Free Republic

Nov 26, 2008 5:00 pm US/Eastern "Feds Warn Of Terror Plot Against NYC Subways Homeland Security: Expect Larger Police Presence In NYC And In Major Cities Across U.S. During Holidays" ARTICLE SNIPPET: "NEW YORK (CBS/AP) ― Federal authorities are warning police of a possible terror plot against the New York City subway and train systems during the holiday season, prompting local officials to beef up security at stations. An internal memo obtained by The Associated Press says the FBI has received a "plausible but unsubstantiated" report that al-Qaida terrorists in late September may have discussed attacking the subway system. A...

CBS 5 Poll: South Bay BART Measure Falling Short SAN JOSE (CBS 5/KCBS/BCN) ― A new poll of Santa Clara County voters finds Measure B, a one-eighth-cent increase in the sales tax to help pay for the BART extension to San Jose, still has not garnered the two-thirds majority it needs to pass. A CBS 5 poll conducted by SurveyUSA found that 62 percent of likely voters either lean toward voting or are certain to vote for the extension. The Yes on B campaign has lined up big names such as former Transportation Secretary Norm Mineta to convince the 17...

Welcome to your Monday morning blood-boiler. The NY Post reports that a jihadi group in NYC planning on running a series of subway ads is led by a Muslim imam tied to the terror plot to bomb the city’s landmarks. Submission: Allah board!An Islamic group plans to blitz 1,000 subway cars with advertisements this September in a campaign being promoted by a Brooklyn imam whom federal officials have linked to a plot to blow up city landmarks.The group says its mission is to explain the true nature of Islam to non-Muslims who believe the religion is bent on acts of...

MUSLIM SUBWAY ADS LINKED TO TERROR PLOTS - New York Post Jul 21, 2008 ... An Islamic group plans to blitz 1000 subway cars with advertisements this September in a campaign being promoted by a Brooklyn imam whom ...

Michael Munger of Duke University talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about Munger's recent trip to Chile and the changes Chile has made to Santiago's bus system. What was once a private decentralized system with differing levels of quality and price has been transformed into a system of uniform quality designed from the top down. How has the new system fared? Not particularly well according to Munger. Commuting times are up and the President of Chile has apologized to the Chilean people for the failures of the new system. Munger talks about why such changes take place and why they...

The Municipal Railway will not use buses from its new hybrid fleet on one line that runs through the public housing projects in San Francisco's Hunters Point neighborhood until officials can stop troublemakers there from turning off the buses' power switches. Muni drivers have reported over the last couple of weeks that people have been shutting down the power on their buses by flipping a switch that can be accessed easily through an unlocked panel on the outside of the bus. When that happens, the drivers can't accelerate, they lose radio contact with dispatchers and the interior lights on the...

FORT WORTH, Texas, Jan 3. -- Just before New Year's Eve, a Fort Worth mother was kicked off the public bus for reading the Bible aloud to her children on the way to church. "What kind of person pulls over public transportation and kicks out a mother and her children for reading their Bible on the way to church?" said Kelly Shackelford, Chief Counsel for Liberty Legal Institute, the legal organization representing Christine Lutz. "Freedom of religion exists on public transportation just like anywhere else." Christine Lutz was reading the Bible to her children while on the way to church...

A MARTA employee is in jail on pending charges of kidnapping a 15-year-old girl on a bus. When Jamella Duvall saw a MARTA bus approach her stop on Hollywood Road Dec. 21, she said, it pulled over and let her on like dozens of times before. She said she had no idea her step onto the bus would lead to a flying leap from the moving vehicle. Dennis Sims, 48, a bus inspector, was supposed to be transporting the bus from a garage to the H.E. Holmes MARTA station for a bus swap, according to the MARTA police report. He...

After conducting business as though it were a private entity rather than a public trust, the Texas Department of Transportation is now trying to turn the tide of public opinion in its favor. The Keep Texas Moving campaign is a $7 million to $9 million effort designed to promote various transportation projects in the state. According to the campaign site, www.keeptexasmoving.com, Texans can learn more about such projects as the vast Trans-Texas Corridor and "its promise for Texas." Unfortunately, TxDOT has a history of not being entirely forthcoming about transportation plans. Last year, agency officials and the road-building consortium Cintra-Zachry...

He is public transportation’s loudest cheerleader, boasting that he takes the subway “virtually every day.” He has told residents who complain about overcrowded trains to “get real” and he constantly encourages New Yorkers to follow his environmentally friendly example. But Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg’s commute is not your average straphanger’s ride. On mornings that he takes the subway from home, Mr. Bloomberg is picked up at his Upper East Side town house by a pair of king-size Chevrolet Suburbans. The mayor is driven 22 blocks to the subway station at 59th Street and Lexington Avenue, where he can board an...

<p>CHICAGO � Five passengers were shot while riding a Chicago Transit Authority bus on the city's South Side on Thursday, authorities said.</p> <p>Two teenage boys and one girl were transported in critical condition to Advocate Christ Medical Center in Oak Lawn, said fire department spokesman Larry Langford.</p>

A worldwide investigation has uncovered an al-Qaida loyalist's plan to blow up the PATH train tunnels under the Hudson River, thwarting a terrorist conspiracy the FBI called "the real deal," authorities said Friday. The alleged mastermind has been arrested. "The individuals were moving forward," said Special Agent Mark J. Mershon, assistant director of the FBI's New York office. They "were about to go to a phase where they would attempt to surveil targets, establish a regimen of attack and then acquire the resources necessary to effectuate the attacks." Mershon identified the plan's mastermind as Assem Hammoud, a 31-year-old Lebanese citizen...

(For education and discussion purposes, only) A research group funded by road builders called Wednesday for more state highway spending to avert a costly increase in accidents, travel delays and wear-and-tear on everyone's cars. [One local planning organization says highways account for only 52 percent of the transportation spending needed in the Durham and Chapel Hill area by 2025, with 44 percent earmarked for rail and bus transit.] North Carolina has failed to repair and expand its highway network quickly enough to keep pace with growing passenger and truck traffic and crumbling roads and bridges... (snip) Citing census and highway...