21 Years Later: FASTRACKS vs. HOT Lanes
Born Ten Months Apart, FASTRACKs and HOT Lanes Went Different Directions. With a major new rail line on the ballot, now is a good time to review the two most consequential transportation developments of the past 25 years: RTD’s FASTRACKS and CDOT’s HOT/Express lanes. In August 2005, Congress authorized High Occupancy Toll Lanes—an idea […]
The Future of Transit is Not a Train, it’s a Market Opportunity
When the Front Range Passenger Rail Authority put a $295 million/year sales tax increase on the ballot (Issue 7A) to fund the Colorado Connector train (COCO), they posed the right question, but offered the wrong solution. Is there a multimillion dollar market opportunity to improve Front Range transportation? Yes! And the solution will probably be […]
Government Planners Nix Key Highway Expansions In Favor of Bike Lanes, Bus Travel
“Let them ride bikes,” say the transportation planners of the state’s most populated regional planning organization. The fallout from CDOT’s shift from an organization solely concerned with building and maintaining the state’s roads into a technocratic experiment in human behavioral engineering is beginning to take effect. From CPR News: The board of the Denver Regional […]
The Forgotten Stakeholders: “Green” Transportation Will Be Funded by Underpaid Workers
By Tegan Truitt Fourth blog in our series on the Colorado Green New Deal The indirect, and in some cases the direct consequences of the Colorado Green New Deal will not be pretty. Among the bills comprising this stream of environmental legislation is Senate Bill 239, which Governor Jared Polis signed into law on May 31, […]
RTD’s death spiral
Much of RTD’s problem stems from its mania for an obsolete form of transportation: trains.
Mass transit is collapsing everywhere
Nationwide transit ridership in March 2018 was 5.9 percent below March 2017, according to the latest data published by the Federal Transit Administration. Following three years of steady declines, these numbers present a dire picture of the nation’s transit industry. Ridership declined in all of the nation’s 38 largest urban areas (and the 39th, Providence, […]
Caldara’s Newsletter 03-23-17
Lately, I have felt very loved by the editorial section of the Denver Post! Regarding our proposal to force the state legislature to do their damn jobs and Fix Our Damn Roads by re-prioritizing an obscene, unimaginable 2% of the budget towards roads, the editorial board wrote, “What our bungled state budget doesn’t need is […]
RTD finally deserves a compliment
by Jon Caldara As you may know, I have a hard time giving RTD a compliment. But they’ve earned one. My political career started when I was elected to the Regional Transportation District board in 1994, where I later became chairman. I was quick to realize that not only does RTD do little to increase […]
Why rapid-buses are preferable to rail transit
Transit agencies from Baltimore to San Diego and from Seattle to St. Petersburg are planning new light-rail lines. Yet light-rail is not only vastly more expensive than buses, it is slower, less comfortable, less convenient and has lower capacities than a well-designed rapid-bus system. Being expensive to build, light-rail can only reach parts of a […]
Diminishing returns: time to end public transit subsidies
Rail advocates often call me “anti-transit,” probably because it is easier to call people names than to answer rational arguments. I’ve always responded that I’m just against wasteful transit. But looking at the finances and ridership of transit systems around the country, it’s hard not to conclude that all government transit is wasteful transit.
Taking the Trolley, er, Light Rail
by Rob Natelson Commuting by car from my home in Lakewood to the Independence Institute usually takes an intense 18 minutes—25 minutes in heavy traffic. But today I decided to take “light rail.” I use the term “light rail” somewhat awkwardly. When I was growing up, I was taught to call it the “trolley,” and […]
The Breakdown of America
A nation’s health and prosperity depends on good institutions. These institutions are political and private. Good political institutions include balanced government with a significant amount of popular control, the rule of law, freedom from corruption, and respect for individual rights. Good private sector institutions include free and open markets and positive moral codes in religious […]