Fix My Station... Revisited

Three years ago, the Commuter Council launched the “Fix My Station” campaign, calling on Governor Rell to fix the crumbling, dilapidated and often-times dangerous conditions at CDOT-owned rail stations from New Haven to Greenwich.

Commuters sent in dozens of photos of their stations showing exposed wires, mold and graffiti which we posted on our website. Months later, CDOT finished a careful station by station engineering analysis recommending not just repairs but improvements. Special funds were allocated by the legislature for the needed work. Then… nothing happened.

Once again, we’d identified a problem, studied it and issued reports… and assumed the job was done. Few, if any, repairs were ever made to stations. If we were to revisit the same stations today we’d find things little improved.

But then, along came the Federal government this year with its “stimulus money” to create jobs with “shovel ready” public works projects.

Regional planners moaned, caught in a classic “Catch 22”. Because they had not been allowed for decades to plan for work that wasn’t already funded, there was little work that was truly “shovel ready”… except, in Connecticut’s case, at the train stations.

Here’s what happened at one station… Noroton Heights in Darien… but is doubtless being replicated across the country with similar public works projects.

One of the problems indentified at Noroton Hts as far back as 2004 was two sets of crumbling concrete steps leading from the west end of each platform up to Hollow Tree Ridge Road. Each set of stairs contains 28 steps.

Town officials initially estimated the repair work would cost $225,000, and the repairs were ordered, pending accumulation of enough money from parking revenues from commuters to pay for them.

Then the CDOT got involved. Because the steps were close to the track and overhead catenary power lines, CDOT said that Metro-North “flag men” would be required to oversee the repair work. That would add $80,000 to the job.

Because of the delays and since building supplies were then in such demand, prices escalated and the final bid for the work topped $400,000.

Then, along came Uncle Sam. When the feds dumped billions onto the states, somehow Hartford decided that $1.6 million should be spent at the Noroton Heights rail station. This would mean that in addition to fixing the steps, platform canopies could be extended and the platforms themselves could be resurfaced… projects long dreamt of but never put to paper by planners.

But be careful what you wish for.

Because Federal funds were now involved, CDOT had to revisit the stair rebuilding to be sure the work met Washington’s standards, not just Darien’s or the state’s.
Now, $30,000 will go to CDOT just to administer the project. But because CDOT is now under-staffed thanks to recent layoffs and early retirements, they can’t administer the job. The work is delayed again and the stairs probably won’t be repaired until 2010, six years after they were first identified as needing the work.

Had the Federal stimulus money gone directly to the towns, work would probably be underway by now. Heck… with a crew of Boy Scouts, a few sledge hammers and some local contractors, the steps could have been fixed in one week summers ago!
Instead, the steps are still crumbling. Federal funds are not being spent. Jobs have not been created. And another summer construction season will probably be wasted.

The “Fix My Station” campaign seemed like such a great idea three years ago, but those were simpler times and I was probably naïve to think anything so important could ever be done so quickly and easily. After all, this is Connecticut.

Getting To The Airport

They used to say that “getting there is half the fun”. Whoever “they” were, they haven’t endured the challenges and indignities of air travel post-9/11.
Even getting to the airport can sap your strength, if not your wallet. Consider the alternatives.

A car service is certainly convenient. But at $160 one way to LaGuardia’ $170 to JFK and $200+ to Newark, getting to the airport can cost more than your air fare. (Mind you, these are the advertised rates, so I wouldn’t be shy about asking for promotions and discounts when you call to book.)

But car services aren’t just expensive, they’re also wasteful. Couldn’t solo travelers share a car with others in a “limo-pool”? Is one passenger in a Lincoln Town Car an efficient use of limited space on I-95?

How about Connecticut Limousine? Now there’s a misnomer! Since when is a bus or cramped van a limo? And try explaining that name on the receipt on your expenses to your company’s accountant. “Really boss… it was just a bus!”

On a few occasions I’ve actually rented a car at the airport, driven home and then dropped the car the next day in Stamford. A day’s car rental is about half the cost of a car service. OK… so call me cheap.

Some regular fliers hire neighborhood teens to drive their own car to the airport, drop them off and drive home, repeating the process on their return. That’s cheaper than a car service, but puts double the miles on your car.

My preferred airport transfer is in my own car. Airport parking is $33 a day. Not cheap, but certainly convenient. And nobody complains about my cigar smoking enroute to the airport.

Another alternative, believe it or not, is Metro-North. Get off at 125th Street and catch a cab or livery and you’re at LaGuardia in about 15 minutes. Future plans call for some Metro-North trains to travel over the Hell’s Gate bridge, through Queens and into Penn Station. That could be a great chance to add a LaGuardia station with shuttle bus service to the terminals. But it’s a rail link our kids might see in their lifetimes, not ours.

If you’re heading to Newark, definitely consider Amtrak. Most Northeast corridor trains stop at Newark Airport where a convenient connection to the airport monorail has you at the terminals in just minutes. The train sure beats the Cross-Bronx and GWB any day. And fares are as low as $23 one way.

The proponents of ferry service on Long Island sound keep tempting us with talk about direct water-borne service to LaGuardia, but I’ll believe it when I see it. The old Pan Am Water Shuttle (a high speed ferry) couldn’t make a go of it carrying expense-account business fliers from the Marine Air Terminal to midtown, so I’m skeptical that operators could fill ferry boats to Stamford and Norwalk. And do you really want a sea cruise in the winter?

Mind you, New York’s three airports aren’t the only choices. Westchester County airport offers non-stop jet service to many cities and offers a variety of major carriers including JetBlue. Bridgeport’s Sikorsky airport used to get you to such cities as Philadelphia and Newark, but service now is very limited and expansion of both of these airports is challenged by local residents. Hartford’s Bradley Airport offers another alternative, including low fare carriers like Southwest… if you don’t mind a two-hour drive to get to the airport, north of Hartford.

One reader extols the virtues of New Haven’s Tweed Airport where US Air flies to Philly where you can connect to most anywhere.

Clearly, the trip to and from the airport can start and end a trip on a very sour, and expensive, note. But with a little imagination, this summer’s vacation can end on a thriftier note.

The Fare Hike Is Unfair

Once again, politicians who pay lip-service to improving transportation are trying to put your money where their mouths are: Governor Rell is proposing a 10% fare increase for Metro-North and a 40% fare hike for bus riders.

Her arguments for raising fares are specious:

1) New York Raised Its Fares, So We Should Also: NY State is raising its fares to pay debt service on $12 billion in bonds raised to invest in subways and trains. It had threatened 23% fare hikes and draconian service cuts (even in Connecticut), so the compromise 10% fare hike (June 17th) seems like a bargain. The MTA dug itself into a financial hole and wants riders to dig it back out. And Connecticut should mirror such bad public policy?

2) The Special Transportation Fund Is Running Out Of Money: True, but this is because lawmakers stupidly lowered gasoline taxes a decade ago. Those fuel taxes help subsidize rail fares and I predicted then that their loss would lead to higher fares. The way to replenish the Fund is to raise gas taxes. For just a one cent per gallon tax increase the state would gain enough revenue to halt the planned bus fare hike.

Sorry, Governor. Your rationale for taxing commuters just doesn’t make sense. Consider the consequences of these proposed fare hikes:

1) Increased Road Traffic: Higher fares just encourage people to get back in their cars and drive on already congested highways. Isn’t this what we were trying to prevent?

2) Exploiting The Poor: The folks who take the bus don’t have cars. They have no other option than to travel by bus to school, to jobs and shopping. For them, a 40% fare increase means less money for food and medicine.

3) Discouraging Business: What employer will want to open a new business in a state where potential employees can’t afford to get to their jobs? A fare hike on trains and buses is anti-business and anti-growth.

4) Reduced Ridership / Even Higher Fares: Making the trains and buses more expensive will discourage ridership just as the new M8 cars start to arrive. Fixed operating costs won’t change, but reduced income from reduced ridership will just lead to calls for more fare hikes, a never-ending downward spiral.

5) Fare Increases Are Already Planned 2010 – 2016: Rail commuters already know they’ll be paying a 1.25% fare hike January 1st in 2010… and additional 1% fare hikes each New Years Day until 2016. This money is to help pay for the new M8 cars which are already behind schedule due to design problems and testing issues.

Hopefully, Governor Rell is just bluffing. Maybe she’s using the fare hike threat to jolt the legislature into action. But what politician would be so foolhardy as to support these fare increases, then look voters in the eye and ask for re-election?
While the downstate delegation may “get it” when it comes to supporting mass transit, the pols upstate clearly don’t have a clue.

Remember, it was just two years ago that Senate President Don Williams from “the quiet corner” of rural Connecticut was proposing free fares for senior citizens on all trains and buses. What a concept: a free ride on Metro-North for seniors while working stiffs pay $300 a month. Fortunately, that idea went nowhere.

So keep an eye on the legislature in the coming weeks. The process of creating a balanced budget won’t be easy or pretty to watch.

But if you want a say in stopping a hike on bus or train fares, contact your state lawmakers now. Only if bus and rail riders speak up can the Governor’s plan be defeated.

Unfinish Work at CDOT

Here’s a quick update on some issues I’ve written about recently, but first some breaking news!

FARE INCREASE: In desperation to find a way to balance our state’s budget, Governor Rell is playing her “trump card”, calling for a 10% fare hike on Metro-North. Her reasoning? “New York raised their fares, so should we”.

But remember… the NY fare hike came because of MTA’s budget crisis. Having spent billions for decades on rail improvements, they couldn’t get up-staters to pay the bills, so they threatened service cuts and 30% fare hikes. Bottom line: a 10% fare boost in NY looks cheap.

That is not our situation in Connecticut, where there wasn’t spending as train service deteriorated, ridership rose and fares remained steady. Yes, the long promised new M8 cars are coming, but will be paid for (in part) by long-planned annual fare hikes that begin January 1, 2010 and continue to rise 1% per year for the seven years.

Governor Rell’s call for a 10% fare hike now is a break of her promise of “no new taxes”. A fare hike now is a tax on commuters and another disincentive to live or work in Connecticut.

If the legislature approves the fare increase there will be public hearings, but they’ll be a meaningless, moot exercise. If you oppose a fare hike, call your state lawmakers now!

PARKING TASK FORCE: In January Governor Rell trumpeted a fresh new look at the issue of rail station parking, calling on CDOT to create a Parking Task Force (on which I was invited to serve). Five months later, CDOT’s Task Force has yet to meet, not even once. Blame it on foot-dragging by the regional planning agencies or lack of focus by CDOT, but nothing has been done to add parking at the stations even as the new M8 cars are scheduled to arrive, increasing capacity on our trains.

THE BRAIN DRAIN: In a call to save money, the state recently offered senior staffers at agencies like CDOT a sweet retirement deal. And many took it. So this week a former Deputy Commissioner and the Rail Bureau Chief have left the agency, taking nice pensions and a combined 50 years experience with them. (At least one is going to a consulting job where he’ll work on CDOT projects at better pay). A state hiring freeze means these men can’t be replaced. That means more work at CDOT for fewer, less experienced staffers.


RIDERSHIP IS DOWN: You can finally get a seat at rush hour on Metro-North, as the railroad has seen ridership plummet 4% month over month thanks to the economic carnage and resulting jobs losses in NYC. Fewer riders means more pressure for fare increases.


WATERBURY WOES: However nasty your commute may seem, some have it worse… the riders of the Waterbury branch. At a recent CT Rail Commuter Council meeting in Naugatuck a mob of 50 angry passengers gave CDOT and Metro-North representatives an earful.

They have no stations, just bus shelters. Despite a 34% increase in ridership last year, they have only half as many trains as the Danbury branch. Cars are often filthy… in one case spewed with vomit that wasn’t cleaned up from the night before.
Automobiles parked in Waterbury are frequent targets of vandalism with local cops and the MTA Police blaming each other for lack of enforcement.

Adding insult to injury, all rail service is being halted for a month this summer to rebuild the tracks and ties (and an aging bridge) on the entire branch. That will mean busing… always a treat.

Gridlock in Hartford

I’ve written many times before of failed efforts to fix our transportation mess… how the only money being spent is not on solutions but on endless studies and consultant reports whose recommendations go unheeded.

Now we’re about to see another example as the Transportation Strategy Board is expected to do nothing with suggestions for electronic-tolling of our congested roads to mitigate congestion and raise badly need funds.

After commissioning a $1 million, 500-page study of the issue, the TSB is expected to say that the idea of “value pricing” our interstates needs, you guessed it, yet more study!

I could tell the fix was in when, even before the consultants delivered their million dollar baby, Governor Rell said she was against tolling.

And don’t expect any leadership on this issue from lawmakers, unable to write a budget let alone show the courage to face a controversial issue like tolls.

As one transportation expert says, the eight year old Transportation Strategy Board has turned into a “debating club”, endlessly talking but doing nothing. Their meetings get little attention and most members attend only sporadically. How would you like try making an 8 am weekday meeting in Hartford, so scheduled that even CT-N can’t cover it.

With a decimated corps of Capitol newspaper reporters, who’s to cover such important discussions? And local media coverage to date has been either shallow or factually inaccurate.

The idea of bringing back tolls has been discussed for almost a decade. Yet every newspaper report about their elimination in 1983 always mentions the firey truck crash at the Stratford toll barrier that killed seven, as if toll barriers are just waiting to get hit.

Current tolling technology eliminates toll booths and their delays, but the mis-reporting continues. So much for what passes for journalism these days. Stories about “killer chimps” make the front page for days on end, while the real news goes unreported.

When the TSB received its $1 million consultant report, outlining nine different tolling options, the board scheduled public hearings across the state… except in Fairfield County. Little was done to explain what the consultants suggested, despite pleas for informational meetings.

So when 50 concerned citizens turned out last week in Norwalk for a last-minute public hearing, their opinions were mostly based on inaccurate media coverage. Few had read or even knew about the 500-page report, summarized at the hearing in a one-page handout.

It’s almost as if the TSB wanted the plan to die.

I’m all for a good debate, but if you don’t educate the public, should their opinions be taken seriously?

One after another, people called tolls a hidden “tax”. They were so cynical that they didn’t believe tolls would do anything to improve traffic (they would). Some called for higher tolls on out-of-staters (illegal). Two who spoke noted the connection between traffic and affordable housing. And one suggested investing in more cars for Metro-North, paid for by employers, their exteriors wrapped in ads for the companies.

Resulting media coverage ignored those, like me, who spoke in favor of tolling. The headlines screamed “Commuters Speak Out Against Tolls” when they should have read “TSB Gets Uninformed Opinions on Unexplained Million Dollar Study”, but I guess that wouldn’t sell newspapers like stories of killer chimps.

Our state is in gridlock, not just on our roads but in our government. Nobody has the vision or the courage to do anything to change our situation, preferring to hide behind endless studies and consultant reports which then get ignored.

Debating the problem for a decade has done nothing. And there’s no sign that the TSB, the Governor or legislature will ever do anything about transportation except what they’re done so far… talk.

Views From The Train: "The Empire Builder"

This week, less “talking” and more observing as I share some “views from the train” on my recent ride from Seattle to Milwaukee on Amtrak’s “Empire Builder”.

Sure, it’s two days and nights, but I’m booked in a deluxe bedroom and am anxious to see the upper-tier of states that, to me, have always just been “fly over country”.

Puget Sound: Minutes after leaving Seattle, we run right alongside the beach. I see families walking their dogs, fishing boats brimming with their catch.

Into the Cascade Mountains and Stevens Pass, 4000 feet up, through the longest (7.9 miles) rail tunnel in the US. Still plenty of snow up here, but nothing like what’s to come.

Leavenworth Washington: 15% of the nation’s apples are grown in this one valley and in late April it is awash in blossoms. As far as the eye can see, neat rows of apple trees are festooned with delicate white flowers in the fading sunlight. Oh to be a honey bee!

Two Tylenol PM’s help me sleep. My bedroom is comfy but not for the claustrophobic. The only time I awake is when we’re not moving, stopped in Spokane where the other half of our train, originating from Portland OR, joins us.

The next morning we awake to four feet of snow in Whitefish Montana. After breakfast in the diner, it’s time to explore our eight car train. The sleepless from Seattle are still sprawled across coach seats. As we travel thru spectacular snow-capped peaks, one passenger sits watching a movie on his laptop, oblivious to the scenery.

A retired railroad guy regales me with stories of his days running steam locomotives, while a couple from Fargo ND tries to persuade me that they don’t really have accents like in that movie. Oh yah, eh?

No signal on my Blackberry, but a local paper is brought on board: “The Daily Inter Lake – Serving The Flathead Since 1869”. On the front page, news of yesterday’s amazing spring snowfall is still all too present out the window. On page two, a reminder that Friday is the deadline to apply for hunting permits to take moose and mountain goats.

I venture downstairs for a hot shower as we careen along welded track at 65 miles an hour. Try that on JetBlue!

My radio scanner crackles with automated “hot box” detectors reading off the number of axles scanned followed by a reassuring “no defects” and “temperature 25 degrees”.

Cutbank Montana: population 3171, 25 miles from Canada and a million miles from anywhere. This is why they call it “Big Sky Country”. We’ve gone from the Rockies to the prairies, the snow covered fields merging with the white clouds on the distant horizon. There’s no “here” here.

This is Indian territory, and what’s left of the reservations look like Appalachia without the pretty mountains. Trailers, abandoned trucks, trash strewn about and miles of nothingness. Hardly majestic. Mostly depressing.

In coach there are many Indians, moving across their country. This train isn’t just a land cruise for retirees but a vital transportation link for dozens of small towns long abandoned by even Greyhound.

Montana merges into North Dakota and we look forward to a servicing stop in the “big city” of Minot, population 37,745. While walking the length of the train I discover we’ve been hauling a private rail car, complete with observation platform. Crowds of curious passengers and towns-folk (not to mention a few “foamers”) snap pictures, but the sole inhabitant of the Soo Line business car doesn’t invite us in.

In the diner, a retired Schlitz worker heading to a reunion in Milwaukee (made famous by his suds!) complains he can’t get a beer with dinner. An ex-Canadian Navy guy regales me with stories of his last long-distance train ride… in 1955, on the way to basic training. Chris, our sleeping car attendant, chats with his 20-something buddies by cell phone planning his summer music festival itinerary. One perk of his job… free Amtrak travel.

A restless night and a long detour around still-flooded Fargo ND, we awake in St Paul MN. From here we follow the Mississippi, La Crosse and Wisconsin rivers to Milwaukee where I get off to catch a flight home.

This isn’t Amtrak’s most scenic trans-continental run, but it’s one of the most vital… connecting people to their work, their relatives and the rest of their country. I have a better understanding of the nation’s heartland thanks to this run.

But I’m also glad to get home.

NOTE: For a multimedia view of why folks loving riding the rails, see this link from The New York Times.

It's All About Affordable Housing

Whether by car, by train or on a bike, the reason we must commute is that, most often, we don’t live where we work. So any discussion of our transportation problems must include an understanding of our housing crisis in this area.

A recent report showed that housing in lower Fairfield County is the most expensive in the nation. You need an income of $70,000 just to afford a two bedroom apartment in the Stamford – Norwalk corridor.

So, people who come to work here can only afford to live further afield. Their daily drives / rides contribute to our congestion. The solution? More affordable housing!

A recent conference sponsored by SWRPA held some startling examples in that poster-boy of affluence, Greenwich. This 67 square mile city of 61,000 has 5545 town employees… teachers, cops, firefighters and the like. However, 67% of those workers don’t live in Greenwich, but commute daily from Danbury, Bridgeport, Westchester and even Long Island.

They spend an average of 103 minutes per day just getting to and from work, paying more than $2000 a year for gas. Combined, they add 15,000 tons of carbon dioxide to the atmosphere, just by their commuting.

In a city where the median home price is $2 million, the average Greenwich city worker makes $65,000. And because these teachers, civil servants and such have to come so far, they have to be paid more. The average teacher in Greenwich earns $12,338 a year more than their counterparts elsewhere in the state. These higher wages cost city taxpayers almost $19 million a year. But their larger paychecks come at the cost of lost time and expense on the road.

The Greenwich schools spend $10,000 to $15,000 recruiting and training each new teacher. But after five years of commuting (75% of the 912 teachers don’t live in Greenwich), they burn out, leave and find jobs elsewhere. Between 1998 and 2007, 581 teachers left Greenwich for reasons other than retirement and 81% of them had less than eight years on the job.

EMS workers in Greenwich have it even worse, averaging 151 minutes (2 ½ hours!) commute time. Just how fresh and ready for life-saving work do you think you’d be with a commute like that?

Greenwich is not unique. All of the towns on “the Gold Coast” rely on importing personnel from far afield. Schools in Darien often announce “snow days” not because its roads are impassable, but because teachers can’t drive through the snows farther north from communities like Danbury where can afford to live.

And what about the people that bag your groceries, clean your home or pump your gas? Where do you think they live? Just drive the Boston Post Road some morning and you’ll see them waiting for the bus.

Fairfield County has its own “migrant workers”. We couldn’t live with out them, but apparently we don’t want to live with them. Just listen to the local debates about adding “affordable housing” in these affluent towns. Whether because of their nationality or economic status, the expressed aversion to “those people” living in “our” towns is clearly xenophobic if not racist.

So how do we solve our transportation problems? Well, one solution is clearly related to affordable housing. Allow folks to live closer to their jobs and they won’t have to be in that car in front of you on I-95 or the Merritt at rush hour.

Free Parking Isn't Free

Our obsession with automobiles is not only creating gridlock and ruining the quality of our air, but it’s eating up our real estate and sending land costs upward. Because, once we drive our cars off the crowded highways, we assume it’s our constitutional right to find “free parking”.

Trust me: whether at rail stations or stores, parking comes at a price paid in more than just dollars.

For decades, city planners and zoning regulations have shared with Detroit in a conspiracy to deliver on that dream. Consider the following:

According to the industry standard-setting Institute of Transportation Engineers, there are 266 kinds of businesses which should be zoned to require a minimum amount of parking. Quoting from the ITE “bible”, religious convents must have one parking space for every ten nuns in residence. Hello? The residents aren’t going anywhere! Why do they need parking? Couldn’t the convents find better use for their land?

Or consider hotels. Why are parking regulations based on requiring enough parking for the few nights each year when the hotel is sold out, rather that the majority of nights when occupancy is much less? Would we require a movie theater to require parking for an every-seat-filled blockbuster when its more typical offerings fill far fewer seats?

Just drive up the Boston Post Rd and see for yourself. Due to zoning regulations, many shopping malls devote 60% of their land to parking and only 40% to buildings. Imagine what that does to the costs of what they sell.

Desperate to attract folks back to their decaying downtowns, some cities are putting more land into parking than to all other land uses combined. A Buffalo NY City Council member commented a few years ago: “There will be lots of places to park. There just won’t be a whole lot to do there.”

Last week I drove through downtown New Britain observing empty stores and sidewalks next to a gigantic ten storey parking lot. They “built it”, but nobody came.

In fact, the cities that have done the best jobs of economic revitalization aren’t the ones that provided the most parking… they’re the ones that provided the least. The vitality of towns and cities requires people… walking the streets, going into shops and interacting… not scurrying from car to shop to car to home.

In his recent book “The High Cost of Free Parking”, UCLA’s Donald Shoup recounts the following tale of two cities:

Both San Francisco and Los Angeles opened new concert halls a few years back. The one in LA included a $10 million, six story parking garage for 2,100 cars. In San Francisco there was no parking built… saving the developers millions. After each concert, the LA crowd heads for their cars and drives away. But in San Francisco, patrons leave the hall, walk the streets and spend money in local restaurants, bars and bookstores. Guess which city has benefited most from its new arts center?

Why are Connecticut’s towns slaves to antiquated zoning mentalities that assume all humans come with four tires rather than two legs? Why do we waste precious land on often-empty parking spots instead of badly needed affordable housing?

Clearly, our transportation planners need to work much more closely with economic developers and sociologists to rethink what it is that we really need in our cities and towns.

We have become mindless slaves to car-obsessed planners for whom no vista is better than miles of open asphalt, be it highways or parking spaces.

"The Train Nuts"

Folks in the railroad industry refer to rail fans as “foamers”, because they supposedly foam at the mouth when they see any kind of train. When they move in groups, radio scanners on their belt and cameras at the ready, they seem to be harmless practitioners of an eccentric hobby.

Now, I’ll be the first to admit I love trains. But I don’t “spot” them, recording car numbers in a small book. I read rail magazines, but I don’t know the number of axles on an FL9 locomotive or the running time of The Broadway Limited in 1942.

For me, trains are a means to an end… a transportation option, not a hobby.

Not all “rail fans” are transit advocates… a point I learned last weekend when I was asked to speak to the regional meeting of NARP, the National Association of Rail Passengers, about the work of the CT Rail Commuter Council.

NARP is a great organization and I’ve been a member for many years. Their President, Ross Capon, works tirelessly in Washington to promote rail alternatives to roads. But if this meeting was any indication, their 23,000 members don’t all live up to the group’s name.

Picture this hotel ballroom in New London, filled with balding white guys (like me). But there’s nobody of color (aside from the waiters) and the only women are dutiful wives along to support their husbands’ hobby, knitting all through the meeting. And this audience is supposed to represent rail passengers?

Where were the students, the business men, the handicapped… the folks who really take trains?

Capon gave a great speech about the many changes in Washington breathing new life into rail: increased funding for Amtrak, new initiatives to force freight rail lines to expedite passenger trains, even discussions about ten new high-speed rail corridors across the country.

Another NARP officer spoke of the crazy plans by NJ Transit to build new tunnels under the Hudson River which would dead-end at a new underground station for Garden State commuters instead of continuing on to Grand Central.

But when I spoke about Connecticut’s sorry history with commuter rail, the audience just didn’t get it.

Sure, they seemed to appreciate the slide show of the horrors of our aging fleet, broken down stations and over-crowded trains. They listened politely when I told of building grassroots and political support for improved service. And they clearly understood how important the new M8 cars will be. But during the Q&A it was clear I was dealing with a group of foamers, not passenger rail advocates.

“Why not build high-speed rail through Worcester Mass.?” I was asked. “Why should we when Acela already runs to Boston,” I replied.

“Did you know that the New Haven used to run from Waterbury to Boston,” asked another guy, handing me a photocopy of an old timetable. Nice historical touch, I thought, but why does that matter now that half the tracks are gone?

“Why not run double-deck cars from New Haven to Boston,” a third guy asked. “Why not add capacity where we really need it,” I impatiently replied. Foamers!

If NARP is to truly represent rail passengers it must get beyond these rail fans’ fantasies and nostalgia for a bygone era. We’ll never have parlor cars from New Canaan again nor ride the “Twentieth Century Limited”. But we can improve Amtrak and expand Shore Line East to Providence. We can refurbish our aging fleet of cars and keep fares affordable. We can add commuter rail to Hartford and beyond.

Rail advocates must be taken seriously, not seen as eccentric hobbyists. And NARP should do more to really represent all rail passengers, not just “foamers”.

Sound Barriers: A Waste of Money?

One and a half million dollars a mile. The cost of building a new lane on I-95? Hardly! That’s more like $20 million. No, “$1.5 million dollars a mile” would be the cost of building new sound barriers on that crowded highway, according to recent testimony by CDOT Commissioner Joseph Marie.

This won’t win me many friends among my neighbors in Darien, but I just don’t see that they should be asking the government to subsidize their peace and quiet. After all, most of them bought houses near the highway benefiting from speedy access to the roadway and should have known full-well that being that close would subject them to noise.

Do you have sympathy for those who buy homes near airport runways, then complain about the jets? Neither do I.

The first sections of what became I-95 were built in Darien in 1954, long before most current residents came to town. Sure, traffic has increased on I-95 over the years. We are well over the planned capacity of this interstate highway. But thinking the solution to highway noise is to create a walled concrete canyon through our coastal communities paid for by others, is just selfish and short-sighted.

I live about 1500 feet from I-95. On a quiet summer’s night I can hear the trucks as they whiz by at 70 mph, especially when they’re “Jake braking” (illegal in many states). And yes, there is a wooden sound barrier between me and the road which helps a bit. I try to think of the noise as like surf at the beach. But when shopping for my current home, I knew that highway noise was the price I would pay for being so near an on-ramp.

Some neighbors in my, and many other towns, want the state or Uncle Sam to build miles and miles of new sound barriers to cushion their karmic calm. But why should the few benefit at the expense of so many?

Can we really argue that someone in Tolland or Torrington should pay for sound barriers in Westport or Greenwich?

Sound-barriers seem to me to be wasted money. They don’t reduce accidents, improve safety or solve congestion. Two miles of sound-barriers would buy a new M8 rail car on Metro-North, taking 100 passengers off the road. And sound-barriers are really sound-reflectors, not absorbers, just bouncing the sound off to bother others.
Consider these alternatives:

1) Sound-proof the homes. This has worked well for neighbors of big airports and is probably cheaper than sound-proofing entire neighborhoods. And insulation against noise also insulates against heat loss, saving energy.

2) Explore rubberized asphalt. Reduce the road noise at its source, literally where the “rubber meets the road”. Using this new road surface, some highways have seen a 12 decibel reduction in noise. Rubberized asphalt also reuses 12 million junked tires each year.

3) Pay for it yourself. Let neighborhood associations affected by road noise create special taxing zones to collect funds to build sound barriers they’ll benefit from, both with reduced noise and resulting increased home valuations.

Stamford / Darien state Senator Andrew McDonald points out a real contradiction in state and federal rules about new sound-barriers: they can only be built at taxpayer expense when the road in question is widened. Is that good public policy… to encourage bigger, wider roads carrying more traffic just to get “free” sound barriers? Clearly, we should be funding mass transit alternatives, not discussing the folly of adding a fourth lane to I-95.

I can think of any number of better places to spend federal dollars to improve mass transit than sound barriers. Can’t you?

Money Saving Travel Tips

In this economy we’re all looking to save money, especially on travel. So I’ve assembled a few tips I’ve learned over the years to keep you on the go while still saving dough.

Let’s consider a business day-trip to Washington, planned and booked one day in advance.

THE AIR SHUTTLES: You can’t beat the convenience, but it comes at a weighty cost. The walk-up one-way fare on the US Air Shuttle from LaGuardia is now $329 in coach (and $500 in First Class!). Given that flying time, gate to gate, is only an hour, this has to rank as one of the most expensive flights you can take out of NYC. But did you know that US Air is now part of the Star Alliance network so it code-shares its flights with United Airlines? A round-trip on the same US Air flights, booked through UAL, is $464. (PS: my last Shuttle flights were empty and even though pre-booked, the agent told me there’d be no problem catching an earlier or later flight.)

ALTERNATE AIRPORTS: If you’re willing to fly out of JFK, the savings are amazing… roundtrip on JetBlue is $116 and on Delta $137. And depending on where you’re heading in DC, flying into Dulles might save you time and money.

AMTRAK: Any regular reader of this column knows that I think Amtrak is the only way to “fly”, even to Washington. And you have plenty of trains to choose from departing New Haven, Bridgeport and Stamford. The high-speed Acela would be my first pick, but Business Class (there is no “coach” fare) would set you back $412 roundtrip. And First Class on Acela is an additional $103 each way, adding up to $618 roundtrip.

A cheaper Am-alternative are the non-Acela “Northeast Regional” trains. Older, slower and making more stops, they’ll get you to DC in four hours and 35 minutes versus Acela’s three hours and fifty minutes… but coach is only $206 roundtrip. (I’d skip the $36 each way ‘upgrade’ to Business Class on these trains. All you get is a bit more leg-room and free sodas.)

AMTRAK DISCOUNTS: Amtrak rarely discounts its flagship Acela service, but it does offer AAA and NARP (Natl Assoc of Rail Passengers) members a 10% discount on bookings made three days in advance. Students, Seniors and Veterans can save 15%. Kids (age 2 – 15) travel half-price.

Amtrak’s “Guest Rewards” (frequent traveler) program is fabulous… and free. Rewards include free travel and, for heavy users, free upgrades for First Class, even on Acela. Last year I took a free trip, Chicago to LA, in a Deluxe Bedroom for two days and nights (including meals) on The Southwest Chief for free! If I’d paid for the trip it would’ve cost more than $1000.

WEB RESOURCES: My favorite online resource for comparing air fares (as well as hotels and car rentals) is www.kayak.com, a Norwalk-based travel website. (In the interest of full-disclosure, they’re a consulting client of mine… but that’s not why I give them a plug.) Kayak shows you all the flights on all the airlines, not just a few, so you can prioritize by schedule, airport or fare.

What’s your favorite money-saving tip for travel? Drop me a line and I’ll share it with others. Just e-mail me at jim@mediatrainer.tv

"Emergency Landing!"

Taking off out of LaGuardia last week, my thoughts were of the recent US Air crash in the Hudson River. Maybe it was because I was flying the same airline and the same kind of jet. Or because I’ve always had a fear of flying.

But a couple of years ago, I was on a flight that really made an emergency landing. It wasn’t frightening and, in fact, made me feel a little safer in the skies.

Delta flight 222, a half-empty 767 bound from Atlanta to La Guardia, was more than half-way to its destination when I heard a beeping sound. Assuming some idiot had left his cell phone on, I wasn’t too concerned. Then, more beeping, this time from the rear of the plane. Concerned flight attendants scurried around trying to find the source. It turns out that most of the plane’s smoke detectors were going off, simultaneously.

There was no smell of smoke. (Believe me… I was sniffing furiously), but the captain whipped on the seat belt sign and said we were diverting. “A cockpit warning light”, was the way she put it, adding that she just wanted to “be safe.” Sounded good to me.

As we decended rapidly from 35,000 feet, dodging the thunderstorms, she told us that we’d be landing in Richmond. Fine… It’s a small airport and this is a big plane … just get us down!

During the decent, she reminded us to follow the instructions of the flight attendants “who are really onboard for your safety.” Really… not just to offer us pretzels for dinner? The attendants remained calm, but not having a script to work from, had to ad lib their instructions.

“Stay seated. Don’t get up until told to. Don’t open the emergency exits unless instructed. If an emergency evacuation is necessary, leave all luggage on board. And when we land, don’t be dismayed at the emergency equipment that we will see…”

Sure enough, Richmond Airport’s entire Fire Rescue Department turned out to greet us, racing down the runway as we landed. When we touched down (probably the first 767 ever to land at RIC), they surrounded us, nozzles aimed at our craft. With no smoke evident, we taxied near the terminal and stopped.

Air stairs were brought up and slowly, we all deplaned, walking past respirator-wearing firefighters who’d come on board. A short walk across the tarmac and we were in the terminal.

We all stood by, noses pressed to the windows watching the fire crews as they inspected our plane, running hoses into the baggage hold, but finding neither smoke nor fire.

While hoards of day-tripping business-people whipped out their cell phones and Blackberries, trying to find another flight, I consulted my Amtrak timetable and contemplated a long train ride home the next morning.

Angst was everywhere, but surprisingly there was no “air rage”. All the passengers were pretty mellow about the situation. In fact, we bonded. We all applauded when one guy’s cell phone rang and he learned that his wife had just delivered twins.
Soon, a Delta DC-9 arrived and a couple hours later we were on our way home to LGA, arriving just before a midnight curfew.

I never did find out what was wrong with our original plane. A small story on AP just referenced the “cockpit warning light,” but I knew better.

Fast forward to this week and I’m listening to a replay of the air traffic controller and US Air crew handling the emergency water landing and I’m struck with one thought… maybe two.

Facing a potential disaster, both the pilots and the controllers sounded amazingly calm and professional. They followed their training and nobody died.
Maybe flying isn’t as scary as I’d always thought.

RR Station Parking: A Fresh Look

What is wrong with this picture?

We say we are encouraging people to get out of their cars and try the train… yet, we have a six-year waiting list for parking permits at some stations!

But wait… there’s more: in a year we’ll finally be adding new M8 cars to our fleet, increasing capacity on trains. But we have no plans to expand parking at stations from Fairfield to Greenwich. (In fact, we may lose 800+ spaces while the Stamford garage is demolished and rebuilt for two years.)

Parking at rail stations in Connecticut is a mess. In Darien you’ll pay $315 for an annual permit. Next door in Stamford, it’s $840 a year. And at the South Norwalk station, $936! And that’s after waiting anywhere from 18 months to six years for the chance to buy a permit.

I’ve written before about possible solutions, including a Dutch auction that would let the market demand decide the value of the limited supply of spaces. But, instead, how about expanding the lots and adding more spaces?

A great idea, say the towns… as long as you do it someplace else. “We don’t want expanded parking in ‘our town’ at ‘our station” because it would only attract more traffic from “out of towners”, they say. The NIMBY’s rule!

Mind you, most of the rail stations and adjacent parking are owned by the CDOT, not the towns. But under their lease arrangements the towns set the parking rules and the rates and treat commuters as a convenient revenue source. Like commuters have any choice when the towns jack up rates?

This has got to change. And finally, Governor Rell agrees. She’s just told CDOT to form a task force with the CT Rail Commuter Council, the regional planning agencies and the towns to find a solution.

The issue’s been studied over and over again, but CDOT has seemed a reluctant landlord in imposing a solution serving the greater good if it risks angering the towns or jeopardizing the locals’ revenue stream from this “commuter tax”.

Here are some possible solutions:

In some places we might add parking lots or deck existing lots. But before we get asphalt-happy, let’s remember what we’re really looking for here.

What’s really needed is increased access to our rail stations, not just acres of more parking.

In some towns access might mean shuttle buses circulating through town, picking up commuters near their homes. In other towns, construction of sidewalks would make it possible to walk to the station without slogging through ice and snow. Or how about racks and lockers for bikes and mopeds… even “kiss and ride” drop-off points. Or subsidized taxi rides.

Where there is parking, why not incentives for those who bring more than one person per car to the station: better spots or lower rates?

And let’s not forget CDOT’s favorite three-letter word… T.O.D., transit oriented development… building homes and offices near the station eliminating the need for cars or shuttles.

We can’t bring these solutions to just one town or one station. We have to do it at all stations, spreading the pain and the benefit evenly across all the towns. We have to make all towns do what’s best for the region, not just their local fiefdom.

So thank you Governor Rell! Thanks for finally telling CDOT to do something and thanks for including the CT Rail Commuter Council as part of the Task Force.

After the Governor’s recent announcement, a reporter asked me if it wasn’t “too late for this effort?” “Heck no,” I said. “It may be a few years later than we’d have liked, but it’s never too late to start fixing this problem.”

So… let’s get going!

Consultants = Wasted Tax Dollars

Any PR person can tell you: the best way to bury bad news is to release it at 5 pm on a Friday because nobody pays attention to the news on the weekends.

So on Friday January 2nd at 5 pm, Governor Rell released the results of her $630,000 consultant’s report on the much needed New Haven Rail Yard. Reading the 55 page report you can understand why she didn’t want it drawing attention.

But let’s back up to explain why.

In 2005 when Hartford lawmakers finally approved funds for long-overdue new rail cars for Metro-North, CDOT told them an additional $331 million would also be needed for shops and improvements at the New Haven Rail Yard.

By 2008, the cost of the project had risen to $1.2 billion.

Mind you, the project had more than doubled in size. Costs for concrete and steel had soared. And because the project wouldn’t be finished until 2020, 10% annual construction inflation was factored in to the equation.

Never mind that inflation now is near zero and construction materials have plummeted in price.

Though she had been told of the cost increases, Governor Rell feigned outrage. Her budget chief, Robert Genuario, said it was his fault for not keeping the Governor informed about the money. Then an FOI suit by the Stamford Advocate turned up e-mails from the Governor’s Chief of Staff, Lisa Moody. (Remember her… disciplined for selling fundraiser tickets to state workers on “company time”?)

Well, the e-mails show that Moody knew about the budget increases. And a CT-N videotape of a ribbon-cutting ceremony (which I attended), show the Governor standing 10 feet away from a CDOT Deputy Commissioner who spoke of the cost increases.

Chagrined and embarrassed, Governor Rell ordered a study of the entire project by Hill International consulting. Usually consultants tell their clients what they want to hear, and I’m sure Governor Rell expected Hill to say an out-of-control CDOT had once again screwed up. But they hadn’t and Hill didn’t.

In fact, Hill’s estimate of the first phase of the project was $150 million higher even than CDOT’s.

While Hill did find fault with much of CDOT’s budget-making and oversight of such large projects, we’d heard this already when the I-84 storm sewer scandal was dissected last year. So most of the 55 page Hill report just tells us what we already know… the rail yard is necessary but can’t be built on the proposed schedule because the state is broke. And for this we paid $630,000?

Flash back to the summer of 2000 and a press conference in Hartford held by then-Speaker of the House, Moira Lyons. Surrounded by stacks of studies and consultant reports taller than her, Lyons said the state was in crisis when it came to transportation and had to do something. No more studies… it was time for action! And thus was born the Transportation Strategy Board.

Two years of further study, and recommendations were made by the TSB which were ignored by then-Governor Rowland. There was no will to embrace the TSB’s call for more rail cars and consideration of “value pricing” of our congested roads.

So, the TSB ordered more studies. A few days from now, the results of their $1 million consultant’s report on reinstating tolls on our highways will be made public.

But Governor Rell says she doesn’t care. She’s opposed to tolls and has said so. Why then spend $1 million studying the concept already embraced by progressive states from coast to coast if our prejudiced Governor says “no”?

Even before we realized we were heading to the poor house, our so-called leaders in Hartford didn’t have the courage or conviction to actually do anything. “We need to study the issue,” was their constant excuse.

Now, with a $6 billion deficit looming, lawmakers have the ultimate out for further inaction: there’s no money.

So instead of putting in signals and passing tracks on the one-track Danbury branch of Metro-North, we’re still studying the issue after five years.

Rather than build the New Haven – Springfield commuter line or expand Shore Line East service to New London, we’re stuck in a quagmire of reviews.

Rather than create a separate mass transit agency apart from CDOT (one of the Governor’s better proposals, following the lead of 48 other states), the idea was sent by the legislature for further study.

Rather than open truck inspection stations 24 hours a day, we hired a consultant.

As the Federal government gets ready to pour billions into public works projects, Connecticut has dozens of such developments under study and review, but precious few that are “shovel ready”.

The only people making money on transportation in this state are the consultants.
And lawmakers wonder why the public has such a cynical attitude toward their efforts at fixing our transportation mess.

Travel Now, Talk Later

I love my cell phone. But I’m not crazy about other peoples’ cellphones, especially when they use them in a selfish or illegal manner.

You do know it’s against the law to talk on a cellphone while driving in Connecticut, New York and New Jersey, right? Yes, cellphone addicts are allowed to drive and talk if they use a “hands-free” device, but even this begs the question of where their attention should be, i.e. on the road.

I honestly wonder what soccer moms with an SUV full of kids are thinking when they drive down busy streets juggling a latte in one hand and a cellphone in the other. Don’t they love their kids?

Local police have told me writing tickets for this offense is like shooting fish in a barrel. The first offense is usually just a warning, but some people never learn and have piled up three or four tickets.

Once, when stuck in crawling traffic on I-95, I actually saw a guy reading a book. I’ve seen other drivers shaving or putting on make-up. Give me a break!

In the words of the NPR “Car Talk” guys’ bumper sticker: “Drive Now, Talk Later”. But I’d carry that message to other travel environments as well, especially on the train.

When people leave the personal cocoon of their private car and move into mass transit they cannot take their selfish behaviors with them. In my car I can turn up the radio and enjoy a cigar, but on the train I have to share my ride with others.

For several years now the CT Rail Commuter Council has been trying to persuade Metro-North to establish “Quiet Cars” on commuter trains… cellphone- free environments where riders seeking peace don’t need to hear some self-centered hedge-fund dealer yelling at his trading desk in a voice that carries through the entire car.

Amtrak pioneered the “Quiet Car”® concept to rider acclaim, but Metro-North refuses even to experiment with the idea, instead pushing its “please be considerate of other riders” public service campaign, to only modest success.

If we used to have smoking and non-smoking cars, why can’t we have “Quiet Cars” as well?

What I enjoy most is watching cellphone users with the new Bluetooth wireless ear clips, chattering away to nobody in particular… “It’s me.” Who cares? “I’m on the train”. Yeah, I can tell. “Just thought I’d check in.” I wish I could check out. “What’s happening?” “My blood pressure is rising!”

But wait, fellow travelers… it could possibly get worse. Recently the FAA was considering allowing cellphone use in-flight. Could you imagine a 5 hour trans-con, crammed into a center seat, between two people determined to talk the entire way… and who’ve brought extra back-up batteries just to be sure? Fortunately, saner minds prevailed and that idea was shot down.

On a recent flight I had to ask the Gen-X’er sitting next to me three times to turn off her cell phone and stop texting her “buds” as we revved up for take-off. Finally, a call to the stewardess separated the gal from her toys until we landed. But if looks could kill…

OK…I’ll admit that I do use my cellphone on the train, but I always make the call short, and cup my hand around the mouthpiece… something like “I’ll be home by 7, but you guys go ahead and eat.” If a longer call is necessary I get out of my seat and use the vestibule area so as not to intrude on others’ peace. And to make sure that incoming calls don’t bother anyone, I leave my phone on vibrate.

Remember: A ticket on the train buys you transportation, not the right to annoy your fellow passengers with a recitation of your woes. And when you’re driving, will you please hang up?

Bankruptcy is the Only Way to Save Detroit

One of the most chilling images of the debacle that was the Vietnam war was a US soldier using his Zippo lighter to ignite the thatched hut of a small village, setting it ablaze as residents looked on in shock. “We had to destroy it to save it,” he said.

The same is true with the big three auto makers in Detroit. Bankruptcy is the only way to save them.

THE UNIONS:
Any tax dollars spent on “bailing out” Detroit would be a waste. Sure, they might prop up a few over-paid UAW jobs and pensions for awhile and maybe keep some local auto dealers afloat, but they are all doomed.

UAW auto workers make an average of 30% more than non-union labor at Japanese auto plants in the US. Union wages and benefits add more than $2000 to the cost of a big-three built car. Sorry guys… the party’s over.

Bankruptcy will allow Detroit to go back to square one and negotiate reasonable labor contracts. Sure the union workers would be screwed, but they’ve been living pretty well for years, even getting paid for not working.

THE FRONT OFFICE:
Big three’s management must go. These guys drove their industry into this problem agreeing to fat union contracts while designing cars that Americans don’t want.
Robert Lutz, is the Vice Chairman of GM now in charge of the make-or-break Chevy Volt electric car. Yet he admits he doesn’t believe in global warming and recently described the car’s potential buyers as “no make-up” lady environmentalists with hairy legs.

This guy needs to be taken out of the executive gene pool. Ignorance and arrogance like Lutz’s have no place in Detroit’s future.

Grounding your fleet of corporate jets and agreeing to work for a dollar a year are sacrifices of too little and far too late.

THE PRODUCT:
Why has Detroit continued to build gas-guzzling behemoths while the Japanese have innovated with hybrids to great success? Gas may be cheap today, but the days of $4 and $5 a gallon will return.

Watching “60 Minutes” the other night, I heard the Saudis unapologetically explain that because their future is in selling oil, they’ll do all they can to stop an electric car from being built.

Detroit’s big-three are clearly OPEC’s best customers, so why not let Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and Qatar bail them out?

But please, do not waste another US taxpayer or Treasury dollar on a bailout of Detroit. They’ve squandered their own money. Don’t let them misspend ours.
Detroit and the big-three’s unions are victims only of their own greed and incompetence. A bailout is like handing booze and the car keys to an alcoholic because he promises to drive to an AA meeting. Bankruptcy would give them a clean slate, like going to rehab.

THE FUTURE:
One silver lining: Senator Chris Dodd’s observation that Detroit used to build more than cars and trucks. GM also used to build passenger trains and buses.

So in a post-bankruptcy auto industry, let’s use their engineering expertise to think of transportation as more than one person in two tons of steel guzzling gasoline.

As of today the US doesn’t have a single large domestic rail passenger car builder: Kawasaki, Bombardier, Alstom and the others are all foreigners with token domestic plants. This lack of competition drives prices up: the new M8 cars on Metro-North cost $2.5 million each.

Imagine a post-bankruptcy Detroit putting its engineering skill, production facilities and labor to work on mass transit and maybe, just maybe, there’s a silver lining in this mess.

A WPA Project For Transportation

How can our nation pull itself out of this economic tailspin, create new jobs and actually give something to generations? Why, by repairing and reinvigorating our country’s transportation system. What we need is a new, 1930’s style WPA Project for transportation!

The recent election saw a number of states and cities endorse spending for mass transit, mostly for overdue improvements transportation, but with the side benefit of thousands of jobs.

In California voters approved an almost $10 billion bond package to build high-speed rail between Los Angeles and San Francisco. The full plan will cost $42 billion and employ a half-million workers. Construction of the 220 mph train system could begin in 2011.

In Los Angeles voters also approved a half-cent sales tax hike to fund new roads and rails. Over the next 30 years that should mean $40 billion for transportation alternatives to road-weary commuters.

Contrast those visionary voters’ decisions with the muck and mire of us living here in “the land of steady habits”.

We’re not building a transportation bridge to the future but paying for the collapse of one 20 years ago! Today, 40% of the budget of the CDOT still pays debt service on bonds issued after the Mianus River Bridge on I-95 fell down due to engineering neglect.

Right here in Darien we’re watching CDOT spend over $5 million to replace the Hollow Tree Ridge Road bridge over I-95. So far, the seven month-long project seems to be employing just a handful of workers and more time has been wasted since the bridge was closed to traffic than has been spent in actual construction.

Face it. We need to fix what we have before dreaming of a maglev running down the center of our freeways.

The Merritt Parkway opened in 1938. Interstate I-95 came along twenty years later. Both are in bad shape and jammed with far more traffic than designers had ever imagined.

We all know that new M8 rail cars are on their way for Metro-North. Sadly, they are being built by a Japanese company (Kawasaki) and not in Connecticut (but Nebraska). Imagine if those millions were spent in-state for local labor.
And PS… your grandchildren will still be paying for the M8 cars when they’re of commuting age.

But enough grousing. It’s a new day in America, even if it is cloudy and cold. The Obama – Biden team understands the value of transportation spending and hopefully will turn on the federal spigot.

According to APTA, the American Public Transportation Assoc., an industry group, $1 billion in federal investment creates 35,000 jobs. And APTA says there are 559 “ready to go” transportation projects worth $8 billion.

So let’s go! The way to jump-start our ailing economy is not to send out “stimulus” checks to consumers who we hope will shop for LCD TV’s (made in China) for sale at Circuit City (now bankrupt).

Let’s think big. A super-Acela truly offering high speed rail service. How about finally fixing our air traffic control system so a light rain doesn’t close LaGuardia. And what about those feeder barge test-projects designed to get container cargos off of our highways.

Let’s build roads and rails, airports and shipping terminals. Let’s make jobs and leave something our grandchildren can envy.

Leaves and Loco's

It sounds like a question on a kid’s quiz show: “How do you stop a train?”

A) Hail it like a cab? B) Pull the emergency brake? C) Put wet leaves on the track?

If you chose “C”, you were correct… and you must be a regular commuter on Metro-North.

This is the time of year that tries train engineers’ souls and commuters’ patience. One day last week, 60 rush-hour trains were delayed by “slippery rails” when wet leaves caused trains to “slip-slide” on their usually solid tracks.

You may not realize it, but the flanged wheel of a train only contacts the rail in a surface area the size of a dime. That’s why trains can move so smoothly with minimal power… riding a small, but firm area of friction.

But when the leaves fall and later get wet, they are ground into one of the slipperiest substances known to man, a compound called pectin. As the train rolls along, its computer senses the slip and tries to apply the disc brakes which eventually scrape off the goo.

But often the brakes are applied so hard that a locked wheel is ground against the track creating a flat-spot on the usually round surface. In years past these flat wheel issues have taken 25% of cars out of service for regrinding.

Sophisticated train computers don’t like it when they think the train can’t stop, so on the new M7 cars running in Westchester county the railroad had to reprogram the safety systems to reassure them the train wasn’t out of control and didn’t need emergency braking.

Worse yet, on some lines the slippery leaves can virtually leave the trains unable to move. Case in point, the Danbury branch line is almost a continual up-hill climb from Norwalk to “The Hat City”, 397 feet above sea level. On this branch, diesel locomotive-pulled trains can’t stop on hills at stations like Cannondale, so on some days they skip such stops and make a running start for the steeper climbs.

On an MU (multiple-unit) mainline train, all cars are locomotives, spreading out the traction-power the full length of the train. But on a branch line, a single Genesis locomotive weighing 120+ tons has only eight wheels touching the track, seeking enough traction to pull a fully loaded eight car train.

Sometimes the solution is as simple as sand dropped from special hoppers on the train just in front of the drive-wheels. The resulting friction gets the train going or helps it stop.

This is a problem for railroads worldwide, not just here in the northeast.
Of late, Metro-North has brought in heavier armament… a specially designed car dubbed “Water World” equipped with high pressure hoses that blast the tracks free of the gooey mess.

They’re also experimenting with chemical sprays. And one inventor in the UK is proposing to zap the goo off the rails with lasers!

So in the fall when we appreciate the gorgeous foliage, remember the words of Paul Simon: “Slip sliding away, slip sliding away. You know the nearer your destination, the more you’re slip sliding away.”

Confessions of a Road Warrior

What idiot said that “getting there is half the fun”?

That’s the thought that went through my mind last week when I did a “day trip” to LA: two door-to-door 10-hour trips just for a three-hour face-to-face meeting with my most important client.

I knew my trip was doomed when I went to pick up my rental car at LAX and there were no cars. Pleading with the dispatcher that I’d been up since 1 am local time and had a crucial meeting I could not be late for, she said “I can give you a mini-van.” Fabulous! If it has an engine and wheels, I’ll take it. Even in LA where people drive their egos, I abandoned my Ferrari persona for a Chevy minivan.

I should have known there was a problem as it was the only van left on the lot, but a road warrior never gives up. Throwing open the door to the van I was met with the unmistakable odor of vomit. The vehicle was clean, mind you. It just reeked.
So, off I drove, windows down and made my meeting on time! When I returned the van five hours later it still reeked of vomit, but now with a nice overtone of cigar.

Another time a few years back I’d booked the last evening flight from JFK to LAX on TWA. I rushed to the airport, arriving just in time to find that the 6 pm flight was delayed due to incoming equipment. A promised 8 pm departure never happened, and the delays kept coming in 30 minute intervals until it was clear we were going to be on a red-eye. Worse yet, after all other flights had left, every bar and restaurant in the terminal closed up.

In its generosity, TWA wheeled out some MRE’s (meals ready to eat) from a back closet and we feasted on stale crackers and government surplus cheese, until one passenger took the initiative and picked up the phone.

A half-hour later (and still hours before departure), a pizza delivery-man arrived with ten pies. “We’re not paying for those,” screamed the TWA supervisor. “We’re not asking you too,” smiled the passenger, who then sold every slice at about $5 apiece. PS: We did eventually take off, arriving at LAX about 3 am.

Then there was the time I arrived late one night at Newark airport from a sad trip to see my dying mother. I had a crucial meeting in central NJ the next morning, so I’d booked the last hotel room within 30 miles at a run-down Howard Johnson’s.

In the dark airport parking lot, I got off the bus at the wrong stop and in a pouring rain (with no coat or umbrella) was soaked by the time I found my car. God was telling me something.

Digging thru my suitcase, I found the only dry clothing I could safely use to dry off … a pair of underwear. And off I drove to Route 287. An hour later I found my Ho Jo’s motel, tired and hungry, ready for a meal of those famous fried clams and at little ice cream. No such luck. The restaurant was closed as were all other eateries within ten miles. That night dinner consisted of Pop Tarts with a side order of humble pie.

Tech Tools to Avoid Traffic

When you’re hitting the highway, a little information can save you a lot of headaches. Knowing where the traffic jams are before you’re caught in them can help you find a detour and avoid lost time.

While some roads are always a mess… I-95 and the Merritt between Greenwich and Norwalk, for example… it’s the unexpected jackknifed tractor trailer and 10- mile back-up that can ruin your day. But how do you get good “intel” on such disasters? Let me share a few tried and true tips from fellow road warriors.

RADIO: I’m a big fan of WCBS 880 AM for its “traffic and weather on the 8’s” reports, which almost always include mention of Connecticut. In AM and PM drive-time, their reports on tri-state traffic can run to five minutes and are almost always accurate. They also encourage “cell-mates” to call in their eyewitness traffic reports, which I do frequently (call 1-212-975-8888).

HIGHWAY RADIO: You might not realize it, but there’s a network of local, low-power radio stations in Connecticut doing nothing but traffic reports. Known as “Highway Advisory Radio”, they’re found at 1610 and 1670 on the AM dial, depending on location. Their looping reports last a minute or two and are generally accurate, originating as they do from State Police offices in Bridgeport where they have access to a network of cameras watching our highways. Traffic info on the large illuminated highway signs (and those helpful reminders to buckle-up and put down the cell-phones) originate from the same place. But like WCBS, they can use your help in finding accidents, so hit 911 on your cell if you see trouble unfolding that affects personal safety and share that info with CT State Police.

TRAFFIC CAMERAS: The same traffic cameras the troopers use are also available online in real time (but as still pictures, not full-motion video) at www.ct.gov/dot Scroll down the list, pick the cameras along your intended route and see for yourself how things look.

CABLE TV: Our friends at Cablevision have their own answer to “traffic and weather together”… Metro-Traffic, found on channel 61. It’s not exactly compelling TV, though they also use the video feed from the traffic cams together with an area map showing color coded traffic flow. Even the Weather Channel is getting in on the act, adding a traffic report to their “Local on the 8’s” forecast showing the average speed on major arteries, again with color coding. (Yes, the speed on the Cross-Bronx was 14 mph the other day. That’s “free flowing” by NYC standards.)

E-MAIL: Thanks to the efforts of State Senator Andrew McDonald of Stamford, the CT DOT was recently persuaded to share its traffic updates in a user-friendly format. Just register your e-mail at www.ct.gov/dot and CDOT will send you free e-mail alerts of major traffic snafus along with guesstimates of how long it will take to clean them up (usually an average of 2 – 3 hours). They’ll also send you a follow-up when things get back to what passes for normal. In its first five months of operation, five thousand e-mails have been registered. By the way… Metro-North offers a similar e-mail alert for train problems. There’s a link from the CDOT website.

TELEPHONE: In many parts of the country you can dial 511 and ask for the latest traffic. Using voice recognition technology and a speech synthesizer, the system will give you an update. There’s no such system in the NYC metro area, though I have heard of pay-per-call systems which probably rely on the same traffic resources listed above. Save your money and just turn on your radio.

None of these technologies will prevent traffic accidents, but they may lessen ensuing traffic jams if the cognoscenti know where they are and can avoid adding to the delays.

America's Getting Into "Training"

Any occasional reader of this column knows that I’m a “train nut”… a “foamer”, as the railroad folks describe us (because we supposedly foam at the mouth at the sight of a train).

I’m a big fan of rail travel, both on Metro-North and Amtrak, and I’ve written extensively about both. Last October I wrote about my two-day, two-night journey from Chicago to San Diego on “The Southwest Chief”. This week, a less cheerful report on my recent trip to the Windy City and back.

We who live along the Northeast Corridor are spoiled with speedy and frequent rail service. Acela can whisk you to Boston or Washington in just a few hours, admittedly at a premium fare. And the reason is that Amtrak owns and maintains its tracks, or “right of way”, where you’ll seldom encounter any slow-moving freight trains.

Not so in the rest of the nation, where freight “rules”. Consider my recent trip to Chicago by way of Washington DC.

Train # 29, the Capitol Ltd, rolled out of DC on time at 4:05 pm. But I knew we had only a 14% chance of pulling into Chicago the next morning at 8:40 am as scheduled, in time for a business meeting. That’s because Amtrak’s own website warns this train is late on 86% of its 17-hour journeys.

The reason: CSX and Norfolk Southern, the freight railroads whose tracks Amtrak uses to make the trip. Amtrak pays a pretty penny to use these tracks, but to the freight operators passenger trains are second class citizens.

Sure enough, minutes after leaving DC my radio scanner crackled with the sound of a CSX dispatcher trying to route us around the slow-moving coal trains that dominate this two-track railroad through the mountains.

By morning as the sun rose over the steel plants of Indiana we were two hours late. It was stop and go, the rail equivalent of “bumper to bumper” traffic, all the way into Union Station where it was almost 11 am CDT by the time we de-trained, much too late for a full-day of business.

The return trip was even slower. Departing Chicago ten minutes late (7:15 pm) we immediately were delayed in the Indiana rail freight log-jam. Next morning’s 5:45 am scheduled arrival in Pittsburgh was more like 8 am (also delaying the connecting 7:20 am “Pennsylvanian” to Harrisburg and NYC). As we crept toward Washington I kept calling “Julie”, Amtrak’s automated phone agent, asking her our ETA in DC.

As it turned out, we were “only” 2 ½ hours late, but it still gave me just 15 minutes to connect to the last train to Stamford of the day. All told, Chicago to CT was 25 hours.

Mind you, the train ride was enjoyable. My bedroom compartment was comfortable and included a private bathroom / shower and tasty meals in the dining car. The on-board staff was professional and communicative.

But the train was packed! Every sleeping compartment had sold out weeks in advance and coach seats were jammed with new converts sent to “training” by high gas prices.

Amtrak has become a victim of its own success. Like Metro-North, trains are running at capacity, but there are no more cars to be added to handle the crowds… or, in this case, funding to design, let alone order them.

In the Northeast, Acela’s seats are almost always sold out. And the slower, newly branded Northeast Regional trains are increasingly packed. Congress has told Amtrak to become financially self-sufficient. And now’s their chance, if they could add cars to capture this huge surge in ridership and revenue.

Americans are getting into “training” alright. I just wish Amtrak could carry them all.

Parking Chaos Coming to Stamford

If you are one of the thousands of commuters who use the Stamford station, either for Metro-North or Amtrak, get ready for two years of parking headaches: the old garage at the railroad station is coming down.

We’ve known about the pending demolition of the garage for two years now. And the deteriorated condition of the structure has been known for a decade. To blame is its shoddy original construction plus the wear and tear of water and salt corrosion. Believe it or not, parking garages only have a 40-year “life expectancy”. This one won’t have lasted half that time.

A CDOT study in 2006 estimated that repair of the garage would take nine years and cost $35 million. But demolition and new construction would cost $30 million (now up to $35 with price hikes and inflation) and take at least two years.

For the past two years CDOT has been trying to negotiate with an adjacent private land owner to do a swap: allow CDOT to build a new garage on the developer’s land, then tear down the old garage and allow the private developer to build an office / residence on the site of the old garage.

This plan would have made the parking transition seamless. While construction and demolition would have been messy, there would be no loss of station parking.

For over a year the Commuter Council has been asking CDOT to see the designs for this proposed swap and offer its input, but the agency refused. Negotiations with the private developer were, well, private. When the deal was done, then we could have a look.

Now, all that is moot. The private-public partnership deal has fallen through and we’re back to the worst case scenario: demolish the old garage then build a new one in its place on the same site.

In breaking this bad news to the Commuter Council this month, CDOT’s Deputy Commissioner stressed that, when finished, the new garage would be a perfect aesthetic match to the private developer’s building. However, he seemed less concerned about the impending chaos for commuters.

What does this mean to rail riders? Well, the loss of 800 daily parking spaces at Stamford for more than two years. And an ungodly mess during demo and construction on the confined site and its narrow roads.

Worst of all, the garage replacement project will probably start in 2010, just as the long awaited Transit Way road project is finished… and as the new M8 cars come into service, expanding potential ridership.

But if it’s any consolation, the new garage will have 200 additional spaces. And it should be pretty.

CDOT says that talks are underway with private developer Antares to use a new surface parking lot on the west side of Washington Blvd. with a walkway being built to the rail platform, but that site is far short of 800 spaces.

Stamford officials have previously talked of running shuttles from the Target and Bell Street Garages, the latter still filled with cars from an auto dealership. While this may make up for lost spaces, who wants to park so far from the station?

What can a Stamford commuter do?

First, start thinking about commuting from stations other than Stamford! Call town hall in Darien, Stamford and Greenwich and get on their 4+ year waiting list for parking permits. You do not need to be a resident of these towns to park at their rail stations.

Second, consider alternative ways to get to your station: car pooling, “kiss-N-ride” spousal drop-offs and bikes would all work (bike racks are plentiful at stations, according to a recent SWRPA audit).

Lastly, stay involved with this issue. Two years ago CDOT promised they would make sure enough parking was available during construction. And they pledged public informational hearings on their plans. The Commuter Council will hold them to their word.

After a decade of reconstruction of the Stamford train station, now we have this. It’s all necessary and when it’s done we’ll have a spectacular transportation center. But it’s going to be a painful few years getting there.

"How To Complain About The Trains"

All that is necessary for the success of evil is that good men do nothing.

Now, this is no way to imply that the folks who run Metro-North are in any way evil. For the most party, I think they do an admirable job running our trains, given the decrepit equipment allocated them by the state. But when things do go wrong, if human error is at fault, it’s important that you complain. Otherwise, bad service is perpetuated.

Each week I get dozens of such complaints by phone and e-mail. Folks must think I’m the Michael Clayton of the commuting world… “the fixer”. Far from it, though I usually know where to send the aggrieved party for real help.

Here are six simple rules to follow to get your complaint heard:

RULE #1: Be sure you have all the facts. To fix a problem you need the date, time, location and name of employees involved (or a good description if they refuse to show you their badge). Gather the names and contact info from other eye-witnesses to corroborate your story.

RULE #2: Be sure to complain to the right party. If it’s a problem involving station parking, you probably have to talk to Town Hall. Same with the stations. But if it’s something that happened on the trains, take it to Metro-North.

RULE #3: Use the www.mta.info website complaint form to officially file your complaint. (Look under FAQ / Contact Us, then E-Mail). Fill out the template and print or make a copy for yourself.

RULE #4: Be patient. You will get a response. The folks in Customer Service have a truly thankless job, but they do it well. Your complaint can bring about real change including disciplinary hearings, changes in schedules and even refunds.

RULE #5: Be ready to follow-through. If a hearing is scheduled and you can’t or won’t appear, you’ve wasted everyone’s time. If the written response you get from Customer Service seems unresponsive or patronizing, fire back!

RULE #6: If all else fails, turn to the Commuter Council. Our job is to be your advocate. By raising an issue at our meetings, the potential media coverage alone often prompts the agencies to action.

Mind you, some complaints we get seem misplaced.

Like the rider last week who “complained” to me about new Naugahyde seats recently installed in an old rail-car. She thought this was a cosmetic tweak to lousy service and a warning sign that the new M8 cars would be delayed. Both her fears proved wrong.

Or my favorite complaint ever was from a woman who screamed at me on the phone that the railroad wouldn’t reimburse her. Seems that she had caught the last, late-night train from 125th Street to New Rochelle, but had mistakenly boarded the express that ran non-stop to Stamford… a unfortunately common occurrence which should be solved by better signage and PA announcements. (The local and express are only minutes apart).

So I assumed that, on arriving at Stamford, she had caught a cab back to New Rochelle and was asking the railroad to reimburse her for cab fare… a plausible and perhaps reasonable request given that she’d missed the last southbound local.

No, she said, when she got to Stamford she decided she was so far from home (in fact, just 16 miles) that she walked across the street and checked into a hotel for the night and wanted the railroad to pay for her $200 hotel room.

See what I mean when I say working in Customer Service is a thankless job?

The New Haven Rail Yard Budget Mess

Once again, our elected officials in Hartford have outdone themselves. At a time when mass transit seems the only alternative to high gas prices (ridership is soaring and trains are jammed), they are nickel and dime’ing our state’s transportation future.

The issue: the over-due rail yard maintenance facility in New Haven.

In 2005, lawmakers approved $300 million for these vital shops and repair facilities for our soon-to-be-delivered M8 rail cars. Now, everyone in Hartford seems shocked, stunned or amazed that the project has grown to $1.2 billion.

Mind you… the cost quadrupled partly because the project more than doubled in size, so let’s keep our apples and oranges straight.

At recent hearings, legislators have suggested that CDOT slash its plan, and indeed, the agency itself came up with $11 million in cost cuts. “That’s no more than a ‘rounding error’”, grumbled one lame-duck Senator.

At first, Governor Rell denied that she knew anything of these rising costs, sending her stalwart budget czar, Robert Genuario to fall on his sword by admitting that he had been told about the cost increase but neglected to tell the Governor. Good solider, bad boy.

Then a newspaper FOI suit found out that the Governor’s Chief of Staff, Lisa Moody (remember her… disciplined for soliciting campaign donations for Rell from state workers on ‘company time’?) knew about the price increase all along. And a CT-N videotape of a ribbon-cutting (which I personally attended), showed the Governor 10 feet away from CDOT officials when the media asked, and the agency disclosed, hard numbers about the necessary cost increases. Somebody wasn’t paying attention.
So, what is the Governor’s answer to the soaring cost increase? Why, hire more consultants and spend more money, of course! That’s right… Governor Rell wants to pay $630,000 for another audit of the CDOT plan.

Mind you, CDOT itself just finished paying other consultants to “value engineer” their design, and they’re the ones who found only $11 million in potential cuts.
What’s going on here? Who’s to blame? Or is this just “business as usual in Hartford”?

In my view… Let’s not blame CDOT for designing the kind of rail facility we really do need. Instead, blame our elected officials for not having designed and built it a decade or two ago when we should have and could have done so for much less.
Playing catch-up in the expensive transportation business is, well, expensive.
Lawmakers were shocked to hear that the MBTA built a similar locomotive shop for $258 million. But that was in the 1990’s when Hartford was ignoring transportation under the Rowland administration. Rome was burning and we all danced a jig to Rowland’s fiddling with taxes.

More recently, George Bush’s $3 trillion war in Iraq is also costing us dearly. The US dollar has plummeted in value, oil is soaring and construction materials are doing likewise because of Pentagon demand.

Engineers told lawmakers they now must factor in 10% annual inflation, not 3% as in years past. And because the New Haven rail yard project continues to 2017, well, you do the math.

I have seen the CDOT plans for the New Haven shops and, while neither our lawmakers nor I am engineers, they seem to make sense to me. We need these facilities! They are not a Lexus… just a Chevy as outside consultants have confirmed.

CDOT was wrong to low-ball the costs at $300 million without having finished the necessary design work. And maybe $1.2 billion is a bit high. But CDOT has explained the added costs and the longer we dicker, or waste more money on more consultants (the only people making money on transportation these days), the higher the cost will ultimately be.

We should have made these investments in transportation decades ago. Now we are paying the price. Let’s not compound these problems with further delays and political posturing. Get on with it!

"Flying This Summer?"

My last column (“Doomsday: What Happens When Gas Hits $10 a Gallon”) seems to have struck a chord. Many of you said I was unduly pessimistic, while a few said “right on… we’re screwed”.

Little did I know that many of my worst fears were already coming true. Take air travel, for example.

I remember the good old days of flying when passengers would get dressed up for the adventure. Flights were roomy and the service was extravagant… not pretzels and soda, but filet and champagne. Getting there really was half the fun! Going “on the road” was almost enjoyable.

But no more. Now, even getting to the airport can be a challenge.

Most major cities in the civilized world have rail service to their airports, but not New York. That AirTrain to JFK is fun, if you can reach its northern terminus by subway or LIRR. But for those of us in Connecticut, the price of car service to Newark or JFK can be higher than the airfare to our destination… though not for long.

And when you arrive at the terminal, the fun really begins. Long lines to check bags (soon to be even longer!) and longer lines to go through security. And does anybody really think the TSA is keeping us safe? Not me!

First, no liquids. Now, three ounces or less. Then, no lighters. Now lighters are allowed again. And don’t you love the TSA agents barking at you as you strip down, almost to your skivvies, just to clear the metal detectors?

True, the TSA is experimenting with a Zen-like security area at BWI airport, complete with mood lighting and soft-music. I doubt that will help as you still have to take off your belt and shoes.

Then, there’s the airlines’ new policy of charging for even the first checked bag. That will doubtless mean more hassles on boarding as the cheapskates demand space for their two carry-on’s. And that will probably mean departure delays as airlines mismanage the turn-around times for in-coming aircraft.

Let’s face facts: Most airlines won’t survive the energy crunch. We’ve already lost Aloha, ATA, Skybus, Silverjet Maxjet and Eos, to name a few. Frontier has filed chapter eleven and US Air, American, United and Continental are rumored to be in trouble.

The merger of Delta and Northwest will just create one terrible airline out of two bad ones.

Most carriers still flying are already cutting back on capacity, grounding less fuel-efficient aircraft and laying off staff. That will mean fewer flights, each more crowded and expensive

So look for fewer scheduling options, more over-booking and a bidding war at the departure gate as airlines bid for who’s willing to take a later flight… if there’s room.

The good news is that fewer flights might mean less delays in air traffic control, but it still seems that a drop of rain in the NYC area translates into departure delays nationwide.

Then there are the fares. The big carriers have already gone through six rounds of fuel surcharge increases this year, but the best (or worst) is yet to come. As the carriers are facing billions in losses from soaring fuel costs, there’s every reason to expect massive fare hikes in the months ahead.

And so it should be. Airlines shouldn’t be expected to fly at a loss. Mobility of all sorts should come at a cost. And at some point the alternatives to flying -- Amtrak, the bus or even teleconferencing -- will find their market.

So next business trip, ask yourself: Is this trip really necessary, affordable… or tolerable?

"Doomsday: What Happens When Gas is $10 a Gallon"

For decades we’ve lived (and driven) in denial, somehow assuming we have the “right” to cheap gas, and therefore, low-cost transportation. Now it’s time to face reality and consider what will happen when (not if) gas hits $10 a gallon.

The following are my hypotheses. (Follow the embedded links for recent news coverage that contribute to my theories.) These things haven’t happened… yet:

AIR TRANSPORT: Following the demise of a dozen airlines and the shrinking of the remaining carriers, air fares soar and service is cut. Air travel becomes affordable to few. Airport congestion fades as business trips are replaced with tele-conferencing. Hotels are shuttered as “leisure travel” becomes unaffordable.

HIGHWAYS: Rush-hour on I-95 is a breeze as half of all motorists can no longer afford to drive. But the highways are a mess of potholes as the price of asphalt, made from petroleum, quintuples making it impossible to maintain the roads because gas tax revenues have dropped with decreased sales. With more people working from home or on flex-time, traffic congestion is a thing of the past. But with home heating oil at $12 a gallon, people close off rooms in their “McMansions” and huddle in the few remaining spaces they can afford to heat, usually with wood stoves which are also in short supply. Office buildings, by law, can heat to no more than 60 degrees in colder months.

MASS TRANSIT: Delivery delays in the long awaited M8 cars and fears their manufacturer Kawasaki may declare bankruptcy send rail commutation into a tail-spin. Seats are pulled out of cars to create standing room capacity and Metro-North offers cheaper fares to those who can’t get a seat. As in Tokyo, “pushers” (click here for video) are assigned at Grand Central to squeeze passengers into trains. Few can afford to drive and park at rail stations, so most spaces there are turned over to bike racks. Despite fare increases, ridership soars.

AROUND TOWN: Local traffic drops as people consolidate their few truly necessary shopping trips. Because they are so dependent on oil (for fertlizers, packaging and transport), food prices soar. Food imported out of season becomes an occasional treat. Few can afford to eat out at now-chilly restaurants dealing with the same food shortages. Wagons and carts, bikes with racks, mopeds and scooters replace the SUV. Kids take the school bus daily instead of being chauffeured by Mom. Suburban housing prices continue to fall as people flock to the walkable cities with good mass transit. Local taxes rise, encouraging further migration. Schools can’t afford good teachers who must still commute from far away due to lack of local affordable housing.

THE ENVIRONMENT: Oil drilling begins in the Alaskan wilderness, but no supply of oil will reach the lower-48 for three years. In a panic, Congress weakens clean air laws to permit increased use of coal in power plants. Air pollution worsens and acid rain decimates much of the Northeast. Increased CO2 emissions hasten global warming. The sea level rises and coastal communities risk greater flooding as more numerous and powerful hurricanes ravage the US.

THE ECONOMY: The recession becomes a Depression as the impact of decreased mobility and soaring energy costs hit home. China decides to stop buying US Treasury notes and the US dollar hits new lows, making imported oil even more expensive.

Will any of these predictions come true? Time will tell. What can we do to prevent this Doomsday scenario? Not much.

So enjoy what’s left of the era of cheap oil. We’ll all have a lot of explaining to do to our grandchildren.

For more, see www.lifeaftertheoilcrash.net and www.oilcrashmovie.com or just Google “peak oil”.

"The Folly of a Gas Tax Holiday"

Once again, politicians are pandering to our worst instincts. They’re suggesting a summer vacation for our 18.4 cent per gallon Federal gasoline tax, telling us it will make driving more affordable in the busy travel months again. Hogwash!

If anything, lowering gas prices will only drive up demand, and thus, lead to even higher prices.

And cutting the gas tax would mean $10 billion not collected to pay for long overdue road maintenance and repairs. Good for car repair shops, but bad for motorists.

This assumes, of course, that the oil companies won’t raise prices. And it doesn’t explain how to deal with the post-summer shock of reinstating that tax in the fall, just before the election.

The same gas tax scheme was floated last year on a state level in a plan that would have lost us $120 million in subsidies for mass transit. Fortunately, wiser minds prevailed in ‘07 and I hope the same will happen this year.

Even if the Federal tax holiday went through, it would save the average motorist, by most estimates, a whopping $1.83 per week. Oh yeah, that’ll help.

If this is how lawmakers respond to our energy crisis, God help us. McCain and Clinton must think we’re naïve and short-sighted… and maybe they’re right. (To his credit, Obama is standing alone in opposition to this idiocy).

If a patient is an alcoholic, you send them to rehab. You don’t just subsidize the price of booze hoping to postpone the inevitable.

The inevitable is ever-higher gasoline prices. For years I’ve been writing that gasoline is too cheap, and I still believe that. Americans are still spoiled with cheap fuel, even at $4 a gallon. Last week in London petrol sold for $8.20. (My daughter helped me with the math, converting pounds to dollars, Imperial gallons to US). Admittedly, some of that price is taxes used to subsidize mass transit. But consider the vast network of trains and buses available in the UK, and I think you’ll agree they’re funding some great alternatives to the single occupancy motor vehicle.

I only wish we had such choices. Sad old Metro-North is enjoying a huge surge in ridership, but because short-sighted lawmakers in Hartford didn’t act a decade ago to order more rail cars, we’ll have subway-like, standee-only conditions on most trains by the time the new M8 cars arrive next fall.

I’ll tell you how to save money on gas: drive less. Trade in your Hummer for a Prius. Be sure your tires are fully inflated. Drive at 55 mph instead of 70. Coast when possible. If you’re stopping for more than ten seconds, turn off your engine. Take unnecessary weight out of your car (unless it’s another passenger). Keep your engine tuned up. Ride a bike (but not on the train). Try walking.

Sure, take a vacation this summer. You can even do it by car if you’d like.

But first, check how much your next road-trip will cost at the AAA’s nifty website www.fuelcostcalculator.com . Then, price out your alternatives by mass transit. That train or bus is making the trip with or without you, so get onboard.

And while you’re traveling, drop a note to your elected officials and ask them why they still pay only lip-service to our nation’s energy strategy. Ask them why Congress is letting tax credits for solar and wind energy lapse just when we need them most. Lawmakers found time last week to vote for “National Watermelon Month” (really!), but they couldn’t agree on a long range plan to provide energy for our nation. Nero is fiddling while Rome burns.

A gas tax holiday this summer? Give me a break.

Bicycles on Trains ?

Much has been written in recent weeks about allowing bicyclists to bring their vehicles on board Metro North commuter trains, and I wanted to add my two cents just as a commuter and not as Chairman of the Commuter Council. (Never be confused when I write here as I am always and only speaking for myself and not the many groups on which I serve.)

What is it about “bikers” that they feel their rights trump those of other commuters? How can such a well organized and vocal lobby be so blind to the sad realities of commuting on Metro-North that they would ask commuters to straddle their two-wheelers in standee-filled vestibules in the name of personal liberties and “being green”?

Bikers have no more “right” to bring bicycles on crowded rush-hour trains than I have to haul aboard a steamer trunk. (At least you could sit on a steamer trunk). Yet, they rant against everyone in their personal strivings for two-wheeled freedom.

In the interest of personal disclosure: I do not ride a bike, but I do commute and often must stand for an hour or more due to lack of seats.

Bikers… here are the facts of life:

Fact #1, there’s no room for bikes at rush hours. Heck, we don’t have seats for paying passengers, let alone space for bicycles. And the new M8 cars that are coming won’t change that crowding for many, many years given annual ridership increases averaging 5%.

Fact #2, bikes are already allowed on non-rush hour trains. And they’re carried for free. So quit your whining.

Fact #3, if you’re heading for New York City, you don’t need a bike. Mass transit is plentiful in the city, so leave your Cannondale in Cannondale.

Fact #4… or maybe an opinion… I don’t think there’s any demand for bikes among city-bound commuters.

The pro-bike lobby is well organized, very vocal and relentless. But they’re also unreasonable in their demands that every Metro-North train accommodate a special car filled with bike racks.

They point to such services in the San Francisco bay area, but Caltrain has only 37,000 daily riders carried on 100 double-decker passenger cars compared to Metro-North’s Connecticut ridership of 110,000 each day crammed into cars with much less space. If Caltrain’s ridership continues to climb, I predict they’ll rip out the bike racks and add seats.

If bikers really wanted to build support for their cause, I have a suggestion. Rather than rant against those who reasonably argue against bikes on trains, the bikers should instead lobby for bike racks and lockers at rail stations. Attract more people to two-wheeled transportation to catch the train by persuading local towns which operate those stations that this would be a great way to cut parking permit waiting lists. Towns like Westport do a great job with bike racks. Why can’t the other towns use parking revenue to similarly serve their residents?

The bottom line: until every paying passenger gets a seat for their Metro-North ticket, let’s allocate room on the trains to people, not their bikes.

Going The "Green' Way

Earth Day is coming and with the reawakening of the planet, our thoughts turn to “going green”. We drink our overpriced lattes in cups made with recycled material, feeling pretty good about saving our planet as we drive away in our SUV, getting 12 miles to the gallon. We’re in denial and reluctant to change our selfish habits.

As the US dollar plummets in value, we wonder why lower gas consumption doesn’t lead to lower prices. And we shake our heads in amazement as the third world mimics us by embracing the automobile, adding to competition for this dwindling resource of energy.

Transportation is one of the biggest energy hogs in the US. And now that gas has reached more realistic levels compared the rest of the developed world, we’re all wondering what we can do to drive and spend less.

A few ideas:

Live Closer To Work: If we didn’t have to travel an hour to get to and from our jobs, the savings would be immense. Of course, this assumes we can find affordable housing… another topic altogether. But if you’re house-shopping, factor in transportation time and expense into the “total cost of ownership”.

Car Pool: Even if just occasionally, share the ride to work or the airport. Check out www.nuride.com for an incentives-based solution. Or for regular commutation, www.metropool.com or www.rideshare.com can help you find someone to share the ride with. Even soccer moms have their own network to get their kids from games to dance class: www.dividetheride.com

Try A Bike: For local trips in good weather, the exercise will do you good. And if you bike to or from the train station you can chuckle as you skip the four-year waiting line for a $300 annual parking permit. Not enough bike racks at the station? Call town hall and demand they spend that parking money on this simple, green amenity.

Take The Bus: Our region’s bus service is improving and is increasingly popular. “The Coastal Link” bus from Milford to Norwalk along Rt. 1 runs seven days a week and costs only $1.50 (vs. $3.50 on Metro-North). And the “I-Bus” from Stamford and Greenwich to White Plains has been running now for a decade and still costs only $2.50. Coming soon, BRT or “Bus Rapid Transit” offering faster speeds in cool new coaches.

Put Your Kids on the School Bus: Your tax dollars pay for them, so why do so many moms insist on driving their kids to school each morning in “the SUV parade”? What are you teaching your kids about avoiding mass transit?

Walk: Health officials say Manhattan dwellers are healthier than their suburban counterparts because they walk so much. Cars offer convenience, but going to the store for a quart of milk doesn’t have to involve moving two tons of steel with you to achieve the purchase.

Take The Train: Commuter rail is the most fuel efficient transportation alternative, far better than even the bus. On longer journeys, an Amtrak Acela uses a third less fuel per passenger than a jetliner and emits 3 times less CO2 . And by train, you don’t have to take off your shoes or enjoy a TSA-massage on your way to the boarding lounge.

If You Must Drive, Plan Your Itinerary: Don’t just drive roundtrip from home to the store. Save up errands and plan multiple stops along the way.

Clearly, there are alternatives to the single-occupancy, gas guzzling automobile. What’s your energy-saving transportation tip? Share it with me and I’ll include it in a future column.

"The Secrets of Grand Central Terminal"

There is possibly no more beautiful railroad station in the world than New York City’s Grand Central Terminal. As the destination of over 55,000 daily rail commuters from Connecticut, it’s a place we where spend a fair amount of time. But rather than rush to or from your train, next time you’re in GCT, look around and enjoy some of its hidden secrets.

Based on my 40+ years of commuting experience, here are some of the nooks and crannies within the station that I find most fascinating… and useful.

Underground Access: Sure, you can enter Grand Central from street level, but in bad weather you can find your way underground from blocks away. The new north-end access entrances at Madison and 47^th St., Park Ave. and 48^th Street and the Helmsley Building walk-ways are dandy, though not open on weekends. But did you know you can also access from 43^rd or 45^th Street, west of Vanderbilt, from inside the Chrysler Building, the Hyatt on 42^nd Street or via the shuttle station, on the south side of 42^nd Street, just west of Park?

Fastest Way from/to the Lower Level: If your train dumps you on the lower level, forget about the ramps or stairs for the long climb to street level, especially with luggage. Walk to the forward end of the train and look for the elevator near Track 112. It’ll take you to the upper level or, better yet, to within steps of Vanderbilt Avenue (see below). Getting to the lower level platforms from street level is just as easy. On the main level look for the elevators and take them down to “P” (Platform) level avoid two flights of stairs.

Best View of the Main Concourse: Ever notice the elevated glass walkways at the east and west ends of the station? They’re accessible (though public access is seriously discouraged). Just go to the entrance to Michael Jordan’s Steakhouse on the mezzanine level near Vanderbilt Ave. and take the elevator up two or three floors. When you get off, go left and through the un-marked door on your left. Walk out and you’ll have a panoramic view of the station from almost roof-level.

Washrooms with No Wait: The new washrooms at the west end of the lower level have helped a lot, but still there’s often a line. Take the nearby escalators up one level, turn around, and on your left is the Stationmaster’s Office complete with a waiting room and lav’s. Or, go right and just before the ramp up to 42^nd St. and Vanderbilt, look on your left for the sign for the Oyster Bar. Go down the steps into the bar and you’ll find ornate bathrooms known only to a few.

Best Place To Get A Cab: Forget about the long line at the taxi stand on 42^nd St east of Vanderbilt. Instead, go out the west end of the Main Concourse, up the stairs and out onto Vanderbilt Avenue. Cross the street and wait at the corner of 43^rd. Taxis flow through here, dropping off passengers every few seconds. If you’re heading west you’ll avoid the traffic on 42^nd Street too.

Where to Have A Smoke: Want to enjoy a cigar before your train? Forget about lighting up anywhere inside the station. Instead, visit the old taxi stand on Vanderbilt and you’ll be “outside” but still under shelter. Or go to the Hyatt, up two levels to their taxi stand and you’ll find yourself on the raised Park Avenue as it wraps around GCT.

These are a few of my favorite “secrets” of Grand Central. Drop me an e-mail with yours and I’ll include them in a future column.

"Value Pricing Our Highways"

Tired of sitting in bumper-to-bumper rush hour traffic on I-95 and the Merritt? Well, esteemed economist Milton Friedman has the answer.

Almost a decade ago, Freidman wrote that traffic congestion was just a matter of supply and demand: too much demand and not enough supply. Some have suggested expanding the supply of roadways by double-decking I-95 or widening the Merritt Parkway. But can you imagine the billions of dollars in cost and years of disruption? And how would the “upper deck” look soaring 90 feet in the air to cross existing bridges? A simpler (and less costly) solution to gridlock seems to be in managing the demand using “value pricing”.

Today, when we drive our highways at rush hour it costs us no more than if we drive off-peak. That is wrong. The value derived from being able to cruise (or crawl) on I-95 in morning rush hour is much higher than at midnight, and should be priced accordingly.

Consider the other services we consume that offer off-peak pricing. Go to a movie on a Saturday night and you’ll pay more than on a weekday afternoon. Take a flight on a busy holiday weekend, when everyone else wants to fly, and you’ll pay more. Even Metro-North offers peak and off-peak (reduced) fares. So too should our highways.

Using electronic tolls (think E-ZPass), motorists who want or must drive at rush hour would pay a small price for the privilege. Those who don’t need to be on the roads at the busiest hours would wait, and pay less (or maybe nothing). That would mean fewer cars at rush hour and less congestion. Those paying the tolls at rush hour would get faster trip times… real value for the price. And the money raised could pay for long overdue highway improvements or, better yet, subsidies for mass transit to keep fares low and attract even more cars off the highways.

Is it worth, say, $4 to drive eleven miles at rush hour? You bet, if it means you pick up your kid at daycare on time and avoid their $1 per minute penalty for late pick-up… or if you can actually make that important 8:30 am meeting that wins you an important piece of business. Time is money.

Value pricing is already underway on the George Washington Bridge. In rush hour, big-rigs pay $40 to cross. But off-peak with E-ZPass it’s only $35 and overnight the toll drops to $27.50. Since its introduction, value pricing has evened out the bridge’s traffic load, saving everybody time and money.

Why haven’t we put such technology to use in Connecticut? Three reasons: 1) people think tolls actually slow down traffic, 2) there are fears of another fiery truck crash into a toll booth and 3) there is a myth that if we reinstate tolls on our highways we’ll have to repay the Federal government billions of dollars. All are false.

Drive the Garden State or Jersey Turnpike using EZPass and you can sail thru the barrier at top speed. Trucks don’t collide into toll booths (and if you’re really worried about trucker safety, let’s open the Greenwich inspection station 24 x 7). And even the Federal DOT acknowledges that it will approve highway tolls used as a traffic mitigation tool.

While other states rapidly embrace “congestion pricing”, Connecticut’s still trying to get together a study of the concept. Seven years after it was formed, you can expect the state-wide Transportation Strategy Board to finally discuss such a plan next month.

Studies, debates, delays. Is this why we’re called “The Land of Steady Habits”?

Fixing the Connecticut DOT

It’s the government agency we love to hate. Who hasn’t been stuck in endless construction delays on I-95 and not cursed the Connecticut DOT? And what commuter hasn’t shivered on an aging Metro-North train lacking heat and not asked “Who’s running this darn railroad?”

Mind you, I have a lot of respect for the CDOT and its 3,800 employees, most of whom labor long and hard to improve transportation in our state. [Full disclosure: I wanted to be a transportation engineer and studied that at Lehigh University for about one semester before the Arts College seemed more viable.] The problem is, the CDOT is so unwieldy and poorly managed that the staff can’t get things done.

Remember the collapse of the Mianus River Bridge 20 years ago? CDOT took most of the blame, but it was the governor and legislature that cut funding and forced a reduction of safety inspections.

Sure, there are corruption and payoffs. The mess over the I-84 storm sewers showed us that, but again it was lack of oversight that didn’t catch that problem. And yes, there’s even an arrogance among some staffers which doesn’t endear the agency to the public.

True story: a CDOT engineer was at a public meeting over a planned highway widening project requiring the felling of some old trees. When a citizen asked why it was necessary to chop down the trees, the CDOT engineer answered… “You wouldn’t understand. You’re not an engineer.” Nice.

The recently issued Critelli Commission report on reform of the CDOT recounts dozens of such problems within the agency. And to her credit, Governor Rell has not only read the report’s recommendations but is acting upon them.

In her recent budget address, Governor Rell called for splitting the CDOT into two agencies… a Department of Highways and a separate Department of Public Transportation, Aviation and Ports. Connecticut would thus follow the lead of the other 49 states that recognize the need to carve out separate agencies for these disparate duties.

For years now I’ve been calling for creation of a CTA… Connecticut Transportation Authority… and this comes pretty darn close. It’s time to get mass transit away from the asphalt and concrete interests that dominate CDOT.

In 2005, when Metro-North was at a near melt-down due to lack of investment in new rail cars, CDOT spent 76% of state transportation improvement money and 84% of Federal flexible funds on highways.

While states like California have long ago halted new highway construction in favor of mass transit, we in “the land of steady habits” see our DOT spending six years and $1.5 billion on the Q bridge project in New Haven. Were that money instead invested in expanded Shore Line East service, we’d lessen traffic for decades and avoid years of construction delays.

On the mass transit side of the current CDOT there’s too little staff and far too much work. Long over-due projects to repair our stations and expand parking languish on the “to do” list as rail and bus administrators just try to keep the system running week to week.

But a new day is dawning for Metro-North riders come the delivery of new rail cars in 2009 – 2010. We have much to do to prepare for their arrival… including an $800 million maintenance shop in New Haven that’s way, way over budget. But that’s the topic for a future column.

“The Critelli Commission”

The Governor’s “blue ribbon” commission studying the reform of the Department of Transportation, headed by (Darien resident and) Pitney Bowes Chairman Michael Critelli, has finally issued its draft report.

While much of the report addresses the dysfunctional organization of this immense agency, I am personally pleased that the Commission also picked up on some suggestions for improving rail service. Among them…

• Expanding parking at all rail stations, but leaving the towns to price and administer the issuance of permits.
• Revisit the Metro-North contract for the operation of our trains with an eye toward greater parity between the railroad and CDOT.
• Focus on the maintenance and repair of our railroad bridges, 206 of the 325 of which are rated as being in less than satisfactory condition.
• Better coordinate bus and rail schedules to offer riders of both an inter-modal transit experience.
• Evaluate an independent Transportation Authority (like the MTA or NJ Transit) which could serve the interests of mass transit apart from the highway interests which dominate our current CDOT. (Connecticut is the only state in the union that runs mass transit out of its DOT).
• Speed up construction of commuter rail on the New Haven to Springfield corridor.
• Expand service on the Danbury, Waterbury and Shore Line East branch lines.
• Finally do something to offer a rail freight alternative in Connecticut.

But, beyond rail, the Critelli Commission also suggested some ideas to make CDOT more “user friendly”, following the lead of other states.

• Have a website where consumers can actually find information. For example, when construction projects are scheduled and, if they are running late, why and when they’ll be completed.
• Offer a 511 dial-in service for all traffic and transit updates. Using such a service a traveler could ask “If I leave Stamford right now, how long would it take under current conditions to get to New Haven?”, and be told travel time by road and rail.
• Finally, the Critelli Commission deserves commendation for embracing an often forgotten transportation alternative… pedestrians and bikers. Think of how many additional auto parking spaces could be found at stations if bike paths and bike lockers were available at stations for local commuters… or even sidewalks to walk safely to mass transit.

The Critelli Commission report is now added to that ever-growing pile of studies and reports on what ails our state’s transportation systems. Nay-sayers will claim this study, like scores before it, will add up to nothing. But I’m an eternal optimist and feel otherwise.

If the current national search for a new Commissioner of the DOT turns up someone with organizational skills and vision, the Critelli Commission’s recommendations could become a roadmap to our future.

"A Report Card for Metro-North"

True to its legislative mandate, the CT Metro-North Rail Commuter Council has just issued its annual report to Governor Rell, the legislature and MTA. The full 97 page report is available on our website, but here are the highlights.

The Council gives the railroad high marks for running an on-time system despite our aging and decrepit fleet. In 2007, 97.1% of all trains ran “on-time” (defined as arriving at their destination within five minutes and 59 seconds), a new record.

When things have gone wrong, such as several wires-down episodes, the railroad got things up and running again with admirable speed.

The problem is, such an on-time record makes commuters expect such service, and when things go wrong, they need to understand why. Here is the railroad’s greatest shortcoming.

Communication with passengers on the platforms, on the trains and through the media is spotty at best. While automated PA announcements have improved, passengers stuck on delayed trains can’t rely on train crews for updated information.

In several cases last year, trains were delayed for several hours. Passengers seeking information from on-board crew members not only didn’t receive it, they found conductors hiding from customers in their control-cabs. This is just wrong, and while the railroad says it agrees with the Council, these problems persist.

Metro-North’s new e-mail alert system and website seem the most reliable sources for updates, but in several incidents CDOT confused the situation by sending out conflicting e-mails. By “trying to help” they just messed up communications.

In its work with the railroad, the Council has encountered similar problems. Senior management of Metro-North has, on at least two occasions, responded to the Council’s efforts to improve communications with an attitude of arrogance and denial. We should all be on the same side, not adversaries.

On a positive note, the Council’s efforts did bring about positive change for commuters… halting the plan to dump morning rush-hour riders on unheated, unsheltered platforms all winter for the sake of needed catenary work… replacing an ill-conceived $1 per ticket fare surcharge with a 1% fare hike for each of seven years starting in 2010… persuading MTA not to ban alcohol sales at stations and on bar-cars… convincing the railroad to add more service on the growing Waterbury line… and getting Metro-North to add a special e-mail alert system for branch riders.

Best of all, design and construction moves forward on the new M8 cars, still due to start arriving in August of 2009. These will truly be world-class rail cars, delighting passengers and adding badly needed seats.

But one huge unresolved problem is that of station parking. With new seating capacity coming down the track, the Council remains concerned that nothing is being done to add more parking at stations to encourage ridership.

Sure, a new station is planned in Fairfield with 1,500 parking spaces, but there are already 3,400 commuters on the waiting list for annual permits there. A new garage is planned in Stamford to replace the old one which must be demolished, but the private / public partnership building it remains a mystery and despite numerous requests, the Council can get no information about the design or local traffic flow. Waiting lists for parking permits at most stations run three to four years.

Finally, it’s been 18 months since the Commuter Council launched its “Fix My Station” campaign documenting dozens of stations with safety issues, yet the $6 million allocated by the state to repair these hazards remains unspent. Why?

Commuters in Connecticut deserve better, and the Commuter Council will keep fighting to make sure they get it.

Catenary vs Third Rail

The Commuter Council’s recent battles with CDOT and Metro-North to keep winter service from the existing platforms was prompted by the multi-million dollar catenary replacement program… like trying to change the fan-belt on a moving car. But why fix this flawed system instead of converting to third-rail? Here’s the story…

Ours is the only commuter railroad in the US that operates on three modes of power… AC, DC and diesel. On a typical run from, say, New Haven to Grand Central, the first part of the journey is done “under the wire”, the trains being powered by 13,000 volt AC overhead wires, or catenaries. Around Pelham, in Westchester County, the conversion is made to 660 volt DC third rail power for the rest of the trip into New York. Even diesel trains must convert to third-rail as their smoky exhaust is banned in the Park Avenue tunnels.

And there’s the rub: Connecticut trains need both AC and DC, overhead and third-rail, power pick-ups and processors. That means a lot more electronics, and added cost, for each car. While the DC-only new M7 cars running in Westchester cost about $2 million each, the dual-mode M8 car being designed for Connecticut will cost $3 million each.

So, some folks are asking… “Why not just use one power source? Just replace the overhead wires with third-rail and we can buy cheaper cars.” Simple, hardly. Smart, not! And here’s why.

Ø There’s not enough space to lay a third-rail along each of the four sets of tracks in the existing right of way. All four existing tracks would have to be ripped out and the space between them widened. Every bridge and tunnel would have to be widened, platforms moved and land acquired. Cost? Probably hundreds of millions of dollars, years of construction and unimaginable service disruptions.

Ø Even with third-rail the CDOT, would still be required to provide overhead power lines for Amtrak’s trains. That would mean maintaining two power systems at double the cost. We’re currently spending millions just to upgrade the eighty-year old catenary, so why then replace it?

Ø Third-rail AC power requires substations every few miles, meaning further construction and real estate. The environmental lawsuits alone would kill this idea.

Ø DC driven third-rail is less efficient. Trains accelerate much faster using overhead AC voltage, the power source used by the fastest trains in the world… the TGV, Shinkansen, etc. On third-rail speeds, are limited to 75 miles an hour vs. 90 mph under the wire. That means, mile for mile, commute time is longer using third rail.

Ø Third-rail ices up in bad weather and can get buried in snow, causing short circuits. Overhead wires have problems sometimes, but they are never buried in a blizzard.

Ø Third-rail is dangerous to pedestrians and track workers.

The idea of conversion to third-rail was studied in the 1980’s by consultants to CDOT. They concluded that, while cumbersome and costly, the current dual-power system is, in the long run, cheaper and more efficient than installing third-rail. This time, it seems, the engineers at CDOT got it right.

So like it or not, we’re stuck with this railroad anomaly. And work must continue on the catenary replacement. But that doesn’t mean Metro-North should send commuters to Siberia for the sake of their on-time performance. Let’s stick with existing platform operations adding the bridge-plates, even if it means trains are a tad late. At least we won’t freeze to death in the name of fixing the wire.

The Truth About Trucks

Two years ago, in my very first “Talking Transportation” column, I tried to dispel the myth that our highway problems are all caused by trucks. “Let’s Blame the Trucks” attacked that common wisdom with facts that didn’t win me many friends. But that’s hardly my goal in these musings.

Hardly a week goes by without some spectacular highway pile-up involving a truck. But check the facts and you’ll find most of those accidents were caused by motor cars, not the trucks drawn into the incidents.

Do trucks drive too fast? Sure, but don’t we all? Next time you’re on I-95 check who’s in the high-speed left lane and you’ll see cars, not trucks.

Should there be better safety inspections of trucks? Absolutely! And Senators Duff and McDonald deserve kudo’s for their long fight at keeping the Greenwich inspection station open more hours. So too do my friends at the Connecticut Citizens Transportation Lobby deserve credit for forcing better reporting on what those inspections turn up in the way of violations and fines ($2 million between July and December 2007).

But for every over-weight truck or over-worked truck driver there are doubtless hundreds of unsafe cars and equally road-weary warriors behind the wheel whose reckless disregard endangers us all.

Truckers drive for a living. They are tested and licensed to far more rigorous standards than anyone else. And because they drive hundreds of miles each day, overall I think they are far better drivers. When’s the last time you saw a trucker juggling a cellphone and a latte like many soccer moms?

And remember… they’re not out there driving their big-rigs up and down the highway just to annoy us. We put those trucks on the road by our voracious consumption patterns. Every product we buy at stores large and small, including the very newspaper you hold in your hand, was delivered by trucks. Want fewer trucks on the road? Just stop buying stuff.

By definition, trucks are high-occupancy vehicles. Compare the energy efficiency of a truck delivering its cargo to you in your “SOV” (single occupancy vehicle), even if it is a hybrid. Only rail offers better fuel efficiency.

Why are trucks jamming our highways at rush hour? Because selfish merchants required them to drive then to meet their delivery timetable. If big-box stores and supermarkets only took truck deliveries in the overnight hours, our highways would flow must better at rush hour.

Truckers must use the interstates while passenger cars can chose among many alternate routes. Why is the average distance driven on I-95 in Connecticut just eleven miles? Because most of us drive the ‘pike for local, not interstate trips.

If we were smart enough to “value price” our highways (ie return tolling) we’d see fewer vehicles of all kinds on I-95, and those that were willing to pay for the privilege of motoring there would get real value in a faster ride.

I’m hardly an apologist for the trucking lobby. But neither will I allow us to blame anyone but ourselves for highway safety and congestion. It’s the SOV crowd, not the truckers, who are to blame. Excessive speed and drinking cause most accidents, and the majority of accidents involve cars, not trucks.

Let’s be honest about this mess of our own making and stop trying to blame truckers as our scapegoat. As the great philosopher Pogo once put it, “We have met the enemy and he is us!”

CDOT's "Big Chill" To Commuters

Winter’s here… the time commuters dread the most. Will the trains run? Will they have heat? What if it snows? And now, a new worry… which platform will they depart on?

To continue with the needed caternary (overhead power-wire) replacement program (now ten years late and $100 million over budget), CDOT recently told commuters they’d have to board their morning rush hour trains from the opposite, or New Haven-bound, platform. Worse yet, this disruption to their morning routines would continue for four months!

When the CDOT announcement was posted at stations November 28^th, I called the agency in my capacity as Chairman of the Metro-North Commuter Council and asked, basically, “what are you thinking?!?” This was a major alteration with no notification to the Commuter Council and only days of notice to passengers.

I reminded the senior rail officials at CDOT that there is no shelter, no canopies or heat on those platforms. There are no amenities or vendors of coffee and newspapers, hard-working folks who could go bankrupt without business for four months. There are no ticket machines on the New Haven-bound platform meaning late-arriving passengers would be whacked $5 for on-board ticket purchases.

My CDOT contacts said “sorry, work must go on and this is the only way.” I said, “We’ll see”. And we did.

Members of the Commuter Council reached out to local elected officials warning them to expect some irate calls from constituents come Monday, December 4^th when the scheme was to go into effect. Using my professional PR skills, I got in touch with the media and told them what was afoot. Both of these efforts reached the Governor’s office, and in less than one day the plan was killed.

(Read Governor Rell’s press release on this issue and you’ll see an almost verbatim transcript of the Commuter Council’s media release. That kind of plagiarism I love!)

The Governor told CDOT to find an alternative plan to keep caternary work going and keep commuters warm. And CDOT did, quickly… announcing that bridge plates would be erected from Milford to Stamford, perhaps delaying trains by a few minutes. Everybody wins… especially commuters.

Why did CDOT attempt the “Big Chill” in the first place? Are these bureaucrats evil or stupid? In fact, they are neither. But they are focused on the business of running the railroad, sometimes forgetting the passengers those trains carry. They are also under-staffed, over-worked and dangerously distracted, waiting for the Governor’s Commission on the Reform of CDOT to issue its report and tell them if they still have a job.

I’d also suggest that many CDOT staffers are probably demoralized by the constant second-guessing they receive from Governor Rell, well intentioned as it may be. None of which is to excuse this amazingly crazy, ill-conceived plan to send commuters into the cold all winter for the expedience of contractors working on the wires.

So this winter when you’re waiting “dark and early” for your morning train, huddled in a heated waiting room with a cuppa Joe warming your hands, think of what might have been if the bureaucrats had got their way. And then you’ll understand why the Rail Commuter Council exists.

"How To Fix the RR Station Parking Shortage"

With new rail cars coming in 2009, now’s the time to plan for additional riders by giving them a place to park at nearby stations. As all commuters know, station parking today is a nightmare.

Many stations have a four- or five -year wait for annual permits, which can cost up to $650; and day-parking is expensive, if you can find it.

As I’ve explained before, parking at most rail stations is owned by the Connecticut Dept. of Transportation, but administered by the local towns. That’s why we’ve ended up with a crazy quilt of rules and pricing.

Take Rowayton for example. Every year annual permits are handed out on a first-come, first served basis one hectic Saturday morning in May. Nobody is “grandfathered-in”. Everyone literally waits in line, often all night, every year. This may seem fair, especially to newcomers, but it’s hardly an efficient way to manage a scarce resource.

I have a better idea: a Dutch auction. Spaces would start selling online on a certain date and time with the first permit going to the highest bidder in a 24-hour period. The second permit would go to the next highest bidder, etc. There’d be no preference to those who already have permits nor by town of residency. The scarce supply of spaces would moderate the demand by price. And there wouldn’t necessarily be an increase in parking rates. It’s just that the people who most want and need parking would pay more than those who need it less. Isn’t that equitable?

The truth is, most towns oversell their available spaces. In Westport they issue twice as many permits as there are spaces. Why? Because the permits are too cheap and there’s never a time when everybody who has one tries to park on the same day. People hoard their annual permits, renewing them even if they don’t use them regularly.

True confession: I have an annual parking permit in Darien that costs me $288. Having waited four years to get it, I’m not likely to give it up, even though I use it only one or two days a week.

Is that fair to the daily commuter who needs that space but hasn’t risen to the top of the waiting list because guys like me won’t let go? Probably not. But unless my town raises parking permit prices and squeezes my greed out of the equation, I’ll keep hanging onto my permit. An auction would change that. My space would go to the highest bidder, not the weasel (like me) who thinks he “paid his dues” by waiting on the list for a few years and deserves tenure.

I’m all for keeping parking “affordable”. The problem is, it’s too affordable. We should let the marketplace define the price of affordability, and that’s what an auction would do most efficiently.

Of course, the real solution is to add more parking spaces. When CDOT tried adding a few spaces in Rowayton a few years back, they were pilloried. When they came to Darien and proposed more parking at Noroton Heights, they were booed out of town.

More parking is planned in New Haven, the soon-to-be-built stations in West Orange and Fairfield and another deck will be added atop the existing lot in Bridgeport. But for the most southern part of the line between Norwalk and Greenwich, no new lots are in sight.

Everybody claims to want more parking… just not in their town where it will add to traffic. We all dream we’re living in the country but really want big-city amenities. Clearly, we can’t have it both ways.

CDOT spent five years and millions of dollars studying this issue, but the resulting “Rail Governance Study” recommendations have yet to be acted upon. I wonder why.

"No January Fare Surcharge, But..."

There’s good news and bad for Connecticut riders of Metro-North. The good news is there will not be a $1 per ticket fare surcharge effective January 1^st 2008. The bad news is… instead there will be a 1% fare hike for each of seven years, starting in 2010.

Why are we even talking about fare increases on Metro-North when service often rivals that of a third world nation? Because 300+ expensive new rail-cars are coming and lawmakers want riders, for the first time, to bear some of their cost in their fares.

Previously, all capital cost improvements to the roads and rails were borne by taxpayers. But in 2005, to appease up-state legislators resentful of all us “Gold Coast fat-cats” getting billions of dollars in long-overdue investment in new rail cars, our local lawmakers gave a bi-partisan thumbs up to a $1 per ticket surcharge for Metro-North riders. To her credit, Governor Rell promised nobody would pay more until new cars were in service.

But the first few new cars won’t be here until 2009, and in any sizable numbers not until 2010. So that made a January ’08 fare surcharge problematic to the pols who want to keep their promises.

In addition, a flat $1 per ticket surcharge is grossly unfair, penalizing those we most want to attract to the rails, the intra-state rider. If it now costs $2.25 to go from Fairfield to Stamford, with the surcharge it would’ve cost $3.25, a 44% fare hike! But a rider from New Haven to Grand Central now paying $18.50 would only have had a 5% fare jump with a buck surcharge.

To lawmakers, the $1 surcharge seemed like such a simple solution. But when they heard from angry commuters, they back-tracked faster than a Danbury-bound locomotive on a slippery-track. The Governor asked Senators McDonald and Nickerson to crunch the numbers and come up with a better plan.

Their solution, the 1% fare hike for each of seven years, but not starting until 2010 seemed a done-deal, or so they told the Commuter Council this summer. Then came the bonding-bill impasse in Hartford with Democrats and Republicans both blaming each other for holding up a variety of necessary spending packages. Finally, last month, an agreement was reached and the plan was approved. But at what cost?

This latest $2.8 billion bond package is now added to our state’s existing $13.9 billion indebtedness. That gives our affluent state the third highest per capita debt load in the nation.

Each year, 11.5% of the state’s budget pays interest on those loans. In the Department of Transportation, 40% of their budget goes to debt service on bonds issued to fix our bridges after the Mianus River Bridge 20 years ago.

Why are we asking our grandchildren to pay for railcars that we’ll ride, but which may be worn out before they’re paid for?

"The Commute From Hell"

If misery loves company, riders on Metro-North often delight in tales of their commuting woes. Here are a couple of recent incidents that are real doozies.

On September 27^th, the 4:50 pm Shore Line East “Silver Streak” from Stamford to New Haven made it just past Norwalk before the engine gave out. After 15 minutes, the conductor told passengers they were “working on” the diesel and that if it couldn’t be fixed, a replacement would be sent. An hour after the break-down, word came “a new engine is on its way”. After another hour (the delay now totaling two hours and fifteen minutes), the engine arrived from New Haven and the train lumbered as far as Bridgeport before further inexplicable delays.

In the meantime, passengers were in limbo with no communications. Not seeing any sign of a conductor, passengers roamed the three-car set seeking answers. One rider even commandeered the PA system asking “Does anybody know what’s going on?” Turns out the one lone conductor on the three-car train had taken cover in his booth!

Metro-North later apologized for the lack of communications and the conductor was chewed out for hiding rather than helping.

Then, just last week, a Danbury-bound train was similarly stalled-out, this time brought to a halt by slippery leaves. Branch riders had been warned that day they may have to take busses part of the way home due to the annual ritual of decomposing wet leaves and the steep grade combining to make even a multi-ton locomotive lose the friction war with Mother Nature.

So, on Friday October 26^th, the 5:16 out of Stamford rolled out on time but never made it past Branchville. Try as it did to make it up the hill, several times, the train eventually gave up, dumping all of its weary riders in the tiny hamlet where a bus transfer was promised. An hour and 45 minutes later, one bus arrived. It was immediately filled, leaving a hundred passengers on the platform. A second bus didn’t show up for more than a half-hour. Mind you, all this was happening in the rain.

As one commuter recounted, “Not once (during the entire time) did the conductor make one announcement as to what was going on.” Once again, passengers were calling Metro-North’s help line to find out was happening on their train while being ignored by the onboard staff. When passengers finally tracked down the conductor he was, you guessed it… hiding in his booth. He claimed there was a PA problem, though he never walked through the three car train to explain what was going on.

If this is what happens when a train is brought to its knees by wet leaves, imagine what would happen in a real emergency? How would passengers know how to evacuate a train or deal with the injured when the lone conductor in the crew is too afraid to face the paying public?

I’ve written at length about conductors who neglect to collect tickets from all riders, but incidents like these lose the railroad more than money. They cost Metro-North credibility, goodwill and any confidence commuters might still have that things will ever get better on their commute from hell.

We can, perhaps, understand it when something mechanical breaks down. But the breakdown in communications is inexcusable. Maybe the conductors are tired of having to apologize for delays and such. That’s too bad. As the face of the railroad it is always their job to explain what’s happening and keep riders informed.

That incidents like these happen more and more often, tells me that Metro-North has some serious training problems… no pun intended.

Aboard Amtrak's Southwest Chief

A few weeks ago I wrote about the miseries of air-travel, pledging to do all I could to avoid the “not-so friendly skies”. Well, being a man of my word, I’m writing this column en route to LA by Amtrak on “The Southwest Chief”.

Chicago’s Union Station is a busy place on the Saturday of my departure on Amtrak’s crack train to KC, AZ and LA. Amid the bustle of downtown-bound suburbanites entering the station off METRA commuter trains, an opposite flow of older “land cruisers” gathers in Amtrak’s Metropolitan Lounge for my and other trains all leaving within hours of each other.

Grand old railroad names like “The Empire Builder” (to Seattle), “The California Zephyr” (to San Francisco) and “The Texas Eagle” (to San Antonio) all vie for attention. Later the calls will go out for “The Capitol Ltd.” (to Washington), “Lakeshore Ltd.” (to NY and Boston) and “City of New Orleans” (to the Crescent City.)

At 2:45 PM the boarding call is made for our nine-car train: two sleepers, a diner, a glass-walled and ceiling observation car, three coaches, a crew dormitory and a baggage car. We board and settle-in. I’m in a deluxe bedroom with plenty of seating, a wash-basin and WC (which doubles as a shower). Located upstairs on this bi-level Superliner, I also have two windows.

Firing up my radio scanner I hear the conductor proudly announce an on-time departure at 3:15 as my sleeping car attendant offers me complimentary juice and coffee and the dining car chief, Moses, give me a 6:30 reservation for dinner.

Coach fare from Chicago to LA rivals the airlines, starting at $146. Mind you, it is a 31+ hour journey. But the bedroom costs another $1,034 under Amtrak’s new policy to allow demand to meet their limited supply of accommodations. Good for them, say I, though my ticket is free. Zip. Nada. A free ticket to ride 2256 miles, including all meals.

Thanks to their frequent rider program, Amtrak Guest Rewards, my many jaunts on Acela between Boston and Washington have added up to this free trip. How sweet!

As we roll thru rural Illinois, Iowa, Missouri and Kansas I play a game of trying to figure out where we are, looking for names on water towers and passing highway signs. These hamlets are small town America at its best. Kids gather near the tracks and waive as we roll by. I wave back.

As I have dinner on disposable plastic plates in the once-proud diner (hot food is only prepared on ”The Empire Builder”, the rest is nuked), the sleeping car attendant makes up my bed. A couple of Tylenol PM’s assure a good night’s sleep despite the rocky roadbed. Sunrise brings us to Colorado. Later, New Mexico, Arizona and finally California.

One of my favorite reasons to travel is meeting folks I’d never encounter otherwise. Like the lady from LA returning home from England after a round-trip on the Queen Mary. “I never fly. Ever,” she says with pride. Or the retired engineer from a railroad family who knows ever town on the route. “Over there’s an old TB Sanitarium,” he says, adding “It’s still used by the Feds”. We joke about renaming this town in the middle of nowhere Rendition CO and hypothesize about the nationality of the current “guests”.

If you really want to see our great country and meet some true Americans, get out of that middle seat in coach and try taking the train. Getting there is more than half the fun.

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JIM CAMERON has been a Darien resident for 15 years. He is Chairman of the Metro-North Commuter Council, a member of the Coastal Corridor TIA and the Darien RTM, but the opinions expressed here are only his own. You can reach him at jim@camcomm.com or www.trainweb.org/ct

Designing the new M8 Rail Cars

Some people say I’m a curmudgeon with never a nice thing to say about Metro-North or the CDOT… always complaining… too negative. Well, this column will change your mind. I have seen the designs for our new M8 cars on Metro-North and I’m ecstatic!

Much of the credit goes to renowned designer Cesar Vergara, who has commuted for years from Connecticut and recently spent many months riding the Harlem and Hudson line cars to learn from their successes and mistakes.

From the outside, our new cars will look much like those M7 cars running in Westchester and on the LIRR. But on the inside, it’s all first class… though it’s still two and three seating. The color scheme is deep burgundy and rich cream with frosted silver and aluminum.

The windows are bigger. The overhead baggage rack has a soft, scalloped look. The lights run the length of the car and are offset by oval accents in the vestibules. The floors are a non-skid rubber made in Germany.

There are single leaf doors instead of doubles. An overhead LED displays the next stop, complimented by an automated PA system. The crew can talk to each other on their own intercom and there’s a separate intercom for emergency use by passengers to contact a conductor.

Yes, the seats are still two on one side and three on the other, but they look much more comfortable. Covered with naugahyde, each seat has its own headrest with airline style winglets to stop snoozers’ heads from landing on a neighbor’s shoulder. Between the headrests are grab bars to assist getting in and out. And wonder of wonders, the seats have an extra inch of “pitch”, or distance from the back of the seat to the next one. They will be soft, but not bucket-style as we now have.

The new M8’s will have vacuum toilets capable of holding five days of effluent, though pump-outs are promised more often… i.e., they shouldn’t stink. And thanks to ADA requirements, they’ll be roomy too!

Each train set will be equipped with GPS so it will always know where it is, as will the control room. Space is being built for the addition of WiFi gear, but none is planned for now pending a study with Amtrak.

Despite earlier plans to have cars share power conversion duties (with one car being powered by third rail and its mate fed by overhead catenary), all cars will now have both third rail and pantographs, but be permanently coupled in “married pairs”. New cars cannot run in train consists with the older M2’s, M4’s and M6’s.

AC traction motors will offer speedy acceleration and convert braking energy into generation of electricity to be fed back into the overhead wires. Because the new cars are heavier and there will be so many of them (300+), Metro-North and CDOT are worried about whether the existing power infrastructure can handle the load. (When the M7’s were first added to the Harlem division major upgrades to the power grid were needed).

The first eight cars will arrive in “early summer” 2009 for testing and acceptance by the end of that year. They’re being manufactured by Kawasaki in, of all places, Lincoln, Nebraska. Despite fears to the contrary, CDOT promises that the M8 maintenance facility will be finished by the time the first cars arrive.

Commuters can watch for a seat-drop in coming weeks with pictures and a chance for some final input on the design.

"I Don't Want To Fly!!!"

You won’t catch me on an airplane anytime soon. Well, maybe for a business trip to Europe (though another crossing on the Queen Mary II would be nice). No, I’m sorry, but the airlines have lost this road warrior as a customer. It’s back to Amtrak, driving or tele-conferencing.

It’s not that I’m afraid of flying. It’s not even the proctological screening by the TSA (though now I hear that cigarette lighters aren’t the terrorist threat we were told they were… but meantime, air cargo still flies unscreened.)

No, it’s the airlines that are at fault. After years of heavy losses, they have down-sized their planes and their service to the point that a trip on Greyhound seems more fun.

This summer is shaping up to be the worst in aviation history. On-time arrivals hover at 68% and are plummeting. Sure, the carriers blame the weather and antiquated FAA equipment, but that’s only part of the problem.

To save money, the airlines fly smaller aircraft, almost guaranteeing a full plane. And schedules are so tight, if there is a delay, forget about finding room on “the next flight.”

When flights are delayed, the horrors begin. You’ve heard the stories… passengers trapped on planes for hours, the AC turned down to save fuel, as planes await their slot for departure. Toilets backing up, no running water, passengers swelter… wouldn’t this be illegal if the cargo were cattle rather than humans?

Flight crews are also at the breaking point. Underpaid to begin with and now vastly over-worked with planes flying 90% full, the flight attendants are starting to crack. On one delayed flight a flight attendant had a mother and her baby ejected because the child kept saying “Bye, bye”. The stew said to the mom, “You’ve got to shut your baby up!” The mother couldn’t, so she and her child waved “bye, bye” to the plane from the terminal. How’s that for “the friendly skies?”

Not that things are much better in first class. Sure, the seats are a bit bigger, but long gone are the days when flying up-front meant a hot meal. On most carriers it’s the same crappy snacks, but in unlimited proportions. Gee, should I go for a third bag of pretzels or try a granola bar?

Access to airline lounges, while still an imperative to get away from the maddening throngs, grows more expensive and less rewarding. In Denver, United saves money by opening only one of its two Red Carpet Clubs meaning a half-mile walk for your free Diet Coke.

Sorry, but the airlines have lost me as a customer. I’ll enjoy an overnight sleeper on Amtrak rather than play on-time roulette at O’Hare. This spring, after being stranded in Charlotte with the promise their “might be” a flight in a day or two, I rented a car and drove home. Twelve straight hours on the interstate beat sitting around that fetid airport with five thousand weary fellow-travelers.

Flying used to be glamorous. Now it’s just tedious.

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JIM CAMERON has been a Darien resident for 15 years. He is Chairman of the Metro-North Commuter Council, a member of the Coastal Corridor TIA and the Darien RTM, but the opinions expressed here are only his own. You can reach him at jim@camcomm.com or www.trainweb.org/ct

"Summers In The Toll Booth"

One of my earliest exposures to transportation was a summer job in the industry. For three of my college years I spent my summers working as a toll collector for the NY State Thruway, both on the Tappan Zee Bridge and at the New Rochelle toll barrier. It wasn’t the sexiest of gigs, but the pay was good and I sure learned a lot about people on the road.

Like the elderly couple who came to my booth in Tarrytown asking “which exit is Niagara Falls?” Consulting my official NY Thruway Map (remember those?) I said, “That’s exit 50, sir.” Reassured they were heading in the right direction they then asked “Is that exit on the right or left?” I responded, “Bear right for 389 miles. You can’t miss it”

I had my share of celebrities while working at the Tappan Zee. One day an old jalopy pulled up and I immediately recognized the driver. “You’re Derwood Kirby!,” I said, recognizing the co-star from the old Gary Moore show. “Right,” he replied. But before I could ask for an autograph he asked, “Which exit for Nyack?” Gobsmacked by my brush with stardom I stuttered, “Exit 10”, and sent him on his way.

The Woodstock festival happened one of my summers in the booth. Of course, nobody expected a half-million kids would show up for the upstate event, especially the folks at the Thruway. But after the rock fest was well underway, the Thruway brass realized the mobs would eventually be heading home, clogging the bridge. Because the music was expected to end late on Sunday, many of us temp-collectors worked overtime into the wee hours of Monday morning.

Of course, the music didn’t end until Monday, meaning that the usual morning rush hour carried as many burned-out hippies as it did business commuters. I remember one station-wagon that pulled in to my lane, caked in mud up to the windows and stuffed with a dozen zonked-out kids. “Hey man,” said the driver with eyes that struggled to focus. “We don’t have any money” (to pay the 50 cent toll). “How about these instead?” That day, the Tappan Zee toll was an orange and a warm Coke.

Most days, life as a toll collector on the Tappan Zee was a delight, as I was usually assigned the outside lane, also known as “the country club” because of its green vistas and views of the mighty Hudson River. But then, as luck would have it, I was transferred to the night shift on the New Rochelle toll barrier.

Overnights on the New England Thruway (I-95) were dominated by trucks… hundreds of them. Most feared by all toll collectors was one vehicle that usually came through about 4 am… “The Chicken Truck”.

This flatbed truck was piled high with open chicken coops stuffed full of terrified live birds on their way to their demise at markets in New York City. Careening down the highway at top speed, the chicken truck left in its wake about a quarter mile of noxious effluent of chicken feathers and bird poop. So when the truck slowed to a stop to pay its toll, this cloud of noxious gas and seepage would continue into my lane.

As old-timer toll collectors would warn me, when “The Chicken Truck” chooses your lane, close your windows and door. Wait til the driver is ready with the toll money and open your door only wide enough to accept the cash, then seal yourself in the booth and don’t breathe!

Gee. And I thought the truck exhaust was bad!

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JIM CAMERON is Chairman of the CT Metro-North / Shore Line East Rail Commuter Council, a member of the Coastal Corridor TIA and the Darien RTM. The opinions expressed are his own and not necessarily those of the organizations on which he serves. You can reach him at jim@camcomm.com or www.trainweb.org/ct

Reforming the Connecticut DOT

Once again, Governor Rell has taken a heavy, hands-on approach to running state government, big-footing her new commissioner by ordering a top-to-bottom reform of the trouble-child of state government, the Connecticut Department of Transportation. Good for her.

It wasn’t enough that she once publicly spanked the former Commissioner, Stephen Korta, for his agency’s messy handling of the used-Virginia commuter-rail car debacle. Or that she was embarrassed by the recent scandal over the $60 million I-84 drainage system. Or that we were all surprised that CDOT had secretly decided it could cut back on bridge inspections, ignoring the lessons of the Mianus River Bridge disaster 20+ years ago.

(For a fascinating, yet depressing, history of the CDOT, click here for a recent commentary in the Hartford Courant.)

Now the Governor has created a panel to completely reorganize CDOT. And they have ‘til December 1st to issue their recommendations. Headed by Pitney Bowes Chairman Michael Critelli, the panel is a strange mix of state bureaucrats, lawyers and business people, with no apparent outside experts in organization or transportation.

But, as they undertake their Sisyphean task, I hope they will give serious consideration to carving out a new agency: The Connecticut Transit Authority or CTA.

Until 1969, Connecticut used to have separate agencies for highways, transportation, aeronautics and steamships. Then they were all subsumed into the Department of Transportation, or as I think of it, the “Department of Asphalt and Concrete”. Highways always have and always will reign supreme at CDOT.

According to the widely respected Tri-State Transportation Campaign, in 2005 CDOT spent 76% of state transportation improvement money and 84% of Federal “flexible funds” on highways… at the same time Metro-North was at a near meltdown. While other states, like California, long ago halted new highway construction in favor of mass transit, CDOT lumbers on building new roads.

The six year, $1.5 billion expansion of the Q Bridge in New Haven will, by CDOT’s own admission, relieve traffic congestion for only three years before the I-95, I-91 intersection is again clogged tight. Those years of construction mess and billions of dollars will yield what?

But take that same money and invest it in expanded Shore Line East rail service and we’d relieve congestion on I-95 for decades.

While the Governor and legislature deserve credit for finally committing $3.6 billion to transportation in the last three sessions, we simply cannot trust the CDOT to allocate and administer those funds for mass transit without breaking out that priority under a separate agency.

Connecticut is the only state in the union that runs its buses and commuter trains out of its Department of Transportation… and it’s clearly not because we have some extraordinary vision or expertise. Transit, airports and water-borne transportation would all be better served by again being carved out of the CDOT and given their own budget, staff and goals.

As it stands, CDOT’s highway focus has pretty-much sublet our rail future to our vendor, Metro-North and its parent, the MTA in New York. We pay them to run our trains, set our schedules and even design our new M8 rail-cars… all without a vote on either board. We write the check but they call the tune.

Under-staffed and over-burdened, the few dedicated CDOT staffers working on bus and rail issues don’t stand a chance in an agency so clearly dominated by highway interests.

In its earliest deliberations five years ago, the state-wide Transportation Strategy Board considered creating a CT Transit Authority, but succumbed to the entrenched highway interests. Last session in the legislature a bill was introduced to reconsider the idea, but the Transportation Committee decided to wait a year.


Now’s the chance for real reform of the CDOT, and I hope the Critelli Commission seriously considers the potential for a CTA. Let’s get our trains and buses, our stations and ferries out from under the highway department!

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JIM CAMERON has been a Darien resident for 15 years. He is Chairman of the Metro-North Commuter Council, a member of the Coastal Corridor TIA and the Darien RTM, but the opinions expressed here are only his own. You can reach him at jim@camcomm.com or www.trainweb.org/ct

"Bridge Inspections: The Unlearned Lessons of Mianus"

In June of 1983 a 100-foot section of the Mianus River Bridge in Greenwich collapsed. Three people were killed, three others injured and a major stretch of I-95 was left in turmoil for six months during reconstruction.

The engineering reasons for the collapse were simple… rust and corrosion. But the NTSB investigation of the collapse also blamed inadequate inspections by the CDOT.

In the early 1980’s the state was in financial difficulty. Budgets for state agencies were being cut… and so were corners. CDOT had only 12 inspectors on staff for more than 5000 bridges. Had Mianus been inspected more often and more diligently, perhaps that tragedy would have been averted.

Fast forward to 2007. State coffers are flush with cash. In fact, we have a surplus of more than a $900 million. And transportation is a top priority for Hartford. Or so we thought.

Just days ago, The Hartford Courant broke the news that the CDOT had cut back on bridge inspections over the past four years “to save money”. Rather than inspect all the state’s bridges every two years, those structures rated as “fair” would be inspected only every four years. Admittedly, bigger bridges (more than 100 feet in height) and those carrying heavy loads would still be looked at every two years, but does cutting back on inspecting our bridges make any sense?

Amazingly, this move to cut inspections had apparently been blessed by the Federal Highway Administration which, you’d think, would remember back to what happened in 1983.

All our neighboring states mandate inspections every two years, so why did CDOT start pinching pennies here? And more importantly, why didn’t anyone know?

Governor Rell certainly didn’t know, judging by her speedy response to the news accounts. (She’s immediately ordered CDOT to return to inspecting all bridges every two years.) Senator Donald DeFronzo (D – New Britain), co-chair of the legislature’s watchdog Transportation Committee says he didn’t know about the CDOT cutback until the Hartford Courant came calling. But the ranking member of the Transportation Committee, Rep. David Scribner (R – Brookfield) said he had been told of the plan a year ago and trusted CDOT’s decision.

Mind you, none of those lawmakers are civil engineers. Nor am I. But if the policy for reduced inspections made sense, CDOT sure didn’t try to convince anyone by disclosing the move publicly.

If CDOT felt that “saving money” was a greater priority than safety inspections on the highways, how about the trains? Has Metro-North’s recent spate of wires-down incidents been tied to cost savings? What about our decrepit stations? Where else have corners (and budgets) been cut?

The sins of the past still haunt us. The billions of dollars in bonding issued after the Mianus disaster are yet to be paid off: forty percent of CDOT’s annual budget pay debt service on those bonds.

Connecticut is one of the richest states in the union. Yet, we carry one of the highest per-capita debt loads. Our grand children will curse us when these bills come due… unless they decide to roll those debts over another generation or two. So much for “the land of steady habits”.

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JIM CAMERON has been a Darien resident for 15 years. He is Chairman of the Metro-North Commuter Council, a member of the Coastal Corridor TIA and the Darien RTM, but the opinions expressed here are only his own. You can reach him at jim@camcomm.com or www.trainweb.org/ct

"Next Stop Penn Station?"

Will Connecticut rail commuters someday be able to travel directly from Fairfield County to New York City’s Penn Station? Someday… but not anytime soon.

As with many good ideas that seem so obvious, this one also has been studied thoroughly and found to be problematic in a number of respects. But once again, Governor Rell is challenging the Connecticut Department of Transportation to explain why good ideas like this can’t be implemented. Here, Governor, are a few of the reasons:

INADEQUATE EQUIPMENT: As any commuter on Metro-North can tell you, we don’t have enough seats for existing service to Grand Central let alone expansions to new stations. But now the Canadian rail-car manufacturer Bombardier, having lost the bidding war for the new M8 cars to Kawasaki, is lobbying Hartford to fund railcars we never asked for… double-decker cars with push-pull electric locomotives. They’d be perfect for new express service to Penn Station, they claim. Those cars may work in New Jersey, for which they were designed, but were long ago rejected by the Connecticut DOT for good reasons.

Now, I’m all for getting more rail cars. (Full disclosure, I’m a Canadian by birth). But why are we turning to a rail car vendor to tell us what kind of equipment we should run, and where?

ELECTRICITY: Our existing fleet of MU cars cannot take a left turn at New Rochelle and head over the Hells Gate Bridge onto Long Island, then hang a right, in through the tunnels into Penn Station. The cars’ overhead power catenary system operates under a different voltage than Amtrak. And in third rail territory on Long Island, our cars use a different kind of shoe to contact the third-rail power source. The proposed 2009 experimental direct train from Connecticut to Giants Stadium in New Jersey that was announced with such fanfare last week will actually be run with New Jersey transit railroad equipment.

CAPACITY: Even if we had the cars with the right electrical equipment to make it over the Hells Gate Bridge and through the tunnels to Penn Station, there’s no room in the station. For years now, the MTA has stalled our discussions about direct service to Penn Station, claiming there is no capacity… that the station is full-up serving Amtrak, the Long Island Railroad and NJ transit. Only if and when the $6.3 billion East Side Access project bringing some Long Island Railroad trains into Grand Central is completed many years from now, says the MTA, will there be room for any Metro-North trains to access Penn Station.

Once again, Connecticut is being told by the New York MTA what its transportation future will be. And Connecticut still has no say in the matter nor voting seat at the table, either on the MTA or the Metro-North boards. Connecticut may be the MTA’s largest customer, hired by CDOT to operate Metro-North trains in our state, but when it comes to important decisions, like expanding rail service to Penn Station, the MTA is clearly in control.

Years ago Governor Rell acknowledged the inequity in this position, and promised to fight for a seat on the MTA board. One might ask… what happened to that fight? Why, Governor, is a New York agency still in charge of Connecticut’s transportation future?

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JIM CAMERON has been a Darien resident for 15 years. He is Chairman of the Metro-North Commuter Council, a member of the Coastal Corridor TIA and the Darien RTM, but the opinions expressed here are only his own. You can reach him at jim@camcomm.com or www.trainweb.org/ct

Saving the Bar Cars

Score one for the commuters! The MTA has backed down on plans to prohibit the sale of alcohol at Grand Central and on the trains, thanks in part to the organized efforts of the CT Rail Commuter Council and a petition drive by bar car fans.

An MTA task force was studying possible prohibition at the urging of an LIRR board member, who was worried that the railroad might be liable for injuries caused by people who were drinking on the train. Board member Mitch Pally started his effort after a young woman died after she fell into the gap between a station platform and the train; the victim was found to have been drinking before the accident.

But it turns out that dozens of people have fallen into such platform gaps when they were stone cold sober, so our suggestion was to fix the gap… not penalize responsible adult commuters who enjoy having a beer on their way home by train. Led by commuter Council Vice Chair Terri Cronin, concerned commuters gathered over 4,000 petition signatures, which were presented along with her testimony before the MTA panel.

To their credit, CDOT officials also testified that even if the MTA plan went forward prohibiting alcohol sales, Connecticut would not enforce it. It's almost a two hour ride from Grand Central to New Haven, and given the crowding, lack of seats, smelly bathrooms and spotty AC, don't commuters deserve (if not need) a drink?

(Full disclosure; I haven't had a drink in over 20 years, but I'll surely fight to defend the right of adults to enjoy such beverages responsibly.)

The panel also heard from MTA police, who said that there have not been reports of unruly drunks on the trains or injuries caused by commuters driving home after time in the bar cars. Bartenders, both at the carts at Grand Central and on the bar cars themselves, are conscientious about sales. Not only do they proof for age, but will only sell one drink at a time.

All of this apparently impressed the MTA panel studying possible prohibition as their initial recommendation to the full MTA is to leave the sale of alcohol alone.

The MTA earned over $700,000 last year from such sales, double that earned on the Long Island Railroad. Not that Connecticut commuters drink twice as much, but we're the ones blessed with the only bar cars on any commuter railroad in the US.

In the mid-1970s, 20 bar cars were built... ten for New York and ten for Connecticut. The New York cars were later converted to coaches to increase seating capacity. But Connecticut's bar cars live on and are almost “the holy grail” of the railroad.

Nine of the original bar cars are left, but eight new bar cars are on order as part of the M8 purchase. But the older cars are really in sad shape, being held together with gaffer's tape, so they’re undergoing rehabilitation, one at a time. The first rehab’ed bar car should be in service this summer.

So, next time you're on the train, join me in a toast to the MTA, CDOT and America's only commuter-rail bar cars! Cheers!
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JIM CAMERON has been a Darien resident for 15 years. He is Chairman of the Metro-North Commuter Council, a member of the Coastal Corridor TIA and the Darien RTM, but the opinions expressed here are only his own. You can reach him at jim@camcomm.com or www.trainweb.org/ct

A Gas Tax Holiday This Summer?

Nobody likes to pay more for gas. But is the solution really the $120 million state gas tax “holiday” proposed by GOP lawmakers in Hartford, paid for from the $848 million budget surplus? Hardly! But as with the Democrats’ recent idea for free mass transit for senior citizens, who can argue against a “let them eat cake” style giveaway to residents.

Remember, these are your tax dollars we’re talking about. Rather than suggesting they actually be returned to you to spend, Hartford seems to think it knows best how to waste your money…

Like cutting the gas tax by 25 cents a gallon during the busy summer driving season. That would keep motoring cheap and subsidize further greenhouse gas emissions. But it would also cut funding to subsidize mass transit which is dependent on those taxes. Isn’t that a bit self-defeating, especially given we have the highest commuter rail fares in North America?

And those rail fares are going higher: effective January 1st 2008 we commuters face a $1 per ticket fare surcharge. Even the alternative plan from State Senators MacDonald and Nickerson would see a 7% fare increase by 2017 on top of whatever CDOT does to raise fares.

And why are rail commuters being asked to pay for the new rail cars? Bus riders don’t pay for buses and drivers certainly don’t pay for highway construction.

Here’s a better idea: why not use some of the $848 million budget surplus to eliminate the fare hike and keep mass transit affordable? Or accelerate the purchase of more new railcars? Or forgo some of their bonding so we actually pay for these cars, not our grand-children? Those would be investments in our transportation future, not a three-month escape from the reality of ever-climbing fuel prices.

This year’s legislative session began with promises of finally tackling the energy crisis. It remains to be seen if anything comes of those efforts. But clearly, offering freebies and handouts to short-sighted taxpayers is easier than making long-term decisions about our state’s energy and transportation future.

The near-annual effort to eliminate “zone pricing” for gasoline in the state was defeated, again, in the legislature. That means affluent towns’ high gas prices will continue to subsidize less well-to-do communities. But do we all really want to drive to Bridgeport to buy gas?

Subsidize gasoline and you only encourage consumption, driving those prices further upward. The way to lower gas prices is to decrease demand by getting motorists out of their cars and onto the train. Investing part of the state budget surplus in improving mass transit would help do that. But a short-lived summer holiday from gas taxes, like a beer binge on the beach, will only leave us with headaches.

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JIM CAMERON has been a Darien resident for 16 years. He is Chairman of the Metro-North Commuter Council, a member of the Coastal Corridor TIA and the Darien RTM, but the opinions expressed here are only his own. You can reach him at jim@camcomm.com or www.trainweb.org/ct

Wires Down !

Metro-North commuters take a lot for granted. Sure, the trains are crowded and you can’t always get a seat. Yes, the fares are the highest on the continent. We all know the bathrooms stink and the cars are being patched with gaffers tape. But at least they run on time… usually.

Wednesday April 25th was anything but “usual”. As the first train of the morning, the 4:12 from New Haven rolled through Cos Cob, its aging pantograph snagged the overhead power wire. A following train, maneuvering around the stranded train, also caught the caternary, bringing down further power lines. It was the worst of all complications at the worst of all times… the beginning of the morning rush. “Wires down” went out the call, at least to some.

While many parts of the New Haven line have caternary dating from the administration of Woodrow Wilson, this section of power lines had recently been replaced. The fault, it seems, was with the 35-year-old car. Nevertheless, the morning rush was going to be a nightmare.

The commuter cognoscenti immediately went to Plan B: rather than driving to their usual station, they made tracks for White Plains to catch the Harlem Line trains. Initial e-mail alerts from Metro-North were not optimistic, promising 2+ hour delays. Some commuters did as I did… stayed home and telecommuted.

But for folks already on the train or at the station, the options were few and the information scant and often contradictory.

At Stamford, the PA said that trains were running from Rye, a few miles down the line. Hoards of New York-bound commuters dashed for cabs only to be gouged $60 for the nine-mile trip. But once they got to Rye, no trains! Five deep, they lined the platform, looking up the line for telltale signs of action. “The train to NY will leave from the New Haven-bound side,” bellowed the PA. And like lemmings, hundreds crossed over only to see “their train” fly through on their original train without stopping. Back over to the original track, a train finally showed up at 8:20 am and they squeezed in like sardines.

At some stations commuters waited in their parked cars listening to radio reports which often contradicted what the automated PA was advising. “Buses are coming,” some were promised, though no buses arrived.

A ten-car train on Metro-North can hold 1,000 passengers. A bus can carry 50. With 80 trains delayed, you can do the math. And that’s assuming buses are even available, it being morning rush hour, or that they can make their way through now-jammed highways to get to stations. Substitute buses would never work.

Ironically, some of the best information that morning went straight to commuters’’ Blackberries from the MTA by way of their new e-mail alerts. If you’re not signed up for this free service, you should be!

At the Commuter Council’s next meeting, Wed. May 16th, we will conduct a detailed post-mortem on what went so terribly wrong that April morning. We’ll cast special attention on the communications problems, a perennial issue with Metro-North. We invite your participation, in person or by e-mail. Check our website for more details: www.trainweb.org/ct
Metro-North riders can tolerate a lot, if they’re kept informed so they can make decisions. Sadly, that didn’t happen. The next time the call goes out “wires down”… and there will be a next time… will things be any better?
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JIM CAMERON has been a Darien resident for 16 years. He is Chairman of the CT Metro-North / Shore Line East Rail Commuter Council, and a member of the Coastal Corridor TIA and the Darien RTM. The opinions expressed are only his own and not necessarily those of these organizations. You can reach him at jim@camcomm.com or www.trainweb.org/ct