I guess the next thing to do is ask the question, “Why would anyone want to blog about transportation, let alone read a blog about transportation? Why is transportation more important than health, political issues, or even (my favorite) personal finance?”
Well, I am not going to swindle you and say that it is more important than other subjects. I mean, how often do you pick up a paper and look for articles about gas taxes, transit-oriented development, or travel time reliability? Would papers even sell? Would they have the spinning newspaper graphic if the headlines read, “MAP-21 Legislation Puts in Place Performance Measures Program”. Probably not, which is sad because that would be a sweet topic to discuss (and maybe it will be for another blog post).
So if transportation is not that important, then still, why would you spend time creating a blog on it? For one – and this hits home to me especially – is quality transportation (not a Level of Service (LOS), which is yet another topic for another day) connects people. An auto-centric culture with hour-plus commutes isolates us from the rest of the world. This, in turn, leads to a detachment with neighbors, and, being the social creatures we are, is harmful to our psyche.
For example, I live in a neat enclave just South of the Central Business District (CBD). The community also has its own downtown, along with large sidewalks, a small downtown of its own, and winding bike paths. Earlier in the week my girlfriend had told me about a tea shop she had seen on one of our bike rides. So, in order to get out of the house and do some work remotely, I decided to check the place out.
As I was putting my headphones in, my neighbor was coming out of his garage. We sat, talked for a few minutes about the weather, the holidays, etc., and then I went on my merry way. At my old house – which was further from the town center and not walkable to anything – I would have had to pack everything up, get in my car, drive, park (possibly pay for parking) in order to just “get out of the house.” This small interaction I had with my neighbor, although trivial to most, felt pretty good.
Another interesting topic on transportation are the politics. Oh my goodness are the roads we drive on ripe with politics. In my time as a transportation engineer, I have seen everything from backstabbing, name-calling, denouncing fellow colleagues, and this is not even from the elected officials. This is just from working within the industry. Now, most of these people are well-meaning, but with intense pressure from the top brass (e.g., city/county officials, developers’ influence, high-level government, etc.), a lot of money being spent, and dwindling staff, the politics come out with transportation. This is both frustrating when you are in it, but fascinating at the same time.
So, I think I have detailed a few items on why I think transportation deserves another blog. It is a challenging and engaging subject that is ever-changing and affects our lives every day.
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