I see the posts not agreeing with you or the concept of the trolley, but I don’t think those could be considered “hateful”.

And quite frankly, most of the posts ARE informed. Again, you might not agree with them, but that doesn’t mean the posters are “uninformed”.

Cyclops: I’ve seen you on a bike, but never in a car. I doubt you own one. How can a avid bike rider be so supportive of cars?

Does the end of the age of the automobile mean the demise of our society?? You’ve got it backwards; the car was the demise of our society. It made us dependant on a costly, dangerous means of conveyance that rewarded us with an obese, weak, and sickly populace, and destroyed our social fabric. It forced us into servitude of the American Empire.

As oil prices rise again (discover ‘Peak Oil’ via Google) and choke off our economy, the car will fade into the dustbin of history and we will be better for it. The demise of the personal automobile is not the end, but a new, hopeful beginning.

It is rather disturbing that most of the posts on this site are extremely hateful, and equally uninformed.

Check out http://www.ntdprogram.gov/ntdprogram/data.htm to see what numbers Valley Regional Transit (and other systems) is reporting to the Feds.

Type Idaho (or any other state or city) in the search criteria under Annual Transit Profiles on the right side of the page and you’ll be able to get reports for Boise and other systems, like Pocatello, in Idaho.

The last time I took an in depth look at the Boise operation alone it was recovering about 10% of its operating costs from fares. Pocatello was about 12%.

Note that the numbers on the report are combined totals for both Boise and Nampa. To get specific numbers for the Boise operation (they aren’t pretty) you’ll need to contact Valley Regional Transit. The numbers for Nampa are downright ugly. Only the intercounty operations show some semblance of hope.

Dean,

Congress came through again last session for Boise and other small cities. Boise continues to receive, for FY 2008 and 2009, Federal operating assistance. About $ 500,000 per year. Last summer, if I recall correctly, VRT staff decided those newly found monies should go toward the Boise share of the Multi Modal Center without telling Hiz Honor. Hiz Honor was not pleased with that surprise particularly since it came in a public meeting. But now they’re both walking happily down the yellow brick road together again.

As to local option tax, it isn’t the only tax option in the tax toolbox. Just the one being pushed the most by the local politicians. The Feds probably really don’t care how a local system is funded only that there is local funding.

Tom Anderson,

Might want to check more into those “other cities.” You might change your mind (again).

Like how many of those cities are about Boise’s size (not the Metro area, Boise)? How many of those cities have a population density anywhere to close to Boise (probably none)? What do those streetcar and/or lightrail lines tie into at each end. Last time I looked we didn’t have anything even remotely resembling a METRA (Chicago) commuter rail line in Boise and Boise wasn’t a suburb to any large metropolitan area (like Chicago).

Bellevue, Washington (recently touted locally for its multi modal center) decided a number of years ago NOT to have a downtown circular at all let alone a rail based circulator. (http://www.bellevuewa.gov/downtown_circulator_study.htm). Recently they opted to contract with the Seattle transit big dog to provide rubber tired (read bus) circulator service.

Years ago (many years ago) COMPASS came up with the idea of a circulator between BSU and downtown. It was a simple concept using a simple rubber tired technology called a bus. That tidbit came from a COMPASS planner. The streetcar idea has been developed by the politicians who seem obsessed with anything rail.

If the “experts” recently said commuter rail (a whole nother cat) won’t work in the Valley what makes you (or others) think a streetcar will?

Sorry, but you’re hearing arguments that don’t even remotely apply to Boise. The streetcar is a really bad deal for all of us, especially the merchants who will have to pay the tax.

The irony is rich…………

https://boiseguardian.com/2008/12/30/economics-real-estate-tax-lesson/

Cars are HEAVILY subsidized in the following ways:

CHEAP GAS – Oil is cheaper per unit than bottled water and is kept cheap by our military efforts in the Middle East that consume over half of the federal budget.

POLLUTION – Cars create many types of pollution not only in the operation, but in the initial construction, and they are causing a substantial amount of the global warming gasses that threaten the planet.

DANGER – Cars are the most lethal product ever devised and would surely be deemed too dangerous to be produced and sold if judged by rational thought and the existing evidence.

NOISE – Cars create noise pollution which hightens stress and anxiety. Noise is the number one complaint in cities all over America.

NEGATIVE TRANSFORMATIVE POWER – Cars have created a sprawling infrastructure which is now totally dependant on cheap oil and widely available cars.

If the true impact of cars, and all of their externalities were considered, they would cost 5 or 10 times what they do to buy initially, and the gasoline to power them would be $15 to $20 a gallon.

Public transportation is cheap compared to the massive societal and environmental cost of the personal automobile.