Darienite (https://darienite.com/tag/jim-cameron-2017/page/3)
I hate to fly. It’s mostly an irrational fear of turbulence and crashing — little stuff like that. But in recent years, the whole experience of air travel has turned from uncomfortable to unbearable. Getting to the airport is expensive and slow. LaGuardia Airport is a complete mess with construction.
Keep an eye on our Hartford lawmakers, because they sometimes contrive a wacky proposal that makes no sense, except perhaps for their re-election plans. A few years ago, then-state Senate President Don Williams suggested senior citizens should be given free transit rides statewide. He said they “earned” it. Full disclosure: I am a tad over 65 and am all for my senior benefits, though I’m not sure how I might have “earned” them simply by my age. The senator believed offering free rides would have seniors flocking to the state’s buses and trains and form an important advocacy group for public transit.
Crawling along Interstate 95 the other day in the usual bumper-to-bumper traffic, I snickered when I noticed the “speed limit 55” sign alongside the highway. We wish! Of course, when the highway is not jammed, speeds are more like 70 mph, with the legal limit, unfortunately, rarely enforced. It got me thinking: Who sets speed limits on our highways and by what criteria?’ Why is the speed limit on I-95 in Fairfield County only 55 mph, but 65 mph east of New Haven?
Jim Redeker has the best job in transportation. And the toughest. As commissioner of the state Department of Transportation for the past six years, he has guided the agency through hundreds of millions of dollars in spending while managing three competing taskmasters: his boss, Gov. Dannel P. Malloy; the budget-controlling Legislature; and commuters who depend on his product. Redeker has successfully managed all three. I’ve known the commissioner for all his years in Connecticut and always considered him the smartest guy in the room.
What happens when a great transportation idea gets ahead of itself? Consider the story of the greatest American railroad that was never built.
Many people have heard of The Twentieth Century Limited and The Broadway Limited, the trains of the New York Central and Pennsylvania Railroads that ran for decades between New York and Chicago. Those daily trains defined deluxe, pampering passengers with plush Pullman cars, fine dining and even an on-train barber shop. But their circuitous routes made it a 16-hour trip. The New York Central followed the “water-level route” north to Albany, then across upstate New York and down the coast of Lake Erie.
Nobody likes the idea of paying tolls. But they’re coming back to Connecticut and state lawmakers should be honest with us and tell us why. We are running out of money for the Special Transportation Fund. That’s the reason. None of the re-funding alternatives are attractive: vehicle miles tax, sales tax, gas tax and yes, tolls.
You may start your day with a cup of coffee and a hearty breakfast. I start mine by reading complaints about Metro-North: emails, tweets and social media posts by fellow commuters who don’t know where to turn for help. It’s just another day in the life as a “commuter advocate.”
The problem is every ride on Metro-North is controlled by different agencies and there’s no way for commuters to know who’s responsible. For years, I offered a simple solution: a sign at every station explaining who was in charge of parking, the station, the conditions of the trains, and the names and phone numbers for those to contact. Lacking this simple signage, I suggest the following:
How to complain
You must be specific: date, time, location and names.
It looks like the fate of Uber — and Lyft, the other popular ride-sharing service in Connecticut — will be decided in Hartford in a lobbying war, not in the competitive marketplace. Uber has enjoyed strong growth since launching in Connecticut three years ago, using 9,000 drivers who carry hundreds of thousands of passengers annually. I am one of those customers and am very happy with their service. I tried Uber after getting sticker-shock for the “black car” limo fees to New York airports: more than $180 one way from my home to JFK vs. $80 with Uber.
It’s the bridge we love to hate. Congested, expensive — charging a $15 toll — and lacking the modern design of the soon-to-be completed new Tappan Zee Bridge, the George Washington Bridge is best to be avoided. But that’s often not possible. The GW was not the first New York City bridge designed to cross the Hudson River. There were discussions back in 1885 about building a suspension bridge to bring the Pennsylvania Railroad into Manhattan at 23rd Street.
Our love affair with the automobile depends on one thing: free parking. After driving on our “free” highways, we need to park somewhere, and we all hate to pay for the privilege. It’s as if there’s some constitutional right to free parking. But free parking is actually expensive and paid in more than just dollars. The industry standards-setting group known as the Institute of Transportation Engineers (ITE) has defined 266 different types of businesses and determined the amount of nearby parking they require.
Does reading this column depress you? That’s what I’ve heard from a few faithful readers. But in opining on transportation issues, my goal is to get you thinking. So this week, just to cheer us all up a bit, I’m only going to comment on good news. (Trust me, it’s taken a while to accumulate these cheerier dispatches, but here goes.)
Faster times at DMV
A friend of mine who runs a limousine company said he recently went to the DMV expecting to waste a day on paperwork, but got out of there in record time.
Parts of Bridgeport are quite beautiful, but others look like the bombed-out South Bronx, especially the lots along the Metro-North tracks. The most populous city in the state with residents paying some of the highest taxes really needs help. But is a proposed $300 million new Barnum train station in East Bridgeport the right answer, or just a political boondoggle? Bridgeport already has a downtown train station right in the business center, next to the new bus station and ferry terminal. The new Barnum station would be a little over a mile away in the middle of nowhere.
As I enjoyed a speedy — 148-mph— ride to Boston last week on Acela, I started thinking about the differences between Amtrak and Metro-North. They each have a different mission, but there are a few things Metro-North could learn from its national counterpart. Quiet Cars
Amtrak invented the concept in 2000 and it’s been a big success. The cars are well marked and the “library-like atmosphere” rules are explained and enforced, both by conductors and passengers. But on Metro-North, the QuietCalmute concept didn’t happen until 2011.
Don’t look now, but our Legislature is back in action considering dozens of bills affecting transportation. Everything from tolls to train fares, from airports to Uber could be up for grabs this session. But how are citizens supposed to voice their views, let alone follow these machinations from afar? Aside from following the Connecticut media or watching every moment on CT-N, the state’s version of C-Span, there is not much to keep us informed. Some bills, like HB773 proposed by state Rep. Gail Lavielle, R-Wilton, deserve our support.
If we want to get cars off the highways, we need to turn drivers into rail commuters. But even the most motivated would-be rail rider faces an immediate problem: the lack of train station parking. Many stations have wait lists for annual permits of more than five or six years. The permits can also cost as much as $1,100 a year. Even day-parking is expensive and hard to find.