[Mpls] Personal Rapid Transit

Fri Mar 4 20:06:53 CST 2005

Thank you, David. I'm usually the one jumping on the PRT detractors but have 
been too busy this week to respond.  You said it very well.

Steven M Nelson
Willard Hay
http://citizenshipchronicles.blogspot.com/
http://minutemenworldwide.blogspot.com/
Get UP! Get OUT! & GET INVOLVED!!!

>I agree with Dorie.
>
> Her route is PART of the network CM Dean Zimmermann mapped out for his
> ward 6+ (including Hennepin, downtown skyways, West Bank, LRT stations,
> Hiawatha, Lake St, Uptown; and all the area inside this large circle).
>
> There is so much diversity in businesses, entertainment, education,
> stores, jobs, housing, etc that you would be able to do most every
> town-type activity inside it, WITHOUT A CAR. No car insurance. No car
> repair, No car depreciation. No licence fees. No gasoline/oil. No parking
> fees.
>
> You can easily get to any of this 24/7. 2 in the morning? Rush hour? No
> problem. You can live anywhere in this large area (less overall rent
> pressure) and get to your area-of-the-moment (West Bank, Uptown,
> downtown...) just like that.  You can take your bike on the PRT, and avoid
> the worst traffic (and threats from being hit by cars, no small problem).
>
> Small businesses would cluster by the stations; they would not need to
> provide parking lots!!; more could start and survive, and counter the dead
> march to big-boxdom.
>
> Community centers would be in or near the stations. More people would walk
> more often; fewer people would drive.
>
> And I think this would be SO popular that people and businesses (and
> tourists) would FLOCK to the PRT area. In very short order all the other
> wards would be demanding PRT, to stop the drain to ward 6. And then
> wanting PRT yesterday would be StPaul, Richfield, Roseville, etc, till it
> covered most of the more densely populated parts of the 7 county metro
> area. And then you could do MUCH more than before without a car. Why pay
> all that money to keep a car when it's easier and cheaper to PRT? No need
> for more or expanded metro freeways; no bigger task for MNDOT; declining
> need for gasoline and oil; cleaner air; less noise.
>
> Well, but who loses with PRT? MNDOT, car-makers, oil and gas, concrete
> companies, road construction, car insurance companies, doctors treating
> asthama and other air-pollution sicknesses. And the big-boxes that live at
> the ramps by freeways choked with customers in their cars; big boxes that
> bust unions and send the profits away to NYC or the Grand Cayman Islands -
> those billioniaire owners would lose. Any big development that relies on
> freeways to dump vast numbers of transients at their parking lots will
> suffer - but we shouldn't have such big developments; most people don't
> like them, and they are able to extort corporate welfare from city
> councils. And construction labor won't like PRT - it costs MUCH less to
> build than LRT, so of course labor wants the option that gives them the
> most money (in the short range).
>
> The people who lose with PRT are few, but they have lots of money and
> power. They want us to keep to exactly the system we have, basically -
> cars and freeways and boxes; continue gutting bus public transportation;
> do a little with LRT, but only where malls and big boxes will profit.
>
> What they want is not sustainable, and will fall to pieces shortly when
> the price of gasoline doubles and triples in the next years. But they
> don't care - they want their money (from us) NOW, and to hell with what is
> left, after they take their cash and scram to some secluded isle safe from
> all developers (like themselves).
>
> --David Shove
>
>
>
>
>
> On Thu, 3 Mar 2005, Dorie Rae Gallagher wrote:
>
>>
>>
>> >
>> > Michael Jensvold wrote:
>> > >  I was pleased to see that the latest PRT article ran
>> > >  right next to the obituaries.
>>
>> > I strongly agree.  This is an outrageously stupid idea
>> > combining the worst features of both automobiles and
>> > rapid-transit.
>> > Michael Atherton writes:
>>
>> Well, I  LIKE  the idea and the perfect place would be to run it from 
>> Uptown
>> to Downtown along Hennepin across the river to Main. Ideal for 
>> eliminating
>> some of the traffic on Henn., ideal for tourists, ideal for sight-seeing,
>> ideal for just moving people without traffic jams, pollution, road rage,
>> they
>> could use their cell phones in private!, could hold meetings in the sky,
>> have lunch in Uptown and be back Downtown without stress or a sweaty 
>> vest.
>> Conventioneers staying downtown could frequent the bars in Uptown and 
>> stay
>> off the road in between, courier service...it might even give new slant 
>> to
>> Michael's story of the Jag. I  see it brimed with all sorts of
>> possibilities...it could be so popular it might pay for itself. {Park 
>> Board
>> might want to get involved :+}!
>>
>> Dorie Rae Gallagher
>> Nokomis
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
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>>
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>>
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> REMINDERS:
> 1. Be civil! Please read the NEW RULES at 
> http://www.e-democracy.org/rules. If you think a member is in violation, 
> contact the list manager at mplslist at tcq.net before continuing it on the 
> list.
>
> 2. Don't feed the troll! Ignore obvious flame-bait.
>
> For state and national discussions see: 
> http://e-democracy.org/discuss.html
> For external forums, see: http://e-democracy.org/mninteract
> ________________________________
>
> Minneapolis Issues Forum - A Civil City-focused Civic Discussion - Mn 
> E-Democracy
> Post messages to: mailto:mpls at mnforum.org
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> 