Moore: Fix the 6-10 Connector For Freedom’s Sake

Monday, December 07, 2015

Russell J. Moore, GoLocalProv MINDSETTER™

If you like cars and dislike traffic, there is a movement that's working against your interests in Rhode Island, and they're gaining momentum.

They call themselves Move Together PVD, and are comprised of transportation advocates and “urban planners”, are calling for the state to decline to fix the Route 6 and 10 Connector, and instead to create a boulevard, that they claim would connect neighborhoods currently sliced apart by the connector--as if the connector is this horrific thing that brings people apart.

Keep Traffic Low

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One of the cool things about Rhode Island is, believe it or not, we really don't have that much traffic. That might be a surprise to many folks who haven't lived in other cities like Boston or New York, but a 10 minute traffic backup here is considered a jam. In other places, that's looked at the same way we look at a red light--a minor inconvenience.

By dismantling the route 6 and 10 connector, the Providence drivers would see a significant increase in traffic in that part of the city and another due to the displacement factor. The connector would have one of it's lanes reduced for cars, as it would be devoted solely for buses (public transportation).

One Olneyville business owner tells me that there’s no possible way a plan like this wouldn’t increase traffic, and notes that there’s already too much traffic in the area to begin with.

To that end, it would be easy to dismiss the idea off if state leaders like Department of Transportation Director Peter Alviti Jr. making public statements in support of the hair-brained idea.

Their Reasoning

One of the rationales behind this misguided plan is that it would save us money because we wouldn't have to fix the admittedly decrepit traffic structure/roadway.

I suppose the logic is that since the leaders that we've elected have been irresponsible with our tax dollars, and we cannot afford to fix one of our most vital pieces of infrastructure, the plan is to simply turn back the clock to the 1940s before everyone drove around in cars? Are these people kidding?

By that logic, and if things continue going the way they have, we'll soon be too poor to fix any roads, and we'll have to use animal livestock to travel. Rhode Island is going to look (hopefully) like ancient Rome. I jest, but the notion that we're not going to fix the 6-10 connector because it costs us too much goes against one of the two things we expect government to do for us: fix the roads and protect the borders.

A Crusade Against Cars

The other rationale for the plan is the fact that it will compel and basically force people to use public transportation. Apparently, it's the progressive view that the function of government is to allow certain individuals to decide what's best for the rest of us. Naturally, those individuals are the progressives who are going to decide what we should and shouldn’t do as well as how we should live our lives.

And they don't like cars. So that means they’re looking for ways to discourage them.

If a person doesn’t like cars, that is their prerogative, but I, for one, happen to love cars. And I enjoy driving. I also hate traffic. I intend to continue driving everywhere I want to go. I speak for thousands of other highway stars who feel the exact same way.

None of us want these wannabe central planners should be compelling us to live our lives in a way that we prefer not to.

Cars Are King

The sad thing is that less than a century years ago, the people who considered themselves progressives celebrated the advent of cars and highway travel. Sinclair Lewis, who very much considered himself a progressive, wrote a book titled "Free Air", which raves about the fact that cars, which were rare, but the clearly the future, represented a more democratic method of travel, contrasted with the more aristocratic rail lines.

That was then. Today, the progressives want us to turn back the clock 100 years.

I'm all set with that. I have nothing against public transportation, and think Rhode Island's system should be better. But I wish these individuals would keep the ideas that would curtail the freedoms of others to themselves.

Let's do the real progressive thing and the responsible thing. Fix the route 6 and 10 connector with the money contained in the annual $8 billion budget.

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Russell J. Moore has worked on both sides of the desk in Rhode Island media, both for newspapers and on political campaigns. Send him email at [email protected]. Follow him on twitter @russmoore713.

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