That may seem a bit snarky but the Denver Post recently rehashed a press release for an RTD sponsored study showing that housing prices in the city of Denver (not metro) increased around some stations while housing prices in metro Denver fell (http://www.denverpost.com/news/ci_10850014). Even though it openly admits this not to be the case for all stations in the city of Denver let alone those stations outside the city, it trumpets transit as a tool that increases the value of housing around it. So we spend billions to get a few thousand cars off the road and add a few % of value to a few hundred housing units in a metro of 2.5 million people. Yep, it’s a success.

How are these sales tax revenues causing issues in Phoenix? Here in Denver retail sales were up in the first half of 2008 (I don’t know about the last half) yet RTD was wining about them being “down”. How were they down? The increases weren’t meeting RTD’s projections!

The light rail fiasco continues. So does the policy of spending every available dollar to fund a “vibrant” downtown. Downtown revival is the Holy Grail of planners. The fact that so many people fled downtown and never go there by choice is not considered.

Regional transportation agencies are all immortal. No amount of fraud, waste, inefficiency, or idiocy will negate the determination of local governments to fund them.

In such a situation the services that perform worst – in operations or finances – will get more attention and more funding to correct the faults. Any services that perform well, such as buses, will be looted to feed the losers.

Light rail usually provides the least value. Therefore it gets an increasing share of any funding available. Hope light rail works at least somewhat. Otherwise bus service will have to be stopped.