Years Late, Detroit's Monorail Opens (1987 NYT article)

[LMich]

I thought people that know about the system would get a kick out of this old New York Times article I found on the People Mover. Parts of the article could be lifted nearly word-for-word and put in a current article on the system. Read the whole thing.

YEARS LATE, DETROIT'S MONORAIL OPENS

by Isabel Wilkerson | Special to the New York Times

August 1, 1987

Nearly two years late and tens of millions of dollars over budget, Detroit's long-maligned monorail system, the People Mover, moved its first riders today above the city's corroded business district.

The 2.9-mile monorail, once considered a possible savior of the city's dying center, is now being greeted with both the excitement of a child trying out a new toy and the dread of a parent wondering what will go wrong first.

Packed People Mover cars whizzed into packed stations today as office workers spent their lunch breaks gliding past the city's rooftops for free. After Aug. 7, each ride will cost 50 cents.

Magnet for Controversy

''This is better than the New York subways,'' said Virgil Knaf, a suburnanite who came downtown to try out the monorail. ''At least you can see where you're going.''

Since its groundbreaking on Halloween morning four years ago, the monorail has been a curiosity, a butt of jokes, a magnet for controversy and a symbol of the obstacles to reviving a crumbling city.

It was built at a cost of $200.3 million, 80 percent of it Federal dollars, and has suffered setbacks ranging from cracked support beams to work stoppages by construction crews charging they had not been paid on time.

Now, it is expected to whisk riders between office buildings, restaurants and special events downtown, eventually spurring development along the route. But critics call it ''a dogless tail'' and ''a horizontal elevator to nowhere.'' They argue that, until there are more places to go downtown, there will be no people to move. 'Nice-Looking Stonehenge'

In a poll by The Detroit Free Press this week, two-thirds of those surveyed said the People Mover was a bad idea. And in a poll by The Detroit News conducted before the system was completed, two-thirds of the respondents said they would not ride the monorail. ''It will make a nice-looking Stonehenge,'' said a respondent to the Free Press poll.

Today city officials put those brickbats aside and celebrated the opening with balloons in the shape of a People Mover car.

...

Detroit's People Mover was originally intended to be part of a larger rail system linking the city and its suburbs. But with about $65 million in cost overruns from the People Mover, Federal money expected to be used for a subway system went to the downtown loop instead.

Now the People Mover is a solitary track dependent mainly on downtown office workers, about 100,000 altogether. Officials once predicted that as many as 55,000 people would ride the People Mover each day. Now they expect about 16,000 a day and, in a city of cars and commuters, some say even that is overly optimistic.

...

Crazy to think that up until last December, the price had remained the same for a ride.