MnLRT...Moving Minnesoootans Into the Next Century
MnLRT...Moving Minnesoootans Into the Next Century |
Lets Get Moving on Light Rail!
Burt Cohen, TWIN CITIES BUSINESS MONTHLY, APRIL 1998
Light Rail Transit Is An Idea Whose Time Is
Now.
We need light-rail transit in the Twin Cities and we need it now.
The stalling, the equivocating, and the pontificating have gone
on long enough to qualify us for the Procrastinators of the
Millennium Award someone is sure to hand out next year, an award
we will have to receive in shame and embarrassment.
The problem is, some people are just always against change. They’re oh, so comfortable with the way things are that they can’t see the need for, or bear the thought of, disrupting the status quo. These folks are probably the great-grandchildren of the folks who opposed putting cobblestones or bricks on Nicollet or Wabasha or University avenues. "Heck, them dirt roads was good enough for my pa, and they’re good enough for me. Besides, them streets are never gonna go more than a few blocks anyhow."
They were wrong, and their descendants are wrong when they dredge up their weak and univisionary reasons for opposing light-rail. They argue:
As usual these people can’t see the forest because the trees are in the way. Instead of having a vision of what this metropolitan area can and should be in the next centuries, they find excuses to inhibit or minimize growth potential in the name of cautiousness and good, sound, conservative planning.
Strong, vital, economically secure downtowns are critical not just to the cities of St. Paul and Minneapolis, but to all of the suburban and exurban communities in the metropolitan area. Many people who know this to be true intellectually seem to forget about it on the drive home to the suburbs. Many others declare - sometimes embarrassingly, almost with pride - that they never come downtown at all. Their social and cultural lives are limited to the suburbs, and, as a result, they miss out on the incredible richness, the diversity, the vitality the downtowns offer. But while that’s their own personal loss, we can’t afford to have them use their own narrow mindsets and habits and fears as a basis for punishing the central cities. Nor can we afford to rationalize complacency with the notion that the major cities can absorb a lot of body blows, because they can’t. Even though our cities are relatively strong, they’re vulnerable and need to be nurtured. One important way to do that is to develop and maintain a first-rate transportation system, a system that will be able to move large numbers of people into and out of and around the cities at high speed. It should also be a system that will entice people to abandon their cars, at least for general commuting.
Speed has become an increasingly important factor in most of our lives. There just isn’t enough time anymore to accomplish everything on our lists. A light-rail system would move commuters swiftly past miles of rush-hour congestion and backed-up buses. At some point it might even contribute to a reduction of traffic jams. On top of that, the system would be quiet, non-polluting, and chic. Most people who don’t take buses now will never take them. With all due respect, buses are smelly, noisy, obtrusive, and clunky. They have no sex appeal. Light-rail, on the other hand, would make a statement: new, fresh, fast, quiet, and "in". An efficient, well-planned system would absolutely attract new riders.
It takes more than modest, incremental improvements to change peoples’ habits. Next year’s new and improved buses, with better grips and tinted glass instead of clear, won’t result in one single convert to buses. But a new commuter transit system, one that will deliver real answers to the most frustrating complaints, will. At some point, we have to act bolder and more aggressively. We need to take the great strides that will position us to remain a strong and vital metropolitan area for the next two hundred years. One of those strides is toward a light-rail transit system. We need to get moving.
Burt Cohen is president of MSP Communications, which publishes Twin Cities Business Monthly.