Running Up The Federal Debt, City Style

Our town of Provo, Utah is a poster child for why the U.S. government is 17.5 trillion dollars in debt.

The city is completing plans to receive $150 million in federal money for a Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) system—a 16 mile route that will connect two universities, Brigham Young University and Utah Valley University, the downtown areas of Provo and nearby Orem, other local areas. The bus system will require the construction of dedicated lanes to run the huge double busses with the accordion folds in the middle every 8 minutes all day long, with 5 minute intervals at peak hours.

The city has been up in arms over the proposed program, pro and con, concerning the routes to be taken, but few raise the biggest objection: why do it at all? We do not need busses with a dedicated lane and accordion-fold doors that run every 8 minutes. Anyone living in Provo knows those busses will travel empty most of the time. There isn’t that much human traffic even at rush hour.

Peak traffic hours could be handled with extra busses, for vast savings on the outlay. In addition, beautiful Provo could be spared the years of construction, the confusion, and, of course, the cost—our share of the matching funds.

We do not need a large scale project for a middle sized town. Maybe we will grow into this down the road, but we don’t need it now. Those who invest in the typical pipe-dream—that once we have the system, people will leave their cars at home and take the bus—hasn’t worked out well in other locations. There is no sensible reason to believe it will happen in Provo and Orem.

Yet, because federal money is involved, the city pants for the project. In our frenzy for the freebies, where is the logic? And where is the federal government going to get that money? It will borrow it, because the government is broke. Who will pay the costs when the federal money runs out, or the government becomes bankrupt? Utah citizens.

This is nuts! We will take borrowed money from a fiscally irresponsible, nearly bankrupt entity to create an overkill system that is beyond our needs because it is “free”?

Rethink that, Provo!