Posted on 02/13/2013 6:04:40 PM PST by Olog-hai
Clearly, a reward to Hawaii for “losing” the phony illegal ‘birth certificate...’
mini-bus and a donkey will get you anywhere
Lead on sir.
The Gravina Island bridge was to have cost $398 million for 1.2 miles (6300 feet) length, or about $334 million per mile. The Oahu rail boondoggle adds up to about 15.3 bridges to nowhere, by that measure.
If the incompetent government(s) estimate it at $5,100,000,000 you can count on it being two to three times that figure.
Bet the taxi, bus, and rental car companies are thrilled too. A lot of locals can watch their jobs evaporate.
Reminds me of the monorail episode of The Simpsons.
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
I love that.
“Mono means one.
Rail means rail.
This concludes our intensive six-month monorail class.”
Suddenly the 9 mile busway they are building in CT seems like a great deal. Only 569 million.
Sad thing is, some of these kind of things can be built for a somewhat reasonable cost. Portland Streetcar came in at about $15 million per mile (in 2012 dollars, including buying the cars and the storage/maintenance facilities), although I suspect that private firms could have come in at far lower cost than that. $255 million per mile for something that’s essentially the same kind of thing is beyond absurd.
Still $63 million per mile for a road you won’t be allowed to drive on and will require the same kind of maintenance as other roads, including snow removal and suchlike. Ain’t government grand?
Will there be a stop at the Baraq Hussein Obama Presidential Library and Choom Gang Museum?
Sure, but the costs for those stations haven’t been figured in yet. Undoubtedly they will have to include some kind of artistic vanity piece for the sake of aesthetics and whatnot, and given the “historic” nature, these will certainly be overpriced more than on other similar systems.
What’s even worse is that this system will most likely have that absurd proof-of-payment system (abbreviated POP) where you have to buy tickets but can only guess when an inspector will show up; more often than not, there aren’t any inspectors and lots of people ride for free, which results in this manner of fare collection having the lowest fare recovery ratio (under 20 percent for the most part), even against subways (with turnstiles), buses (where the bus driver collects fares) and commuter rail (with conductors).
Isn’t that where he has his new digs, paid for by big donors from Chicago?
-—— kind of like the super highway that goes about 15 miles into the jungle that was build back in the 50’s or early 60’s that goes nowhere, has no off ramps - just dead ends in the middle of nowhere with no way to get to the ground unless you bring repelling rope.
Some of this is money that Gov Kasich turned down in Ohio right after he took office.
Yeah but at least they'll have riders. For outrageous costs per passenger mile I don't think anyhing tops the Santa Clara County Light Rail extension to Los Gatos. $175 million for 1.6 miles with a projected ridership of 200 people per day.
Another way to look at it ...
Every citizen is shelling out $1 or his/her own money PER MILE for this sham. $20 from me, $20 from my wife, $100 from my kids, etc.
Choom choom Charlie thinks he’s an engineer
Island is only 30 miles wide? Railroad? They can’t drive (or walk) to their destination? Heck, where I live it is at least 45 miles to the next small town with nothing in between and the government pulled up the only railroad tracks around here a decade ago to “save the enviroment.”
Oh, the "high speed" rail that was planned to travel at about the same speed as traffic on I-71 between Cincinnati and Cleveland. Double the speed and it might make some sense, but at 75 mph there was no reason for it at any price.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.