GOT SUSHI
Wasabi Sushi in Scotts Valley wants to create a “Good Times” roll … but what to put in it? Would love your input.
Kipp
BIKES NOT TRAINS
Let’s consider the common sense of implementing a genuine best way upon the transportation corridor which would finally provide a safe place for bikes and pedestrians. This should have been completed by now to at least allow proven efficient electric bicycles with 30 MPH capability to remove slower moving cars from the nearby roadways.
Generations ago the escalator was introduced, and its asynchronous ability proved that it could transport many more people faster between a few floors than an elevator (synchronous implementation) which sometimes required passengers to queue up in groups to have to wait multiple full transport cycles.
It is now obvious and many situations that have only a few floors feature escalators to expeditiously transport people between floors while relegating infinitely patient freight to the less expeditious elevator.
The advantages of asynchronous transportation was why the car became so popular. Unfortunately, this has become so popular that we now constantly end up with congested freeways during rush hours, yet amazingly this car convenience factor is still worthy enough to warrant getting continually involved with such wasteful stop-and-go traffic.
As an engineer (retired) I grew up favoring trains but am 100% certain that implementing the Santa Cruz County version of Rail-Trail would be a mistake.
Unscrupulous opportunists focused upon diverting endless taxpayer funds into their own pockets are promoting a sham. Attempts to just resuscitate a single track that was intended over 100 years ago for only slow-moving freight and tourist trains is already known to cost taxpayers endless millions. A single track restricted to a linear configuration is not a favorable foundation for an active commuter train that has to allow travel in both directions at the same time on the same track!
The Santa Cruz County version of Rail plus Trail is obviously a sham being perpetrated by a slow-moving tourist organization that has been deceiving residents that they will go out of business unless they are allowed to expand their novel 10 MPH-on-a-single-track-monopoly throughout the rest of Santa Cruz County.
Let’s avoid getting railroaded by NOT putting Supervisors in place who are at the mercy of those who are backing their election. Getting railroaded has happened to so many so much that it has been known as forcing something that was not wanted:
If a landowner was in the way, by hook or by crook, the railroads usually managed to put the tracks where they wanted them. The landowners felt they had been “railroaded.” It turns out, the word still applies in the 21st century.
Bob Fifield
Aptos
Thank you Mr. Fifield! Trains make sense where there is a dense population over a large area. Although Santa Cruz is the world for many of us, it is still the second smallest county in California. Trains simply do not make sense in our community, especially on a single track with only 3 sidings. This would only allow 5 vehicles to operate at any one time. With the demonstration of the small hydrogen hand-built custom trolley demonstrated several years ago, this would only allow 200 seated passengers at any one time when we currently have 100,000+ trips happening daily between Watsonville and Santa Cruz. The math simply does not work along with the expense of over $1,300,000,000 to construct and operate such a vehicle. It will not help with traffic, it is actually worse for the environment and all it helps is the pockets of those in the rail industry.
Thank you Bob. I particularly like your comment regarding a single track serving a two direction commute.
If there ever comes a time when we have the money and demand to warrant a train, it certainly would make more sense to build a rail in a location that allows for two tracks (perhaps elevated over hwy 1?).
Thanks
It’s hard to square “equity” with eminent domain. What a long strange trip it’s been. We’re living in an age where these very words—like equity— are used to blugeon and undermine robust civic discourse. Tropes and memes drive big money agendas and work to silence dissenting voices. The tragedy is that these game plays tear at the very fabric of our interwoven lives.