CA: Governor Gridlock (Moonbeam Brown's Legacy)

OC Register ^ | 2/16/05 | Ray Haynes

[NormsRevenge]

Through most of the 1960s, Gov. Pat Brown undertook the construction of a world-class freeway system in California and, by the time he left office in 1967, California had planned for and begun construction on that system. Gov. Ronald Reagan continued the construction, and improved on Brown's plan.

Then, like a Suburban in a SigAlert, California road-building came to a grinding halt. In the 1970s, under the throes of the "progressive" leadership of Gov. Jerry Brown and his leftist friends in the Legislature, the state began a new course. Freeways were passé; mass transit and government land-use planning were the order of the day.

Between 1974 and 1982, the years Brown was governor, California stopped improving its existing freeway system and made it virtually impossible to plan for new freeways. Our current system of freeways, then, was built essentially between 1958 and 1974 - 16 years). Today, it can take 20 years to fix or expand an existing freeway or to build one mile of a new freeway.

Freeways, no matter how many are built, will always be crowded at rush hour. In the 1970s, Brown and his environut friends used this fact to convince people that California should spend its gasoline tax money on mass transit. These same people argued that good government land-use planning would also create jobs close to homes and protect our air and water and other natural resources. These concepts all intended to accomplish good things and sounded good on paper. While good intentioned, however, they have literally paved the roads to hell we now all occupy 24 hours a day.

California has a lot of government bureaucrats who "plan" to build freeways but rarely ever get around to actually building them.

--snip--

[gridlock]

If nominated, I will not run.

If elected, I will not serve.

[GOP_1900AD]

This insanity started right here in the Bay Area. As some here may recall (this was admittedly before my time) there was a plan to build freeways through San Francisco to connect the Bayshore Freeway and Bay Bridge to the Golden Gate Bridge. There were to be two of them, one, extending from the at-the-time end of the Central Freeway (at Turk Street) to the Golden Gate Bridge ramp and the other, along the water front from the end of the (ill fated, via the 1989 Earthquake) Embarcadero Freeway to the same point. Now the Embaradero Freeway was a bonehead move but the Central Freeway extension made sense (and STILL makes sense!). Anyhow, the proto Lefty SF whackos rose up in opposition and stopped both from expanding. (post script - The '89 quake damaged the Embarcadero Freeway and they had to tear it down, the Central has been slowly torn down as the NIMBYs have expanded their power and as anti-suburban-commuter Communists in SF have increased theirs). Once the Left experienced this small victory, back in, IIRC, 1958 or 59, they set their sights higher. It took them until '74 to get someone sufficiently whacko to undertake their plans, but Moonbeam did get in (this was definitely during my time - I was 12 when he got voted in) and the rest is history.