But the New York Times thinks we are so cool.

http://www.autoblog.com/2010/04/04/wi-drive-luxd-out-commuter-buses-for-the-wealthy-popping-up-in/

Has this been on the table for discussion?
Big on East Coast and CA.

Don't think the "streetcar promoters" would want that conversation. Have there been any articles in the O about these?

...and we're twice as smart as those sods in Shelbyville!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lrjL-X_Q6xA

See how the analogy between our various projects and the military industrial complex works? Matt is the Pentagon general who's now working for General Dynamics.

Remember, the So What district was not an epic fail for them - to them it was a shining success. Just as Iraq was a shining success for the military industrial complex.

Thousands of dead American soldiers, many times that number with lifelong injuries. And for what? Iraq's future?

Maybe things will be better for Iraq, if the place doesn't explode when we take the lid off, but was that the reason we went there?

No, we went there because the military industrial complex wanted a war there and they got it.

Sure, the seriousness of our problems is small compared to what the soldiers went through, but the momentum is similar - the momentum to continue coming up with our local projects and to come up with more wars for our corporations.

We're locked in. Even if the people in charge wanted to stop these expenditures - and they don't - they couldn't.

This is an out of control beast romping through Portland and the rest of America and it will most likely go on chomping 'til there's nothing left.

The swarmy article in the Trib makes this all sound like it is a done deal.
I wish some one with some moxy would bring up Dame's fraud and Homer's sleezy deals with the banks in Naru when he was building "Forest Dump", and his sleezy deals at Jumby Bay before that!

Hey Clineman, those look like private buses? Sounds like a great business opportunity to me. I doubt the street car promoters care unless you are suggesting the "enhanced bus" option actually be a publically funded "luxury bus". I'm sure that would go over well with bojack. I can almost write that blog post for him...

This is an out of control beast!

Why does it feel like we are in a horror movie?
. . . a continuous TV series here locally, you are the writer Bill.

What's the point of tar and feathers, until we have a rail to run him out of town on?

Issac,
Another great business opportunity I wrote about several weeks ago are the water ferries that could transport many in a kind of neat way, and in place of all that expensive light rail. We have a natural here for water transportation with our rivers from Oregon City to Vancouver and to other places as well. Seattle uses them for commuters. Kind of like the "luxury bus" idea. Having coffee and reading instead of dealing with traffic congestion sounds good, might not even need that spendy bridge!

Jobs for people too.

Does anyone here remember that some entrepreneurs proposed that several years ago? What happened?

No boats...not enough graft to line the pockets of the Arlington Club members and the DC slime balls.
But trains and trolleys, that were the money is!

portland native:
Thought so.
I think we need to shift the conversation to these alternatives and besides how neat it would be take water transportation around the area!

Seems the pro-bike people could check in their bikes below deck and enjoy this too!

The Lake Oswego people I would think would like those luxury buses with wifi, etc. rather than a light rail.

portland native,

In response to you:
Thought so.
and etc. as above.

Clinamen:
"wouldn't it be loverley?" but it ain't gonna happen.
This fix is in and I'm afraid that Bill McDonald is right, the jugger-naught is a comin' at us and we are just like that poor guy in Bejing standing in front of the tank.

Congenial Matt Brown, he's the one that swore that over 45% of the trips to and from SoWhat would be by mass transit. He said that the tram would cost only $15 Million. He said the trolley into SoWhat would not use any of Portland's general fund dollars, it did, and even has debt bonds paying for some of it, and exceeded his cost estimates by 50%. And then he left town with Homer. And now he's back doling out more, at best, half truths and smiles.

Lake Oswego, Dunthorpe, and South Portland neighborhood associations and citizens should ask Brown how his past projections reflect on his sales jobs today. I'm sure he'll have a pat answer and a smile.

lw - Matt Brown may or may not be a PMP (certified project manager) but he is a pimp. And you know the old iron triangle of "cost, scope, and time" should never apply to projects involving certain people. Just ask the slime that constantly have cost overruns on the taxpayers dollar.

And besides they can always justify cost overruns by claiming the scope changed..... ad nasuem. Why the project managers on the tram have very publicly declared that project was a complete and total success. Of course, that's what they want the world to think but those of us who pay attention know that it has cost and time overruns and that a sizable percentage of stakeholders were not happy. But hey.......

Portland,

Where when you do the math, $2 million (the cost for four "luxury buses") and $5 million in upgraded bus stops is somehow more expensive than $200 million (the cost of a streetcar, tracks, stations, etc.).

The only reason the streetcar is being pushed so hard is because the governments own this encumbered piece of real estate that by federal law can't be used for a bike trail (because the right-of-way reverts to the adjoining property owners if its rail use is abandoned). Of course, the governments (Two cities, a county, Metro, and TriMet) all bought the land for a couple million dollars, and God forbid they want to make us feel like they wasted that money.)

Erik H.
Thank you for the math on the luxury buses and bus stops.

Comments by portland native indicate there is a “block” to water transportation here.

I still think this could be an upbeat form of transportation in our river city.

http://www.citywatertaxi.com/taxi_stops.html

http://www.oceansart.us/OceansArthome/PixFerryBoats/ferryboats.html