Something is happening here, and the Northwest Arkansas Regional Planning Commission and the Regional Mobility Authority had better start paying attention. These relics of status quo thinking and devotees of more concrete slabs for the trucking industry and SUV crowd have been funneling tax dollars only to road contractors and resisting even a feasibility study for a light rail system to serve Northwest Arkansas, but there is clear indication that local citizens don't think that stunted thinking will serve us well in the future.
Last night, the Washington County Quorum Court unanimously adopted a resolution brought forward by Justice of the Peace Gary Carnahan asking for a feasibility study of a light rail public transit system. The City of Fayetteville and the City of Springdale have already adopted similar resolutions. These three governments provide a considerable portion of the budget for the Northwest Arkansas Regional Planning Commission, and they have made a request that should be honored.
The only public opposition to a feasibility study of light rail has come from Laurie Taylor Masterson and the Teabaggers, althought other economic interests might be working against light rail and demanding of more of the same slavish obedience to the status quo to which they are addicted and expect to be supplied. After all, the NWA Regional Planning Commission got the idea somewhere to spend $750,000 in tax money to study a "western beltway," and it didn't come from resolutions adopted by Fayetteville, Springdale, or Washington County governing bodies that have membership on their Board.
Jonah:
ReplyDeleteit doth seem you will want to check with these folks before you waste any more pixels
www.modernhistoryproject.org/mhp/EntityDisplay.php?Entity=NWArkCoun
Thanks!
Hawkins, Pumphrey, and the slugs at the NWARPC will stop any effort for light rail without lifting a finger, that is to say in a passive aggressive resistance to any change, partly because they are bought and partly because they are lazy. It will take a thorough house-cleaning before anything ever changes, and that won't be easy as long as small town mayors have a majority of the seats on the commission.
ReplyDeleteIf you'd stop calling it a light rail study and call it what it is, an alternatives analysis, then people wouldn't have so much room to oppose it.
ReplyDeleteCitizen- you are about as informed as Congressman Joe Wilson of SC...first of all you can't have a light rail system without a bus system...how are those people going to get to the train or from it to their home or employment? (Beam me up, Scotty?) Maybe all those cities that have or are building light rail systems already have a demonstrated financial committment to mass transit, and people using it...Which doesn't exist in NWA at this time. Those are just two of the major criteria that have to be met before you want to spend money ($2M according to mr luoni...) Gee, that's what is great about the internet...anyone can say anything without stopping to get the facts...
ReplyDeleteI was sitting here reading about "Laurie Taylor Masterson and the Teabaggers," holding my small dog in my lap and a dog up the street let out a few barks. Then the dog across the street starts barking, and the dog next door, so my dog starts barking. I'm sure you've had that experience before. 3 out of 4 dogs have no idea of why they're barking. If one dog barks then all within hearing distance barks.
ReplyDeleteI'm sure Laurie and Teabaggers practice it often.
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