Reply With QuoteLinda Dear,Originally Posted by Linda_D
is my imagination running away, or do you take only the negative approach to anything Buffalo?
The properties acquired by the Bridge so far were at 4 to 5+ times their value, with little or no negotiation if I recall. Big dollars for that stuff.
Bridge authority has way too much money.
Linda Dear,
is my imagination running away, or do you take only the negative approach to anything Buffalo?
Shiny strips of steel in the pavement & a pair of single or double wires overhead... truly hideous.
But elevating the entire system above the street would be so much nicer; everybody likes to live under an El.
Monorail = Disneyland and the remnant from a World's Fair ... or the episode of The Simpsons, where a Harold Hill character sells them one. haha
I bet you have never stepped foot on the metro rail before.
I rode the train every day to and from highschool for 4 years. A majority of the riders at peak times were professional-looking people dressed in business attire--people who would park at the university station and ride the train to their downtown jobs.
When it comes to busses your statement is mostly correct. Most bus riders who are old enough to drive do so under duress. But trains and buses are two very different psychological realms--atleast in WNY. People with economic choice around here snub their noses at buses but don't look down on trains so much.
I bet if rail lines were built to the eastern suburbs and southtowns, many downtown commuters residing in those place would opt to ride the trains instead of drive downtown and pay for parking.
Small, office-oriented companies of say 20-30 employees would be more inclined to locate in a building downtown if there are decent transportation options like rail.
With more people walking from trains, more retail could thrive down there. Little by little Buffalo's urban core could regain its vitality.
More limitations?? Like not getting stuck in a massive traffic jam trying to pull out of the HSBC arena parking garage?
Ever see the trains after a sabres game? They PACKED. 4 cars per train full of people, standing-room-only.
Trains provide a much more orderly, less-stressful way of getting alot of people to and from sporting/entertainment events that take place in big arenas.
gabe is right,
Your really missing the mark on this one linda. Sabres games or big events downtown like thursaday in the square, First night etc and the rail cars are packed.
People who wonder if the glass is half empty or full miss the point. The glass is refillable.
I live up near UB Amherst and I enjoy going to the Lafayette Tap Room for Blues, Shea's, Sabres (only a couple of games a year), and Thursday in the Square.
I drive to UB Main St. and hop the train. Great way to get into and out of downtown.
I can't see any expansion of mass transit here unless two things happen:
1. gas prices become so high very few can afford them and need mass transit; and
2. Suburbanites get over their fear of city residents "invading" the suburbs via mass transit, and using it to do bad things.
There is still a high level of paranoia where I live regarding city people, which is basically code for "blacks." Until that is dealt with, I think the level of wrath against expanding mass transit into the burbs will preclude any action.
You are so very right about the paranoia. The racial thing really holds this area back.
As for gas prices, we may see $4.00 a gallon by the end of summer.
I work near Albion, my car gets 31 miles to a gallon, and I currently spend $210-216 per month on gasoline. That appears ready to go up another $50-60 p/month.
Actually, I have, although since the park 'n ride is over by UB it was inconvenient.
Trains are too expensive to build and maintain and lack flexibility, and there's been no study done to find out just how many people would use rail for commuting if it were built. Now, why is that, do you suppose?
Commuters aren't going to shop on their way home. Forget it. They get out of work, they go to the busstop (in your fantasy world, the train depot), they wait for their ride. If they're going to shop, they're more likely to do it at the end of their ride not the beginning of it, but most people don't have the time or inclination to hang around after work because they have various responsibilities at home.
Your right to buy a military weapon without hindrance, delay or training cannot trump Daniel Barden’s right to see his eighth birthday. -- Jim Himes
This area is ripe for gouging. It won't let go of its habits, like moving as far away from humanity as possilbe and thus driving farther than need be to get to work. I feel for the owners of small businesses, like landscapers who end up driving a lot.
For the rest, I don't have much sympathy. The fickle nature of gas prices has always been there....we just got in the habit of ignoring that.
I truly believe this area needs real mass transit. And, after more than a decade of living here, I know that won't happen. The balkanized nature of this region precludes ANY change. We're so isolated, and have been for a long time, that our fears of outsiders is huge.
We may see this soon. Although I think it would take gas prices reaching catostrophic levels for people to completely shift their transportation habits.
$4.00 -- will cause people to reduce unessecary car trips and perhaps think twice about buying gas-guzzlers as their next vehicle. Consumer spending power will be impaired by more of people's budgets going towards transportation.
$5.00 -- may cause people to do everything listed above more rigorously and perhaps move closer to where they work. School districts will be in dire financial straits having to run their massive yellow bus fleets at these high fuel costs.
$6.00 -- all of the above even more. many familes will be defaulting on their mortgages, abandoning their homes and moving in with better-off relatives. consider the financial burden of heating an oversized home. Expect to see alot of houses sporting multiple familes, kind of like the old immigrant days. Trucking food 3000 miles from where its grown to grocery store will become prohibitively expensive. If people know what is right, oversized, seemingly useless suburban lawns will become productive gadens.
and $7.00 ??? for now, let's not go there....
This irrantional xenophobia is the single most major roadblock we are facing right now.
Most suburbanites, however, don't realize that regional rapid transit is indeed in their best interest. As gas prices keep going up, car commuting will become more and more of a family budget eater. Office jobs that are currently scattered throughout office parks in an incoherent manner are only conveniently reachable by car. These jobs could very easily be in dense centralized downtowns that are mass-transit friendly. As foreign oil become more and more scare, the power from the falls will always be available. Fast, electric trains can and will take a seriously economic strain off our oil dependancy. If jobs are to return to denser commercial nodes like downtowns, it will be in suburbs best interest to have rail links to these places. These burbs have a chance of remaining well-off bedroom communities, instead of becoming isolated, dated, ashpalt jungles cut off from other cities by steep gas prices.
Also, I wrote an entry for BuffaloRising recently on how feasible a Downtown-Airport metro rail line would be.
http://www.buffalorising.com/city/ar...hp#commentsall
The rights of ways (ROW) are there waiting to be reused.
No tunneling will be required.
No homes or businesses will need to acquired and knocked down.
I even made a mini-graphic show how exactly this line would work, using a google earth image as a medium.
What about the irrational stereotyping of the suburbanites? The only poll I've ever seen taken about the issue (in the Snooze IIRC) showed that Amherstonians (is that a word?) were in favor of putting the rail further up Main St.
Remain calm!! But run for your lives if necessary!
No, CRLACHE, urbanites never use irrational stereotyping, and certainly not irrational xenophobic stereotyping -- unless they're talking about people who are poor, who speak English with an accent, who are from the wrong side of town or who happen to be from the 'burbs.
Your right to buy a military weapon without hindrance, delay or training cannot trump Daniel Barden’s right to see his eighth birthday. -- Jim Himes
Right. There is very little conclusive data on the matter. I can tell you from experience that alot of the riders on the train during peak hours are southwestern Amherst residents commuting to and from their jobs. I'm sure residents of Eggertsville and Synder will have opinions on mass transit that greatly differ from those living in patio homes on North French road.
You're right, lumping all "suburbanites" into one generalized consensus is irrational.
But also consider that these same stereoypes may be taken serious by suburban politicians who don't have an exact grasp on the true opinions of their constituents.
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