MORE Thoughts -- PRCo--2000 -- What Trolleycars Remained??

[Donald Galt]

On 9 Jun 00, at 10:09, Edward H. Lybarger wrote:

> And now they want to do this with a big chunk of Downtown Pittsburgh.  Isn't
> government wonderful?
> 
> [Quoting Herb Brannon]: 
> The most interesting part about turning East Liberty into a "mall" was that
> it killed East Liberty. Stores when out of business one after the other
> when people could no longer get to the front door via public transportation
> and/or the private auto. 

And yet, pedestrian malls, and tram/pedestrian malls, are successful 
outside the US. Here, the pedestrian is regarded so disdainfully that, in 
many places, simply crossing the street requires filling out a form in 
triplicate.

The advantages of allowing private cars into a commercial block are more 
imagined than real - the principal effect is to have more and more cars 
circling looking for parking spaces. But rationality has never been a big 
factor in our social decisions concerning the automobile.

Don