Category: Transportation
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Let’s Prepare for the Next Uber Revolution
by James A. Bacon Uber and Lyft, known mainly for providing taxi-like services, may find sprawling Sun-Belt cities to be the most hospitable markets for their new car-pooling services. That’s one of the conclusions arising from a new Morgan Stanley report on the proliferation of Uber- and Lyft-style services across the United States. The logic: Sun Belt…
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Frustrated by Government? FOIA Is Your Friend
by James A. Bacon The Virginia Department of Transportation’s plan to toll solo drivers on Interstate 66 inside the Capital Beltway seeks to address a complex transportation problem with no easy answers. Among the groups that have taken an interest in the project is the McLean Citizens Association (MCA), which is concerned that the tolls might…
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NoVa Legislators Balk at Bailing out Metro
by James A. Bacon Eleven Virginia legislators from Northern Virginia say they would block any “new dedicated funding stream or tax increases” to fund Metro repairs expected to cost $60 million. “We cannot in good conscience ask Virginia taxpayers to bail out years of mismanagement, negligence and wasteful spending,” stated a letter signed by House Majority Caucus Chairman…
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MidTown Tunnel to Open this Summer
A rare piece of good news on the infrastructure front: The new Midtown Tunnel between Norfolk and Portsmouth will open early this summer, months ahead of its scheduled December completion. Officials with Elizabeth River Crossing said they had made “significant progress” on construction, and expect both lanes of the second tube to be fully open…
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Siding with the Least Greedy Bastard
by James A. Bacon Elon Musk has a gift for spinning fabulous visions involving super-cool technology — everything from solar energy and rocket ships to high-speed rail and electric cars. But he has also mastered the art of scrounging money from government. According to a year-old Los Angeles Times article, his enterprises had racked up some $4.9 billion…
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Virginia in No Rush to Address Impending Metro Meltdown
by James A. Bacon The McAuliffe administration seems to be in no hurry to bail out the ailing Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority (WMATA) commuter rail system crippled by declining ridership and an $18 billion capital spending shorttfall over the next ten years. Bolstering state support for the transit authority, which has been plagued for decades by union featherbedding and short-sighted, politically driven…
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Tech’s “Smart Infrastructure” Initiative Progresses
by James A. Bacon Virginia Tech has been re-thinking for a several years now how to invigorate traditional engineering disciplines by integrating civil engineering and computer engineering to create “smart infrastructure.” The $100 million initiative received a $5 million boost yesterday from the Hitt family, owners of Falls Church-based Hitt Contraction, a company that typically recruits eight to ten Virginia…
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Pulse Has a Pulse after All
by James A. Bacon When last I blogged about Richmond Pulse, the Bus Rapid Transit plan for the city’s Broad Street corridor, the projected cost had leaped $11.5 million over its original $50 million estimate. While I support mass transit in the right circumstances, I saw little good coming from this project, in which state…
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In Metro’s Disruption, a New Opportunity
The good news is that the Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority is making the tough but desperately needed measures to maintain the commuter rail system serving the Washington region. The authority has announced a “massive” maintenance surge to address chronic infrastructure issues that have created safety issues and hindered trains from staying on schedule. The…
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Even the Washington Post Has Noticed that Metro Is Failing
by James A. Bacon How bad is the Washington Metro rail system? So bad that only 84% of its trains ran on time, mainly due to poor maintenance. So bad that ridership declined 5% since 2010, even as transit ridership nationally was up. So bad that the system needs an extra $1.3 billion every year…
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Driving Down, Mass Transit Down, Telework Up
by James A. Bacon The trend toward less driving in the Washington metropolitan area has conformed to the devout wishes of greenies and planners alike over the past decade: Average daily vehicle miles driven per capita has declined steadily since 2005 from 25.7 miles to 22.6 miles. (Driving in 2015 showed a 0.1 mile up-tick, not…
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Reader Alert: Another Jeremiad about Debt and Risk
Holman W. Jenkins, Jr., at the Wall Street Journal reminds us how countries around the world, including the United States, are doubling down on debt to stave off recession: The Richmond Fed’s “bailout barometer” shows that, since the 2008 crisis, 61% of all liabilities in the U.S. financial system are now implicitly or explicitly guaranteed…
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Somehow, This Comes as No Surprise
Here’s the latest news about the proposed Richmond Pulse project: The expected cost of the project, which would extend Bus Rapid Transit service along 7.6 miles of Richmond’s Broad Street, has just increased by $11 million. In other words, the contract to design and build the project came in 32% higher than estimated. “Unfortunately, there are…
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Making NIT More Productive, More Resilient
by James A. Bacon For the millions of Virginians living above the fall line, the struggle that Hampton Roads has with rising sea levels and increasing flooding may seem remote and far away. Why should we care? After all, does anybody in Hampton Roads give a hoot about our problems? Kit Chope, vice president of sustainability for…
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How Not to Think about Mass Transit
by James A. Bacon Michael Paul Williams, a feature columnist for the Richmond Times-Dispatch, takes a dim view of a decision by the Chesterfield County Board of Supervisors to discontinue a subsidized bus route between downtown Richmond and Chesterfield Plaza. “Chesterfield, despite its dramatic demographic shifts and an increasing poverty rate, continues to turn a blind…