Kansas City Transit Cornucopia

Detailed commentary will follow, but I wanted to get Mayor Funkhouser’s new regional Kansas City transit plan up on our blog. Here is the Kansas City Star‘s story. Here is some typical boosterism. Here is some blunt critisicm. Here is the Show-Me Institute’s contribution to the discussion. I do like how the mayor’s plan includes some less expensive and efficient parts, like bus?rapid tranit, express buses, and even commuter rail, assuming there is enough demand for the commuter rail. But $600 million for 11 miles of light rail sounds low, considering it cost St. Louis that same amount to do just seven miles from 2004 to 2006 — although that included two miles with significant tunnelling. As I said, much more analysis of this to come.