George Will doesn't like Portland, but Australia does!
Kari Chisholm
In the latest issue of Newsweek, conservative columnist George Will - America's ambassador from the 1800's - gets all grumpy about Portland when talking about Ray LaHood, the new Secretary of Transportation (and former GOP congressman):
LaHood, however, has been transformed. Indeed, about three bites into lunch, the T word lands with a thump: He says he has joined a "transformational" administration: "I think we can change people's behavior." Government "promoted driving" by building the Interstate Highway System—"you talk about changing behavior." He says, "People are getting out of their cars, they are biking to work." High-speed intercity rail, such as the proposed bullet train connecting Los Angeles and San Francisco, is "the wave of the future." And then, predictably, comes the P word: Look, he says, at Portland, Ore.Riding the aforementioned wave to Portland, which liberals hope is a harbinger of America's future, has long been their aerobic activity of choice. But LaHood is a Republican, for Pete's sake, the party (before it lost its bearings) of "No, we can't" and "Actually, we shouldn't" and "Not so fast" and "Let's think this through." Now he is in full "Yes we can!" mode. Et tu, Ray? ...
And as for Portland ... Its government has been, intermittently, as progressive as all get-out, trying to use zoning, light-rail projects and high-density housing to cool the planet by curbing automobile use. This sort of "New Urbanism" is metastasizing. Last year California's attorney general, Jerry Brown, 71, the state's once (1975–82) and, he hopes, future governor, was a prime mover behind a new law that would deny certain state aid to communities that do not adopt "smart growth" plans. They are supposed to herd Californians into higher-density living near mass-transit rail lines in order to reduce their carbon footprints (tire prints, actually).
Ol' George may be complaining that the Portland idea has gone all the way - all the way! - to California, but he doesn't know the half of it.
It seems that Fred Hansen, the director of TriMet, is headed to Australia this fall to help the province of South Australia be a bit more like Portland.
From the Independent Weekly:
South Australia will continue to take its public transport lead from the US city of Portland with the appointment of its latest thinker-in-residence.Fred Hansen, the general manager of Portland's public transport provider, will take up his position in October.
Premier Mike Rann said on Tuesday, the appointment was timely considering the state government's plan to spend $2 billion on transport infrastructure and further funding announced in the federal budget.
"Mr Hansen's home town of Portland is internationally recognised as one of the finest exponents of a sustainable and integrated public transport system," Mr Rann said.
"We have taken our lead from Portland and Mr Hansen in developing our plans for the coast-to-coast rail system which is now taking shape."
George Will's antediluvian grumpiness is generally amusing and even somewhat lovable - but no matter what he says, Portland's commitment to being an example for the world of how to live lightly on the planet is a very good thing.
I just spent a weekend in L.A. stuck in traffic, and I gotta say, things are better here.
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connect with blueoregon
May 19, '09
The South Australia tie is a long standing one, when I was interning with Rann 2 years ago Fred Hansen was in Adelaide advising the Rann Government on mass transit during my first week. Actually, Rann's love of all things Portland and Oregon in South Australia goes deeper than that. Shortly after Rann became Premier (I believe in 2002) they designed a strategic plan for South Australia that was modeled very specifically upon Oregon's. The Rann government loves Oregon.
May 19, '09
George Will is one of America's more skilled practitioners of the written word. Unfortunately, people don't recognize that his essays belong in the fiction department. He is a mouthpiece for the establishment, and in that role he concocts stories to help persuade his readers to buy into the establishment's interests.
10:22 a.m.
May 19, '09
Here's LO's take, including links to commentary by Kos and Matt Yglesias. I like this column, because it combines the fact-avoidant cluelessness of his global warming piece, with the heartwarming curmudgeonism of his blue jeans rant. Building a bridge back to Amish Country, George Will!
10:23 a.m.
May 19, '09
Crap, didn't close my tag. Sorry.
May 19, '09
It's repulsive how we Portlanders continually congratulate ourselves on how "cutting edge" and green-conscious we are.
Sure, we've made some good steps but it's not like the transportation around here is not still completely dominated by passenger cars with a high percentage of those having just one occupant.
And, the 12-lane bridge on I-5 is the preferred option of most local politicians.
We talk as if we have the transportation priorities of Amsterdam, and apparently Will believes the hype.
May 19, '09
Good for Portland! Maybe you can sell some more of those wonderful self propelled cars from the factory in colorado that you now own.
May 19, '09
Umm, the only problem is of course that light rail and WES and other such transportation projects aren't sustainable at all. They only exist because of large capital expenses that aren't being paid back. The fees from riders don't cover the operating expenses so the whole system is slowly going broke. What exactly is sustainable about a model where expenses are higher than income?
May 19, '09
andy: about 67% of TriMet's costs are paid by the tri-county business tax. What is not sustainable about taxing the private sector to provide public services? Isn't that how it's usually done?
May 19, '09
I'm prety sure I spent Friday afternoon stuck in Portland traffic. Can't say I miss that at all! Not nearly as bad as my last time in L.A., when I spent three hours staring at my exit...
11:02 a.m.
May 19, '09
"The fees from riders don't cover the operating expenses so the whole system is slowly going broke. What exactly is sustainable about a model where expenses are higher than income?"
So you're saying what, that cars are a better system? In addition to the cost of road maintenance factor in the personal expenses car owners pay in licensing fees, tolls, mandated insurance, upkeep, storage, parking, etc. and I think government promotion, even forcing, of the car-in-every-garage model resulted in one of the greatest mechanisms for trickle-up transfer of wealth we've ever seen. If we put a fraction of the $ into safe bike commuting (read: "bikes only paths") and mass transit that goes into cars--which have a whole branch of state government almost exclusively dedicated to their upkeep and regulation--car ownership would plummet and mass transit in most urban areas would have the critical mass needed to be economically efficient. But that's the whole reason cars were pimped on us in the first place--they transfer more wealth than mass transit or bikes.
11:16 a.m.
May 19, '09
I'm prety sure I spent Friday afternoon stuck in Portland traffic.
Huh? Where? Unless there's an accident that involved a fatality, it's highly unlikely you spent more than 10-15 minutes in any kind of traffic in Portland.
May 19, '09
Actually, I think there was an accident. Don't know if it involved any kind of a fatality, but I was on 205 way longer than I wanted to be.
When I lived in Portland, I would routinely get stuck in traffic at the oddest hours, like two in the afternoon. Still not as bad as L.A., but it could still be much better.
May 19, '09
Actually, I think there was an accident. Don't know if it involved any kind of a fatality, but I was on 205 way longer than I wanted to be.
When I lived in Portland, I would routinely get stuck in traffic at the oddest hours, like two in the afternoon. Still not as bad as L.A., but it could still be much better.
May 19, '09
First, he's from Champaign-Urbana, IL. What would you expect Col. Henry Blake's analysis of Portland to be like? There's no real diff between Normal and Champaign, so, consider the source.
Second, he is a recognized dickhead .
May 19, '09
What's with links disappearing?
May 19, '09
So much for Portland, let's talk about George Will. His view of the world is dominated by the tightness of his rectum. When he farts all the dogs in the neighborhood start barking. When he sits on a metal chair there's a ringing sound. His favorite desert is vanilla ice cream covered in molten Ex-Lax with a cherry on top, which he saves for his collection.
12:01 p.m.
May 19, '09
I like this column, because it combines the fact-avoidant cluelessness of his global warming piece, with the heartwarming curmudgeonism of his blue jeans rant.
His cluelessness is astounding. This is a guy who used to rip GHW Bush and was a pretty sharp thinker. Having signed onto Dubya's debacle, he seems completely insane. He's gone anti-science, but still clings desperately to intellectual cred (seeding half-witted columns like this one with sentences passages this: "To the herd of independent thinkers who deplored it in chorus, suburbanization was emblematic of the banality of bourgeoisie life. Then, 45 years ago this week, a Democratic president who had been in office exactly six months heeded the liberal intellectual's cri de coeur.")
He's become a pretentious Andy Rooney and an apologist for the party led by Limbaugh, Palin, and Cheney. No wonder he's so cranky.
May 19, '09
Hmmm, in the "old days" light rail, streetcars and trolleys were privately owned and operated, costing the taxpayers virtually nothing. No wonder nobody wants to return to that system!
May 19, '09
I have always liked Portland and still do, but from a livability point of view it strikes me as going downhill. San Francisco was a great city in the 1960s, but people with power and a desire to make money made it into a mini-Manhattan. It's still a nice city to visit but not for living there. Portland is making the same mistakes and following the same pattern. Enjoy it while you can.
1:06 p.m.
May 19, '09
George Will is absolutely right. Portland is a terrible, terrible place to live. If you are reading this and considering moving, I wouldn't even bother. You will be very unhappy.
We are, however, a great place to visit!
1:46 p.m.
May 19, '09
I agree, Bill. San Fransisco lost track of affordable housing in the majority of its neighborhoods, the same thing that will happen to Portland if Randy Leonard and others on the city counsel are allowed to tinker and trade away affordable housing from one neighborhood to another in the name of urban renewal and shady ballpark deals. We'll end up with an East Side/West Side split resembling Oakland/SanFran. We need to be sure the WHOLE city is livable, and accessible by means other than cars.
May 19, '09
Jamais, I believe one of the main contributors to Frisco's lack of affordable housing was their institution of rent controls with exemptions on high end housing.
File that policy under the category of another leftist palliative to help out the little guy but having the exact opposite effect.
It wouldnt surprise me at all if Portland followed suit. As Bullwinkle said, "This time for sure!" :)
May 19, '09
Of course, under the new BHO mandate, cars will be much more efficient than mass transit.
Already they are about the same, but under the new rules, if the goal is really to reduce CO2, we should shut down mass transit and get everyone into a new BHO Mandate car.
As to Portlanders driving less. It is a lie: We drive more than we did in 1990, per person. We drive more than Vancouver WA, per person. See metro-region.org/article.cfm?articleid=16340
Portland's social engineering has been a dismal failure, only giving us un affordable housing, more driving, more expenses and cut backs in basic services as we give $70 million annually to developers.
2:43 p.m.
May 19, '09
"I believe one of the main contributors to Frisco's lack of affordable housing was their institution of rent controls with exemptions on high end housing." Interesting perspective. Please expound.
May 19, '09
Having signed onto Dubya's debacle, he seems completely insane.
I don't think Will ever signed onto the neo-con vision for Iraq. I didn't read his columns regularly, but the ones I remember were pretty scathing in the critique of Bush's optimism and desire for nation-building and spreading democracy. Will is an old-school real politic internationalist and rightly predicted that the neo-cons would fail.
I like Will precisely because he writes columns such as this. The fact that he's wrong doesn't reduce the enjoyment I get from his prose and his argument. Seriously, "To the herd of independent thinkers who deplored it in chorus" is a sharp and elegant attack, wrapped in irony. It's brilliant!
As to the substance, Will represents a large portion of America, and even a (smaller) portion of Portland. There are people who despise the City's focus on density because they don't want to live in a condo. They want everyone to have a house on a 1/4 acre lot with trees and a lawn, and when the City fills up we just shut the borders. What they fail to realize is that making sure we have enough high-density housing actually keeps the prices of those 1/4-acre lots down. But the arguments aside, Will's column should be posted on our walls as a reminder that Portland's experiment will only succeed to the extent we can convince real people that they are better off living in a vibrant, dense city with lots of alternative transportation options (and still lots of roads, too).
May 19, '09
Jamais,
http://www.cato.org/pubs/pas/pa-274.html
May 19, '09
George Will needs a new mission in life, like trying to get Latin instruction (and maybe even classical Greek) back into our schools so they can be just like the expensive prep school he attended. This would mesh nicely with his crusade against denim, as no self-respecting Latin student would ever wear denim. And there's the added benefit that that if he combines a crusade for Latin with a crusade against public transportation and his typically arrogant attitude, he will automatically co-opt 99% of the readership at Team Bogdanski.
May 19, '09
Miles wrote:
They want everyone to have a house on a 1/4 acre lot with trees and a lawn, and when the City fills up we just shut the borders.
Not exactly, Miles. There is a place for high-density development. Unfortunately, Metro's guidelines make everywhere within the UGB fair game for increased density. This usually means McMansions with country estate airs shoehorned into 8000 square foot lots that been clearcut. It's all about developers profiting on neighborhood livibility by destroying some of it.
Just as there is nothing sustainable in infinite sprawl, there is nothing sustainable in infinite densification. This does mean, at some point, saying "no more."
May 19, '09
I agree with Bill Bodden's first comment.
George Will used to be relevant. Now he's almost relevant inside the beltway to those few people who read him. Average Republicans probably don't even know who he is. They sure didn't pay attention to him about George W. Bush, that's for sure. And that was 9 years ago.
And as a Democrat, I see no reason to read him, either. His day has passed.
May 19, '09
Kari:
It seems that Fred Hansen, the director of TriMet, is headed to Australia this fall to help the province of South Australia be a bit more like Portland.
Bob T:
No surprise there. Why would any government invite someone to show them how to have less control over people? Besides, the Aussies would learn more if they invited someone who knows a lot about the subject rather than a career bureaucrat who got the job at Tri-Met despite having sero transportation/transit experience.
Bob Tiernan Portland
May 20, '09
George Will is nothing more than a pompous, self absorbed know-it-all who doesn't. He's just another mean, cranky, got-up-on-the-wrong-side-of-bed-for-life conservative who has seen his entire world view destroyed by GWB and Alan Greenspan.
May 20, '09
Unrepentant liberal:
He's just another mean, cranky, got-up-on-the-wrong-side- of-bed-for-life conservative who has seen his entire world view destroyed by GWB and Alan Greenspan.
Bob T:
Nah. His world view wasn't destroyed by GWB because the latter's view wasn't the same as Will's (far from it). Why is the world so black and white to you?
Bob Tiernan Portland
May 20, '09
Why pound on that vaginal blood fart George Will when we've got billy? You can't TP George Will's house. This topic has nothing to do with cars and isn't the appropriate forum for his environmental terrorism.
If it says Sam it's spam, but if it says billy it's just silly? That's very poor editorial policy, imho. Not to mention karma you can live without.
If Portland was 1/2 what Will thinks, billy and terry parker would be tarred, feathered, hung by the balls, flogged and exiled. It's not what George says. It's just another Amerikan shitty where progressive debate is constantly fouled by ignorant shitheads.
Will is pissed that liberal verbiage is being heard. It's supposed to be squelched at the source. He's got a point. Most of the TALK does come out of Portland. If he was really, really, concerned about liberals implementing their vision, he would love Portland. This is where good ideas get butt-fucked until they die a horrid death.
How can shits like Will and billy not love Tri-Met? They have a 5% shortfall, so they're going to cut 15% of services, while useless middle management take their normal yearly increase. THAT, idiots, is how you kill public transport, not arguing the virtues of the auto. Pull your dick out of the exhaust pipe, billy and think for once. Here's a guy that gets his major policy motivation from the fact that his neighbors aren't a mile away as he sits in his Munster fantasy house.
May 20, '09
SF- you have zero credibility if you call if Frisco- is slightly different, though, admittedly the typical real estate/breeder fraud will rear its ugly head and destroy livability here too.
Being a seven square mile peninsula with the ideal climate for human habitability has a little to do with it, too.
"If you're going to San Francisco, When you get there, Make sure you have return fare..."
Willy Brown for Drug Czar!
May 20, '09
This study , out today from MIT, shows double the temperature increase between now and 2100. The difference in this model and their earlier one is that they have factored in the effect of climate change denial.
Bottom line, this is hard evidence that life is over, as we know it, if we are not willing to end the lives of those deliberately trying to exacerbate the effect, and end them now!
(In case the link gets eaten, "http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/georgemonbiot/2009/may/20/climate-change-denier-mit").
May 21, '09
I think it's hilarious how liberals claim to support a 'green' planet but want to force everyone to live in an asphalt paved, cramped inner city environment and live in apartments with no yard.
NYC is nirvana.
The people who want a house on a few acres of beautiful green land are the devil.
May 21, '09
"Bottom line, this is hard evidence that life is over, as we know it, if we are not willing to end the lives of those deliberately trying to exacerbate the effect, and end them now!"
Right on! The Fuhrer is implenting the form of the Reich, the next step is to put it to use in the service of the Volk! Tomorrow belongs to me!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZMVql9RLP34&eurl=http%3A%2F%2Fwww%2Elewrockwell%2Ecom%2Fblog%2Flewrw%2Farchives%2F2009%5F05%5F14%2Ehtml&feature=player_embedded
May 22, '09
Right on! The Fuhrer is implenting the form of the Reich, the next step is to put it to use in the service of the Volk! Tomorrow belongs to me!
And, of course, you will have democracy and a very nice life, after we go tooth and nail with everyone and everything for clean water, in the next few decades! Yeah, it's heavy handed. It's required because you dithered for too long. Now, realistic types have a simple choice. Continue to dither and live in the same hell, or take a little poison now to avoid a grisly death later. I'm a big fan of a little daily poison. A little for good dreams, and a lot in the end, for a good death! (Misquoting a famous German, former poster to this blog).
Posted by: torridjoe | May 19, 2009 10:23:31 AM
Crap, didn't close my tag. Sorry.
By Jove, TJ, I think you've got it! The recent anomaly where tags were being eaten? Typepad was testing new functionality that detects unclosed tags and removes them, and the buggy version they released removed ALL tags. That has to be it.