Posted on 03/02/2011 6:47:11 AM PST by seekthetruth
Edited on 03/02/2011 7:23:59 AM PST by Admin Moderator. [history]
LAKELAND | Mayor Gow Fields met with Gov. Rick Scott on Monday night in a secret meeting in Orlando. Fields and mayors from Tampa and Orlando united to try to press Scott into accepting $2.4 billion in federal high-speed rail money.
http://www.theledger.com/
Keep fighting the good fight. Scott Walker sent the train funds back during his first week in office. The media beat him up for a week, but the train is gone. La Hood had told us we were getting it whether we wanted it or not. La Hood was wrong.
Please open to poll and make your choice!
Gummint Choo Choo Ping.
No one will ride a train from downtown Tampa to the Orlando airport...Orlando Airport to Disney maybe..
Folks, you do not any poll to derail the “High Speed” rail scheme. It is doomed to failure, is not needed at all and shows how stupid and dumb POTUS Obama is about life in the “real” world where passenger trains are passe’. A rail link from Orlando to Tampa is not just crazy, it is absurd, foolish and idiotic!!!
Our hometown Pasco county paper, the Suncoast News, is actually the only paper around here that I’ve seen that actually presents a conservative view. The rest are monolithically liberal.
Here is the editorial view on rail on the 19th:
Gov. Rick Scott announced Wednesday that Florida will decline the $2.4 billion the federal government is offering the state to help pay for the first phase of a high-speed rail system, dollars Wisconsin and Ohio had previously rejected. This brought pledges from some in the Sunshine State political establishment that they would attempt to end run Scott and bring home the rail-funding bacon. Here’s why we hope they fail.
News reports on the governor’s decision said construction of the first part of the rapid-rail network, between Tampa and Orlando, would generate 23,000 jobs. Ignore, if you must, the dubious history of such job-creation claims for public infrastructure projects and the temporary nature of many of those jobs. It would, however, be years before those jobs materialize. Can anyone doubt that the rail project would be tied up for years in legal challenges and regulatory review over associated environmental and safety issues?
Pasco County has been trying for years to win permission to merely punch through a few lanes of asphalt from Ridge Road’s eastern end to the Suncoast Parkway. Imagine how long is it going to take to answer all the questions surrounding the laying of track for trains that could operate at 200 mph on ground that could collapse into a sinkhole.
That’s a lot of risk for a rail system that would lose buckets of money and require a permanent taxpayer subsidy.
As a Floridian, I am opposed to this money pit. If a high speed rail is so necessary, let Disney and Busch Gardens fund it and maintain it.
I have dear friends in the beautiful state of Wisconsin, and they have kept me posted from their area. God Bless Governor Walker for standing strong! We lucked out across the country with several NEW STRONG GOVERNORS! God Bless them ALL!
Sorry. My laptop was giving me problems, plus the fact that I am not very good at posting threads. I mess up pretty regular!
In the 1960’s, NASA (at the Kennedy Space Center building the Apollo towers and launch facilities) faced millions (in early 1960s dollars!) of cost over-runs and delays while non-union (local) workers and companies facwed challenges and job protests from out-of-state (union) contractors and union-job-seekers.
Almost all the counties it passes through stand to get some money from this project, which is why many state and county officials want it.
Personally, I’d be really in favor of reviving passenger rail in Florida, because traffic congestion around some of our big cities is becoming a problem and a useable train system could help. BUT it doesn’t need to be high-speed (which requires the building of all-new track, acquisition of right-of-ways, etc.). The current trains go 75-110 mph, which is faster than a car, particularly in our traffic, and quite fast enough to get people where they’re going, particularly in the case of commuter traffic. (But from what I’ve seen, there’s NO need whatsoever for anything from Orlando to Tampa!)
I wish people supporting the high speed rail would take a middle approach and support regular passenger rail, which would take some of the pressure off our highways and highway infrastructure (as well as giving us an alternative in the case of a serious petroleum crisis), actually be used by people...and cost about 1/10th of this insane high speed rail project. Some of the old tracks need work, the old stations would need to be renovated and reopened, and probably new sidings would have to be added at various points to accomodate both the freight and new passenger traffic. But my county and city had already voted to build a nice new passenger station, and it sure would have been a better use of the money than most of what they do with it.
Ten years down the road, if it is ever decided that there’s a real need for high speed rail, they can worry about it then, by which time the technology will probably have changed in any case and today’s “modern” system will be passe. But for now high speed rail makes no sense, even regardless of its cost.
Corporate Greed looks like a virtue; compared to Gov Greed and Gov sponsored 'Labor' Greed.
Get over it those who cry for FL Rail. Instead, get Gov off backs of citizens and let them create, produce and hire! Out damn Gov: OUT! And take 'Labor' with you.
and that is what will happen if we allow this rail line to be built.
Out of state unions will come in , their thugs will come in, tax payers here will pay for the over budget and then come election time we will have thousands of union members voting.
Scott got a narrow victory and if we had those union members last year he would have lost.
The white house is behind all of these protests, community organising so to speak.
This in response to the tea party which has troubled the left for two years.
They now have targeted important states with protests for the next election, FL, WI,OH.
I asked the union woman where is the money coming from and why is she working with socialists, communist Marxist groups.
No answer.
This woman is not from my county as my county is very republican infact one of the most republican counties in the state and so they come from other counties to give the impression that we do not want budget cuts.
Time for the tea party to mass again and counter protest in our thousands.
Our message is no money , do not raise taxes . Their message is raise taxes and spend into more debt.
We have a more popular message and it needs to be put out.
Thanks; No problem w/link; but trouble finding poll; will, try again. . .
Unions would blow it up anyway.
I witnessed such a thing in Troy, Ohio 1970/71
Does anyone with a dab of brains really think this Train/Boondoggle will have average speed times above 40MPH. When layover times at the mid-stations will be 15+ minutes, Disney would be 20+ minutes, Orlando Convention Center would be 15+. Starting and stopping will add time to the equation. The posted numbers for travel time the proponents use are unrealistic! Coming from Tampa to OIA with stops at Lakeland 15 min, Disney 20 min. and OCC 15 min. you would lose 50+ minutes to dead time.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Florida_high_speed_rail
Boneheads are saying you could do it in one hour and four minutes. Haha!
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