The Secretary of Transportation Ray LaHood (R-IL) has a blog that highlights transportation projects throughout the country and gives details on the inner workings of the Department of Transportation. Yesterday he had an excellent post on the public transportation system in Portland, and how they are creating new jobs manufacturing new, modern streetcars for that city.
Reading this blog illustrates two important issues. The first is that public transportation is not a partisan issue; both sides of the aisle benefit from increased public transportation. The second is the progress other cities around the country are making with increasing their transportation options and the positive returns on their investments. Other cities are making these investments in public transportation infrastructure, while in Cincinnati a group of naysayers wants to pass an Anti-Passenger Rail Amendment that will increase our dependency on foreign oil and put the City at a competitive disadvantage when trying to attract and retain jobs. Let’s not get left behind.
American-Made Modern Streetcars Creating New Jobs in Portland, OR
July 2, 2009 at 10:10 am
My question: will the jobs of manufacturing street cars be outsourced to Portland or will we create that industry in Cincinnati?
July 2, 2009 at 11:28 am
I’m not sure if streetcar manufacturing will come to Ohio. However, Stacy and Witbeck Inc. (a rail transit construction company) will be opening up their Midwestern regional office in Cincinnati because of our Streetcar project. This will be their home base for future streetcar and light rail projects in the Midwest, which are bound to spring up after the success of Cincinnati’s system.
August 27, 2009 at 9:19 pm
I’ve wondered this myself. I really do hope we pick the American made streetcars (the others being Ukraine, I think?).
As for development here? Portland has had 10 yrs to develop that infrastructure. If we were going to build them here we’d have to get the streetcars going first, I doubt the market can get too big without being saturated.