Light Rail: The Smoking Gun
Posted June 15th, 2007 at 12:47 PM by Jeff A. TaylorFrom the pages of the June issue of Governing magazine leaps conclusive proof that Charlotte’s light rail scheme is a fraud on local voters.
This article, and its various sidebars, is of vital importance. It spells out in city officials’ own words exactly how residents have been misled and duped. Only here, speaking on the record for a friendly niche publication, do they let their guard down and speak about the true purpose of CATS’ $9 billion train plan.
I urge you to read and spread this article far and wide in its entirety, but for now the high — or low — points as detailed by writer Zach Patton.
First up “Charlotte’s transit-oriented development czar” Tracy Finch.
In Charlotte, it was the city’s rise as a national banking center that began discussions about finding a new way to grow. In the early 1990s, Bank of America relocated its corporate headquarters to Charlotte. Other banks, including what is now Wachovia Corp., also proliferated there. With the banks came an influx of employees transferring from cities such as Philadelphia, New York or San Francisco. “These were people used to an urban lifestyle,” says Finch. “They didn’t want to live on a half-acre lot at the end of a cul-de-sac. They understood the value of a walkable neighborhood.” At the time, Charlotte didn’t have many of those to offer; Finch says that a lot of bank employees refused to make the move.
Really? Now that is damn fascinating info right there. First off is it true? Did BofA or Wachovia/First Union really have trouble getting execs to come to Charlotte because it didn’t have a light rail plan? Because we didn’t yet have condos Uptown next to rail stops?
Even if false, Finch clearly believes the story to be true and it is doubtful that Charlotte’s transit oriented development czar is alone in that belief.
Next up, city planning director Debra Campbell:
Planners began thinking about transit by mapping where population growth was already occurring around Charlotte. What they came up with was a five-armed figure, a slightly askew star with downtown at its center. The city council adopted this “Centers and Corridors Vision” in 1994. From that, planners started to see how they could use trains or rapid buses to channel future growth along those corridors. “We always saw transit as a means, not an end,” says planning director Debra Campbell. “The real impetus for transit was how it could help us grow in a way that was smart. This really isn’t even about building a transit system. It’s about place making. It’s about building a community.”
Couple massively important items here. One, our current transit and transportation plan dates to 1994. Might we want to update it to reflect recent lessons in land-use and transportation planning?
Two, We always saw transit as a means, not an end. The real impetus for transit was how it could help us grow in a way that was smart. This really isn’t even about building a transit system. It’s about place making. It’s about building a community.
Funny, “place making” was not on the ballot in 1998. Nor did it come up the other day at the Astrotuf press conference to save the half-cent transit tax. Nor did the Uptown paper of record mention “place making” in today’s clumsy attempt to define ‘”the real transit issue.” Instead it was all about “choking on traffic.”
The public is systematically being fed one line — that Charlotte’s $9 billion transit plan has something to do with traffic congestion, or sometimes air quality — while the real reason stays hidden. That is because local officials know that voters would not willingly hand over $9 billion so central planners can play at “place making.”
Next up Mayor Pat McCrory:
Nobody worked harder than Mayor Pat McCrory to sell Charlotte on this vision. A Republican elected in 1995 and now Charlotte’s longest-serving mayor, McCrory excelled at translating planner-speak into terms that resonated with everyday people. “Planners use acronyms and words like ‘density’ and ‘R6 zoning,’ ” McCrory says. “People can’t relate.” The mayor liked to present two competing images of Charlotte’s future. One included tidy tree-lined streets with bikeways and sidewalks. The other showed “traffic lights every 15 feet, strip malls and unlimited pavement.” More than anything, McCrory stressed the idea that a transit system isn’t intended to be a quick fix but rather a long-term investment.
Rather speaks for itself. Mayor Pat is proud of the way he has hoodwinked voters over the years.
Now, the $40 million trolley revealed as the stalking horse some of us long suspected it was:
Charlotte did two creative things to build momentum, turning its effort into a national model for transit-oriented development. First, the city ran a commuter trolley along existing freight tracks in the South End — the same tracks the light-rail trains will use. The trolley opened in 2001 and ran for only a couple of years along a relatively short section of tracks. But as a public relations tool, it helped residents and developers taste the potential. Campbell calls the trolley an “instrumental catalyst” for showing what this transit thing was all about.
So $40 million for light rail PR is fine with the city. Patton evidently does not know that the trolley is unlikely to ever run again, having served its purpose as a “catalyst.” Was this true purpose ever disclosed by city officials? Of course not; not even as the trolley’s cost spiraled out of control from $9 million upward. The city was going to pay whatever it took to run the trolley given what was at stake. This provides further evidence of CATS’ and the city’s willingness to mislead the public.
On the half-cent repeal issue:
Charlotte’s transit boosters are confident they’ll prevail in November. Voters have supported transit several times in the past, and city officials, from the planners to Mayor McCrory, have worked hard to build support within the community. Tina Votaw, a planner with the city agency in charge of light rail, says it’s important to convey a big-picture message to the public. “You have to be honest and say, ‘You’re right. This transit line might not help you. But it might help your neighbors. It might help your children.’ ” Votaw adds that traffic congestion isn’t going away, and that adding lanes to busy freeways is a short-term solution to traffic problems. “We’re not traditionally good at taking the long view,” she says. “But you’ve got to impress that upon people one by one.”
More Votaw:
You’re not going to see people throwing away their car keys. We don’t expect everybody to get out of their cars. But I’m afraid that’s what these critics think we believe. We’re just trying to give people a choice.
More Campbell:
It’s also about giving lifestyle choices. Charlotte had gotten to the point where there was really only one lifestyle: suburban half-acre lots. We will never ever do away with our suburban cul-de-sac communities. They’ll always be a choice for our residents. … We never, ever, ever said transit was going to be a panacea. It’s just about providing a choice. A big part of that was bringing in the transit folks, the engineers, the planners and the developers to talk to the public, so it wasn’t just seen as a transit project. … Your perspective on transit has to be based around adding choices. And there should be a strong linkage between the vision you have for your community and this tool — and it has to be considered a tool. Transit is just one additional piece of infrastructure, like roads or utilities, that shapes your community.
City officials have already unilaterally decreed that adding road capacity will not relieve traffic congestion, but nor will light rail. Light rail is merely a “choice.” Congestion then, is evidently a natural phenomenon beyond the reach of human hands. But “place making” is not. Strange.
Here’s is what we’ve learned from the city’s own officials.
Charlotte’s current mass transit plan is intended to increase density to provide “lifestyle choice.”
Charlotte’s current mass transit plan tries to serve large corporate interests.
Charlotte’s current mass transit plan is means to an end, and is not intended to address traffic congestion.
Those are the primary goals. There cannot be any dispute. Here then the big question the Uptown crowd so does not want to hear: Given those goals, should we spend at least $70 million a year in half-cent transit tax revenue to secure them?
Or do we need new goals and a new plan?
June 15th, 2007 at 1:10 pm
Trying to build three square blocks of New York or Frisco Uptown to attract Creative Class Guppies.
June 15th, 2007 at 1:27 pm
You need to spend about an hour with Tara Servatius just exploring that article.
June 15th, 2007 at 1:45 pm
Jeff, as Don Reid is quoted in that magazine article, I will leave it to him to decide who he wants to send it to.
If we want to blow the real whistle, CATS Chief Ron Tober, let CATS out of the bag of tricks in the June 5, 2006 Charlotte Business Journal, when Tober said, ” …public and civic leaders are clamoring for more rail as a way to promote sustainable development”. We will never hear this term from McCrory, planners, or the Observer, as Smart Growth is the term used to disguise that Sustainable Development is a UN treaty!
June 15th, 2007 at 11:00 pm
Once again Jeff Taylor and this blog are incredibly ignorant to the future of this city. You guy’s have Don Reid and Patrick “race baiting” Cannon on your side. Congrats. Please consider moving to a city like Atlanta where they waited too long for transit and enjoy their many congested roads.
June 16th, 2007 at 2:13 am
I came to this site to acquire a divergent standpoint of the Light Rail. My aspiration was to assemble information so I might enhance my perceptive of why someone would want to foil the evolution of the city they live in.
Subsequent to reviewing your post, I must say, I understand the dissatisfaction of paying such a high cost for something that sounds like you will not use; I feel your dispute was pathetic, biased-propaganda. The city of Charlotte is trying to keep one step ahead and has shown enough reason with, help reducing traffic, establishing economic and social growth.
Furthermore, you make the point that government officials have stated differently (many times) of the intention of the Light Rail. Whether is for congested traffic, pollution, and yes, even place making; the Light Rail can help with every one of those issues, if not more. Until, I hear a stronger reason not to go with the enhancement of Charlotte, I choose growth.
June 16th, 2007 at 4:43 am
RP — Atlanta started plans for light rail in 60s, started building it in the 70s. After an audit of MARTA in 2005, among other things, Atlanta shifted focus to smart road building and is actually trying to beat back congestion, unlike Charlotte. Expect Charlotte’s robust trucking-warehousing-logistics biz to end up there sooner or later, given current paths.
More here:
http://charlotte.creativeloafing.com/gyrobase/Content?oid=oid%3A148154
http://charlotte.creativeloafing.com/gyrobase/Content?oid=oid%3A79680
And ‘rist — Just what are you willing to pay for this “enhancement of Charlotte?” Anything? Something? Might someone disagree with your perception of the value of that enhancement without being guilty of trying to “foil the evolution” of the city? Oh, and if this evolutionary process is so organic, why does the city have so many people working so hard to make sure it happens?
More importantly you miss a vital point, I don’t want to slow Charlotte down, I WANT TO SPEED IT UP.
I want to completely leap over the evolutionary stage of cities where we spend billions and billions and billions of dollars on a huge public sector project that does little to enhance our quality of life while enhancing (!) the power of public sector officials and bureaucracies.
Look to telecom for a metaphor — Let’s forget about stringing copper everywhere. Let’s go straight for fiber optic with an eye on wireless.
Light rail is NOT the future. It is the past. Like copper.
June 16th, 2007 at 7:39 am
To: Centrist and Republican Poster… Thanks for posting your views. It is fun to watch Jeff cut up your argument/posts as if they were biology class frogs To RP- What do you have against Don Reid, and why do you call Patrick Cannon a race baiter.
Would you both please post with your full names? Why do you both hide behind silly CB radio type handles. Posting with out your name is gutless and cowardly. This is not the men’s room wall at Big Al’s in Cornelius, where unsigned posts are often found.
June 16th, 2007 at 9:41 am
Actually Marta did not finish it’s first line until 1979 and by then it was too late because congestion had already taken over. In the surrounding counties they refused to join Marta and it is not a truly great transit system. Kind of sounds like the cheap people i’m talking to. I looked at your biased creative lofting articles(kind of like a democrat sending me moveon.org articles) and i’m sorry but a bunch of 23 lane roads like Atlanta has aint the answer. Can we even fit that many lanes on I77? No, inless you want to build right into downtown. That’s probably good for some of you because you can have more grand roads and congestion and wipe out downtown at the same time!
June 16th, 2007 at 11:04 am
RP — Finishing a line in 1979 = starting building it in the 70s.
Give me an example of what it is you think light rail will do and a city in which it does it.
In meantime, I confess you have discovered my secret plan, 23-lane roads and the destruction of Uptown.
/twirls stache and cackles
June 16th, 2007 at 11:13 am
Jeff, actually that was MY plan. MUHAHAHAHA
June 16th, 2007 at 12:32 pm
RP- I’ll ask again post with your name. Your spelling and grammer leave a bit to be desired, but that’s OK, we can decode your dribble You call all of us cheap, with no facts to back up your slur. When you say creative lofting, do you mean the newspaper called Creative Loafing? Is “inless” RPspeak for “unless”? RP I hate to break it to you, but there is an moron posting under you “handle”
June 16th, 2007 at 10:54 pm
Man Rick, ya got me. I spelled a word wrong. Call the papers. You guys have NO PLAN for traffic problems except more roads. Where are those roads gonna go? I wonder how you would feel if this tax gets beat in November and roads start going through your neighborhood. I can’t wait until I-77 is 23 lanes! Have some vision and try having your own ideas instead of being Jeff Taylors biggest fan “It is fun to watch Jeff cut up your argument/posts as if they were biology class frogs” You sound like suck up hack. And no, I will not give my full name because this is the same site full of people that likes to look up peoples records and financial information which is more than lame.
June 17th, 2007 at 6:27 am
Who on this site looks up records? What is wrong with making I77 8 lanes from Statesville to Rock Hill. And not HOV lanes either. There is a UNCC transportation professor (can’t remember his name, but he was on Tara S’s show on BT on Friday morning.) who points out the folly of doing nothing about roads, while spending billions on trains.
You have yet to explain what is wrong with Don Reid and why Patrick Cannon is a race baiter. I think it lame to hide behind a handle, when you insult others by name.
June 17th, 2007 at 9:11 am
RP, in my first post, the real truth is revealed by Ron Tober, and the petitioners have the advantage of three well- known transportation experts with peer-reviewed research, backing the petitioners.
Wendell Cox, Ted Balaker, and David Hartgen from UNCC. If you were not blinded by McCrory & Co’s
“visions” of utopia, you would check out what the experts versus central planners, have to say!
RP, by not revealing your identity, we must assume you a part of the government’s ‘Grassroots effort to stop the will of the people from being heard! Actually, the fear and smear campaign began weeks ago, as the fear grew in the McCrory camp that ballot access was real possibility. Now, that a referendum is a sure thing, you stoop to a low level of propaganda to attempt in this forum to promote “visions” that trump reality!!!!! How’s it working for you, RP?
June 17th, 2007 at 7:45 pm
I’m gonna miss old RP. I guess he is back in his cubacle in the government center, pondering how much he should pony up to the “help save the transit tax campaign”,
Last ? to RP. When you read the Declaration of Independance, do you notice how no one chose to hide behind a handle, and they all risked everything to sign their names to the Dec. of I. Grow some stones, you gutless coward. No one that posts here could care less about your record and finances.
You insulted Don Reid and Patrick Cannon, please back it up.
June 18th, 2007 at 9:47 am
I won’t miss RP, as he promotes the propaganda we get from the Observer, and a waste of our time to dispute propaganda in this forum!
RP has no facts or he would present them!
As for the local govco grassroots–Court disaster long enough, and it will accept your proposal. Quote from the Charlotte Observer!
June 18th, 2007 at 11:03 am
[...] Update: Wound up joining Tara Servatius at 11 am by phone too! Wacky day. If you are looking for the Governing mag article we talked about, go here. [...]
June 20th, 2007 at 9:06 pm
To Rick Barton…first of all your an Idiot. The people that looked up records are on this website. On one of the last light rail “articles” on this site they started doing that with Pat Mumford and Pat McCrory. You guys claim that the “uptown crowd” is so awful and that you dont care about them but you look at their personal records. Cool. Like you, these people have too much time on their hands. Second, the fact that your trying to compare this to the revolutionary period is again, lame. Third, your right I do insult race baiting Cannon. I guess you refused to read the actual letter to the editor in the observer. He had to bring race into the issue to make his point. He was the guy who wanted light rail ALL OVER Charlotte, even where it wont work. The blind hatred you have towards anything light rail results in you clinging to a true blue liberal. I’m glad you research these issues… Like Cannon, Reid cant win an election on a large scale because he only repersents the fringe of the Republican party. If he’s so credible then why has he not run for Mayor…well, because he cant win by only getting the far right to support him. I’m glad to call myself an anti-illegal immigrant, prolife, and an overall conservative Republican but it’s you people that are just as bad as the lame brains on the far left. Just like the far left you must not conform!
Sweet life guys, sweet life.
August 8th, 2007 at 5:38 am
[...] The mayor reveals too much. First, that when push comes to solve, CATS’ light rail spending will always crowd out spending on buses. That is because — as we learned from city officials in June — our transit plan is not really about moving people around, it is about “place making.” [...]
August 9th, 2007 at 5:30 am
[...] There is certainly nothing efficient about spending billions of dollars on a transit plan that does nothing about traffic congestion — indeed does not intend to do anything about traffic congestion. Recall that building trains is a “means to an end.” The end? “Place making.” [...]