Um, please tell me what is wrong with a politician actually questioning the exorbitant cost of a massive public works project? The new interstate bridge is project to cost as much as 80 trams.

Gil

A 1/3rd of the project cost is going to a transit/ped improvement that no one really wants or needs. Plus, if we had been making incremental improvements in the corridor throughout the last 40 years it is likely that a super project wouldn't be needed [maybe just a bridge].

The problem I have with the project is that it will not be adding any additional through traffic capacity. We should be building a bridge with enough capacity to handle at least 20-50 years of traffic growth.

No worries though, I predict Vancouver will be the larger and more dominant city before too long.

When people like Liberty is elected with less than 20% of the total Metro citizens qualified to vote, then we get poor representation of how citizens probably feel about the I-5 bridge. It is becoming that 5% to 10% of citizens are determining the outcome of many regional issues.

With the bridge the largest, most costly regional project ever, we need to vote on more projects of this nature. H*## with pretending Liberty represents the majority.If he thinks so, he should support a vote on two or three options.

Please voters, don't let the planning mafia rule. We need more diversified representation running for positions in all the political bodies, then we need to vote.

The fact that guys like this can run for office without meaningful opposition is a clear indication to us that the whole concept of Metro needs to be re-thought.

The fact that guys like this can run for office without meaningful opposition is a clear indication to ME that few people give a s**t. Wake me when the masses revolt.

Nature may abhor a vacuum, but people like Liberty are attracted to it like moths to a flame. It's simply capitalism in the public sector. The "market" reacts much less efficiently when the "consumers" are so credulous as to the motives of their "leaders".

Anyone who thinks that the entrenched bureaucrats and dedicated, organized groups who feed off the disengagement and naivete of regular folks, will go away without crisis is nuts.

And I mean that in the nicest possible way.

the METRO layer of government is not well understood, even in the Portland area...

My mom understands them as the company who handles garbage and recycling. My neighbor mistakes it for Trimet since the word "metro" is normally what a transit company is called. Point being, I don't think many people realize they are ultimately a strong-arm extension of the City of Portland designed to control places outside its jurisdiction and ensure increasing tax revenues.

a strong-arm extension of the City of Portland designed to control places outside its jurisdiction and ensure increasing tax revenues.

It's also a large and dimly lit pork pot with all sorts of money in it for cronies of the powers that be.

I don't get it. Why are you all dumping on Liberty when he's about the only guy in any government position questioning this white elephant?

Another lane over the river is just going to dump more traffic onto I-5 south of it, with nowhere to go. Right now, traffic comes to a standstill most of they day about a mile north of the I-84 exit, which is the worst bottleneck on the system. Think of what it's going to be like if another lane is added.

Time for double decker freeways to take advantage of all the new ULEV and electric vehicles that will be flying off dealer lots for the next 50 years.

Think of what it's going to be like if another lane is added.

I think eliminating the drawbridge openings might help traffic a little.

Give it 10 years. Liberty and his buddies will have taken over all bridges, all regional policing of transportation, parks and built a Convention Hotel and a MLB baseball at the total cost of 6-10 billion of taxpayer money. It's called Boston(MTA) and Friends of Neil, including Sham, Liberty, Teddy K, Kate Brown, the Bragdon boys, Tom Walsh,Linberg, Homer and the rest of the gang will be rich and long gone.

"the METRO layer of government is not well understood"

You're right, originally it was jsut garbage and the Zoo. However, mission creep has let them set their own agenda whatever that is.

At least he recognized there was an 82nd Avenue.

Metro has powers over anything it wants. Per its charter:

"Metro has jurisdiction over matters of metropolitan concern. Matters of metropolitan concern include the powers granted to and duties imposed on Metro by current and future state law and those matters the Council by ordinance determines to be of metropolitan concern. The Council shall specify by ordinance the extent to which Metro exercises jurisdiction over matters of metropolitan concern."

Some areas that Metro might decide are of metropolitan concern include regional water (taking over Bull Run, etc.), mass transit (taking over Trimet), health care (how about a regional hospital next to the new convention center hotel), food supply, utilities, and so on. Be afraid. Be very afraid. And we only have ourselves to blame.

"...the main issue concerning freight corridors would still not be addressed, namely providing options for freight."

What exactly is this guy talking about? Lack of options? Is this something shippers are actually concerned about? Have they every said as much?

I was impressed that Liberty knew the main problem with the Interstate bridge is not capacity, but the merging of traffic immediately before the bridge begins. The island on-ramp northbound should be closed and traffic re-routed south to delta park. That would reduce that bottleneck at the bridge. Nobody else has pointed this out, so kudos to him for that. Now lets talk about that hotel...

You can't eliminate the drawspans without a new bridge. The Columbia is a navigable river and must accommodate, by law, shipping.

MJ: Shippers, commerce representative serve on most of the bridge committees. Tribune had several articles on the commerce bottleneck of the I-5 system. Boeing after repeated imput on how congestion in Seattle was hurting many aspects of their business moved many parts of their business off-shore and elsewhere in the US. Poor movement of commerce is a big issue, but businesses must be polite and worry about the negative press-they are bad, they are corporations. But it is your job that can be lost. Portlanders are slowly learning about this. Creative jobs are not our savior alone.

Gil,

No you don't get it.

Liberty is a phoney. His opposiion is like his other oppostion to ALL road capcity increases.

If all the $4 billion got was light rail to Vancouver Liberty would be all in favor of it.
The white elephant is Liberty, Metro and the rest of the planning cabal that hates roads and freeways.

Another lane over the river isn't going to magically dump more traffic onto I-5. That's anti-car rhetoric. "Induced demand" nonsense.

The whole section from 84 to the river is a bottle neck. Liberty likes that.

Including more lanes on a bridge needing replacement is common sense. Just like adding lanes on the Sellwood bridge when it's built.
You need to think of what it's going to be like if another 20 years goes by without any new road capacity.

Forget light rail. It's a fraud.