So this morning I arrived at my desk at UCLA and popped open a web browser to see a CNN article that said that the Shuttle Endeavour would be landing at Edwards Air Force base today at 4:25 pm Pacific time. As it was only about 10:30 am when I got in, I briefly entertained the idea of driving the 2 hours up to Edwards to see the landing. The shuttles are scheduled to be retired from service in 2010, and Edwards landings don't happen all that often, maybe once a year, so this could possibly be the last shuttle landing in California ever. I spent 20 minutes looking around online and reading about viewing locations, before I went to NASA.gov and found that CNN had got the times wrong: It would be landing at 4:25 EASTERN time, 1:25 pm pacific. Thanks CNN. And yes it was their mistake, not me misreading the numbers, as I had kept that browser page open and compared it with the NASA site. Serves me right for trusting CNN on details. Oh well.
I did get a shuttle-related treat anyway, though. I had heard anecdotally that you can hear the double-sonic booms from the Shuttle as it passes over the L.A. area on its way to Edwards. But I'd never heard it firsthand in L.A.. I remember back in college, when I worked at EarthKAM, wondering if we'd hear the booms in San Diego, but we never did. I guessed, at the time, that the shuttle was simply to high and too far away from our location on the ground to be able to hear it unless you are right under it. I know it also depends on whether the shuttle is approaching Edwards on an ascending (south to north) or descending (north to south) section of its orbit, as it will be coming in farther north if it's on a descending track.
Anyway, I expected I might be able to hear a soft double-boom if I went outside at the right time. So at 1:15 pm, when the NASA TV announcer said the shuttle was at an altitude of 20 miles and only 137 miles from the Edwards runway (which put the shuttle right over the coast, right around Oxnard) I walked outside onto the roof and listened. I waited for about 5 minutes, figuring that it would take less time than that for the shuttle to pass the area on its way to Edwards, as it was going about Mach 2.5 (~2000 mph). I waited and looked upward, listening. Nothing. A tad disappointed but not too surprised, I walked back toward the door, and was about 2 steps from going back in side when. . .
BOOM-BOOM!
It was unmistakable, and much louder than I had been expecting! I walked down the hall to see if my friend had heard it from his office, but he wasn't there. I then thought to call my friend Phil, who lives in Downey to the southeast. He had the same idea, apparently, as my phone was ringing and I answered to hear his voice: "My house just shook!". Next came a text message from Regan, who was in the valley. She had heard the booms, which she said were so lound it sounded "like a bomb went off". Curious, I texted my sister and called my mom, who both reported hearing the booms clearly all the way in San Diego. Apparently, everyone else in the Southern CA area heard it as well, according to the OC Register and LAist.
From the timing and from listening to the NASA TV broadcast, I gather the shuttle was somewhere between 15 and 18 miles (80,000 ft and 95,000 ft) in altitude when I heard the boom. So, since sound travels around 700 mph at sea level (~11.5 miles per minute), it makes some sense that Endeavour's shock wave took a couple of minutes to reach me. As the shuttle flew right over L.A., I guess I shouldn't be surprised that I could hear it. . . but I am impressed that my family in San Diego, another 150 miles south, could hear it so clearly!
I'm so glad the election is over. After nearly 2 years of hearing about this presidential campaign, it's finally over. We're getting a new president. A smart, inspiring, reasonable, Democratic president. I'm so glad! I have so much more hope for our country now! I think our standing in world politics, our reliance on science and reason for policy decisions instead of religion and tradition, our dedication to the Constitution, and our civic progress will all improve under Obama!
And, though Obama has been reluctant to play the race card throughout his campaign, all the emotion that comes with the fact that he will be our first African American President has come pouring out in me and in many others now that he has won. To think that, if we were living 150 years ago in this country, he would probably be a slave. To think that, if we were living just ~40 years ago in some parts of our country, he would have been a second-class citizen, with all the discrimination and "separate-but-equal" treatment that comes with it. And come January 20, he will be our president. Seeing Jesse Jackson's tears of joy as he stood among the huge crowd at Grant Park nearly moved ME to tears. Free at last.
I did not vote for Obama just because he was black. And I don't think most voters did either. If Americans were going to vote for a candidate because he was black, they had their chance with Jesse Jackson in 1984, and Al Sharpton in 2000. No, I voted for Obama because I agree with his policies, his positions on the issues, and I admire his background in relying on intellect and reason and dedication to the constitution. But, all that said, for the rest of my life I am going to be able to say that I helped elect the first black President in U.S. history. And yeah, I'm pretty proud of that.
John McCain's concession speech was excellent. It reminded me that I really do like that guy. He's probably my favorite Republican politician. And, if he had been running his campaign supporting the same ideals he had espoused for much of his career, I think I would have felt more sympathetic to his cause. But his switch to the more conservative of the far right side of his party, his changing positions on issues (like the Bush tax cuts) where I agreed with his former position but not his latter one, and his choice of a right-wing veep candidate, all heralded his loss. Of course, a huge reason why the country voted as it did is due to the economic crisis, and there's plenty of blame to go around for that crisis amongst the Democrats, the Republicans, and Wall Street. McCain just happened to be running for the party with a sitting administration. Well, he's a good man and I know he has more good work to do in the Senate.
As for California, I'm mostly happy with the results of our ballot measures. I'm especially happy that both Prop 1A (the high speed rail initiative), and Measure R (the L.A. County public transit initiative) have passed. As a result of those, my city and state are going to get a new, expanded, modern transit system that will help give people more travel options, reduce our dependence on foreign oil, reduce our emission of smog and greenhouse gases, and demonstrate California's leadership in civic progress. I already believed that California is a great state, but I now also believe that Los Angeles has a chance to become a great (not just big) metropolis! And with a Obama in the White House, and a hugely Democratic Congress, where Pelosi has hinted that she will try to make infrastructure funding a major part of the next stimulus package, I'm confident we'll actually get the federal fund matching we need to complete these projects.
Despite these other victories, I feel a huge bitterness that Prop 8 appears to have passed. I am genuinely surprised, first of all. I knew it would be somewhat close, but I did not actually believe it would pass. I had more faith in the awareness of the people in this state than was warranted, apparently. I've already explained why Prop 8 is unfair, wrong, and completely analagous to the racist "separate but equal" Jim Crow Laws that survived until the 1960's, so I won't go into all that again. (Except to point out that California's Supreme Court was the first in the nation to strike down the ban on interracial marriage as unconstitutional in 1948, and I was glad to see the Court repeat its wisdom back in May, despite the stupidity and bigotry of the voters.)
All I'll say is this: Those who voted for this initiative (apparently a majority of this state) are, in my eyes, as equally bigoted as those who supported the ban on interacial marriage that became law in California in 1850 and lasted until almost 100 years later. You do not get a pass on this just because your church told you to do it and you were too indoctrinated to think for yourselves and realize it was wrong. And when homosexuals finally are granted the same rights as heterosexuals, hopefully some time in the not-so-distant future, your legacy will be that you opposed equal rights, opposed equal treatment under the law, and supported discriminatory policies that were along the same lines as slavery, Jim Crow laws, and Japanese Internment camps. Shame on you. You made a horrible mistake. And I won't be letting you forget it.
I already posted about prop 8 a few days ago. Now I'd like to talk about another important proposal on the ballot for L.A. County. It may seem more logistical in nature than the civil rights being addressed in Prop 8, but I think it can potentially be just as important to Southern California's future.
Measure R is a 0.5% sales tax increase for L.A. County. It would increase our sales tax from 8.25% to 8.75%, and generate about $40 Billion over the next 30 years. Unlike other sources of public transit funding, this money would be forbidden to be used for anything other than public transit in L.A. County, and a committee of retired judges from throughout the county would provide oversight to make sure the funds were not being diverted by the county OR the state of California to other projects (which has been a problem with public transit funds in the past). Click here for the short, impartial summary of what Measure R provides over at smartvoter.org. Or here for Metro's information guide on Measure R.
Ridership of each of the metro rail lines and of bus services has increased by around 10% in the past year. That is a major increase, likely originally caused by the rise in gas prices over the past year. Those figures are based on comparing September 2007 ridership numbers to September 2008, after gas prices had already started to go down again; so it's possible that people have established some gas-saving habits that they are now wary of changing. This is encouraging news, at least to me. Driving our cars less will help to solve so many problems: environmental, economical, geopolitical, you name it!
Measure R would do too many things for me to talk about in this post, though the highlights include finally building a subway under the uber-congested Wilshire Boulevard to UCLA, where 70,000 people arrive and leave every day. There's also the extension of the Gold Line at both ends (one into East L.A., the other through the San Gabriel Valley), the extension of the Exposition light rail (which is currently being built from Downtown L.A. to Culver City) all the way to Santa Monica, the building of Green Line connection to LAX, and various highway, bridge, rail, bus, bike and traffic light improvement projects throughout the county.
Instead of just listing all the things that Measure R would do, however, I thought I'd address the three main arguments against it I've heard made by a variety of people and organizations.
Arguments against Measure R: 1.) "It unfairly puts the tax burden on the poor and lower class, while many of the benefits will go to the middle and upper classes! "
Measure R is a sales tax increase, which means that anyone in the county who purchases goods and services incurring sales tax will be contributing to this transportation fund. Now, let's think about those poor people in the lower classes: what are they spending their money on? At the most basic level of subsistence, they are paying for food, rent, and transportation. Well, there is no sales tax on food if it is purchased at grocery stores and markets, no sales tax on rent, and improving transportation access for all is exactly what Measure R is trying to do. Many of the poor and lower class take the bus because it is cheaper than driving, and Measure R includes a statute that will freeze the current fares for a few years longer than was originally planned (without R, the fares will go up in 2010), and keep the bus and rail fares for seniors, students, and the disabled from increasing before 2015.
Now let's think about the middle and upper classes; what are they buying? Meals out at restaurants (where sales tax IS incurred), electronics, flat-panel TV's, cellphones, maybe a new car, etc. They are contributing more to the transit fund because they are participating more in the sales economy, and that's because they can afford to spend more money on sales taxable items. A sales tax does not affect everyone equally across the board: it draws more money from those who can afford to pay more.
And, what's more, how does Measure R benefit only the middle and upper class? This is a claim I've seen made by a few organizations, chief among them the Bus Rider's Union (BRU), which is so pro bus that they oppose any contribution to public transit that is not a bus system. They are vehemently anti-rail, and anti-Measure R because: "The MTA funds rail projects (subways cost about $350 million a mile to build) that serve development interests and a more white, more affluent ridership not low-income, transit-dependent riders that are Latino, black or Asian-Pacific Islander, and more than 60% of them are women." --BRU and Strategy Center website
Ok, first of all, I posit that whatever members of the bus rider's union wrote that sentence have never set foot on the metro rail system. I've been on the blue line every week or so, riding between Downtown L.A. and Long Beach. If you're going to characterize the people on that train as "white and affluent", you're blind. I am usually one of only two or three "white" people in my train car, while the other 50 - 80 or so people are decidedly not.
It's true that trains are usually built along corridors that serve development interests, but that's usually because those corridors have already naturally grown to have high population density, and the rail would best serve the population by traveling in that particular area. This is the case for Wilshire Blvd, where the subway will be expanded.
Also, if you are in the upper class of L.A. ("white and affluent"), you have probably never set foot on a bus or rail line, and 65% of the funding appropriation in Measure R is for mass transit (buses and rail). Another 20% is highway expansions and improvements such as car pool lanes, and 15% goes to the individual cities to be used for light synchronizations and road maintenance. So only 35% of the funding in R is going to benefit the upper class who drive their cars on the freeways instead of using rail or bus. I wouldn't call that primarily benefiting the middle and upper class. Besides, buses need to travel on the roads and highways just like personal cars do, and so bus-riders would also benefit from that 35% as well.
------------------------------------------------------- 2.)"We should have increased income tax, gasoline taxes or traffic congestion fees to fund the MTA, not a sales tax!"
Why not an income tax increase? Because income tax is a state revenue. One of the major plusses about Measure R is that it ensures that California doesn't raid these public transit funds to cover budget shortfalls due to mismanagement. The state has done this in the past, but Measure R money would be safe, as it can legally only be used for public transit in L.A. county. If we decided to raise money for L.A. public transit by raising the state income tax, there would be nothing that we could do to prevent the state from dipping into that L.A. transit money for use elsewhere in the state. And why should people in Eureka be paying extra income tax for public transit in L.A. county, anyway?
Why not a gas tax increase, vehicle registration fee increase, or congestion fee? Each of those things would be great if they could actually happen. I challenge someone to try and get a measure to increase those fees or taxes on the ballot. My prediction: it will not happen. Most of the people in this county drive, and everyone is looking for the cheapest gas price they can find. I highly doubt that people who are so worried about having cheaper gas are going to vote to increase their gas price. People tend to see sales tax as the most egalitarian of the types of tax: Everybody pays. To quote the L.A. Times editorial:
"We'd rather see these projects funded by motorists, via higher vehicle registration fees or gas taxes. That would properly place the burden of relieving our traffic and smog problems on those who cause them. Sales taxes, by contrast, hurt low-income people the most and do nothing to discourage driving. Unfortunately, that seems to be the only politically tenable course. Tax increases require a two-thirds vote for approval, and polls show that the sales tax is the only funding source that comes close to reaching that level of public acceptance."--L.A. Times
So, if we want this public transit funding, the sales tax is the most likely way to get it. If we reject Measure R, it's unlikely that the same plan with a different funding source will be approved. This is an opportunity we shouldn't miss. And, besides, this is a city that has up-to-now embraced the car and the freeway system. We can't simply quit our cars cold turkey! For many people there currently is no bus or rail service that offers convenient service to or from their area, and driving really is the only option. Those people should not be penalized with higher car expenses when the current transit system is unable to meet their needs.
------------------------------------------------------- 3.) "It doesn't proportion the funding equally according to population! Region X has Y percent of the population of L.A. County, but only gets Z percent of the funding!" or "It doesn't do anything for the San Gabriel Valley!" or "It doesn't do anything for Long Beach!"
First of all, as a general philosophy: devoting money to public transportation corridors is a strategic endeavor. It involves evaluating the population density, concentration of residential areas, concentration of businesses providing jobs for those residents, and then finding the bus or rail route that will provide the highest ridership at the lowest cost. At any given time a sizable portion of the money needs to go into the highest priority transit corridor. The benefits then reach throughout the county, as the reason those corridors have such high population density is due to people from other parts of the county commuting in there to go to work. Even if a commuter from suburbia will never take public transit, the traffic on the freeway they're driving on will improve as other people do opt to use the bus or rail line.
Hence, the decision of where to distribute the rail lines and transit corridors has to be based on population density and need, not spread throughout the county equally. Still, I'll argue that most parts of the county, including the San Gabriel Valley, would be getting plenty if Measure R passes.
The San Gabriel Valley (SGV) leadership has decided to take a stand and demand some pork from the county. They have their hearts set on an extension of the Gold Line all the way to Ontario Airport. Since Measure R does not include enough funding appropriation to do this, they are taking stances against it. Never mind that the Wilshire subway project will serve an area with far greater population density, to which many SGV residents need to commute anyway. Never mind that the Gold Line currently has the lowest ridership numbers of any of the metro rail lines, and has consistently been below ridership projections since it was completed. Never mind that the SGV will lose the opportunity for lots of other project funding if Measure R fails. Never mind that Measure R ACTUALLY INCLUDES funding for the "Foothill Extension" of the Gold Line, which will extend it from Sierra Madre all the way to Montclair, AND funding for the completion and maintenance of the "East Side Extension of the Gold Line, which is on time to open next year. They want an even higher priority for the Gold Line. This is unreasonable, greedy, and parochial.
Let's look at what the SGV will lose if R does not pass (you can check these for yourself in the Measure R info section of MTA's website), and thanks to Ken Alpern who summarized these points in a comment on the Bottleneck Blog:
-- Improvements to the 10, 60, 210, 605, 710 and freeways
-- The Alameda Corridor East grade separations, which would gets lots of trucks off the 60 and 10 freeways while keep SGV residents from having to stop at rail crossings as often.
-- Foothill Gold Line extension toward Clairemont
-- Eastside Gold Line extension BEYOND the Atlantic station (which will open next year), to stations farther east.
-- The Downtown Light Rail Connector which will allow Gold-line trains to connect directly to the Blue Line
-- Improved Metrolink service for the SGV area
-- Local bus service funding for the individual cities
-- The Wilshire subway extension to UCLA, which will have SGV residents as its second-highest ridership constituency
Regarding that last point about the subway: 22% of the people expected to ride the Subway to the Sea are residents of the San Gabriel Valley. They are the next highest constituency of projected riders after west side residents, who will make up only 36% of the ridership. Those figures are based on a ridership study done by the MTA to determine which parts of the county will benefit from a Wilshire Subway. It's on page 25 of the linked presentation: http://www.metro.net/projects_studies/westside/images/2008_0505_presentation.pdf
Public transit project funding should not be appropriated according to population size. It is population DENSITY that matters. East L.A. and the San Gabriel Valley (SGV) are a large percentage of L.A. County, it's true. But they are spread out over an enormous area compared to West L.A., downtown, and even the San Fernando Valley. We would have to build many more rail lines, branching out in many directions, in order to provide improved access for most of the SGV. The reason the MTA is targeting projects like the "Subway to the Sea" under Wilshire Blvd, or a Green line LAX connector, or the downtown light rail connector, is that those projects would help far more people than the Gold line extension to Ontario, and so they are of higher priority.
I was so annoyed at the Long Beach Press Telegram's editorial that I left a comment about it on their website. For one thing, their opposition to Measure R seems hypocritical: Two previous countywide half-cent sales tax increases passed in the 1980's and 1990's, respectively. The funds generated from them went to build the blue line from downtown to Long Beach and the red line from downtown to North Hollywood, respectively. That means that, back in the 1980's, West siders were apparently happy to vote for a countywide sales tax increase that gave Long Beach a great public transit rail line. . . and now the Press Telegram is urging its readers not to return the favor? Sure, Long Beach has it's rail line, thanks to the residents of the rest of the county; why should it bother helping out other parts of the county now?
------------------------------------------------------- 4.) "Now is not the time for a tax increase!"
Yes, the economy is bad. But it turns out that big investment in public infrastructure projects during hard economic times is probably not such a bad idea. Paul Krugman, who just won the Nobel Prize in Economics, says that now is a good time to invest in infrastructure. He says "The usual argument against public works as economic stimulus is that they take too long: by the time you get around to repairing that bridge and upgrading that rail line, the slump is over and the stimulus isn’t needed. Well, that argument has no force now, since the chances that this slump will be over anytime soon are virtually nil. So let’s get those projects rolling." We have plenty of old roads and bridges in L.A. and throughout the country that need repair. A good dose of government spending ala the New Deal and Works Projects Administration might be just what the doctor ordered. The Golden Gate Bridge was financed by a bond measure during the great depression, and there it is still benefitting the Bay area some 80 years later. And a sales tax increase is better than a bond measure because we won't have to pay double the cost in interest.
A good public transit system is a sound investment that will improve the lives of people in this city for decades, even centuries to come. Keep in mind that the first train of the London "tube" subway system began operating in 1863, and now that city, which is arguably just as sprawled out area-wise as Los Angeles, has one of the best public transit systems on Earth. -------------------------------------------------------
Wrapping things up:
What bothers me most about the opposition to R is this "try again next election" mentality. How much do you want to bet that whatever other distribution of funds is proposed at the next election, there will be just as many communities crying out that it is unfair? Sure, there are details in this measure that I don't think are perfect. But it's a comprehensive public transit measure, chalk full of language and details. OF COURSE some people are going to have problems with someparts of it. Sure, we could reject it this time and hope they put together another plan next election, but it's likely that another group of people will dislike some details about THAT plan, so maybe they'll say "try again next election". And this goes on until suddenly 10 more years have gone by and we're still arguing over the details when we could have had a new rail line built by then.
This passing the buck on to the next election is one of the reasons why, 20 years after the subway to the sea was first conceived, construction has still not begun. Sure, we can keep passing on good public transit for this city because we don't like this or that detail in the bill, while L.A. County's population continues to grow (expected 30% rise by 2030), and our roads get more and more congested, and commute times get longer and longer, and less and less tourists will want to come here because there is no easy way to get around town.
Or we can take some responsibility for our future and make a commitment to better public transit, and a better county for our children and our grandchildren; and we don't have to wait until the "next election". We can do this now.
So, if you live in L.A. County, when you have your ballot in front of you ask yourself this: Do you want Los Angeles to have a great public transit system like other great cities do? (Chicago, New York City, Washington D.C., London, Paris) Then why would you vote no on R? If it's because of some minor detail in the plan, ask yourself if that minor detail is important enough to delay these great projects even further into the future; to keep this city chained to it's car-based, smog-creating, oil-guzzling, time-wasting freeway infrastructure even longer. Let's quit wasting time and do the right thing.
Uh, I guess I might have over-hyped the rocket launch last night. Sorry about that.
Reg and I went to the park with Lucy and watched the launch. Even though it was only an hour and a half after sunset, I guess it was still too late for the rocket to enter sunlight during its climb into orbit, so the exhaust trail was not lit up by sunlight, as it was in my photos from the launch a few years ago.
Still, the rocket's red/orange flame was clearly visible as it rose southward in the night sky. It was brighter than most other lights, save nearby planes, and you could see it blink momentarily as it dropped it's first stage.
Didn't really get a good picture, sort of just looks like a red dot rising in the sky. But it was still fun to watch!
Rocket launch tomorrow night out of Vandenberg! These tend to be lovely spectacles when they happen close to twilight, and this one should be visible for "at least 200 miles", weather permitting. IE: if you live somewhere in Southern CA, you will probably be able to see this if you have a clear view to the West. Actually, just based on the geometry of a typical Delta II rocket launch and a spherical Earth, the above map shows the range of visibility (the farther from the rocket you are, the lower over the horizon it appears).
Once the rocket climbs into sunlight, the exhaust plume and trail tend to be very visible! You can see pictures from a previous twilight launch a few years ago here:
If you're in Southern CA, just be outside looking Northwest (toward Vandenberg) at 7:28 pm on Friday (tomorrow) 10/24! The rocket should come from the Northwest and head pretty much due South.
And this is a great website with lots of info on all-things-space for the Southern California community: http://spacearchive.info/
(P.S.: These launches do sometimes scrub at the last minute, so if you're not seeing anything within 10 minutes or so of being out there, you might want to check the above update website to see if it was canceled.)
