Andrew Schroeder

Munich Metro via Tobi_2008 (Flickr)

Living in Minneapolis entails certain annoyances – one of which is the terrible mass transit. The 20th Century has proven to us that buses make horrible means of moving a lot of people. In Minneapolis/St. Paul, they’ve taken this to the extreme. For example, do we really need to have a bus stop on EVERY corner? How about every 3 blocks? That would require us all to WALK more than a block and, in turn, the bus wouldn’t have to stop every 30 seconds. This is especially funny downtown: there is one area where there is a bus stop 1/2 of a block from another. The back of the bus almost touches the other stop… and yet… my fellow Minneapolitans can’t get off their asses and walk.

There is also no really well enforced right-of-way for buses in this city. It is always a joy to get on the bus and then have to sit in traffic because no one can see the HUGE yield sign on the back of the bus. Wouldn’t it instead be great (if we’re going to keep with buses) to have dedicated bus lanes? Just a thought.

MetroTransit does do one thing REALLY WELL: it’s named appropriately. MetroTransit. There is no mention of speed, accessibility, an expansive network… nothing. It is just a bunch of crappy transit for the metro. Nothing less. Nothing more.

Throughout the rest of the world, cities the size of Minneapolis/St. Paul have taken great pride in building underground rail lines sometimes called a subway, metro, U-Bahn, or underground. Although it is expensive, the crazy thing is, people actually LIKE to use the subway… it is fast, effecient, and proximity to subway lines almost always raises property values. Perhaps that is something that our Republican governor can understand?

Anyway, that is my sleepless night rant.