Lars Larson: Transit sinks in debt, bad ideas, failure

By Lars Larson
NW and national radio host,

The Northwest Nonsense

Portland’s hopeless, hapless transit agency Trimet has been circling the financial drain for years.

Now, the sucking sound you hear signals its imminent demise.

Start with the 850 million bucks Trimet lost last year. Add to it the insane multi billion dollar light rail system that always costs more and delivers far less than promised.

Trimet actually proposes the single most expensive rail line on planet earth in its two billion dollar, less than two mile long extension over the troubled, not yet built, interstate bridge.

So, what does the agency propose?

Cut 15 bus routes altogether and dramatically change 20 more.

Trimet planned to get another hundred million from the legislature’s crazy transportation package. That got sidelined when a quarter million voters signed an initiative to put it to a vote 11 months from now.

Even that still leaves Trimet hundreds of millions of dollars short.

Bottom line, the failed transit agency with ridership that’s been falling the past decade, promises much less service at much higher cost.

Not exactly a prescription for success.

At this point the only bailout I can imagine is opening a Somali style daycare center, and given the kleptocratic Kotek administration, don’t put it past them.

That’s the Rose City Rap. Join me at noon on KXL for 4 hours of Honestly provocative talk. I’m Lars Larson