I'm listening to a Bush news conference as I write this; don't ask me why. Maybe I like the way some white noise in the background stimulates my inner curmudgeon. In any case, my outer curmudgeon is headed up to the Adirondacks by bike, on a recumbent that I'm just breaking in, or that's breaking me in. Those of you who've got emails from me know my signature includes a great quote from Chilean Senator Viera-Gallo (I got the quote from Ivan Illich's essential work, Energy and Equity): "You can get to socialism only by bicycle." I plan to ride with that in the back of my mind.
On a more mundane level, I'll be thinking about how to address some transportation issues when I get home. There's much more to say about the fast ferry debacle. For example, beneath all the scandals and failures is the basic arithmetic that doomed the service from the start: Any vehicle that burns almost 9,000 gallons of diesel fuel for a 200-mile round trip is bound to sink financially, even at the fuel prices of two years ago. And the environmental implications of such fuel consumption (recall the ferry uses more fuel than all the motor vehicles it carries would use if going by land) are pretty grim, too.
Of course, the logical alternative to such wasteful, harmful transport is the one that consistently gets the shaft: intercity rail. Here's a signpost that tells what's happening on that front: Amtrak is now posting notices that warn of delays of up to 90 minutes on all trains between our region and Albany. The delays result from track work that CSX Corporation is doing - work that's undoubtedly been slowed and delayed by today's retrograde politics of rail.
Well, check in again soon. And please comment on the posts, whether to soothe or antagonize the resident curmudgeon.
