Box and Horn: Mike Dahmus

Beginning this week, Austinist will host a Friday guest column hereby named Box and Horn where an Austinist reader is given full floor to write about… well, whatever’s on their mind. For this week, everyone please welcome the writings of Mike Dahmus! All opinions expressed in Box and Horn are strictly those of the writer and do not reflect the opinions or beliefs of the Ist Network. Word to words – Austinist Columnist Editor

Photo of Mike Dahmus courtesy of himself

Howdy istites. My name's Mike Dahmus, otherwise known all around various ratholes of the internet as M1EK, and I've been invited to write an honest-to-goodness post instead of a wimpy little comment. Normally, I crackplog ("crackplot blog") at my own place, M1EK's Bake-Sale of Bile, which is "Mostly Austin. Mostly Transportation. Mostly Bile.". I served on the city's Urban Transportation Commission from 2000 to 2005, before Daryl Slusher gave me the boot for being insufficiently slavish to Mike Krusee's plan to screw Austin's rail fans forever. I've been writing that crackplog since about 2003, starting in the run-up to the commuter rail disaster.

Today I shall regale you with part one of a one-part series entitled "Bile-Filled Corrections To Infrequently Answered Questions". Yes, grammar fans, that's questionably composed. But I couldn't pass up the acronym "BFATIAQ", because it's so similar to that of my good friends at BATPAC. Here we go!

Photo of Cap Metro bus courtesy of cloverity on Flickr

Q1. "The buses are always empty!?"

A1. Screw you, Kelso. That's not even a question! The buses are always ‘empty’ when you see them because you can't get your fat ass out to the midpoint of the route during rush hours - where they are almost always full. Just a week or so ago, I gamely tried an awful 1:45 2-bus commute from my company's new office out in lovely downtown Westlake, and both the #30 and the #5 were quite full, the #5 eventually having several people standing. (Yes, that was a half-hour walk, a half-hour bus ride, a 10-minute wait, and 35-minute bus ride. No, I won't do it again). Here's the key: if you're a suburbanite, you're usually seeing the buses at the very END of their route - the part at which they're SUPPOSED to be empty or only have a couple of people on them. If you see a full bus at the end of its route, that's a sign that Capital Metro cut the route off too early. Think about it.

Q2. "We shouldn't spend all this money to run rail when Capital Metro can't make the bus system work well enough for me! If the buses ran every ten minutes, I'd definitely use them!"

A2. Screw you, BATPAC. Also not a question! Most people who are actually served by Capital Metro and will ride buses are already riding them; running them more often won't do anything other than make it a bit more convenient for those who already ride at a huge expense for taxpayers, which has to be made up for somewhere else. Most people know how to read a schedule book and their watch; that's not the problem. The problem is that the bus is stuck in traffic behind everybody else's car, and it runs a lot worse in traffic than your car does. The bus can't switch over to Guadalupe when Lamar is backed up; it has to stay in the right lane to pick up and drop off; and it accelerates like a dead cat.

Q3. "Hey, we're building light rail, right?"

A3. Screw you, Krusee. We almost did; Capital Metro had a good plan underway in 2000 and was shooting for an election in 2001, May or November. Then state rep Mike Krusee, of lovable Round Rock, decided that even though his constituents weren't even in the Capital Metro service and tax area, he was the boss; and forced a November 2000 election, before Capital Metro was ready. Some jackass of particular local interest was running for president that year, if you remember, and drew out the suburban vote in droves. So no, we're not building light rail. We're building commuter rail. See question 6. By the way, neither Houston nor Dallas had to have an election before building their first rail line.

Q4. "Well, the voters spoke. Austin rejected light rail, right?"

A4. Screw you, Daugherty. In an election rigged as far as possible - forcing Capital Metro to go to the polls before they had settled exactly where and how far the line would run and where the stations would be, the voters in the city of Austin actually approved the measure anyways. Only the inclusion of our friends in the exurbs (including Leander, of course) tipped the scales for "no", and barely so (less than 2000 votes; less than 1%).

Long exposure photo of DART Rail in Plano (Dallas) by zbowling on Flickr

Q5. "Well, nobody would ride light rail anyways! Our city's too small and not dense enough!"

A5. Screw you, Skaggs. Tens of thousands of people every single day are now riding lines just like our 2000 proposal in Houston, Dallas, Salt Lake City, Denver, Minneapolis, and Portland. The Feds loved our 2000 plan and would have kicked in 50% of the cost, unlike our commuter rail disaster, for which Capital Metro wisely decided not to even ask. We’re actually denser where it counts than most of those cities.

Q6. "But then we approved light rail in 2004, though, right?"

A6. SCREW YOU, KRUSEE. Capital Metro could have and should have come back with a scaled-down (and nailed-down) version of the 2000 plan, but Krusee made them an offer they couldn't refuse - forcing a different plan on them, which is NOT NOT NOT NOT NOT light rail. It's called "commuter rail", which is also a bit of a misnomer, since nobody who commutes will like it. Ironically, the only people it really serves are the people in Leander who voted against rail in 2000 - and it serves them poorly. The dirty hippies in Central Austin who really wanted rail in 2000 get nothing but the back of Krusee's hand.

Q7. But I HEARD it was light rail. And urban! Like a "light urban railway" or something!

Photo of proposed Highland Mall platform, by whiskeytangofoxtrot on Flickr

A7. Screw you, Lyndon Henry. That's not a question! Capital Metro stretched as far as they could without actually lying by claiming it was an "urban commuter rail service" that would serve Austin and even central Austin, but the closest station to what most of us would call Central Austin is going to be at Highland Mall, on the lovely walkable urban tableau of Airport Boulevard. After that, a station miles out east on MLK will "serve" commuters to UT and the Capitol, who will take a lovely "shuttle bus" the last couple of miles, jerking and wheezing through heavy traffic to their office. Then, it'll hit one more stop east and come into "downtown", and I use the air quotes because nobody really thinks that the Convention Center is the part of downtown anybody wants to go to. Except for helpful guys like Krusee, of course. Oh, if you're unlike most people and will walk more than a quarter-mile to your office from the train station, you might be a winner here. But most downtown office buildings aren't remotely close to the magic quarter-mile circle.

Q8. Well, people will just take the shuttle bus to work after they get off the train, right?

Image of artistic rendering for downtown Austin shuttle transfer, courtesy of Mike Dahmus

A8. Screw you, Capital Metro. There's already some real nice express buses which run from park-and-rides (the same ones you might be able to pick up the train at) straight to your office at UT, the Capitol, or downtown. They're slowed down some in traffic on Mopac, but only 10-15 minutes compared to the free-flow commute (30 minutes versus 45, say). Here's the kicker: if for whatever reason, you're not willing to ride that bus straight to your office today, why would you ride a SHUTTLE BUS that stops more often than the space shuttle delays a launch and is less reliable than Jennifer Kim's vote?

Q9. We can just expand commuter rail to run to UT and the Capitol. Why are you such a buzzkill?

Photo of Camden DMU, courtesy of Christof Spieler, CTC Houston

A9. Screw you, other 2000 light rail fans. The vehicles we chose, called “DMU”s, are way too porky to turn corners in the street. We might be able to extend down 4th street a bit, but there's no way it can turn up towards UT or the Capitol, or turn down Lamar at Airport like light rail would have. That is, unless we decide to knock down a whole bunch of buildings so the train can make some verrry gradual turns, which is how they "solved" this issue on the other DMU line people incorrectly call "light rail" in beautiful Camden, New Jersey.

Q10. We can build a streetcar line, and that'll fix it, right?

Photo of by Toronto Street Car stalled in car traffic, courtesy of Payton Chung

A10. Screw you, Connect Austin. These boneheads gave commuter rail legitimacy with skeptical Central Austin voters by getting an implicit promise (since broken) that the real urban parts of Austin would get rail right after the commuter rail election passed - the problem is that Capital Metro's streetcar plan isn't designed to serve them at all - it's just the same awful shuttle bus, except running on rails, which actually makes it even worse. You heard me; WORSE. Because this streetcar, unlike 2000's light rail plan, wouldn't have its own lane - it would have all the disadvantages of the shuttle bus AND all the disadvantages of trains, all in one shiny package. Yay! Every time somebody's double-parked, or there's an accident in your lane, you'll be wishing you were riding that old dowdy bus. Plus, instead of running in, you know, urban central Austin, Capital Metro combined with UT in a stunning festival of numbskullery to propose that this circulator should run up San Jacinto, where's there's nothing but a ton of state parking garages, and then out Manor, where nobody wants any more density. Leaving Guadalupe, where all the current density is and all the future density will be, with a big load of nothing.

Q11. But Rapid Bus is going to run in Central Austin, right?

A11. Screw you, Capital Metro. They sure said so, during the election. After the election, of course, it fell off the rails, or the rubber tires, or something. Of course, Rapid Bus was never going to do anything useful anyways, and now that the City Council has figured that out (our reps on the CM board basically stopped the bidding), it's basically shelved; and the most optimistic readings you can find now from CM are 2010).

Q12. Is anybody doing anything about this now?

A12. It's way too late to recover anything remotely as useful as 2000's plan, which now can not be built for a generation or more (at which point we'll probably be blasting through the alkali flats in our monkey-driven jet boats anyways). In the meantime, Brewster McCracken and Will Wynn are trying to float a rail plan for central Austin which, depending on the day, either sounds like it might not be half bad or might just be Capital Metro's awful circulator. McCracken, at least, has indicated in no uncertain terms that he understands that Capital Metro's route is useless and stinky; and that the train needs to run up Guadalupe where the people are; where the current density is; and where the future density is going to be; and he also knows it needs to run in its own lane at least a lot of the time to be of any real use. Please stay tuned.

Thanks to austinist and especially truecraig for letting me bile it up on their stage. Drop on by for a visit sometime.

Your pal,
M1EK

P.S. I am not a crackpot.

If you’re an Austin local, have something you’d like to say and are prepared to pen a future entry for this weekly column, send an inquiry to columnists [at ] austinist.com. Bucket-o-thanks! - Austinist Columnist Editor.

Contact the author of this article or email tips@austinist.com with further questions, comments or tips.

By truecraig in Other on February 8, 2008 12:00 PM 0 Comments

Comments [rss]

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What you said was quite true

Tarvin

I'd vote for monkey driven jet boats.

malaysand

I'd hope Brewster can put himself into the mindset of a resident of the Triangle considering he lives there. :) I spoke with CM Martinez and he also seems to understand the route must go up Guadalupe, FWIW.

mdahmus

The LRT that Krusee killed is the same stuff Dallas and all those other cities built - and it's working just great. By now, trains would be running down Guadalupe and Congress. This is a very common talking point I've come across many times from people trying to let the guy (and CM) off the hook; and it's just not true.

Streetcar is a little bit cheaper to build, but it's more expensive to operate, and the cars can't go as fast. LRT could go 60 out in Leander and 20 downtown, while carrying hundreds and hundreds of passengers; streetcar is limited to 20 or so everywhere and can carry about a quarter as many as the typical LRT train.

AustinStyleWatch

This is a great piece and I think we need this column now more than ever. If people in Austin are going to make smart transportation decisions they need to be well informed. Another thing you might want to do a piece on that would be useful for people is a glossary of terms so people know the difference in technology between types of rails and buses: "commuter rail" as opposed to "light rail" or a "bus" vs "rapid bus." There's a good reason why light rail didn't pass and why Krusee advocated metrorail instead, the light rail technology at that time would have been way expensive, taken a long time to build, ripped up utilities etc. But there's new technology for light rail that requires the tracks to go much shallower and cuts the cost way down. Austin should get on that with a quickness. As for the Austin San Antonio rail? I still don't believe it's ever going to happen, I'd be shocked if it was passed in the next 5 years and ready in the next 10

Wad

Is there anything happening on a commuter/regional rail system between Austin and San Antonio?

kingkirbythegreatoftexas

Thanks for yelling the truth as it is.

mdahmus

Benj,

1. There's no demand there, nor will there ever be; the buildings south of MLK are mainly big state parking garages for state employees. While one could conceive of them being useful on the weekends as a "park here, ride train to shop downtown" thing, it's not going to help bring more people into downtown to work; those people in that garage are going to walk from the garage. The part of UT that it would run through is where relatively few people work, too; so again, no help.

2. Manor could use a lot - but the neighborhoods are virulently against it. There's none there now and very little in the future; whereas Guadalupe has a lot now and even more coming down the road.

3. I hope they're right. I think McCracken gets it - we've had a conversation or two that have made me optimistic that he believes the "to the Triangle" needs to happen up Guadalupe, not as the end of the Manor to Mueller back across 51st question-mark route that Capital Metro supports. As usual, nobody at CM and relatively few in the community bother to put themselves in the shoes of a prospective rider at the Triangle and ask "how on earth could it be worth it to hop a streetcar only to run all the way out to Mueller, back on Manor, and drop me off either at the ass end of UT or at an ugly state parking garage"...

Benj

Well done. And it's good to know your avatar picture is not in fact a photo of a 40ish Jello Biafra.

One thing though, re Q10:

Plus, instead of running in, you know, urban central Austin, Capital Metro combined with UT in a stunning festival of numbskullery to propose that this circulator should run up San Jacinto, where's there's nothing but a ton of state parking garages, and then out Manor, where nobody wants any more density. Leaving Guadalupe, where all the current density is and all the future density will be, with a big load of nothing.

1. San Jacinto would be a good,quick run through low-traffic, and would be a good idea if there were no stops between the closest point to the capitol and UT/Royal Stadium.

2. Manor needs and is ripe for more density, especially as you head east past Chestnut. Prime target for Gentrification, Baby.

3. Several business owners on GUANO between 38th and 45th seem pretty confident they're going to have a train passing their places within the next several years.

mdahmus

See, now you made me have to comment again, so you can slag me for commenting again to my own posting. You're fiendishly clever.

The blue hair shot is actually from about 2000 or so at a party at a friend's house on Lake Austin; it shows two things I can no longer do: have blue hair and drink beer. One might assume the bile comes from the lack of one or both, but not really.

Grape Ape

There shouldn't be a bogus e-mail for me. BTW - I do appluad M1EK for putting his thoughts and beliefs out there for the Austinist world to see; and on top of that he puts his photo out there too - how could you miss bluehair if you ran into him? Unless of course he's mixed in with a bunch of old ladies from Tarrytown.

truecraig

Loud Mouth hasn't answered my call for a submission. Neither has Grape Ape. I think we may have bogus emails for them.

Shawn Shillington

I can't wait for the LoudMouth column and the Grape Ape column.

I hope that we will get reserved lanes for the new streetcar plan that Brewster et. al. are putting together now. I also hope that it will be built using an expandable technology, so that even if the first route isn't the best, new routes can be added where they make more sense. I also hope that it will get built at all.

shototsu

This is a depressing, enlightening read. Like many folks who've only been in Austin for around 15 years I've found the proposals floated over the last 8 or so to be confusing at best, nonsensical at worst. I remember trying to make heads or tails of the "streetcar" survey sent to my house in East Austin a while back. There wasn't any mention of streetcars taking up the same lane as traffic; merely questions about whether or not I prefer vehicles with alternative fuel. Who doesn't prefer alternative fuels these days? I felt like such a sucker after I figured out what they really meant. Now I don't trust any proposal I see, no matter how good it vaguely looks on paper.

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the space shuttle delays a launch and is less reliable

Grape Ape

This is awesome! M1EK has even dominating the comments section of his own piece...brilliant!!!

mdahmus

We should all just tilt our heads to the right in honor of that not-quite-funny Super Bowl commercial, at which point the italics look straight up and down anyways.

mdahmus

Thanks again to craig for letting me do this; and the originally broken link tag at the end was almost definitely my fault.

truecraig

It's not the post, unfortunately. It'll be fixed in a minute. Hopefully.

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so you tahank this article very much

LoudMouth

Close your tags please you old blue hair.

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We can just expand commuter rail to run to UT and the Capitol. Why are you such a buzzkill

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