Rail Transit

[sansei]

Re: Rail Transit

hi this is sansei and i just spoke with my eldest sister on the railtransit and she said its a good idea that our mayor brought up and will build the raill and that once the rail is up and running,it'll be a big help to the people on the other side of the island and for us in town, the bus system would help also like in my neigbborhood so i thought to share my eldest sister's thought's with everyone since she ride's to work on a train system called the muni bus and it help's her to get from place to place and on the weekend's,she use's her car and i applaud our mayor for bringing in the rail system,thank's mr Mayor!


Well thank's for your time

[sansei]

Re: Rail Transit

hi this is sansei and in response to This Coaltion of Stop rail now,how would they feel if they succeded and they stopped rail and that we the community would wait another 16-20 year's and maybe the mayor at that time would have to bring the rail subject up once again and if we do get the rail,would they know how long it would take to build our rail and i believe no one would want to wait that long for a rail and not even a elevated Highway or Toll bridge would help since my Eldest sister who live's in the mainland say's those two wouldnt work and that even putting more buse's on the road wouldnt do it and we do need the rail transit since it'll be more effecient than what the Stop Rail now would propose and I wouldnt sign what they sign.

Well thank's for your time

[TuNnL]

Re: Rail Transit

one must buy (or lease) [a vehicle], then one must have insurance, maintain the vehicle, pay for gas, etc. Mandating household limits undermines our freedom ... while increasing the cost to own and operate a vehicle doesn't.

Regardless of your definition of freedom, increasing the cost of car registration would have unintended consequences. There are already too many unregistered vehicles on the road for police to catch them all. Adding more would really jeopardize our safety.

If we want to address the traffic problem through taxation (which personally, I think is a bad idea), the most effective way to do it is by increasing the tax on gasoline. If you cannot afford gas, you cannot use your car, regardless of whether it is registered, insured, maintained, etc. Now you will really be forced to consider alternatives.

[islandguy]

Re: Rail Transit

What's up with that proposal?

http://stoprailnow.com/

http://stoprailnow.com/

[cynsaligia]

Re: Rail Transit

http://stoprailnow.com/

http://stoprailnow.com/

wow, aren't you obnoxious?

(yeah, i know--pot, kettle, kettle, pot. but my posts generally exhibit a more thoughtful style. example coming right up...)

this op-ed piece by retired S-B sportswriter, al chase, humorously mirrors much of my own thought about the railing anti-railers. i love how he lampoons his neighbor, whose sputtering responses are representative of other anti-railers' i've come across. i recently went to a neighborhood board meeting and heard a woman say that the people on the west side should just try to find jobs on their side of the island and not come into honolulu at all. brilliant thinking, woman!

the more i hear anti-railers speak, the more it becomes clear to me that they're a selfish lot, more concerned about their property values and their own lifestyle versus the good of the community as a whole. i firmly believe that if rail was built when i was in college, the traffic congestion problems we have now would have been pre-emptively alleviated meaningfully, thereby making quality of life better for everyone on this island.

[TuNnL]

Re: Rail Transit

wow, aren't you [islandguy] obnoxious?

I have to agree with this sentiment. islandguy, please have some kind of point to your posts, besides shamelessly promoting your anti-rail site.

this op-ed piece by retired S-B sportswriter, al chase, humorously mirrors much of my own thought about the railing anti-railers.

I loved it! I’m glad someone from Hawai‘i Kai (besides my dad) is looking at rail objectively. These anti-rail nutjobs are wasting our money by forcing the city to re-print ballots with a “question about rail transit.” The lady Chase talks to in his parody is actually smarter than most of these petitioners, most of whom have no clue what the city should do instead of rail to solve our traffic crisis.

[salmoned]

Re: Rail Transit

Regardless of your definition of freedom, increasing the cost of car registration would have unintended consequences. There are already too many unregistered vehicles on the road for police to catch them all. Adding more would really jeopardize our safety.

If we want to address the traffic problem through taxation (which personally, I think is a bad idea), the most effective way to do it is by increasing the tax on gasoline. If you cannot afford gas, you cannot use your car, regardless of whether it is registered, insured, maintained, etc. Now you will really be forced to consider alternatives.

I never suggested this was a great idea, just that there are real alternatives in this debate and that the Rail Transit option is not among the best solutions. Higher taxes on gas is also a good idea. Another might be to modify growth through development regulation. It may take numerous approaches to reach an optimal solution, rather than putting all the eggs in a single basket (high priced, low versatility solution).

Yes, there are too many unregistered vehicles on the road, yet if the government raised the priority to remove those vehicles just a wee bit (above parking tickets, perhaps) that number could be significantly reduced.

I admit the anti-rail initiative is poorly written/worded, but agree with the question being posed to the public. The cost of building and maintaining THIS rail system (which couldn't possibly save a minute or a penny from my commute from Ewa Beach, even if it were a free ride) is just too high. The money would be better spent flushing it down the toilet (sewage system improvements), slapping us side-a-da-head (education) or bleeding it out of us (health care).

[islandguy]

Rail System and Govt Lies Exposed

This was VERY good http://www.brightcove.tv/title.jsp?t...nnel=293897125

[TuNnL]

Re: Rail System and Govt Lies Exposed

There is already a thread for rail transit in Route 808. In any event, that is the section this topic belongs in.

[AlohaKine]

Re: Rail Transit

Rail transit = white elephant.

[mel]

Re: Rail Transit

As of today, 22,000+ signatures.

[Keanu]

Re: Rail Transit

The Stop Rail Now folks are not being completely forthcoming. Their petition should specify the alternative they are proposing.

I'm not a big supporter of the City's fixed guideway project as proposed but at least it will take people directly into the urban core when it is built out, allowing them to leave their cars at home. HOT lanes otoh, will not take vehicles off of the roads.

[salmoned]

Re: Rail Transit

What does an alternative plan have to do with it? Rail transit solves nothing, it won't decrease vehicular traffic, so why do we need an alternative to an extravagantly wasteful project? Rail will just be a big, immobile beast, that must be fed continually. Development will have to become more centralized (to make rail more attractive to riders) and that will force traffic to become even worse as a result. We'll need to turn the rail system into a holy shrine of development in order to justify it's existence. If rail is successful (okay, I have a wild imagination), we'll just be beholden to yet another union [for transportation, this time]. Is that what we want?

[TuNnL]

Re: Rail Transit

What does an alternative plan have to do with it?

This is the attitude that will sink the Stop Rail Now campaign. People who think like salmoned make up the majority of the anti-rail movement. The reason people supported rail in the first place, is they want traffic addressed as top priority. A new study shows Honolulu possesses the top bottleneck in the country. Many have sat through it too many times to count. You can infer that since salmoned says you don’t need an alternative, that he/she doesn’t have one. Again I say, that logic will never win the transit debate. You can bank on it.

If rail is successful ... we'll just be beholden to yet another union [for transportation, this time]. Is that what we want?

This is inaccurate. We already have a union for transportation. It’s called The Teamsters, a union led nationally by Jimmy Hoffa, jr. They represent the bus drivers. Gas prices have fueled increasing ridership. If anything, rail will cut the cost of the Teamsters contract, since we will not have to expand the bus fleet any more than projected. Without rail, we most certainly will need a significant amount of buses to make up for the people who would have rode rail instead.

[Leo Lakio]

Re: Rail Transit

A new study shows Honolulu possesses the top bottleneck in the country.

Well...not quite the top in the country. Quoting from the article:

Honolulu also has two of the 100 worst bottleneck areas in the country. Ranked 41st are the eastbound Moanalua Freeway lanes by the H-1 freeway interchange, with an average congested speed of 8 mph. And ranked 87th are the eastbound H-1 lanes by Kalihi Street, with an average congested speed of 12.6 mph. Those spots are the worst and second-worst bottleneck areas in Honolulu. The third-worst bottleneck, and the 104th in the nation, is the H-1 freeway eastbound near Middle Street.

Still yet...