Ten questions about light rail, answered
Posted inDowntown & central Phoenix Phoenix Phoenix 101: History

Ten questions about light rail, answered

PhxLRT2
It's the tenth anniversary of the completion of metro Phoenix light rail (WBIYB). I'll have a history of the project in a special insert of the Arizona Capitol Times. In the meantime, some common questions and answers.

1. What decided the route of the starter line? It was a combination of demand, available right-of-way, and cost. The line follows the route of the old Red Line bus, which was at 125 percent of capacity by 2000. This ensured high ridership and a favorable outcome in federal funding (with an invaluable assist from the late Rep. Ed Pastor).

2. Why was it built at grade rather than as a subway or monorail? Cost. While both those modes — especially a subway — would have been preferable to street running, the funding was not available. The federal government once spent heavily for such subways as the D.C. Metro and Atlanta's MARTA (originally meant for Seattle), but that aid largely ended by the 1980s. Monorails also have the problem of controversy about being unsightly to some, although the Skytrain in Vancouver, B.C., part overhead and part subway, is highly successful.

3. Did Mesa almost miss out on light rail? Yes. The most conservative big city in America was especially wary of the project, and the starter line might have ended at McClintock Drive in Tempe. If so, it would have been very expensive to eventually build into Mesa. Mayor Keno Hawker played a leading role in securing city council approval of the line to Sycamore. This set the table for extending light rail deep into downtown Mesa under Mayor Scott Smith (now Valley Metro CEO). With Phoenix, Tempe, and Mesa on board, this helped the metro area rise in the national competition for federal assistance.

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Phoenix 101: The Mormons
Posted inPhoenix Phoenix 101: History

Phoenix 101: The Mormons

Mesa_Temple

The Arizona Temple of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in Mesa.

Growing up in Arizona, I found the Mormons neither strange nor mysterious, much less threatening. They were part of the wonderful mosaic of a state still tasting of the frontier, before it had been overrun by immigrants from the Midwest and miles of lookalike crapola subdivisions.

We had a Book of Mormon in our library, more a testament to my mother's insatiable curiosity than any desire to convert. My great-grandparents were among the first non-LDS farmers to settle near Mesa, and Grandmother reveled in telling the story about how the Saints pestered them to convert and "seal" their marriage in the temple, much to the horror of these former Presbyterian missionaries. But it was a story told gently and with affection for all.

The Mormons were revered among the great Arizona pioneers. They were known for their generosity, including to "gentiles," something our family experienced. Mormons were hard-working, reliable, self-reliant, patrons of education and the arts. Mesa in those days was a beautiful small city, a monument to the energy and far-sightedness of its LDS founders. We would regularly drive down neat and prosperous Main Street to see the beautiful Arizona Temple. The Mormon kids with whom I went to high school were among the most talented in one of the country's top high-school fine arts program.

The Mormons were also powerful. That was clear even at an early age.

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Posted inPhoenix

Phoenix and Mesa dementia

As the Great Disruption rolls across the globe, changing everything, Arizona slips ever deeper into unreality. And that's saying something. Mesa's notoriously anti-everything voters approved — by 84 percent — using tax incentives to lure what the Republic calls "two massive upscale resort projects." Meanwhile, Phoenix Mayor Phil Gordon is due to "outline an ambitious strategy to make Phoenix the first carbon-neutral city – and the greenest – in the entire country." And what will the strategy, to be unveiled in today's State of the City speech, include? Providing bicycle rentals. Installing solar panels on city buildings. "Developing Phoenix's canal system for recreation and business use similar to the Tempe Town Lake area."

Where to begin? What's most remarkable is how Arizona is willfully ignoring three mortal perils: water, global warming and the rising possibility that it could have one of the world's failed states on its southern border. Oh, the relatively lesser perils remain as well: the growing underclass, the horrible schools, linear slums, income inequality, inadequate infrastructure, serious environmental damage and the health consequences that follow, etc. There's little realization that the props that held up the old growth machine are gone, done, over. I know: Let's build "two massive upscale resort projects!"

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Posted inPhoenix

Phoenix diary: Golf, urban Chandler, ‘green leader,’ med-school disaster, the storm

Phoenix and Arizona sleepwalk on. Mesa is giddy about the promise of a big new resort out in the middle of nowhere. It’s fascinating that the metropolitan area and state seem to have no substantial economic development strategy other than to hope that more clones of Scottsdale golf resorts can be birthed. Tourism, of course, brings notoriously low-paying jobs, many part time and lacking benefits. It may be facing structural challenges as American living standards fall and energy prices rise. And considering that golf is a stagnant pastime — as many give it up as take it up every year — well, do the math…

"Chandler shifts to urban focus," the headline proclaims. The story is about studies on what happens when the suburb runs out of greenfield development space. But they know they shoot studies in Arizona. Chandler has been deeply engineered as an automobile suburb, complete with wide highways ("streets"), walled off "communities" and ugly berms to separate land use from highways. It is completely car dependent, without commuter or light-rail links. I doubt there will be much interest by developers in doing anything remotely urban. But it’s rich enough to survive awhile if the growth machine revives and moves elsewhere…

Meanwhile, a "marketing strategy" was launched to tout Phoenix as an "emerging leader" in green and solar technology. Hahahahahahaha. I hope this is better than the "marketing strategy" of Copper Square. I guess anything helps, if the region could lure at least a few California companies. Unfortunately, the Legislature and extreme political climate’s refusal to fund meaningful economic development tools and research will keep metro Phoenix a backwater. A "city" based on endless driving in individual automobile trips while spreading out into the desert without enough water to sustain it can’t be any kind of green leader, emerging or even flaccid…

Then there’s the crackup of the medical school…

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