Arizona Republic: “A Phoenix man is hoping to derail Metro light rail’s plans to lay track through his neighborhood as part of an 11-mile extension to the city’s west side.” Wow! Who knew Valley Metro was planning to spend more of other people’s money so it could lose even more money and need bigger government subsidies? Not content to suck money from bankrupt Phoenix, Tempe, Mesa and the federal government at the current level, Valley Metro is planning to expand it’s money losing light rail system. The audacity of dopes. Why do these people want to ignore the difficult economic reality facing government at all levels and continue to spend, spend spend?
The ignoramuses who run the buses/rail across the US sit behind their desks, they don’t ride the buses or rail to work, etc. They are so clueless that they usually have to hire outside consultants to tell them how to run/expand their systems. These ignoramuses will take stimulus money to expand rail and buy new buses (capital expenses), then after they are built/bought they say they don’t have the money to run them (operating expenses) and won’t deliver what they promised. Tucson is currently spending $196 million to build a 4-mile streetcar from downtown to the University (tinyurl.com/872ck4j), which is already served by several bus routes. What a waste! Tempe is about to do the same. I’m a Yankee social liberal/fiscal conservative and have never had a car in my life and I’m disgusted by all this waste. It doesn’t make economic sense, so I’m guessing it might just be a kind of crony capitalism payoff to campaign contributors!