Darienite (https://darienite.com/tag/jim-cameron-2017/page/4)
Building and maintaining our highways is expensive. But here’s a quiz: On Interstates 95 and 84, what costs a half-million dollars a mile to construct? The answer: sound barriers. Why are we spending that kind of money to enshroud our interstates simply to protect the peace and quiet of neighbors? Didn’t they know living close to a highway came with increased noise and air pollution?
As the Legislature reconvened on Jan. 4 in Hartford, all were buzzing about filling the predicted $41 million deficit in the state’s budget. While the governor is again pledging no tax increases (we’ve heard that before!), the alternatives are looking pretty ugly. For the state’s Department of Transportation, it may mean drastic cuts in services and staffing with long-term implications — what I’m calling the Doomsday Scenario. A few months ago, the state’s Office of Policy and Management asked each department to come up with a plan for an additional 10 percent budget cut on top of last year’s reduction of the same amount.
Everybody writes “year in review” stories, but not me. Instead, I’m going to predict the future and tell you what’s going to happen in transportation in the coming year! Metro-North: The new M8 cars will perform well in the winter, but the aging tracks, switches and catenary (overhead power lines) will continue to suffer breakdowns, causing delays. Ridership will continue to climb, causing further rush-hour crowding until new railcars start arriving in 2019. Gasoline Prices: The party’s over, folks.
Stuck in traffic on I-95? Wouldn’t you rather be sitting on a deck chair on a cruise ship somewhere warm? It was the Cunard line that first marketed long distance ship travel with the phrase “getting there is half the fun.” And in those days, it was. Now, with the exception of trans-Atlantic crossings, most cruise ships end up right where they began. Over 23 million people hop aboard a cruise each year, half of them Americans.
Stuck in traffic on I-95? Wouldn’t you rather be sitting on a deck chair on a cruise ship somewhere warm? It was the Cunard line that first marketed long distance ship travel with the phrase “getting there is half the fun.” And in those days, it was. Now, with the exception of trans-Atlantic crossings, most cruise ships end up right where they began. Over 23 million people hop aboard a cruise each year, half of them Americans.