Is Jacksonville Losing Logistically?

[Ocklawaha]

Guess they are if you work for GM, Firestone, Standard Oil or Phillips anyway.

OCKLAWAHA

[Dog Walker]

CUTR/USF are experts? Well they sure do think they are..............not!

Of course they are experts!  The real question is what they are experts at.......maybe producing impressive sounding reports that support the position of whoever gives them money?

[CS Foltz]

Dog Walker that is the issue in a nutshell. Who ever pays them gets their consulting and forecasting projections biased in their favor plain and simple. I can understand how that would take place since you don't bite the hand that feeds you but to assume CUTR & USF are the "reigning" experts is simplistic and not in the Taxpayers best interest for sure! Gee makes me wonder just well they represent the paying public?

[tufsu1]

I don't think its quite that simple CS....I know you have a distrust of consultants (and smetimes it seems everyone else), but I know many who are very honest....in the case of CUTR, they have some researchers who favor BRT...so they seek out those clients and vice versa.

[Dog Walker]

TU, you are right, but they should then not claim that they are putting out "scientific, objective" studies.  They should put their advocacy plainly.

"If the only tool you have is a hammer, then all problems look like nails."

[CS Foltz]

Dog Walker...........I agree with your synopsis of the situation......nails, cute for sure! tufsu1 your are correct .....I do not trust consultants, who are biased by the people who have retained them to produce a report or a projection! In fact I seldom trust most people......since most have an agenda that concerns them and them only.  A lot of people have two sides, their public side and their private side and both can be 180 degres apart.  I really have to know someone for quite awhile before I even begin to trust anyone but that's me!

[Ocklawaha]

My own take on this might be different then yours TUFSU, I just don't believe these "institutes", "think tanks," "Anti-Tax Groups," or the "Highway Lobby and their consultants," can be trusted. The reason is founded in history. From the earliest auto trails in 1900 until today, they have been able to pay the political machine to get their wishes. From 1900 until today the railroads have paid Interstate Taxes, Property Taxes, Utility Taxes and even special Road and School District Taxes. In those early days of roads it was REQUIRED of every able bodied man to spend up to 30 days a year in service to the State, digging ditches, cutting right-of-ways, and laying shell on our roads. Failure to show up for your term was punishable by imprisonment. So the highways were paid for in no small part by the Railroads, and built with the "slave labor" of the masses, to satisfy a growing power bloc of American industry and finance. We allowed the combined might of big oil, big rubber, and big auto, and big Truck and Bus, to dictate our transportation system as we know it today. Anyone who doesn't think this entire "Highway industry Bloc," operates like the Mafia, need only ask Packard, American Motors, Willy's, Studebaker, or Kaiser. They succeeded in destroying virtually the entire mass transit industry of the United States, Canada and Mexico, as we knew it. These guys were even convicted of trashing the streetcar and interurban railroads. Less common is the story of the Interstate Highway System, which was mysteriously laid out (by planners and consultants) to run right alongside EVERY SINGLE railroad mainline in America, taking full advantage of modern construction machines to shortcut  the tracks. They are almost solely responsible for the piecemeal dismantling of the passenger rail network, and massive abandonment's of freight trackage. As long as the taxpayers and political parties could be duped into buying into such trick words as FREEway, Flexible Transit, etc. we would be immune to their poison. We were shown how much cheaper it was to operate a single semi or Greyhound, compaired to 20-50 miles of track. A weekly train to Podunk next Friday, could hardly compete with a Semi truck TODAY. Ditto for the bus and passenger train. Once the feeders were cut to pieces the mainlines began to fail and fall. Even two of our transcontinental railroads were torn up and sold for junk. Entire states became converts to the "highway only," doctrine all the time being led by professional legal and Consultant advice. I mentioned politics too, another guilty group, Republicans who support big oil, autos, rubber and highways. Democrats who stay in bed with big labor, UAW, Teamsters, UTU, BLE, BRAC etc... How does a citizenry or a city differentiate between "professional advice" and "evil design?" Cha Ching...

Sure this is way over simplified, and not a case in point, but it certainly gives us some ideas on why not just consultants, but transportation consultants are on the suspect list. Hopefully the "big 4 on MJ" are not guilty of this, I know for a fact that TUFSU, Lake, and Anonymous, have refused to compromise principal for dollars on many occasions. Myself, every idea and concept EVER shared with the City of Jacksonville, has been of passion, not money. Sure I wouldn't mind being paid, but when job crosses ideals, well lets just say they probably wouldn't have to put up with me very long. So maybe we are the "4 good guys," that will change the face of Jacksonville and Florida forever... THAT would be one hell of an epitaph.

OCKLAWAHA

[tufsu1]

In fact I seldom trust most people......since most have an agenda that concerns them and them only. 

true for everybody CS!