As I was perusing the Atlanta Urinal and Constipation I cam across the following article about this colossal waste of money for a trip back to the early 20th Century. Alas, only subscribers to the AJC can view the entire article but I’ll post it all here with comments.
After almost five months of official Atlanta Streetcar operation, city officials are exploring route expansion to the Beltline. But storefronts boarded up and covered by newsprint along the route are their own news story on the economic-development promise.
It may be that the promises are simply slow to be fulfilled. Nevertheless, looking ahead to Streetcar promises should require looking back on past promises.
Promises made, promises broken. This is Atlanta city gummint after all.
Deadlines: The streetcar was originally scheduled to begin operating in May 2013. Service began on December 30, 2014, inconveniencing commuters and businesses along the route far longer than expected.
An example was coming upon some underground utility cables as they were digging. Who would have expected that to happen?
Construction: The 2.7-mile project was at least $28 million over its initial capital budget of $72 million, of which $47 million was a federal grant. The last official cost estimate, back in 2013, was $98 million. Expect that to go up: AT&T recently became the first utility of 15 affected by construction to sue the city, seeking reimbursement of $5.7 million for equipment relocation costs.
Those are the underground utility cables I mentioned. Cost overruns? I’m shocked! So now it’s gonna turn out to be at least a $98 million waste of money. Look for it to pass the $100 million mark.
Operations: Annual operating cost estimates started out in 2010 at $1.7 million. In 2014, the estimate was $3.2 million; at last count in February 2015, it was $4.8 million. The city also expects to spend more than $1 million on a new office, “dedicated to amassing federal transit funding.
It just keeps getting better and better doesn’t it.
Hours: The city initially proposed running the streetcar no later than 11 p.m. any night. Now, the service runs to 1 a.m. Fridays and Saturdays. As the song goes, “Nothing good happens after midnight,” and empty beer bottles strewn along the route may be testament to that.
Anyone considering riding the streetcar after dark is an idiot, especially if that person is white. Is it raaaaaacist if it’s true?
Ridership: In the federal grant request, estimated weekday ridership was 2,600. In its first six weeks of operation, the city reported ridership of 102,000, or 18 percent lower than projections. After Mayor Kasim Reed announced the ride will be free the entire first year, officials say ridership is 20 percent higher than expected.
Originally, it was only gonna be free for the first four months but Reed figgered out the only way to maintain any type of ridership, after the novelty of going back 100 years in time wore off, was to make it free for the entire year.
Traffic: The plan was to, “prioritize the corridor’s use away from automobile traffic,” the city said. Fifty-seven percent of the households in proximity of the streetcar don’t even own an automobile. But it appears the city is indeed prioritizing auto traffic “away:” The slow-moving vehicle traps cars that share the route; unfamiliar street markings force vehicles to back up for streetcar turns, no easy task anytime, let alone in rush-hour traffic; and traffic lights in the corridor are painfully unsynchronized.
In other words, they made things worse. But it’s a streetcar! Streetcars are good! That’s why we abandoned them 60 years ago and tore up all the tracks. What’s next? Horse drawn carriages?
As one who took the time to drive (28 minutes), ride (35 minutes ) and walk (43 minutes) the entire 2.7-mile route Wednesday last week — around mid-morning to give it a fighting chance — the verdict: uninspiring, uncomfortable and unlikely to succeed.
$98 million down the drain. And it will be even more since it will need subsidies to continue operation and then there will be the cost of junking all the streetcars, tearing up the tracks, and repaving the streets.
Why? The 35-minute ride is not only uninspiring but scary in some stretches. There was no visible police presence along Auburn Avenue, where pedestrians and tourists encounter stretches of buildings boarded up, graffiti, empty beer bottles and the occasional catcall. A friend reported witnessing a mugging in broad daylight at one stop; derelicts already are sleeping at some stops – in broad daylight.
One rider, a seasoned military veteran who took his wife on the streetcar out of curiosity over the weekend, said he will never do it again.
“It was a 20-minute wait. Then the driver couldn’t make the turn at the end to go back because of cars in the way. It crept forward because of the cars in front.”
He said nervous tourists watched rowdy passengers misbehave as the crowded streetcar made its way along “dilapidated” Auburn Avenue. “Even though there was an [Downtown] Ambassador on board, he did nothing to stop bad behavior and expletives on the crowded car.”
Just imagine that after dark. Welcome to Atlanta for “an African-American experience”. That’s what former mayor and crook Bill Campbell said about the Olympics. He said people were coming to the Atlanta Olympics for an “African-American experience”. Boarded up buildings, grafitti, muggings, empty beer bottles, and foul language. Let’s ride the streetcar!
The streetcar will always be taxpayers’ albatross. It’s a ride you take once because you’re curious, many times because it’s free. As humorist Will Rogers said, “If you find yourself in a hole, stop digging.”
As the military veteran tourist said, more recently, “I don’t see how this is going to last. It’s free now; no one is going to pay to be this uncomfortable.”
Yep! Next year it will cost a dollar to ride this piece of crap. And just think, Atlanta is planning for more of these white elephants. I’m glad I live in the suburbs and not in the city.
Cincinnati is doing the same damned thing. They’re even routing it through one of the most dangerous neighborhoods in the city. Maybe they’re hoping “gentrification” will move them out to East Price Hill or Avondale where they belong.
Free tickets will draw the riffraff on board. Riffraff will drive the normal people away. When they start charging for tickets, they’ll have neither.
The tragedy of these boondoggles is that the resources that go into them could have been used for something productive, but instead they are wasted. Do I need to point out that consuming vast quantities of material and human effort on a completely useless, nonproductive item is the opposite of “green”? And I bet some foreigner took the people’s money to build the streetcars.
You’re right. I think the streetcars were built in Germany.
The ones in Michigan are built in Spain. They’re the ones that Wisconsin shitcanned from their budget that our RINO Nerd has been dicking with since 2005 in his beloved Moscow on the Huron People’s republic of Ann Arborstan.
Yeah, but someones relatives got a nice payout somewhere.
You have to love the socialist’s consistency or insanity if you prefer. Repeating the same actions over and over and expecting a different outcome. I give you the brain trust of Washington DC where I work and not live fortunately. Of course being DC, they’re spending twice as much at a cool 190 million so far:
http://www.wusa9.com/story/news/local/dc/2015/03/09/dc-streetcar-project-h-street-benning-road-flaws/24641387/
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2015/jan/16/dc-streetcar-opening-delayed-again-no-date-schedul/
To paraphrase Maggie Thatcher, at some point the commie, pinko bastards will run out of other people’s money…. Or not….
When the feds run out, they just print more. At least city and state budgets are somewhat constrained. And if you want to see idiocy on a colossal scale all you have to do is look to California, which is broke, but nevertheless, Governor Moonbeam is building a high speed train from nowhere to nowhere and eventually plans to link up San Francisco to LA. It never will make any money and will have to be highly subsidized since most people will fly, drive, or take the bus. This boondoggle makes the Atlanta Streetcar look like a good investment. Of course, the feds are giving California a chunk of money for this white elephant.
Liberalism is a mental disease.
As I have said a number of times, $100 million will purchase a few very nice transit buses and pay for the drivers for a good number of years. Buses can be routed to and from real points and destinations. I guess that makes too much sense for the average lib though.
We have one of those up here. One of them goes from downtown Seattle to Lake Union. It is the South Lake Union Transit (S.L.U.T.).
Light rail is the big thing here in the Twin Cities. Two routes in operation now with another one being planned. Same problems as mentioned above. Too slow, too costly and a good chance of getting mugged if you ride at the wrong time.
The really funny but sad thing with light rail number three is that even the greens are against it because it goes through one of the nice park like areas where they live. Can’t have that. NIMBY! The cost swelled from around 700 million to over 2 billion after numerous lawsuits and new requirements due to those lawsuits which has stretched out the planning a couple of years. Part of it has to be underground now, for instance. So for now the project is on hold. That only means that it will be built in another couple of years and by then the price will be closer to 3 billion.
Let me off the train!
And to think they wanted to build a spur out to Eau Claire running from the cities down to Chicago.
Most retarded idea ever!
Wrong application of “If at first you don’t succeed, try try again”…
Can anybody name a city where these streetcar projects have done anything but make money for the contractors and the mayor’s cronies??
Reminds me of when MARTA was first being planned in the late 1960’s to “help future traffic on Atlanta’s growing highways.”
Originally, it was planned from suburbs to work, shopping and business centers. But NOOOOOO. the “poor” wouldn’t hear of it and since they didn’t work, they marched and protested that the remote stations be in and around the poor “projects” and government housing.
Well, we know what happened there. Those “poor” areas, AKA, crime centers, where the out stations were built, resulted in no one riding MARTA since they were neither convenient nor safe. So, traffic on the highways increased, MARTA rates escalated due to lack of ridership and only now, over 40 years later, they’re beginning to build out stations where they’re needed.
Ain’t government wonderful !
I used to take MARTA to the airport but stopped after a few black flash mobs hit it at one of the stops between downtown and he airport. All those stops are right in the middle of black neighborhoods. Race relations have grown so bad under Obungler that I no longer feel safe on MARTA.