The Right, Rail And Ridiculous Reaction

Gov. Jim Doyle pulls off a political coup - - bringing to Wisconsin a Spanish company to assemble and maintain high-speed rail trains for in-and-out-of- state systems.

Which puts Wisconsin and the entire Midwest on the cusp of a multi-billion-dollar regional system - - sure to bring along economic development and tourism, too - - that could compete with the airlines for medium-length trips and certainly offer travelers a modern option to heavily-polluting, congestion-plagued automobile travel.

Who might think this is a terrible idea?

I'm looking at you, State Sen. Glenn Grothman, (R-West Bend).

People like Grothman and his talk radio enablers see trains and go bananas.

For reasons known only to Republican shrinks, righties hate trains.

The way the rest of us might hate swine flu.

Apparently the our suburban opinion-makers prefer the eight years of congestion already underway on the drive from Milwaukee towards Illinois and into freeway widening hell, or the separate period on the drawing board for a good four-to-eight more years when the Zoo Interchange - - the state's busiest crossroads - - is headed for rebuilding.

Neither corridor has any rail service: Waukesha killed light rail in the late 1990's that could have easily been running from New Berlin and Brookfield by now, and the Kenosha-Racine-Milwaukee commuter rail line is on planning life support as we speak.

And let's not claim that opposition to rail is about fiscal restraint!

The I-94 reconstruction to Illinois is budgeted at $1.9 billion.

The Zoo Interchange may exceed $2.3 billion.

That's $4.2 billion on two segments of Interstate Highway just in Southeastern Wisconsin alone, and there are other segments galore in the unfunded plan only a gleam in the planners' eyes - - I-43 south through Walworth County, I-43 north all the way through Ozaukee County, I-94 past Miller Park, perhaps on a giant elevated span, plus widenings to I-894, State Highway 45, and so on.

If we had truth in budgeting and planners language, someone would take the word "free" out of "freeway."

This pathological and often partisan reaction to train service in southeastern Wisconsin in favor of every freeway (sic) expansion imaginable gathered steam in the 90's, when Milwaukee was close to a light rail system.

In reaction, conservative politicians and talk show hosts discovered there were voters and listeners you could set on edge - - hence, ratings and re-elections - - by suggesting to white flightees that urban riders might ride into the suburbs.

Failed Milwaukee mayoral candidate George Watts made his famous "strangers" remark - - the threat was to suburbanites' property and children - - quote and history here - - the phone lines lit up, and power brokers in the 'burbs had found their issue.

Now a dozen years later, anything on a rail is anathema, mockable and ripe for demagogy - - but Doyle figured out a way to marry modern rail transit with desperately needed job development, leaving Republicans like Grothman in the dust.

Or is at the station?