Vote of no confidence, right down the ‘Center’

Geoff West

The Orange County Transportation Authority board did the right thing

by not placing a vote on CenterLine on the November ballot -- the

right thing for them!

Had they done the right thing for the residents of Orange County

and voted to recommend to the Board of Supervisors to place the

CenterLine project on the ballot, it most likely would have,

rightfully, gone down in defeat.

In its present diminished configuration, this ill-advised project

is nothing more than a monument to the egos of those who conjured it

up in the first place. The Daily Pilot report “Directors derail

ballot proposal” on Saturday said it will run from Santa Ana through

Costa Mesa to John Wayne Airport. From that comment, one could get

the impression that the city of Costa Mesa will be served by

CenterLine, when in fact the line will only strike a glancing blow to

our city as it dips underground when it enters our borders and pops

up again as it departs.

The planned stations are too far from the shopping venues to be

practical for the shoppers riding down from central Santa Ana. And,

based on the last report I read of the actual route, it stops just

short of John Wayne Airport, requiring passengers theoretically

heading for that destination to lug their baggage a considerable

distance once they’ve disembarked from CenterLine.

No, CenterLine is not a good use of public funds for

transportation. There are many other much more practical ways to

spend that mountain of cash that will actually do the job intended --

move the people from one destination to another economically.

Politics being what they are, I don’t really expect the

decision-makers we elected to represent our best interests to learn

from the dismal performance of other similar projects. They will

continue to throw tax dollars at CenterLine, hoping it will work.

When it doesn’t, and it costs more mountains of cash to subsidize it

for the fewer than 20,000 or so people who may ride it, they will be

long gone -- leaving in their wake an unproductive eyesore that will

be a perpetual cash drain for us all. One has only to look as far as

the closest toll road to see just how competent our transportation

planners are. Yes, the toll roads move the traffic efficiently, but

several are teetering on the brink of bankruptcy. CenterLine will

become the ultimate representation of just how poorly we, the

residents of Orange County, have been served.

* GEOFF WEST is a resident of Costa Mesa.