The Texas Transportation Commission approved increasing the speed limit to 75 mph on about 1,500 miles of mostly-rural Interstate highways in the state.  Around the San Antonio area, the following stretches will see 75 mph signs soon:

• I-10 West from Loop 1604 to past Kerrville (where it’s already 80 mph)
• I-10 East from just outside Loop 410 to Waller County west of Houston
• I-35 South from Palo Alto Rd. to the existing 75 mph section south of Devine
• I-37 from just inside Loop 410 to Corpus Christi

I-35 between San Antonio and Austin was not approved for the higher speed limit.

The Legislature approved the higher speed limits last year.

More information

• TxDOT’s 75 mph page – http://www.txdot.gov/safety/speed_limit/75mph.htm

If you have a lead foot, then you’ll love this news.

First, if you hadn’t heard already, the Legislature earlier this year approved– and the governor signed– a bill that would raise the statutory maximum speed limit for state highways to 75 mph (excluding, of course, the existing 80 mph speed limit on some sections of I-10 and I-20 out in West Texas.) Texas now joins all but a handful of states west of the Mississippi with a 75 mph top speed.  The limit can only be increased on roads where an engineering study determines that it’s safe to do so, but if past practice holds true, that should be the majority of roads that are currently capped at 70 mph.

Even better, the bill finally eliminates the matrix of speed limits for daytime/nighttime and cars/trucks.  All speed limits will now apply to all vehicles at all times.  Texas was the only state to still have a different nighttime limit and one of the few with a separate limit for trucks.

The new law takes effect September 1st.  A separate effort to increase the maximum speed to 85 mph died.

More recently, the speed limit on the northern arc of Loop 410 has gone up from 60 mph to 65 mph.  With the recent completion of construction to widen the freeway to 10 lanes, TxDOT completed a speed study that showed the 85th percentile speed being 65 mph, so in accordance with agency engineering guidelines, TxDOT asked the City of San Antonio to officially increase the speed limit to 65 mph north of US 90.  Signs went up this past week.

I also recently noticed that the speed limit along Loop 1604 south of Braun Rd. increased from 55 mph to 60 mph.

(Image from Boston.com/The Boston Globe)

First it was Windcrest.  Now it seems that SAPD is also cracking down on jaywalkers.

Earlier this year, reports surfaced that Windcrest police were ticketing Rackspace employees who were on their way to or from lunch at one of the restaurants across Walzem Road from Rackspace’s headquarters at the old Windsor Park Mall, known affectionately as “The Castle”.

Now, there are several anecdotal reports of this happening in San Antonio itself, first at a school, now at some other location (it might even be the airport based on the person’s description of the sign, which I have only seen at the airport.)

So this begs the question, what are the state and local laws regarding jaywalking?  Here is the state law:

Sec. 552.005.  CROSSING AT POINT OTHER THAN CROSSWALK.  (a)  A pedestrian shall yield the right-of-way to a vehicle on the highway if crossing a roadway at a place:

(1)  other than in a marked crosswalk or in an unmarked crosswalk at an intersection; or

(2)  where a pedestrian tunnel or overhead pedestrian crossing has been provided.

(b)  Between adjacent intersections at which traffic control signals are in operation, a pedestrian may cross only in a marked crosswalk.

(c)  A pedestrian may cross a roadway intersection diagonally only if and in the manner authorized by a traffic control device.

(Source)

By the way, in the transportation code, the term “highway” means any public roadway.

Therefore, if the nearest two intersections to your location have traffic signals, you have to use a marked crosswalk.  This would mostly apply in the downtown area as most suburban arterials don’t have signals at every intersection.

The local ordinance is a little more restrictive: 

Sec. 19-80. – Pedestrian “walk,” “don’t walk” and “wait” signal lights.

(a) Whenever special pedestrian control signals exhibiting the words “walk,” “wait” or “don’t walk” are in place, such signals shall indicate as follows:

(1) “Walk.” Pedestrians facing such signals may proceed across the street in the direction of the signal and shall be given the right-of-way by drivers of all vehicles.

(2) “Don’t Walk,” or “Wait.” No pedestrians shall start to cross the street in the direction of the signal, but any pedestrian who has partially completed his crossing on the “walk” signal shall proceed to a sidewalk or safety island while the “don’t walk” or “wait” signal is showing.

(b) No pedestrian shall cross a roadway other than in a crosswalk in any business district.

(Source)

Of course, the response out of southern Comal County was nearly instantaneous.  Terri Hall wrote a verbose response on her blog lambasting Davidson and the E-N, essentially calling them shills for ARMA.  While she spends less than a sentence acknowledging Bruce’s main point about the Legislature, she spends probably 95% of the 1,516 words in her article assailing Bruce, the E-N, and ARMA.  As usual, there was much hyperbole and many inaccuracies in her comments (I’ll get to those in a minute), but the main thing that struck me was that she spent just about the entire piece focusing on Bruce’s defense of ARMA instead of balancing her tirade with a healthy amount of support for his focal point about the gas tax, a point which she actually agrees with (as do I for that matter.)  A more evenhanded response would have demonstrated that she’s not just trying to be antagonistic, an impression she has left on many folks.

It’s always fun to pick-apart Terri’s diatribes, so let’s take a look at some of her more “interesting” remarks:

Whenever we’ve attempted to go to the Editorial Board to dialogue about the toll issue, they flatly ignore us and our concerns (as well as elected officials, attorneys, certified planners, and other experts who have joined us) and print a negative editorial in response to our “visit.”

Maybe that’s because they see through the malarkey you wanted them to believe.

After all, the paper has the establishment to please, never mind the Express-News is bleeding readers. Why? Because of columns, editorials, and stories like this one. Or perhaps it’s because the RMA has paid the Express-News nearly $25,000 in government advertising.

That advertising is required as part of the federal laws regarding public involvement in the planning process, so they would have to spend that with the E-N regardless of whether or not the E-N supported their position.

It is interesting that she asserts that people who don’t like these types of articles would stop reading the paper.  There’s a word for that: close-minded.

This notion that the RMA “doesn’t care where the money comes from, they just want to fix the road” is a farce. They’re a tolling authority! They exist to toll roads!

And yet they’re building the 281/1604 interchange toll-free.

Most importantly, the needed fix to 281 was already paid for with gas taxes until TxDOT made the money disappear sometime in mid-2008. … They had the funds…it’s about tapping a new revenue stream and levying a discriminatory, targeted tax on 281 users in order to fund 1604 (which they don’t have the money for).

Ugh, how many times do we have to go through this?  Yes, funding was promised to the 281 project in the MPO TIP ca. 2000, but when the Transportation Commission (at the behest of the Governor) edicted that all new expressway projects be considered for tolling, the 281 project was required to become a toll project.  Consequently, the funding that was budgeted for it was re-allocated to other toll-free projects.  The money didn’t just “disappear”– it was spent on other roads that we all drive on.

Then, the stimulus money the RMA is using to build HALF of a non-toll interchange (for the price of a WHOLE interchange) is a one time deal. We’ve long objected to the RMA even doing a non-toll project, especially with the pricetag they can’t justify ($143 million for just the four southern ramps of the interchange when the RMA’s published price to build the northern ramps in 2018 dollars is $59 million. If they can build half of the interchange for $59 million, they can surely build the whole thing NOW for $120 million! For comparison, the 410/281 interchange just built cost $155 million.

As I explained in great detail in a previous post, her logic on this allegation is severely flawed.  You can read my previous post for the details, but the upshot is that much more than “half” an interchange is being built: about 75% of the ultimate bridgework for the full interchange would be built in this initial project, along with the bulk of the final ancillary infrastructure (e.g. drainage and such).  This project also includes lots of improvements to the 281 and 1604 approaches.  You can’t compare the 410/281 interchange for a number of reasons, including the fact that a good portion of the prep work for it was built in separate, preceding projects.

(The RMA) hides behind a state law that allows these agencies to keep toll viability studies, the market valuation, and other key financial details SECRET from the public AND even YOUR elected officials.

By her own admission, they’re not doing anything illegal.  If she doesn’t like that, she needs to lobby to get the law changed.  She may not like what they’re doing, but they are allowed to do it.  As they say, hate the game, not the player.

As long as the 281 & 1604 projects are marked “toll” in the MPO’s plans, the RMA has control of the project and a vested interest in ensuring it remains tolled even when new sources of revenue become available.

Not true.  The 281/1604 interchange was listed in the MPO’s plans as a toll project before the stimulus funds became available.

The RMA is conducting its own environmental studies on both the 281 and 1604 toll projects (the fox guarding the hen house)…

She forgot to mention that they’re doing this at the direction of (and with the oversight of) the Federal Highway Administration.

RMA Chair Bill Thornton promised on WOAI radio January 14, 2009 that they’d fix 281 non-toll if they got a new source of funds. When stimulus funds became available, the RMA STILL submitted the project as a toll project (they planned to build it with stimulus money and still charge users a toll to drive on it, a DOUBLE TAX), which is proof-positive that even when they get a new pot of money to do something non-toll, the RMA still pushes its toll agenda…regardless of the opposition to it.

Again, the interchange project is the proof that that’s not true.  And in the case of 281 itself, it’s all moot because no project could/can be built on 281 until the environmental study is done.  Since projects had to be “shovel-ready” to get stimulus funds, 281 was not eligible for those funds!

Also, the FHWA also informed MPO Chairman Commissioner Tommy Adkisson that as long as a project is marked toll in the MPO plans, it will be done as a toll project.

Once again, the interchange project invalidates this claim.

Goes to show, one must do his/her due diligence before believing what you read in the Express-News.

This is even more true when reading Terri Hall’s blog.

That said, she did have some valid points, mainly these:

Second, where is Davidson’s call to end the diversions to the gas tax we ALREADY PAY? Why would any thinking person ask government to raise taxes when they’re misappropriating the taxes we already send them? Third, why isn’t Davidson insisting San Antonio get back the money we already send to Austin and Washington that we’re shorted before he advocates for higher taxes (tolls)? Lastly, ending the vehicle sales tax diversion (that’s being dumped into general revenue instead of going to roads) would nearly triple our region’s road money WITHOUT RAISING TAXES!

And this one in particular about my fellow OnTheMoveBlog contributor:

…since they laid off the excellent, unbiased, and very fair transportation reporter Pat Driscoll

A good summary of my position (and Bruce’s) is this comment I posted on Terri’s blog (which had not yet been approved as of the writing of this blog):

Our state lawmakers are entirely to blame. There would be no ARMA nor need for them if the Legislature had just done their jobs. ARMA and toll roads are just a *symptom* of the root problem, and ARMA (and TxDOT for that matter) just play the hand they are dealt by the Leg and Governor.

The MPO is the agency charged under state and federal law to control the transportation funding purse-strings for the San Antonio urban area, which in this case includes Bexar County and portions of Comal and Guadalupe counties in the Schertz area.  The TIP is required under federal regulations as a condition of receiving federal funding.  Projects not in the TIP cannot use federal funds, so this is an important process.

There will be three meetings, all with identical content:

• Tuesday, May 4th from 5:00 p.m. to 8:00 p.m.
• Thursday, May 6th from 11:30 a.m. to 1:30 p.m.
• Saturday, May 8th from 9:00 a.m. to noon

All three will take place at VIA Metro Center on San Pedro just south of SAC.  Visitors will also be able to check-out some new interactive systems and discuss the transportation planning process with the folks that make these decisions.

For more information and to see a draft copy of the TIP, click here.  Also, see the interactive site here (link added 5/4/10 10:35 am).

(* As I’ve discussed before vis-a-vis the US 281 project, the term “funded” in transportation parlance means that anticipated revenues during the plan timefame will be able to fund a project.  Until those revenues are actually allocated to the MPO, a project does not actually have money available to start work.)

1925 Baldwin steam locomotive at Pearl Brewery

Question:  How do you return a long dormant steam locomotive back to active passenger service in 2010, with all the heightened concerns about safety?  Answer:  Very, very carefully.  This ain’t 1964.  Way back then early Texas Transportation Museum members including one Dave Wallace, acquired the 1925 Baldwin 0-4-0 steam locomotive from New Braunfels where it had sat idled in a shed since being retired around 1928, brought it to San Antonio, placed it on tracks adjacent to Pearl Brewery, simply filled the boiler with water and fired it up.  While it didn’t explode, it sent out enough smuts and soot that those same volunteers ended up cleaning car windshields for several blocks around.

The locomotive, called #1 by the electricity generating power station, was then used regularly for several years before the museum was offered forty acres of the old Northeast Preserve adjacent to the international airport and relocated.  Faced with a green field site, it took museum volunteers time to lay tracks and build structures to accommodate the delightful small steam switcher, specially designed to move and empty one loaded coal car at a time on rails with tight curves and limited access.  Once #1 was brought to the Wetmore Road location it was only run very briefly.  The museum had acquired a 1942 diesel electric switcher which was far easier to operate and maintain and #1 was relegated to that treacherous location, the wish list.

There it languished, staying in the top ten but never making it to the top of our priorities.  In the early 2000s, the museum embarked on a long term rejuvenation program.  Lacking any funding from the city, county, state or federal governments, we would have to rely on our own resources.  We looked hard at our facilities and, working with a small budget to begin with, began to upgrade as much of the museum as circumstances would allow.  The public noticed and each year we attracted more and more visitors.  More visitors meant more revenue which was in invested in further improvements.

We also began attracting new volunteers.  They could not understand why we were ignoring our best asset, the item which had caused the museum to be formed in the first place and the one with the biggest potential to draw in even more visitors, not only from San Antonio but across the state and beyond.  We crunched all the relevant numbers plus began researching what new regulations, restrictions and legal requirements we would have to follow.  It began to appear that the time was finally right to dust off #1 and bring it back to life.

The key thing was finding volunteers not only with enthusiasm but also the necessary skills to make the project happen.  In this we were very fortunate.  Several remarkable men were ready, willing and able to get started.  We also still had Dave Wallace who had acquired #1 for the museum back in the early 1960s, plus access to the volunteers who had operated it in the 1980s.  This was 2004 and things were looking good.  After about a year’s worth of work we even managed to have it move again under its own power for the first time in a long time,

Under pressure, 2004

However, just as with old automobiles with which I am more familiar, you get the thing running in order to find out what’s wrong with it.  It became apparent that 20% of its sixty-four flue tubes would need to be replaced.  Appropriate tubes were ordered from a steel foundry in Pennsylvania and partially installed.  But flaring, sealing and beading the small bore pipes required a very specialized tool and one could not be found.  As a result the project stalled.  Our volunteers were disenchanted with this turn of events not to mention exhausted from almost two years of hard effort and decided to take some time off and focus on other things.

Meanwhile the rest of the museum was going from strength to strength.  Somehow the temporary delay began to stretch out.  Once again #1 fell from pole position on our wish list.  At a certain point it became apparent that we had successfully undertaken pretty much all the low cost projects we could and now we needed to tackle the big ticket items that would take more in the way of capital investment than hard work by volunteers.  Despite the economic downturn in late 2007 our own resources were in relatively good shape.  It was time to take the plunge and take on serious debt if necessary to bring #1 back into service at last, on the basis that this would be a catalyst for other much desired projects, such as extending our mainline and building a museum quality display building.

Our first piece of major good fortune was finding the Holman Boiler, conveniently located just around the corner from the museum.  This was after checking with at least a dozen other outfits who would hardly give us the time of day.  Holman was not only enthusiastic about working on our steam locomotive they said they had access to the appropriate sized boiler flue beading tool.  Our next piece of luck was in acquiring the museum’s first ever major grant in its forty-six year existence.  This was given by the Brown Foundation out of Houston expressly for the purpose of getting #1 going again.

And so it came to pass last Saturday that I found myself atop the diminutive locomotive tightening bolts on its steam dome along with Ben Bennett, one of the folks instrumental in moving the project to this point, and Bob Owers, who deserves the lion’s share of the credit for where we are today, which is very, very close to a successful hydrostatic test and a state issued boiler certificate.  With these in hand we can get boiler insurance that will allow us to operate the locative in public.  There is still quite a bit of work to be done but the dream is about to become reality: Live steam passenger service is coming back to San Antonio!

Lewis bzirdsong in a 1910 Franklin on College Street, San Antonio

It is, of course, one of the more minor centennial occasions.  You probably won’t celebrate it but you will, without noticing, except for this little reminder, observe it.  February 7, 2010 is the 100^th anniversary of San Antonio’s first traffic ordinance.  Nine years after the first gasoline powered horseless carriage, eight years after the city gained its first automobile agency, seven after the creation of the San Antonio Automobile Club, and six years after the city mandated that all vehicles be registered and display ID plates or numbers, the city introduced written rules for all road users.

 Comprised of three sections containing thirty-one rules in all, number one is the most significant today.  “Vehicles going in opposite directions shall pass each other on the right.”  This answers a frequently asked puzzler: Who decided that folks would drive on the right side of the road?  In essence, no one did.  It certainly wasn’t a federal or state mandate.  It was simply a custom that became codified by local authorities up and down the country.  In all my research I have never heard of a locality in the USA that drove on the left.  It has been suggested that the British preferred the left because most held their swords in their right hand so passing on the left meant you were better protected.  In the USA, it was easier for stage coach operators to shake hands and exchange mail if they passed to the right.  At the end of the day, it seems just to be lost to the mists of time.

 Before I move on, some folks credit Henry Ford who placed the driving position on the Model T introduced in 1908 to the left, in contrast to his own previous vehicles and those of almost all other American manufacturers.  This was indeed one of the contributing factors to the car’s initial popularity.  The very earliest horse carriages, the Curved Dash Oldsmobile, had a centrally placed tiller but the brake pedal was on the right.  What is strange about this is while this was quite suitable for the British drove on the left side of the road; it ran against the grain in America where folks preferred to use the right hand side.  Ford was simply the first to recognize this and reaped the benefits accordingly.

 Rule number two, and you may be relieved to know I do not intend to enumerate them all, state that overtaking must be done on the left, so no inside passing even way back then.  Vehicles could only be parked with their right side at the curb and no further than twelve inches from it.  I could go on.  And on.  Instead I will suffice to comment only on those rules we no longer have to obey.  At the time these rules were promulgated, most vehicles lacked either brake or direction indicators.  Brake lights were not introduced until 1925 and did not become mandatory until much later .  Turn indicators were first devised as early as 1907, were not introduced commercially until the mid 1930s and did not become a legal requirement until the 1940s.  The 1910 traffic rules therefore instruct the driver regarding various hand or vocal signals.

 The other major area concerns horse drawn traffic.  All of the rules apply to all forms of transportation though the bicycle is not mentioned per se.  It turns out that motorists were not obliged to stop their engines for all horse drawn traffic.  They only had to come to a standstill if they were signaled to do so by a person riding a horse or driving a team that was agitated.  They were then obliged to wait until they had been safely passed.  As the speed limit within one mile of San Fernando cathedral was just eight miles an hour and fifteen otherwise within city limits, and all vehicles were forbidden to cross rive bridges at a speed higher than that of a walking horse, such delays were probably not too difficult to bear.  Plus, spotting an opportunity, folks set themselves up in business, and advertised tin the local newspapers, to train horses to remain calm in the proximity of gasoline powered vehicles.

 By the time revised traffic rules were published in 1921, just about all mention of horse drawn traffic was gone.  In fact a person wishing to pass his or her driving test would probably be able to pass just from studying the small booklet.  While Ford stuck stubbornly to the cumbersome, pedal activated, two speed planetary transmissions until 1927, the introduction of by now common three speed manual transmissions by its arch rival Chevrolet in 1916 brought about a standardization of vehicle operations that would allow just about anyone who can drive a stick shift car would be quite familiar with most cars other than Model Ts from this era.  Of course this number itself is dwindling due to the almost universal popularity of automatics.  Refinements continue, of course, but, largely speaking, the 1910 road rules still apply.

Congress has yet to approve a new, comprehensive surface transportation bill to replace the previous legislation (known as “SAFETEA-LU”) that expired last year, instead opting to keep it on life-support through a series of short-term extensions.  The resulting lack of certainty over future funding– as well as limited funding in those extensions– is severely crippling the construction industry, that according to several speakers at a noontime rally outside San Antonio’s convention center yesterday that attracted about 100 people.

The rally, held in conjunction with the Associated Equipment Distributors (AED) convention here, included remarks by local and national construction and equipment industry leaders as well as local state representative Jeff Wentworth and was intended to draw attention to the fact that the depression in the construction industry is a huge drag on the national economy, not to mention the fact that it is delaying needed infrastructure improvements across the country.  Despite lofty claims, the federal economic stimulus program has actually resulted in minimal transportation infrastructure spending– just 6% of stimulus funding has gone to transportation programs, about the equivalent of half of one year’s typical expenditures, and it was spread over two years.  The result is a nearly 23% unemployment rate in the construction industry.  In fact, although construction workers comprise only 5% of the US workforce, they represented 20% of layoffs last year.  Furthermore, the scarcity of funding has meant that heavy machinery sales are down about 50%, resulting in layoffs of 37% of the workers who manufacture that equipment.  Overall, the industry has essentially been decimated with over 2.5 million jobs lost.

The message of the rally was clear– Congress’ plate is full with a variety of high-profile issues these days, but they need to find time to get a new transportation bill enacted quickly, and that bill needs to find a way to adequately fund our nation’s increasingly decaying infrastructure.  Now obviously the folks who organized this rally have a direct fiduciary interest in getting transportation funding committed and increased, but in reality, we all do.  Not only is the current funding dearth causing a demonstrable drag on the economy, it’s also causing billions of dollars worth of needed transportation improvements as well as basic maintenance to go unfunded.  This certainly affects each and every one of us on a daily basis and has resulted in officials having to resort to other means to get projects built– namely tolling.

The one benefit to all this is that construction costs have plummeted in the past year, meaning that what projects are able to be funded are coming in cheaper than expected, which means there’s leftover money to do more work.  However, this is a short-term benefit and ultimately balance needs to be restored.

This was the fourth such rally nationally and it concluded with a loud parade of construction equipment down Commerce Street.

Links:

• http://www.startusupusa.com/

On Saturday January 10, 2009 I found myself stuffing a brand new Breezer Villager 7 speed bike into the back of my minivan.  Brooking no argument, my dear wife had decided that I, too, would be acquiring a bicycle so as to accompany her on one she purchased a few months earlier.  I spent some time failing to find what I was looking for at a number of San Antonio’s better bike stores, which was a full fendered machine with self-powered lights and without derailleur gears.  I decided that since I was being railroaded I could afford to be fussy.  Derailleur gears are awkward in urban situations, making the frequent stops for lights and other traffic conditions no fun.  Fenders too were a must as who wants that nasty dirt stripe up your back and grit in your hair?

 I came across a couple of machines which could be customized to fit my wants and needs, at additional expense of course, but then my wife found the Breezer, which turns out to be a very cool machine in the eyes of cycling aficionados, a little to my surprise.  It fit the bill almost perfectly.  It would not look out of place outside an Irish pub in the 1930s, just the look I was going for.  It has seven speeds inside the rear hub.  It is a commuter bike, not at all fast, but not bad on hills.  The lights are large and bright and have a built in diode to keep them illuminated for a few minutes when stationary at traffic lights.  I was back on two wheels.

 Bicycles are not cheap.  With a stiff wire carrier capable of holding two gallons of milk – not that I ever have – and an inexpensive odometer, mine came to around $700.00.  At $2.50 I could buy 280 gallons of fuel for that amount which means, at 25 MPG, I ain’t gonna save an undriven dime until I pedal over 7,000 miles!  That’s a heck of a deal.  How we manage to convince ourselves to do these things is one of the miracles of capitalism, if you ask me.  Even at $4 a gallon I will need to do 4,375 miles just to break even.

 My main concern at the outset was whether or not I would use the thing at all.  It would be an awfully expensive piece of garage art.  I was already exercising an hour a day, five days a week, and had lost forty pounds plus reduced my cholesterol to an acceptable level along the way so I knew this aspect would not be a strong motivator.  Both of my jobs are almost exactly twelve miles from my house, a little too far for an acceptable commute by bike.  I ride at an average of 13 MPH.  Who has two hours to spare just to get to and from work?

 My wife proved to be the motivator, at least at first.  Once your legs have gotten used to the work and your butt has grown accustomed to the new seating arrangement, no mean feat and one I have yet to completely achieve, despite a replacement saddle at the 500 mark, you have to find places to go that don’t quickly become as dull as dishwater.  I have always been a results focused individual.  To get on a bike and just roam around is not compatible with my mentality.  But my wife, on the other hand, likes to flit around like a gadfly and I found that letting her be “Red Leader” was very satisfying.  Providing I have a rough idea of what our ultimate objective is, her choice of route is both mystifying and gratifying at the same time.  For someone with so little Irish in her, she certainly follows their national adage:  “We’re not lost, we’re just going a more interesting way.”

 She does think I need to get a faster bike, though.  I find this funny as I invariably catch her on any kind of upgrade.  Anyway, I don’t think it’s the bike that is slow, it’s me.  Even as a kid and later, as someone who cycled everywhere and did not even learn to drive until I was 26, I just like to trot along at my own, none too fast, pace.  Coincidentally, I have become something of a slow vehicle expert.  No one else will drive the old trucks at the Texas Transportation Museum.  Our 1929 Ford Model A truck pretty much tops out at 40 MPH if thrashed but has a much more comfortable cruising speed of 31.  A regular A will probably hit 60.  The 1924 Ford Model T truck is even slower.  It cruises somewhere around 22 MPH.  Regular Ts are comfortable at 35 or so, and will leave you behind even on club cruises.  Oh well.

 Left to my own devices, I tried to ride to my job at the gym at Camp Bullis once a week.  In this line of work, no one cares if you arrive a little hot and sweaty.  Going to the museum was less common.  Whereas I have found a good route to Bullis that keeps me off most major roads most of the time, going to Wetmore Road is not much fun at all.  Maybe once they finish the Wurzbach Parkway it won’t be so bad.  The worst stretch is the last half mile along what I have called the Wetmore Speedway for years.  In an antique vehicle you just take over a lane and let the maniacs deal with it.  You can’t do that on a bicycle.  No wonder you rarely see one there.

I haven’t been out of town much on two wheels.  One visit to Helotes and surrounding country roads through Grey Forest but it wasn’t much fun plus after that couple got killed there this year, I doubt if we’ll be back.  I’m more of a city cyclist.  On Sunday mornings, I quite like to go down to the Alamo mainly along San Pedro and back up Fredericksburg.  I’ve hauled our bikes to Espada a number of times for rides along the river as far, again, as the Alamo.  I should mention that riding a bike is way better on the south side of the city.

 So, one way and another, I managed to cycle 1040 miles just in time for the Breezer’s first anniversary in my possession.  That’s 20 miles a week.  That sounds a lot better than 86.6 miles a month even though it’s the same thing.  My goal for this year is 1,200 miles, 100 a month.  That’s just 23.08 a week.  Of course, that’s also the equivalent of riding to Bullis once a week every week and that ain’t gonna happen.  The record breaking summer heat certainly caused a big drop off this year and then I stayed off two wheesl through most of the fall.  My “excuse” was I didn’t want to ride for an hour in the dark, which is fairly valid, actually.

 While I have no plans to join a bicycle club, my wife did try to go riding with a number of folks, including a women only group.  But they start at an insanely early hour and one thing we ain’t in our household is morning people.  Nonetheless I would like to participate in at least one group event.  I planned to be part of Hammerfest out of Lavernia this year but rain the preceeding weekend forced a Model T event I planned to be rescheduled and I had to miss it.

Another good trip would be to ride from my house near Callaghan just outside Loop 410 to Mission Espada just outside the loop on the south side.  It’s about 20 miles each way.  My longest ride this year was just over 30 miles.  It also might be fun to ride from one end of old historic routes through the city such as Commerce Street.  One way or another I think I am getting the hang of being on a bike in San Antonio.  Despite all the negative comments I have heard from so called cycling enthusiasts, I have had no bad experiences with local motorists despite the poor accommodation for two wheelers on most roads.  Of course I wear stuff bright enough to dazzle the sun and try to follow all the road rules.  I’ve come to like taking a breather at stop lights and signs.  If I was in a hurry I would have taken the car.

Fortunately, the policy board understood this, but still showed concern over the possibility that this meant that those future projects, should they actually be tolled, could be franchised-out to private companies, particularly the omni-evil foreign corporations.  As such, State Representative David Liebowitz moved that CDAs be removed entirely, but the board wisely voted 12-3 against his motion and instead voted by the same margin to support an alternate motion to remove just the concession part of the CDAs, essentially meaning that should those projects eventually be developed as toll projects, they would have to be owned by either the state or a local governmental agency such as the Alamo Regional Mobility Authority (ARMA).  As such, they will probably now go forward in the planning process envisioned as “design-build” projects.  (As a footnote, the statutory authority for such projects will need to be renewed by the Legislature in 2011.  The Legislature did not renew concession CDA authority during its last regular and subsequent special session.)

The final motion to approve the long-range plan with the amendment to remove concessions was approved with only one person (Liebowitz) voting against it.  Much to my surprise, chairman Tommy Adkisson offered-up an ”aye” vote on it.  He also stated his support for raising the gas tax and indexing it to inflation as his preferred alternative to tolling, a position I had never heard him take before.  Perhaps he finally is starting to “get it“.

In other business, the board also directed MPO staff to find a way to fund a side-by-side analysis of proposed tolled and non-tolled expansion plans for US 281.  My instinct is that when all is said and done on that, three results will emerge:

• The two plans are essentially identical with similar costs; only the tolling equipment and any related signage will be the delta.  (Alternatively, it may be found that the toll-free plan is too old now to do a valid “apples-to-apples” comparison.)
• The results of the study will have to somehow be rolled into the ongoing US 281 environmental impact statement (EIS) study.
• There is no easy way to fund the project without tolls unless all the area’s gas tax and tax-backed bond funding for a number of years is used exclusively for this project.

The last item of general public interest was a report from ARMA that the 281 “super street” project is expected to break ground in February and that the 281/1604 interchange should get underway next summer.

Related link:

• Express-News report