have seen my share of graft, lunacy, gaslighting, self-sabotage, and mindless destruction in government. Our city is a mess, our County is profligate beyond measure, our unelected Metropolitan Council is a graft machine, and our state government has never seen a boondoggle it didn’t want to blow money on.
But few government decisions have been as nakedly cynical as the one I just read about in my local newspaper, the Star Tribune. It really takes the cake.
For decades our local Lefties have been itching to build a light rail system to cover the region. After all, light rail has created the Portland we know and love today, right?
...
The latest light rail boondoggle is called the Southwest LRT project. It connects downtown Minneapolis with the western suburbs, and has never been a favorite of the tonier sort of people. They love light rail, except when it comes to or through their neighborhood.
The project has spiraled out of control, vastly outstripping its already bloated budget. As usual. Light rail is hideously expensive, and especially so when going through expensive neighborhoods. The line is only 14 miles long and will cost $2.7 billion.
(Excerpt) Read more at hotair.com ...
I would say, giving the money to Ukraine would be money better spend!
Now, what this town really needs is a gen-uine, bonafide, electried, six car monorail!
lol, it will be at least 6.66 billion before it is done.
Just look at Sound Transit if you want to see how that works
In the past light rail projects wound up costing six times the original estimate, so this one isn’t anywhere done with cost overruns.
I live in the southwest metro area of the Twin Cities in the People’s Republic of Minnesota. I also have a graduate degree in Urban Planning.
In my opinion light rail is a 19th Century solution to 21st Century transportation needs. The COVID pandemic forced many businesses to use remote workers with a fair degree of success. The old paradigm of workers commuting from the suburbs to the big shiny glass boxes downtown and hence the “need” for light rail that goes from all points to downtown is outmoded. In the future many office workers will be working remotely at least part of the time and there will not be a need to lease expensive office space downtown. Already there is a growing vacancy of office space in downtown Minneapolis. Add to that downtown Minneapolis is crime ridden and narrowly avoided being torched in the 2021 riots.
I also agree that the Metropolitan Council needs major revision. The Met Council is the sole exception to a federal law that requires such multijurisdiconal entities to have a majority of their governing body made up of local elected officials. The Met Council has a governing body of solely Governor’s appointees. However, the Met Council has taxing authority. I seem to recall that taxation without representation was one of the reasons we fought the American Revolution.
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