Rest easy Jack, the City of Vancouver is universally loathed outside downtown - the folks up there would sooner raid city hall with pitchforks than go along with a streetcar - or light rail for that matter.

What the public wants and what the City Council does couldn't be more disconnected, as Portland proves again and again.

I hope someone tells them that the actual cost of the streetcar is about 5 times that of the best Trimet bus line, 4 times that of MAX and over 6 times the cost of driving:

Streetcar.................$1.67 per passenger-mile (no construction cost)
MAX........................$1.11 per passenger-mile ( with construction)
Bus (system avg).....$0.84 per passenger-mile (no road construction)
MAX........................$0.43 per passenger-mile (no construction cost)
Bus (best line).........$0.34 per passenger-mile (no road construction)
Driving....................$0.25 per passenger-mile (inc. most construction)

See DebunkingPortland.com/Transit/Cost-Cars-Transit(2005).htm for the data, all from government sources.

Thanks
JK

"The trip will "give the council an opportunity to see how the streetcar functions," said Thayer Rorabaugh, the city's transportation director. "What does it really do?"

And here I thought it was only 98% of Portland that wondered what the streetcar really does.

Well, seeing as the local planning junta refuses to widen I-5 and build a bridge to accommodate all of that traffic, I'd take one more stop on the rail line over nothing.

Something has to be done about that I-5 bottleneck. This town is becoming a giant overgrown suburb with total gridlock at times...and I grew up in Texas, drove cab there, and know what gridlock looks like as it develops. 2.3 million and growing here, with over 50,000 legal immigrants into metro PDX per year. I see license plates from the East Coast and Midwest daily.

The other day, it took me the better part of an hour to get from N/NE to 28th and Holgate at around 3pm, southbound. The really heavy traffic was already lined up the other way up that pathetic two lane stretch of I-5, as well as MLK and all of the other arteries. Wait 'till the treacherous rainy season starts back up.

Lots and lots of trucking and other business concerns in that traffic. It's not all about commuters, you devout Planning religion freaks. There has to be somewhere we can meet in the middle. Two lane freeways in a city this size are simply absurd.

If this particular bottleneck is not addressed soon, take it from me, with more thousands of hours in Portland's traffic than you could ever imagine, we are headed for serious problems.

Maybe Sam the Tram could help them out on scamming a trip to Europe to see how they build these wonderful people movers! I feel MUCH better knowing that Sam the Tram had such personal interest in the manufacturing process that we got to pay for his trip!

Cabbie said,
"I'd take one more stop on the rail line over nothing. Something has to be done about that I-5 bottleneck."

Hey ther pal. Adding light rail to address traffic is worse than doing nothing. If you could blink your eyes and have it operating tomorrow for free traffic would not see any relief at all, NONE.

With such absolute proof of light rail's inability to releive traffic so readily available around here why do you and others cling to the nonsensicle theory that spending billions on light rail and density chaos works?
Sam the Tram thinks approach is preparing us for the atermath of peak oil and global warming. Two more nonsensicle theories.

Hey, I'd like to see I-5 widened to 5 lanes each way, like freeways in cities one half of the size of Portland, but that is never gonna happen. The MAX line was put in for the express purpose of relieving I-5 congestion, and it never even went over the river, that's what I was getting at.

Oh yeah, another thing, I stand to make money off of the fools who use give up their cars for light rail...but at least I'm honest about it.

Whoops, bad typo, maybe I was thinking about people who both use their cars and public transit...

What with all this proposed activity around downtown Vancouver, including increased traffic from the gargantuan rail yards at it's Port should that Biodiesel refinery gear on up, the I-5/Columbia industrial bottleneck will get even worse. Count on more regional Planning head-in-the-sand foolishness and waste.

Train arrivals at Union Station are delayed routinely now that our heavy rail infrastructure is crumbling, and the traffic is increasing. The freights have the right-of-way.

Portlanders seem to willingly ignore this place's industrial past and present, the very reason it's here to begin with.

But it is funny that Vancouver got the refinery. Beautiful Linnton, nothing industrial about that place, no sir.

"The MAX line was put in for the express purpose of relieving I-5 congestion, and it never even went over the river"

No it was not put in to "relieve congestion". It was put in to "provide an alternative mode" with only the pretense of reducing congestion.
Alternative for the sake of being alterantive while playing "look how different and green we are" games.

There is not a shred of evidence that shows light rail crossing the river would effect traffic at all.
It's all convenient theory and presumption. BS for short.

"The other day, it took me the better part of an hour to get from N/NE to 28th and Holgate at around 3pm, southbound."

Well, Cry Me a River.

That's nothing compared to commutes the rest of the country faces.

"No it was not put in to "relieve congestion". It was put in to "provide an alternative mode" with only the pretense of reducing congestion."

>>>> MAX was put in the make Euro wanna-be planners, crony contractors and hobbyist railfans happy.

They don't use the congestion ploy so much any more. Now light rail is supposed to spur "development." The only trouble is that one has to use tax subsidies to achieve that purpose.

Funny thing about North Portland: almost all of the "reinventing" is going on everywhere except on Interstate Avenue.
Think Alberta, Mississippi, Greeley, etc.