So I went to the NARP Meeting in downtown Portland today.  It was ok, with the Governor skipping out, kind of as I expected - I'm still not sure of his thinking skills when it comes to transit - or anything else for that matter.  Maybe he knows what he's doing but the few things I have seen and read about his actions, I don't have increasing faith in his abilities to lead.

Jonathan Hutchinson spoke, whom I enjoy listening to.  Even though he has the obvious slant toward subsidized passenger rail (he is Amtrak's Employee) he doesn't beat around what amounts to facts, at least the vast majority of the time.  He's a truthful, to the point type of guy.  I respect that for a person in his position.  He could be full of hot air all the time, but instead is good at laying out the way it is, and what needs to be done to get better or more capable transportation service.

One thing Jonathan pointed out, that I've said a million times and is a pervasive problem in ALL of our publicly operated and publicly funded transportation.  The simple FACT is that it is NOT market driven, it is policy driven.  Atlas Shrugged to the tee.  There should be no confusion about this, and this is what boils down to the fact that we have service in places we don't need it, that barely covers itself, barely serves the people it does, and we have lacking service in areas where it could practically pay for itself plus flowers on the road side to boot.

Then Earl Blumenauer spoke.  He was interesting also, but there was a problem I had with his spiel.  He sounded, and came of as well educated about rail history or at least American infrastructure history.  Emphasis on he "sounded" like he was educated.  Maybe he knows, maybe he doesn't, but he definitely left out MAJOR points of FACT from American infrastructure history.  He also railed against privatized operations, and then talked about how we had the greatest passenger rail system in the world during the mid-20th century.  Hello, did he miss the chapter in history where it was quit obvious that Santa Fe, Milwaukee Road, Great Northern, New York Central, and other PRIVATELY OPERATED rail companies are the ones that ran these systems.  NOT the Government.  Not state, not federal, not city governments.  It was 100% privatized operations and a MARKET DEMAND that allowed these to be created, operated, and managed, mostly at profit by private rail corporations.

He commenced also to talk about streetcars, but left out the FACT that they also where privately operated by the historically private light and power companies.  Sometimes operated by railroads or independent companies within a city.  Sometimes they competed, often times they shared right of way and even did other amazing things, like pave city streets, build sidewalks and even cooperate with other transit companies.  Not until PUBLIC entities regulated their pricing, mandated modernization to "buses", broke up these so-called monopolies, and other predatory rulings did these companies start losing the ability to provide public streetcar operations via private means.  He completely glossed over this fact.

He continued on to act as though everything rests in the hands of the Government, namely the Federal Government to act and make an infrastructure plan.  Something they've notoriously failed to do numerous times.  He acted as if privatization was the enemy of any service that we might ever achieve in this country.  He stated that tax breaks won't get us the service, he put emphasis on states building these systems out.  I can't disagree with everything he said 100%, but I definitely detest that he LIED, even if it was because he doesn't know historical FACTS about transportation.  This would go to show, as he has with his perpetuation of certain types of streetcar service, and the encouragement of the construction of non-American designed streetcars that are over 2x as much as streetcars we COULD BUILD, and New Orleans (Little Rock), Siemens, and even Bombardier have proven with their respective designs.

One point he made, somewhat boastfully, is this idea that Oregon Iron Works will be building the first American Built (not American designed) Streetcar in over 50 years.  This is absolutely untrue, New Orleans, and the other cities I just mentioned rebuilt, and built from scratch their own streetcars.  They ARE modern streetcars for all intent and purposes.  Meeting handicap accessibility rules and everything.  Why does he say this, I don't know.

The last, and most horrid thing he did, time and time again, is discredit private industry for what they did by laying the credit for building this country with the Federal Government.  Excuse my language, but that is utter bullshit.  The men and women of this nation, the companies they worked for, and the respective insightful leaders that managed these companies are the ones that built this country.

Great Northern built out an entire transcontinental line with zero Government help.  James J. Hill built it himself, with his funds, that he earned from PRIVATE operations from his company.  Even when states and Government bureaucrats got in his way he managed to get his system built in spite of their intrusions and manipulations.  He refused to let petty politics and special interest groups manipulate what would eventually serve the people of an entire area of the country.

Union Pacific met up and built a transcontinental with some navigation assistance and other help, but barely any financial assistance.  If you read the history closely you'll also realize that the Feds in their land grants and supposed "loans" barely came through on time, even with the money manipulations that UP's original leaders performed their actions where nothing in comparison to the incompetency of the Federal Government.  Then and now.  If it wasn't for the individuals and the leaders of that company, it wouldn't have gotten built.  No "subsidized", Federally mandated system would have gotten this built.  Only the incentive based, privately operated, prospective private ownership and investment potential got this system built.  The promise that they would own some of the land that they lent value to.

Then of course there are the local transit companies.  The Key System in San Francisco.  It turned a profit until the city and other companies forced destruction of pivotal parts of the system.  Yes, look at the books, look at the history, it turned a profit.

The Kansas City Streetcar system turned a profit, but was then bought out and the city encouraged "modernization" to buses since it appeared, that roads where free and tracks where expensive.  Now they too, just like any American city, has an "authority" and not freely built and market driven companies operating these services.

Earl failed to realize these things in his speech and has ostensibly denied the true and documented American History of infrastructure.  In turn he cast what could only be deemed a deeply felt disrespect for the people who managed, maintained, built, financed, and rode these systems.  In the end, these are the people who did actually built this country.

Earl - here's a reading list to get these facts straight.

• Empire Express - Building the First Transcontinental Railroad by David Hayward Bain
• The American Railway:  Its Construction, Development, Management, and Appliance - The Eveyday Life of the Railroad Men by Adams, BB Jr.
• The Story of the First Transcontinental Railroad by Bailey, WF.
• Chapters on the history of the Southern Pacific by ??

A good book to emphasize the talking the Feds did and the general failures they committed.

• Highway to the Pacific: Grand National Central High-way by Thomas Hart Benton - just a senate speech.
• Transcontinental Railroad Legislation by Thamar E. Dufwa (1981)

Needless to say, pay close attention to the details and you'll realize the legislation and other things the Federal Government did was tantamount to someone picking up a brick, setting it, and then saying they've built a house.  It just isn't so.

Don't get me wrong, I'm glad Earl is pro-transit and alternate means besides auto based transportation.  I'm sick of the excessive and general budget subsidies that industry has gotten to get where it is today (pervasive).  But amid that, with his viewpoint I worry that all he'll do is increase our tax burdens, push down the middle class, create excessive travel through price unbalances that aren't based on market demand (aka subsidize one mode and not another).  These are the things he appeared to tout.  Tax the US Citizen, the legislature and such will then decide what to do with the money.  They'll decide where it needs to go, with or without any market observation or knowledge, they'll decide these things with the complete lack of knowledge that they have.  Instead of letting the market connect, with some minor oversight to assure good and solid construction and competitive practices, to places that need service.  HE wants the politicians to dictate and decide.  As if they know these things.  The people who do are not the politicians, but the operations managers of industry and of the railroads themselves.  The people who travel know where the peak points of travel area and those are the areas that need service, not where Jo Schmo Politician man lives because he wants a station.

I honestly hope that a more solid perspective on these issues can be achieved, because one thing that I do agree with Earl about is that we are in very pivotal years of America's future well being.  If we don't allow things to be done well, solidly, quickly, accurately to meet where demand actually is and to clean up the mess of infrastructure that we've been coerced into over the last 30-50 years of Government "policy" we're in a deep mess.  Hopefully he'll realize that more rules don't fix bad rules, allowing people to act freely is what fixes bad rules and policy.  In other words, get rid of the policies and bad rules, don't add to them.