Pittsburgh politicians want to boot buses (again)

Pittsburgh PA - Every 10 years or so, some clown from the Pittsburgh City Circus (Council) comes up with some plan to boot buses off the streets the Downtown area. This time the honor of the "let's kill off transit" proposal goes to City Councilman William Peduto (D) who wants to get buses off the streets in the Downtown core. The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette reports this in a story on two candidates running for the position of Mayor.

Peduto offered his "vision" of Pittsburgh which was loaded with transportation plans. Of course there was the usual plan of linking Oakland to Downtown with some form of expensive rail line but what stood out was his plan to get the buses off the streets of Downtown.

His plan would have buses just enter and immediately turn back without going deeper into town. This would result in instant lawsuits against the Port Authority of Allegheny County (PAT), especially by disabled groups, who depend on the buses going deeper into town. Short turn routes were tried off and on over the years as well and failed dismally. Even though Pittsburgh's central core is relatively small, dumping people off on the outskirts of one side of town when they need to be on the other will not fly well.

Of course Peduto fails to deal with the true problem of congestion in the downtown core which is cars and trucks.

Current Mayor, Luke Ravenstahl (D), also has transportation visions. Again, some form of rail link between Oakland and Downtown although he is being purposely vague on his answers.

Both candidates for the mayor position want to use rail as a development tool rather than a transportation tool and neither proposed a direct route which is needed. That's a disaster in the making and is another way of saying, "I want to hike your taxes sky high". They'll have to if they use a rail line for development purposes, especially in this business unfriendly area of the country.

Let's look at a key point here. PAT can't afford what they have now and these two bozo's want to saddle the agency with even more expensive toys as well as drive off the already declining bus ridership.

All I can say is that from what I have seen of the "vision" both have for the area's public transit system, they are determined to destroy it.