Officials discuss conservative support for transit

Can it bridge partisan divide?

Steve Hawley, Feb 05, 10.

US Rep. James Oberstar, who chairs the House Transportation Committee, met with several experts to discuss how to increase conservative support for transit, according to Streetsblog Los Angeles. The other individuals in the room were conservative transit advocate Bill Lind, co-author of Moving Minds; Assistant Transportation Secretary Polly Trottenberg; Reconnecting America president John Robert Smith; and developer Chris Leinberger, who spoke at the Texas Triangle Megaregion conference co-hosted by Houston Tomorrow and America 2050.

“The way we got to America’s national motto being ‘drive or die’ ... is not because of any sort of free market,” said Lind. “We got here because of massive government subsidization of one competitor [roads] and the taxing of another [transit].”

Streetsblog reports:

Lind made perhaps the most cogent argument in favor of abandoning transportation dichotomies such as urban versus suburban. “The rural-urban split is something that anti-transit forces try to exploit on the state legislature level” to defeat transit funding proposals, he observed.

The participants expressed hope that agreement between liberals and conservatives on transit projects, such as the national revival of streetcars, can bridge some of the sharp partisan divides in Washington. Smith, the former mayor of Meridian, Mississippi, said that even small towns have a need for transit, saying that their residents will need transportation alternatives when gas gets too expensive.

(Photo credit: cacophony)