It appears that the six mile light-rail line to south Phoenix is on life support. I say "appears" because much of the reporting on the issue has been inaccurate. The Arizona Republic's Jessica Boehm reported the immediate news correctly, but plenty still needs to be filled in.
If I understand correctly, the City Council — with transit-backers Mayor Greg Stanton gone and Councilmembers Kate Gallego and Daniel Valenzuela set to resign in August to run for the seat — voted to "redesign" the south line along Central Avenue. This is to address a "grassroots" opposition complaining that Central would lose two of four lanes for automobile traffic.
Redesign may well mean death and loss of federal funding, especially with the rump Council after August. Skillful/shameful maneuvering by Councilman Sal DiCiccio, an ardent light-rail opponent, even took hostage City Manager Ed Zuercher, threatening his job and the city budget. This is the shorthand to a very complex moving drama.
It's no secret that the Koch brothers and other dark money groups are working to kill transit projects around the country. The anti-rail fetish on the right has always puzzled me. The "You Bastards" part of WBIYB is intended for them and their thuggish opposition to the starter line. And it's always possible to find a few discontents for a "grassroots" front group. But south Phoenix voters approved this line by 70 percent. If the likes of Better Call Sal prevail, this would be a blunder of historic proportions. For the facts and context, please read on.
In fact, the city since 2012 the city held 340 meetings with south Phoenix stakeholders, explaining the project and getting their feedback (see page 569 of this report). Bilingual notices were delivered door-to-door within a quarter mile of the proposed line 10 to 14 days ahead of each meeting. The narrowing is necessary because segments of south Central are narrow and acquiring all the land for additional lanes would have entailed prohibitive cost and destroyed many businesses. The completed line would have produced much wider and more numerous vehicle lanes approaching major intersections.
As we learned from the starter line, light rail would be a boon to the area. This is especially true of south Phoenix, providing a reliable transportation option to employment centers. It would undo some of the civic malpractice done over many decades. The worst polluting industries were placed in south Phoenix. Infrastructure was inferior, as was transit. The priceless Japanese flower gardens along Baseline Road were lost. The city didn't even want south Phoenix, only bowing to annexation on the eve of the 1960 Census to carry Phoenix above 400,000.
No wonder residents voted for light rail by such a large margin. As with the starter line, the city would have provided a variety of help to businesses affected by construction.
DiCiccio is an especially destructive force on Council. He lives in Ahwatukee Foothills, so has no dog in this fight. Neither does his mini-me Jim Waring. It's a pathetic paradox that not-too-bright Councilwoman Laura Pastor voted to sandbag the south line, considering that her father, Rep. Ed Pastor, was the motive force behind federal funding for Phoenix light rail.
Someone asked me about trolley buses. Seattle runs a large fleet, in addition to regular buses, light rail, trolly lines, and the monorail. But these require expensive catenary and still can't provide the capacity or comfort of a light-rail train. Like bus rapid transit, they need their own dedicated lanes to be effective, which almost no locality will provide.
Important context: For decades government policies and dollars subsidized the hollowing out of cities with freeways, cheap loans for suburban sprawl, flood control, and fleets and armies to ensure the flow of cheap gasoline (with climate change as a bonus). Employers moved out of cities and underfunded transit left many low-income peoples stranded. Phoenix was no exception, with the hostility toward transit and defeat of ValTrans.
Most people in Phoenix have "suburban values." They didn't come from real cities. So light rail is new, strange, and subjected to intense skepticism. The media cover every real or contrived inconvenience from construction, while ignoring the same disruptions from road work. Phoenix is the only major metropolitan area in North America that is still building freeways (which make less valuable land suddenly ripe for development). Sprawl is killing Phoenix.
But against all the hysterical predictions, light rail has succeeded here. That's no surprise. For example, Dallas faced the same headwinds until the first line was completed. Then the suburbs were clamoring for their own trains. Now Dallas has the largest light-rail system in America. Alas, Phoenix is still resistant, still fertile ground for Kook and Koch propaganda.
I'm disappointed that the south line didn't include a jog over to Third Avenue — a dense area of government employees — and pass Union Station. This would have allowed the historic depot to be reclaimed as a multi-modal central station like Diridon in San Jose. Never miss an opportunity to miss an opportunity.
But now this is gut-check time. The next 90 days will be critical. Are we going to let the Bastards get away with this?
Cult profit in concrete:
https://www.azcentral.com/story/news/local/southwest-valley-traffic/2018/06/21/south-mountain-freeway-metro-phoenix-more-than-halfway-done/707104002/
Posted by: Cal Lash | June 22, 2018 at 07:30 PM
I’m sympathetic to light rail but I feel like this topic is really complicated and a deeper analysis is necessary.
While the community may support light rail IN THEORY a lot of local folks will probably be displaced by this development. Knowing how the state likes to minimize damage estimates (I’m thinking of the I-10 eminent domain debacle) people may be right to protest the extension—especially if light rail leads to gentrification and displacement (as it inevitably would in a place like South Phoenix). I thought the Glendale yokels were nuts to turn down light rail (they’re probably just too racist to spend good money on brown communities) but at least the vegan storefronts popping up over there are small, local investors—not the corporate behomeths that accompany light rail. The business owners on south central may be best off being left alone. So while they probably are being played by Koch money, is South Phoenix really ours to fight over? I’d love light rail in So. Phx but not at the cost of losing what’s there, and since i don’t live or work there I don’t know why to care. I mean, outside of thumbing to Sal. I’ll admit that’s pretty important.
And besides, Phoenix has to crash and burn before it can rise out of the ashes again. But Hopefully we can get rail transit all over the valley. If we’re lucky even in our lifetime. Just a thought!!
Posted by: the_intellectual_assassin | June 23, 2018 at 12:04 AM
Interestingly lite rail speeds easterly forward in the rather white city of
conservative Mesa.
Posted by: Cal Lash | June 23, 2018 at 06:32 AM
Nothing new here. Any area south of the river has always been kept "tamped down". The prevailing thought of the so-called "movers and shakers" of Phoenix has always been to pretend that that area did not exist.
Posted by: Ramjet | June 23, 2018 at 08:24 AM
Without a Sneltram, Phoenix's light rail is a POS. I rode it once. Amsterdam's system would have cut the nearly life long trip time by 90%.
Face it, the same corrupt politicians and same corrupt businesses benefited, not citizens.
Posted by: Kyle Lyles | June 23, 2018 at 09:24 AM
"Kyle,"
I'd be very interested in specifics. The political elite was opposed to transit, especially LRT. Leaders who supported it took a big chance, although the voters did support it.
"Same corrupt businesses"? Huh? Business has been slow to see LRT's potential. The ruling Real Estate Industrial Complex has always opposed it and seeks to locate businesses in its car-dependent, polluting suburban office "parks."
Start making sense or don't show up.
Say hi to the boys in Wichita.
Posted by: Rogue Columnist | June 23, 2018 at 09:47 AM
I think there might be some value in critique of this project if these supposed grassroots opponents of light rail were discussing the potential of the area to gentrify, but that doesn't appear anywhere in their public statements (somebody correct me if I'm wrong). It's disheartening to watch this unfold as the City Council so cavalierly wishes to throw away nearly $600 million of federal funding because one lane in each direction of Central Avenue will be lost in the project's current iteration. Oh the humanity! It's not as if there are bridges to downtown on 7th St and 7th Ave...oh wait.
Phoenix is an amazing city but it could be so much more than an endless horizon of strip malls if the people of Phoenix demanded a better vision for the city and region. But considering how deeply the kookacracy is entrenched - with the physical environment of our sprawling AZ cities built to inhibit the formation of civic spirit - it's open question if Phoenix and enough of Arizona will undergo a paradigm shift to get away from the bleak, polluted, and dreary future the right-wing is building for our state.
Posted by: El Nogalense | June 23, 2018 at 02:54 PM
Es Verdad
Posted by: Cal Lash | June 23, 2018 at 03:35 PM
Houston is still building freeways, though technically not "free"ways since they are toll roads. I'm not a fan of the tollways, but that seems to be the way around here for new roads. At least Valley freeways are all still free.
Posted by: Jon7190 | June 24, 2018 at 09:19 AM
Freeways aren't free. Their costs include climate-change causing greenhouse gas emissions, unhealthy local pollution, inefficient sprawl, damage to center cities and loss of valuable farmland and desert.
https://www.vox.com/2015/5/14/8605917/highways-interstate-cities-history
Posted by: Rogue Columnist | June 24, 2018 at 09:56 AM
Take away the "freeways" and the CAP and you have Phoenix 1966. No hordes of immigrants from the heartland. A viable downtown and livable city.
Posted by: Ramjet | June 24, 2018 at 10:48 AM
simón
Posted by: Cal Lash | June 24, 2018 at 01:15 PM
With all due respect I am pasting this here and on the last blog also.
Trump Adviser Rips Into Stephen Miller: 'He's Waffen-SS'
https://www.haaretz.com/us-news/.premium-trump-adviser-rips-into-stephen-miller-he-s-waffen-ss-1.6192214
Posted by: Cal Lash | June 24, 2018 at 01:37 PM
A couple of things in response.
First, gentrification of South Phoenix is already happening. This is especially true east of 24th street, where new home development prices range from the upper $200k to $600k. Some of the newcomers are happy to live in a diverse neighborhood, while others want to make it another predominantly white suburb.
Second, there is a core of residents who are making it our business to show up at planning committee meetings and council meetings to look out for the community. The light rail issue is already on our radar and we will show up for it.
Posted by: Lisa A | June 25, 2018 at 12:23 PM
I think its absurd to dismiss the concerns of South Phoenix residents in 2018 because of a 2015 vote (during which only 19% of south phoenix residents cast a ballot).
If driverless ride-shares and shuttles are the future, why would the city spend millions of dollars erecting obsolete technology from the 19th century in the middle of a central thoroughfare? Next time you are in town, take some time to drive up central from south mountain. Consider the views looking down on the river and downtown and ask yourself if we should spoil a scenic drive and bikeway with 19th Century technology?
Full disclosure, I live in south phoenix three blocks from the new extension.
Posted by: Chris Brennan | August 06, 2018 at 09:49 PM
I have lived in South Phoenix all my life. We don't want or need the light rail. It is not worth the 5 years of construction and it will destroy our small town feel we love down here.
Posted by: Valerie Smith | March 11, 2019 at 12:19 AM
Kate Gallegos reminds me of Marie Antoinette. She does not care what we the people of South Phoenix say or feel. WE DON'T WANT HER TRAIN!!! I will never vote Democrat again!! BLEXIT!!!!!
Posted by: Valerie Smith | March 11, 2019 at 12:24 AM
BLEXIT!!!! Black and Latinos exiting the Democrat party who don't listen to us!!
Posted by: Valerie Smith | March 11, 2019 at 12:26 AM
Please Vote No Light Rail train in August. We need your help to stop the train down her in South Phoenix. We don't want it. Glendale and Scottsdale didn't want it.
Posted by: Valerie Smith | April 07, 2019 at 12:27 PM
The last line in this story called us 'Bastards' we are not Bastards we are life long Southsiders. We don't want or need this LRT. I use the city bus all the time and usually there is only 3 or 4 people on the bus. We don't want the shoplifters, vagrants, and other bad people it will bring down here. We don't want to change the Southside into the Westside. We don't want apartment complexes replacing our family businesses.
Posted by: Valerie Smith | April 07, 2019 at 12:36 PM
South 7st and South 7th Ave are already very busy all day long and in the afternoon it is bumper to bumper. The LRT is ridiculous and disatorous for us. We know now what we didn't now back in 2015 and we don't want the LRT. What South Phoenix needs is a Cemetery. We live here all our lives and our people are buried all over town.
Posted by: Valerie Smith | April 07, 2019 at 12:44 PM