Other Notable Blogs

Cafe Unknown
Travel, History and Portland Oregon by Dan Haneckow

Jack Bog's Blog
By Jack Bogdanski of Portland, Oregon. (Like he needs any other introduction by now? -- A.B.C.)

For Portlanders Only
"Why buy a mattress anywhere else?"

Good Stuff NW
Featuring stuff that is good in the NW

LOST Magazine
LOST Magazine is an online monthly magazine that combines elements of many other literary, online, and national magazines with a singular mission--to reclaim in writing lost people, places, and things.

Mapes on Politics
Way West of the Beltway

Outside Is America
A journal about photography, roadtrips, trains and life, with occasional detours into movies, baseball, music, family and more.

The Photographers' Railroad Page
Good photos usually have good stories to go with them.... The goal of The Photographers' Railroad Page is to provide an outlet for top quality photographs and their story.

Portland Food & Drink
Throwing Ourselves on the Grenade of Bad Food to Save You

Portland Transport Blog
A Conversation About Access & Mobility in the Portland/Vancouver Region

PowellsBooks.Blog
Authors, readers, critics, media -- and booksellers

Rambling West
The musings of a farmer with a typewriter and camera

Stumptown Confidential
Documenting Portland, Oregon architecture, history, and culture through photos, postcards, and words.

The Unauthorized Observer
Observations on faith, photography, trains, baseball, the city where I live (Fullerton, Calif.), anything that I find funny (a lot of things) or irritating (some things) and various incidents involving friends and family.

Under the Weather
...the open road, fatherhood, family life, music, railroads, photography, popular and unpopular culture, sex, violence, religion, the oppression of consumerism and capitalism and the general bullshit that makes up modern life.

Urban Planning Overlord
A blog to counter the myths, lies, and demagoguery others use against sound city planning to further their own ends, fair and foul - but also to urge the profession itself to pull back from the occasional wretched PC exces.

VanPortlander
Living in Vancouver; working in Portland. I have some thoughts.

Whiskey, Texas
...life and experiences in Texas and the Southwest. Recurring themes: Photography, railroads, fading ads / ghost signs, fallen-flag railroad logos, boxcars, bicycling, Texas music, pop culture, sports, road trips, literature, kids and family.

World Scott
The Travel Writing and Photography of Scott Lothes

Blegs & Bargains

 Amazon Book Wishlist

 B&H Wishlist

 My eBay Listings

 Powell's Books Wishlist

Friday, February 15, 2008

First up this week: the saga of railroad service in Southern Oregon continued this week. RailAmerica, owner of the Central Oregon & Pacific, sent a response back to Oregon Governor Ted Kulongoski stating that the company would undertake repairs to the currently shuttered Coos Bay line on its own dime. The hitch? The railroad conglomerate wants a commitment from the state that they will receive assistance for both repair costs and operating expenses on the route.

The Governor wasted no time crafting a response, which said in no uncertain terms "no deal". As it sits now, it appears the state is still on track to pursue a forced transfer of the line to public ownership. That said, the fact that RailAmerica was willing to change their proposal at all suggests to this observer that they have "blinked", and can likely be moved further with the right amount of pressure.

"Interestingly enough, the same representatives who want tax dollars to supplement ferry service to Vashon and Maury islands are not arguing that Puget Sound would be harmed by increasing ferry traffic.

These representatives also do not seem to be taking into account that transporting sand and gravel by barge, instead of by truck, saves fuel, reduces heavy truck traffic on area roads, reduces greenhouse-gas emissions and helps keep down the cost of state-(taxpayer-)funded transportation projects that benefit the entire region. One average barge keeps 186 heavy trucks and trailers off the road."

"Then this morning I'm reading a seemingly harmless Valentines Day article in the NYT about couples who have different food preferences, and one woman says that she's been able to tolerate her husband's occasional need for animal flesh because she's not a "vegangelical." What?"

Labels: Food, Portland History, Public Policy, Railroads, Transportation, Week in Review

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