[continued from previous message]

a multi-billion dollar transit plan. The Southwest Ohio Regional Transit
Authority proposed a ballot referendum called Metro Moves, which would
have created an extensive light-rail system incorporating the three
remaining 1920s-era subway stations at Liberty, Brighton, and Hopple
streets.

In many ways, Metro Moves was more ambitious than the original Rapid
Transit Loop. It included seven light-rail lines and 72 stations, at a
total cost of $2.7 billion. While the federal government would have
covered the bulk, Hamilton County (which encompasses Cincinnati) residents
were asked to approve a half-cent sales tax levy to cover their portion.
Just like they had a century ago, local businesses endorsed the plan, as
well as environmentalists and good government groups. Supporters blanketed
the airwaves with positive ads in favor of Metro Moves, and dominated
opponents during numerous public debates.

Metro Moves was the result of a decade-long effort to bring light rail to
Cincinnati. Moreover, it was the city’s chance to erase the stain left
behind by their unfinished subway project. But Hamilton County residents
rejected Metro Moves in a 2-to-1 vote, with over 68 percent voting against
the project.

Wedged between the Fort Washington freeway trench and the Ohio River, a
stone’s throw from the city’s baseball park and football stadium, sits the
Riverfront Transit Center, a two-story tall, half-mile long underground
concrete tube opened in 2003. That makes it one of the largest transit
stations in the world. It is also another failed Cincinnati public
transportation project: most of the time it sits completely empty.

When it was envisioned, planners thought that the transit center would be
a hub where light-rail lines — if Cincinnati ever got around to building
them — could converge. In the meantime, the massive underground transit
station would serve as a pick-up and drop-off location for public and
private buses, as well as special shuttles during game days. Today, the
above-ground portals are locked and the driveway leading up to the main
entrance is closed for 275 days out of the year. Though I’m told the
center is lined with subway tiles and mosaic art, I wasn’t allowed inside.

"It is an orphaned station," a Channel 9 reporter mused in a 2011
investigative piece on the station’s underutilization. No rail lines
currently run to the Riverfront Transit Center, and it’s only open during
during major events. Public metro buses are left to do their pick-ups and
drop-offs at street level.

With a $48 million price tag, the transit center has been enough of a
money pit to turn once ardent supporters into foes. Former Cincinnati
mayor Charlie Luken, who helped cut the ribbon on the Riverfront Transit
Center in 2003, now calls it the biggest waste of money he’s ever seen.
"The only reason there's not more outrage about it," Luken told Channel 9,
"is because people don't know it's there."

When I ask him about the Riverfront Transit Center, Dan Hurley, a local
historian and civic leader, almost chokes on his water. "Underutilized is
such a kind word," he says. "Boondoggle is the one I hear more often."

What is it about Cincinnati that it served as the setting for not one, but
two multi-million transportation fiascos? Most of the Cincinnatians I
spoke to shrug off the question, insisting that the forces that gave rise
to both the subway and the transit center have nothing in common. The
subway was never finished, while the transit center is complete, if
underutilized.

In September, the city will cut the ribbon on its new streetcar system.
Many Cincinnatians are excited for their fancy new streetcars. Others
remain opposed, including Cincinnati mayor John Cranley, who calls it a
waste of money and "a mistake." In 2013, Cranley tried to stop the
streetcar, but the city council, perhaps realizing the horrible irony
involved in canceling another half-complete transportation project,
overruled him.

Recently, the city realized it was losing money by keeping its empty
spaces like the Riverfront Transit Center empty for most of the year. In
October, the station will be unlocked and the gates flung open for Ubahn,
a two-day hip-hop and EDM musicfest. (The German word "U-bahn" translates
as an underground rapid transit or metro.) The organizers are billing it
as the "the first underground music festival in Cincinnati."

New York City transformed an abandoned elevated train track into a world-
class park. It’s now doing the same for an empty trolley terminal in
Manhattan. The High Line begat the Lowline. If the Ubahn is successful,
could the Cincinnati subway be far behind?

Moore says no. "We’ve had people approach us about using the tunnel for
everything from grain malting, to a water bottling operation, to
nightclubs — you name it." None of these ideas will work, though. There’s
no way the subway can accommodate thousands of sweaty club kids. The floor
is uneven, there are pillars, and the water main, which was installed in
the 1950s, leaks constantly.

Which is not to say the tunnels aren’t in good condition. In 2008, the
city was faced with a choice: spend $100.5 million to revive the tunnels
for modern subway use, $19 million to fill the tunnels with dirt, or $2.6
million to simply maintain them as an abandoned space. After two years of
debate, the city went with the cheapest option. The subway houses a water
main, as well as fiber optic cables. And with Central Parkway running
directly above, the tunnels needed to be refortified to keep the street
safe.

Today, most people don’t know why the subway was never finished. Even
Murray Seasongood, the posh city manager who was most responsible for its
demise, didn’t seem to understand his own role in the boondoggle. When he
was researching his book, Mecklenborg stumbled across an old interview
from the 1960s with Seasongood, who was in his 80s at the time. The
interviewer, a college student from the University of Cincinnati, asked
him if he regretted killing the subway. "He was very jovial, very
enthusiastic," the student said of Seasongood. "But as for the details of
the subway system, he could not recall them."

Back at Hopple Street, Mecklenborg and I emerge from the labyrinth, a
little dirtier than when we entered but otherwise unharmed. Despite
everything that he and his city have been through, he’s surprisingly
indifferent to the decision to seal off the subway from the public
forever. He thought that the tours were okay, but prone to misinformation.
Maybe it’s better this way. "You can go on a tour of the subway, you can
physically see it," he says, "but you still wouldn’t understand it."


--
His Omnipotence Barack Hussein Obama, declared himself "Pooptator" of all
mentally ill homosexuals and crossdressers, while declaring where they
will defecate.

Obama increased total debt from $10 trillion to $19 trillion in the seven
years he has been in office, and sold out heterosexuals for Hollywood
queer liberal democrat donors.

Barack Obama, reelected by the dumbest voters in the history of the United
States of America.  The only American president to deliberately import a
lethal infectious disease from Africa, Ebola.

Loretta Fuddy, killed after she "verified" Obama's phony birth
certificate.

Obama ignored the brutal killing of an American diplomat in Benghazi, then
relieved American military officers who attempted to prevent said murder
in order to cover up his own ineptitude.

Obama continues his muslim goal of disarming America while ObamaCare
increases insurance premiums 300% and leaves millions without health care.

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