Rail coming to Charlottesville

Maybe. It’s been more two years since I first noted CvilleRail.org’s efforts to bring commuter rail to the Charlottesville area, and certainly they’ve been working on it longer than that. Today brings good news – we could possibly have such a service in two years.

To get some “historical” perspective, read the story from September of 2005 showing two points of view regarding rail –

1) It’s great!
2) Keep it out, because then the yankees will have even better access to the Charlottesville/Albemarle area

Sometimes I lament the naming of the advocacy organization – the name CvilleRail (archived: 2026) makes the “us versus them” arguments that much easier.

“What is the advantage to us, other than a ride?” he asked.
…
“Cooperation is better than competition” when the localities are asking state officials to help improve rail service, Gleason said.

At the end of the meeting, participants agreed to keep the discussion going, and parted with a tacit acknowledgement that localities along the corridor needed to form coalitions with each other and within their communities so that each could become a stronger advocate for its interests.

More at Lynchburg’s News & Advance (archived: 2010), The HooK and The Daily Progress (no longer available).

Now – if we could see some progress on transit within the CharlAlbemarle area:

Even if you managed to take most of the cville local residents off the road and put them in a bus- how much road space does that really free up when you’ve got people still needing to commute in to town? Once I’m here in town with my car- why am I going to take a bus? I’m not.