In my eight years in Washington, I have come to love its fabled streetcar project. I say “fabled” because as of this writing, we do not actually have any streetcars. No, wait, that’s wrong. We totally have streetcars. What we do not have are streetcars that actually ferry passengers hither and yon, rather than sitting in storage or going on endless test runs that all too frequently end in flames.
The best thing that you can say about the DC streetcar project is that, while it wasted hundreds of millions of dollars, the Democrats probably would have wasted that money anyway; and at least wasting it this way didn’t get anybody killed. …I think. I hope. I’m sure I would have heard of a streetcar-project-related fatality.
Via Instapundit.
Moe Lane
PS: Yeah, I know. That was my money. But fixing that problem is Step 5,542; and right now we’re on Step, what, 3 or something? There are limits to what I can get exercised over.
It will never see customer operations . Vote nce Frays dream but he ain’t mayor anymore
Amazing as somehow, someway, DC couldn’t handle the operation of what, a hundred plus year technology?
I would support legislation that restricts the number of boondoggles that any state/municipality may have active at any time. Lord knows that Folly’s are part of the human experience, but the number of Follies permitted at any one moment should be sharply regulated.
… is this related to http://ismetroburning.com .. and if so, in the worst possible way?
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… the same crews who cannot keep the D.C. Metro from catching fire are going to operate streetcars? On streets? With *CARS*?
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I’ve driven in D.C. It’s *crazy*! New York aggressive plus Portland stoners plus Chicago creative lane use plus L.A. self-centered idiocy … all on a city *deliberately* laid out to be confusing… and they want to add *streetcars* ?
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Just … wow.
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Mew
Back in the mid 1980’s we went on a family trip to DC. Dad was driving the old mid-1970’s Monte Carlo. Yes, people did not want him to merge – until he pushed that old piece of Detroit iron over. Then the BMW and Mercedes drivers found room for him. Amazing what a little bit of mass got you on the road (Right of Weight.)*
*Brother and family live in Maryland. I have driven there – at the best of times it is like trying to commute across the Detroit area at the worst of times.**
A knife fight! With cars! Cue up the West Side Story soundtrack!
**Detroit, its major roads, and the freeways that follow them, come from an abbreviated wheel and spoke design with Detroit the hub.
Yeah, getting southwest to northeast – or vice-versa….
I… don’t see that working as well with streetcars.
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That said, I drive an older pickup for similar reasons.
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The shiny-box-driving lawyer-wannabes do get out of the way when I start to merge.
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Meq