Milwaukee WI - Milwaukee Wisconsin once had one of the stand out transit operations in the United States. Today it's barely a shell of it's former glory. There are many reasons for this but most hinges on politics.
Over the past several years there have been numerous proposals to introduce some other form of transit to the Milwaukee area besides buses. These included heavy rail, light rail, trackless trolleys and now the latest, streetcars.
OnMilwaukee.com's web site has a story about the latest proposal, filled with the usual rail proponent verbiage about how trolleys will save the city.
Milwaukee is one of the cities which I often cite as being barely can handle bus operations anymore. It's glory days are gone but those in politics feel if you just spend more taxpayer money on expensive transit projects, people will flock back to the city.
Of all the proposals brought up over the years, none addressed the key point that the existing transit system has problems. The warning buzzer went off for me on this latest proposal when I read that Alderman Robert Bauman stated that they don't care about fares but view the project as an "economic development tool".
What this means in layman terms is this. The transit system will get saddled with the costs of building and running this line and the bus service can go to hell just as long as the trolley line can be run.
The Milwaukee Alderman, Robert Bauman, gets the Lance for going out of his way in trying to find some way to just waste taxpayer money instead of addressing the problems that need to be addressed with the transit system in Milwaukee.
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