Is Transit Really Green?

The conventional wisdom is that projects like the RailRunner and Mayor Marty’s proposed trolley are inherently “green” because they get people out of their cars. While this is usually the case if a bus or train is full and automobiles contain only one passenger, this is not how the equation usually works.
In fact, Brad Templeton [...]

Questioning Mayor Marty’s Trolley

Although taxpayer activists managed to beat back previous efforts by the Mayor and many on City Council to put a $28 million a mile streetcar down Central, bad ideas never die. The Albuquerque streetcar is one that has recently resurfaced via a consultants report outlining how the project should, in their minds, move forward. View [...]

I can’t drive 55

Bad ideas never die. While Albuquerque Mayor Martin Chavez’s streetcar is one well-known local example, high gas prices have given Virginia Senator John Warner an excuse to propose a plan to return America’s speed limit to 55 mph.
With every supposed crisis (high oil and gas prices being only the most recent) some propose [...]

Earmark for the Rail Runner?

It never ceases to amaze me that David Roybal was a speech writer for Governor Richardson. His columns are often incoherent and never really seem to make a policy point one way or the other. Perhaps that is a strength when it comes to writing politicians’ speeches? If you never make a clear point, you [...]

New Mexico’s Transportation Future

All of the controversy over the Rail Runner and its negative impact on our transportation budget is just a sideshow to the very real problems and opportunities facing us when it comes to transportation. You read that right…as one of the leading critics of the Rail Runner, I’m telling you that it is not at [...]

Raise Gas Tax by 40 cents a Gallon?

According to a new report from a panel that included some of the nation’s leading transportation policy experts, we are not paying nearly enough in gas taxes and the tax should be increased by 40 cents a gallon.
Most New Mexicans will dismiss such findings out of hand and justifiably so. But the fact is that [...]

Richardson Flip-Flops on Rail Runner Taxes

It was inevitable. While campaigning for President, Richardson stated that tax hikes to pay for the Rail Runner were “off the table.” Now, that he is out of the race, he has put them back on the table. Given the fact that voters in the southern part of the state have been asked to pay [...]

RailRunner vs. Utah Rail: Does Lawrence Rael’s Comparison Matter?

Lawrence Rael, Executive Director of the Mid Region Council of Governments, argued today in the Albuquerque Journal that New Mexico’s Rail Runner is a great deal compared to the Utah Transit Authority’s Commuter Rail project because we are getting more train for less money.
Rael looks at the cost increases that have happened in Utah and [...]

Where are the bus riders on Coors?

I live off Coors just south of Montano. While I don’t oppose buses and often notice full buses — both Rapid Ride and regular — on Central when I’m over there. Unfortunately, the new Rapid Ride buses which form the so-called Blue Line along Coors are constantly empty or they have one or maybe two [...]

Toll Roads in New Mexico

New Mexico is facing a well-documented transportation crisis. Everything from raising taxes to shifting existing revenues around has been discussed as a means of bridging the gap.
While stopping the Rail Runner must be seen as a bare minimum in the effort to resolve this crisis and shifting transportation revenues back to transportation must also [...]

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