This is a sad, sad part of the Metro story. I hope everyone who voted against the Metro funding reads this blog. I would like to share the story of a gentleman I know. He has lived for many years independently in South County and works at Ronnie’s Cinema. He happens to have a disability for which he uses a wheelchair. He uses the Lindbergh-49 route along with Call-A-Ride to get to work and back, which allows him to maintain his independence. Due to the lack of funding of Metro, he will no longer be able to get to his job. In case you are not aware, the 49 will now stop in Sunset Hills, and not continue down Lindbergh through South County. Of course, paying $19.60 a ride would make the trip undoable. Of course, this can then be extended to the many other people who depend on Call-A-Ride for transportation. Not to mention the many people who are working at jobs that they can not find in their neighborhoods that use Metro for transportation.

All the more reason for city-county partition and realignment. Let the 636 go its own way and establish its own Metro-free Ronald Reagan County.

spyguy, I agree that is a sad story. Metro’s management over the years is another sad story. Faced with a worsening economy and less income, and the memory of some of the really, really stupid things that Metro has done lately, it is no surprise that people voted that tax increase down. It’s easy to call out folks like me (who voted no) and maybe assume we didn’t think of people like that. But we also had to take into consideration the organization asking for the money, and what they have done with it in the past. We had to consider our own finances. Most areas had more than one tax increase on the ballot that day (my school district also had one, which passed), so these decisions are not made in a vacuum and certainly aren’t made willy-nilly.

ticket punch, that will never happen. No one in St Louis County would want anything to do with St Louis City.

Metro can’t do anything without the funding sources approval and in most cases orders. It was not Metro’s decision to build the cross county extension without Federal Funding. It was not Metro’s decison to go underground thereby incurring additional costs, actually the lion’s share of the overrun costs. Metro didn’t cut 10 million from it’s funding. The area is going to suffer further economic hardship because of people like Tim. Thousands of people will not be able to get to work. A major national call center is planning to leave the area because it’s people will have problems getting to work. But that’s what we wanted because that pesky Metro can’t get it’s act together

samandjake, “It was not Metro’s decision to build the cross county extension without Federal Funding. It was not Metro’s decison to go underground thereby incurring additional costs, actually the lion’s share of the overrun costs”

Where did you get this information from?

“No one” really means “I,” doesn’t it? People in the inner ring do not fear the city the way you do.

Ronald Reagan County would be a fine way to honor the president “everyone” adores, and it would be a way to disengage more fully from the city. JCD? Zoo-Museum? Gone.

All it takes is a group of Chesterfielders with the, er, gumption to get things going. Whine less. Do more.

I get my information from the same places you should before you make rash statements and certainly before you vote. From the St.Louis Post Dispatch, the County Council and last but most importantly from the East -West Gateway Coordinating Council which is headed by the regions leaders, Mayor, Supervisors, etc. Metro can’t do anything without permission from this Board. Also Metro is not a funding source they can’t expand anything without one of the funding sources. The expansion was Buzz Westfall’s project. Actually Metro wanted to wait for Federal Funding because they knew there was no funding to run the extenson once it was completed. Every expansion of Metro has a politician’s name on it. The original was Rep. Young, the East side was Rep. Costello, the Cross County was Buzz Westfall.

Here is why I ask, and why I didn’t make a rash statement: I worked for Metro as a construction engineer on the Cross County Extension, specifically on Facility 2 which was the tunnel from Washington University to the Ritz in Clayton. Metro did not have to build the CCE, but they certainly wanted to. In fact, they were chomping at the bit for it. The East-West Gateway Coordinating Council is responsible for doling out transportation dollars and deciding what projects get done. In this case they had no choice but to fund the project because the tax that raised the money was specifically for the project. Even though the money goes through East-West, Metro knew they had the money. Metro knew they didn’t have operational monies for the long term, but they figured they could get it. So did Buzz Westfall, so they all agreed to move ahead. Political pressure did force the CCE to go by Wash U (instead of the Zoo and SLCC at Forest Park, how stupid!), and the folks in U City fought to get it put underground. But all of these costs were already covered in the final design before construction. The “lion’s share” of the cost overruns were not due to the tunnel, as you claim. They were due to the two primary sources of almost all change orders on all construction projects: unknown conditions, and bad plans. The bad plans part was significant, but the lawsuit about that ultimately failed so I won’t bother rehashing it. The other part, unforseen conditions, caused significant delays and cost overruns. I should point here, by the way, that my Facility had the lowest $ of change orders out of all 5, even with the tunnel. Metro’s project specs were also horrible. They were too generic and short, which helped contractors get change orders that they wouldn’t have on other jobs.

Metro, in my opinion, got in over its head when they fired the CCC. There were problems with the plans, but whether or not they were bad enough to fire the CCC is hard to say. In any event, Metro decided to go for the project, they hired the CCC, they fired the CCC, and they took over a massive job when they were not fully prepared to.

Metro is ultimately responsible for what they did. And the latest vote showed that the public agrees with that statement.

You’ll be happy to know that my school district is on good financial footing thanks to my yes vote on their proposal.

Funny, Tim, that if you give money to engineers, they are going to want to build something. What samandjake wrote is all true, Metro as an agency has to build where it is directed to build. Whether individual employees want to expand the system or not, the decision is made at the level of elected representatives, all of whom knew that without a tax increase there would be no funding for operations. Now that Metro hasn’t gotten that money and has to cut service, Metro takes ALL of the blame, even though the decision had to come from elsewhere. It’s an odd situation and one that not a lot of people really understand. It’s nice that you have enough of an insider perspective to understand about change orders and bad plans, but most people don’t get that info. All they get is “cost overruns” = “mismanagement.” “Changed conditions” include lowering an alignment that was originally planned - and budgeted - to run along the street. Changes that are made due to political considerations always come back to roost with the agency, not with the politicos and factions that forced the changes in the first place. In the end, though, the project was finished, was a roaring success, but the lawsuit got ugly and left a bad taste in the mouth of the public. Again, it’s a complex situation and hard to explain in sound bites, so the story doesn’t get out there. As a construction engineer, Tim, you have a particular view of how construction projects “should” be done and consider it mismanagement if it is done some other way. A politician sees it a second way, and a voter a third way, and everyone else probably has a different perspective. The end result is, as we all agree, a sad situation indeed.

Jen, Metro builds where IT decides to build. That doesn’t mean that the opinions of the public, elected officials, and so forth aren’t considered, of course. But in the end Metro has the transit experience and the expertise to make that decision, no one else. Whatever the possible influences, it was Metro’s call. Metro, like all over transportation governmental agencies under East-West Gateway, submits a list of items they want to get funding for. East-West does not tell them it can’t go here or it must go there, that is not within the purvue of their scope. I think your understanding of the process is not accurate.

It’s not as complex as you might think, and I think you are underestimating the ability of the public to understand the basic facts of the situation. I talk to people all over St Louis about all different kinds of projects, and they understand just fine. Your dismissal of the hoi polloi smacks of arrogance.