Transit on Tuesday: The General Assembly Fail Edition
I don't think I've ever seen a group work so hard to do nothing. It was doing nothing taken to an art. They had since February to come up with something and they came up with nothing. It was like a 'Seinfeld' episode, the show about nothing. - Virginia Governor Tim Kaine
Well, we were planning to bring you some of the "highlights" from the recent special session of Virginia's General Assembly - but it seems that Marc Fisher of the Post beat us to it yesterday. But no hard feelings - Fisher's column is highly recommended reading for anyone out there, Virginians in particular, who feels slighted at the Assembly's ninth failure in just a few years to pass a transportation bill that does anything to alleviate the gridlocked status of Northern Virginia. The massively failed special session concerning Virginia Governor Tim Kaine's $1 billlion funding plan will end up costing taxpayers $117,000 - and it's believed that Kaine, hilarious soundbites aside, will give up the ghost and move on to energy and environmental issues when the Assembly next convenes in January. But as Fisher notes
...energy and transportation are essentially the same issue. Our heating and gas bills have a direct impact on our freedom to move around...By the time we're shelling out $6 for gas, the public's eagerness to see real movement toward energy independence and real alternatives to getting in the car will be far more powerful than it is today.No matter how right Fisher is, the key issue here is that the political schism between Northern Virginia and the rest of the Commonwealth creates an air-tight deadlock which prevents any progress from being made. The sooner both sides realize that transportation funding is tantamount and entwined with nearly every other major economic issue in this election cycle - jobs, commercial development, housing costs, the environment, gasoline consumption, and on and on - the quicker that movement, regardless of party, can be made. Also, it should be interesting to see how Virginia's status as a swing state in the upcoming Presidential election will affect the Assembly's next meeting in the winter - since the state's vote could be used as a mandate to represent either candidate's pro- and anti-transit ideals.
Since there's a significant financial and human ripple effect which flows through to both the District and Maryland, here's to hoping the Assembly and the Governor can solve their "Seinfeldian" conflicts.
photo by Bill Jones Jr.
Metro's Rolling Stock: Melodrama in Spades: You know, one of our favorite things about Metro is that there's seemingly no end to the intricate details you can learn about the system. The trains that we sit and stand in all the time are no exception - especially those Rohr trains that have been grinding the tracks since Metro's inception in 1976. For instance, did you know that the system's four money trains - which carry the deposits from farecard machines to drop boxes within the system - are numbered 8000 through 8003? Or that train number 1028, separated from its "mate" at the Federal Triangle incident in 1982, now has a role as the "feeler car," testing the system clearances? Perhaps our favorite is train 1076, which doesn't have anything going for it after its "mate" was lost in the accident at Woodley Park in 2004 - Metro's lovable loser, that train 1076.
So, really, we're just waiting for Pixar to do a movie based on a Metrorail car losing its "mate," finding redemption in some glorious way. Aww.
Engines and Cabooses: Phst, don't they know that Maryland drivers are Satanic beings, incapable of restraint?... AAA: Growing number of drivers over 65 causes unique challenges... Purple Line supporters take offense that the Chevy Chase Country Club purportedly runs a grassroots website campaign against the line... Metro looking to increase reserve bus fleet from 23 to around 100... D.C. considers raising fines for drivers who fail to yield to pedestrians, which we mentioned previously in May.