Monday, January 05, 2009

San Fran to charge drivers in city

The liberals want to control congestion by limiting the amount of cars in the city of San Francisco.
"I want a San Francisco that is far less congested and far easier to navigate," said a city supervisor, Jake McGoldrick, who has shepherded congestion-pricing proposals and is leaving office this week because of term limits.

Congestion pricing generally intends to nudge drivers out of their vehicles and onto buses, subways and bicycles by pushing up the cost of driving into certain parts of a city during peak commuter hours. The fees help generate money to improve public transportation.


My problem is I have to go to certain appointments with my kids, pick them up from school, get them to speech therapy and doctor appointments. Public transportation could not possibly get me to one appointment to the next. The doctors and therapy are 15 to 20 miles away from my home. (In opposite directions.) So limiting me from my car will not work. We are a car culture for a reason. We have families that need to get to sports, music lessons, scout meetings, church functions, doctor appointments, dentist appointments, therapy etc. And charging us extra to use our car is ridiculous. If I was single I could do the bus daily to do my errands and appointments. But when you have to get kids to multiple places in one day it's impossible using public transportation.
McGoldrick said he had been sold on the plan since a 2005 meeting with the man he called "Mr. Congestion Management": a former London mayor, Ken Livingstone.

Americans have "a very parochial mind-set" about driving, said McGoldrick, whose wife is English.

"It's hard for people to envision anything else because this is such a car culture."

Car culture my a**! I call it INDEPENDENCE!

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