Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article

Skip to comments.

Next monorail stop: Pollyanna Station
Las Vegas City Life ^ | 19 july 07 | GEORGE KNAPP

Posted on 07/20/2007 4:15:47 AM PDT by rellimpank

THE BELEAGUERED LAS VEGAS MONORAIL IS PERILOUSLY CLOSE to earning my respect. It doesn't seem to matter what calamity befalls the troubled train, its management team just keeps chugging along.

Pieces and parts fall off and land on the sidewalk? No problem. Brakes fail and doors don't close? What's the big deal? Ridership plunges to ridiculous new lows? Happy days are just around the corner. Maybe they have a requirement that anyone who gets hired by the monorail must pass a personality test in which the glass is always

(Excerpt) Read more at lasvegascitylife.com ...


TOPICS: Business/Economy; Culture/Society; News/Current Events; US: Nevada
KEYWORDS: monorail
--for the public transit fans out there--
1 posted on 07/20/2007 4:15:48 AM PDT by rellimpank
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | View Replies]

To: rellimpank
I live in Germany and am a big public tranist fan, for Europe. For back home? I have a bunch of misgivings. On a slightly different topic, I watched a show on the local rail in Mumbai two nights ago. Many of you have seen the pictures of people clinging to the roof and sides of these trains, crossing in front of trains.

Anyway, they said 3,500 people are killed a year doing one of the above.


2 posted on 07/20/2007 4:30:17 AM PDT by Gamecock (FR Member Gamecock: Declared Anathema By The Council Of Trent and Wounded By The Current Pope)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: rellimpank

Where’s Willie Green when you need him?


3 posted on 07/20/2007 4:33:28 AM PDT by csvset
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: rellimpank

Trains are great if the city can be built around them, but otherwise its a money drain. The DART system here in Dallas has good ridership and gets 22c revenue for every $1 spent. Even if the ridership raises to fuller capacity they may get revenue of 40-50c to every $1 spent.


4 posted on 07/20/2007 4:36:02 AM PDT by neb52
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Gamecock

Wasn’t most of the European cities rebuilt after WWII around mass transit funded by the Marshall Plan and have since upgraded.


5 posted on 07/20/2007 4:37:36 AM PDT by neb52
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 2 | View Replies]

To: rellimpank

I like the Las Vegas monorail. It’s a great way to relax and enjoy unexcelled views of the Strip both day and night. The staff are great too.


6 posted on 07/20/2007 4:41:41 AM PDT by NaughtiusMaximus ("Eat yer groatcakes, Porgy!" "Heavy on the thirty weight, Mom!")
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Gamecock

they do it all over india... on busses too.


7 posted on 07/20/2007 4:44:17 AM PDT by GovernmentIsTheProblem (The GOP is "Whig"ing out.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 2 | View Replies]

To: GovernmentIsTheProblem

You’d think their mommas would teach them better.


8 posted on 07/20/2007 4:49:10 AM PDT by Gamecock (FR Member Gamecock: Declared Anathema By The Council Of Trent and Wounded By The Current Pope)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 7 | View Replies]

To: neb52

I think so.


9 posted on 07/20/2007 4:52:15 AM PDT by Gamecock (FR Member Gamecock: Declared Anathema By The Council Of Trent and Wounded By The Current Pope)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 5 | View Replies]

To: rellimpank

"Well, sir, there's nothing on earth Like a genuine, Bona fide, Electrified, Six-car Monorail!"

Perhaps if the good people of Las Vegas built the Monorail so that it went through the lobbies of the larger hotels on the strip (ala Disney World's Contemporary Hotel,) it would get more ridership.


10 posted on 07/20/2007 5:43:36 AM PDT by Yo-Yo (USAF, TAC, 12th AF, 366 TFW, 366 MG, 366 CRS, Mtn Home AFB, 1978-81)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: rellimpank

It misses out on most of it’s potential utility by not running to the airport.


11 posted on 07/20/2007 5:58:08 AM PDT by posterchild (Isn't all gasoline organic?)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: neb52

I heard a story about the highrise developments in downtown Dallas; that young people and empty nesters - who work for TI and other suburban companies - live downtown and use Dart to get to work, instead of living in the burbs and going downtown to work. This, Dart trains, is part of the reason we have 19 cranes building new housing and that, taxes on construction and homes (starting @ $400,000), helps to offset that per person cost you mention.


12 posted on 07/20/2007 6:16:30 AM PDT by q_an_a
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 4 | View Replies]

To: All

If they had built the Monorail in the median strip of Las Vegas Boulevard, it might have worked. Instead, the Monorail is so far from the Strip that nobody wants to make such a long hike.


13 posted on 07/20/2007 6:50:16 AM PDT by DNME ("When small men cast long shadows, the sun is about to set.")
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 12 | View Replies]

To: rellimpank
When nationally known bond experts downgraded the monorail's state-backed bonds into junk status, and then into junky-junk status, and now into bottom-of-the-junk-drawer status, local officials OK'd a plan to expand the train to the airport.

Well that about the smartest thing they've done. I never understood why they seemed to purposely avoid the most important stop they could have put on the route.

14 posted on 07/20/2007 6:56:36 AM PDT by KarlInOhio (May the heirs of Charles Martel and Jan Sobieski rise up again to defend Europe.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: NaughtiusMaximus
I like the Las Vegas monorail. It’s a great way to relax and enjoy unexcelled views of the Strip both day and night.

So why is the route carefully gerrymandered so you can't see it from the Strip? There are crowds of people on the sidewalk for miles who might be tempted to ride a monorail that ran down the center of the street. But no - they can't see the monorail unless they already know were it runs. Small wonder there are few people riding it.

15 posted on 07/20/2007 7:07:51 AM PDT by BlazingArizona
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 6 | View Replies]

To: rellimpank

16 posted on 07/20/2007 7:09:53 AM PDT by SlowBoat407 (It's never a good time to get sucked into an evil vortex.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: KarlInOhio
"I never understood why they seemed to purposely avoid the most important stop they could have put on the route"

My guess is that it's your tax dollars at work, protecting the owners of taxis and airport shuttles.

17 posted on 07/20/2007 8:08:02 AM PDT by PUGACHEV
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 14 | View Replies]

To: rellimpank
local officials OK'd a plan to expand the train to the airport.

The fact that the train didn't begin at the airport, is proof positive that it has been a scam from the word go. Intrinsic corruption disqualifies it from being a fair test of point-to-point mass transit.

18 posted on 07/20/2007 7:55:15 PM PDT by hinckley buzzard
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.

Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article

FreeRepublic, LLC, PO BOX 9771, FRESNO, CA 93794
FreeRepublic.com is powered by software copyright 2000-2008 John Robinson