I’m with Del–make it bigger and they will come to clog!

Ditto! And given the legislature’s refusal to acknowledge widespread support across the state for constitutional reform, I’m not sure it would do much good for all of us individuals to band together.

*sigh*

I wonder, too, but I’d be all over mass transit if it were available in my neighborhood. When we first moved to town, my husband and I had one car and different work (and school) schedules, so I took the bus several times a week. Loved it!! That was years and years ago, though, when the schedules were reliable. I knew if I missed the 5:15 bus, I could catch the 5:30 bus. And not having to drive was such a treat.

Yeah, I’d sooo much rather have mass transit than an uberexpensive 5-mile-stretch of sure-to-be-obsolete-in 10-years mass of river-killing concrete to facilitate yet more sprawl. But I don’t have enough money to influence anybody in Montgomery, so I guess my 2 cents doesn’t count.

SY, I wonder how many of the people who drive 280 and support the elevated highway have thought about this. Unless it’s totally different from every road construction project that has come before, it will take longer than expected and be a huge disruption to existing traffic. And ten years will give developers plenty of time to sell their new projects to local officials.

I like the idea of using the money to revitalize neighborhoods closer to downtown, as long as the revitalization doesn’t turn into gentrification that gets rid of affordable housing (a la Homewood).

I’m curious — do you have to drive downtown every day? And if so, would you use a park-and-ride bus service (assuming it was reliable and reasonably clean) if you had that option? My first choice of alternative plans for the money would be decent public transportation, but I wonder how many people would use it.

If the money to build an elevated freeway could instead be spent revitalizing some of the neighborhoods closer to downtown, that would make a lot more sense. It would reduce traffic and fuel consumption at the same time. It might take several years to move enough people to make a difference, but it’ll take at least ten years to build anything over 280, and can you imagine what a mess the construction project will cause?

I’d love to use mass transit, but it’s not an option. Birmingham is a city unto itself surrounded by a bunch of smaller cities, and all of them have their own separate governments and agendas. Add to that our ridiculous state constitution, which cedes most local control to the state legislature, and in fact hands it over to the Jefferson County delegation. The Jeffco delegation splits on this issue by party (and race) lines. That lack of agreement left over $80 million of federal matching funds on the table that became unavailable when the Dems took control of the US Senate and Richard Shelby lost his committee chairmanship.

Our mass transit consists of an inadequate and unreliable bus system and a few trolleys that run on fixed routes in the city. No light rail; no park-and-rides, just a few very congested routes into and out of the city center. While intercity cooperation was lacking before, it now appears to be non-existent. The new mayor of Birmingham is a blowhard who has made it clear he intends to set his own course. And we have a tendency to worship our cars and the “personal freedom” they supposedly bring.

So — the short answer is not very and not much. Sorry for the rant.

The other problem on 280 is rampant lack of planning. It’s impossible to retrofit that.