When Transit Isn’t Transit At All

A couple of weeks ago, I shared some thoughts about transit projects being the ‘swimming pools of the 21st century’.

‘Shovels in ground’! Politicians come running.

‘Proportional funding arrangements’. Politicians, planners, consultants and other special interest groups gang up on advocates of a more universal approach and call them Luddites and knuckle-dragging elitists.

And then there’s St. Louis which planned an incredibly innovative line that … didn’t connect to anything.

This is a classic example of how demand for money leads projects.

And plunges them into the abyss of wasted money, bad infrastructure and poor planning.

Be careful what you wish for, bus advocates. You may well become the brunt of many jokes about government waste.