Quote:
Originally Posted by babs
I don't know how this garbage happened but Trimet is the agency that built it and their name is on the side of every rail car. Heck, they even bought out the railcar manufacturer. So unless guns were pulled, they could have stopped it.
The billion dollar infrastructure of MAX can get you downtown. Running an extension of the Red Line down the WES corridor is going to cost WAY less than the planned spending of the billions on SW light rail. Fix what you got, before building more.
|
This argument is compelling. I don't know enough about the WES, nor rely on it enough, to say it is entirely useless. The SW Corridor, should it reach Tigard as a MAX, seems like a good occasion to revisit the WES idea. If most passengers transfer at Beaverton TC presently, then having a system where the WES and MAX travel from Tigard to Beaverton TC seems redundant.
Perhaps Trimet can consider a phase-out approach where the WES ends at Tigard TC, and two MAX lines continue on, one to Beaverton-Ptld and the other to Ptld. A couple more stops could be incorporated into the new line from Tigard-Beaverton-Ptld (certainly one at Scholls-Fry). How much money would be saved by shortening the line, but spent by requiring overhead wires?