Two weeks back, we reported on the doomsday predictions of local rail advocacy group All Aboard Ohio: “Cleveland Rail Shutdown Unavoidable,” wrote the group’s Executive Director Ken Prendergast in a post which suggested that RTA wouldn’t have the funds to maintain its Blue/Green Line fleet in as few as five years.
At the time, RTA CEO Joe Calabrese called those predictions “absolutely false,” and told Scene — what else — that RTA had no plans to abandon either the Blue or Green lines, 100-year-old community assets.
RTA said that it was “exploring” whether or not a single rail car fleet could replace what is now two different and non-interchangeable fleets (Red and Blue/Green). If that were the case, the current 108 rail cars could be replaced by approximately 70.
Calabrese has now come out and said that, yes, he wants to raise $280 million to finance 70 rail cars at $4 million a pop. And the money that RTA is putting aside every year won’t come close to covering the cost. Calabrese said he’ll look to the state of Ohio and the Federal Government to help finance a new fleet, but one wonders what in the world makes him think Governor John Kasich will suddenly about-face and decide that public transit is a worthwhile investment.
In a 2014 study, the Ohio Department of Transportation found that the average state supports 20 percent of the cost of transit, while Ohio supports only one percent. One percent! The study recommended that Ohio increase its transit funding to 10 percent by 2015. And while Kasich proposed a modest increase in the current budget, that increase was not contained in the final budget bill. (FYI: Opportunity Corridor Price tag = $331 million).
Meanwhile, Prendergast reminded ideastream that every winter, the aging rail fleet reveals itself as a fleet in need of repair and replacement. “And that need is only going to grow more acute as time goes on,” he said.
This article appears in Oct 28 – Nov 3, 2015.
I took a friend from Europe on the rapid to downtown to see an Indians game. He looked at me and said, “You Americans call this a train!!??” I looked and shrugged, “Beats walking.” He said. “I would rather walk.”
How leftist: the government (the debt/taxpayer) should pay for it! As if other states and European debt loaded socialism is the way to go. Not a word about the failure of government run monopoly to turn profit and have proper funds and public transportation. Here is an idea: get rid of local red tape/’regulations’ and auction the whole RTA off on eBay.
Herpa derpa doo. Debt (on anything I don’t think the government should spend money on other than wars) is bad. Let the poors user uber like everyone else.
Here’s a hint you dolt, economies don’t function without infrastructure, and public transport in high density areas is part of that infrastructure.
What an idiot.
So, hi. Really finding it hard to believe that RTA couldn’t see any of this coming, and are just now coming to face the harsh reality of the status quo. They dropped the ball and didn’t manage funds well enough to do any sort of upgrades at all, so now someone has to bail them out and get this done? Look, public transportation is very important, and ours is basically crappy and run down, but how does no one in authority at RTA see this and realize what was happening? Only two options here: (1) They are crappy leaders who truly didn’t see this coming. Therefore, they are idiots and should be fired and flogged immediately, or (2) They saw it coming, and decided not to do anything until it got to “emergency disaster code C” levels, knowing that they could then use the level of emergency to get someone else like the state or feds to come in, finance, and fix everything. If they did this, they are horrible, horrible people and should be fired, flogged, and imprisoned as well.
What a mess. ****.