As a Houstonian, I absolutely understand how rail lines getting ripped up and paved over is demoralizing and deeply frustrating. I get how it contributes to gentrification. I acknowledge that it is - at best - a panacea and - at worst - actively harmful to reducing gross carbon emissions. At the same time, my neighborhood has gone from being an island in between major highways that’s dead after sundown to a genuinely walkable / bikeable neighborhood that feels safe and friendly well into the early hours in a way nowhere else in the city I’ve lived before.
I’ve seen so many efforts to revitalize rail in my city fail out of some combination of liberal apathy and conservative averice. Bike trails seem to be the only thing liberals actively embrace (or, at least, something conservatives can’t muster the outrage to undermine). And unlike when I moved into my neighborhood, I can now bike all the way to work.
So… shrug
My grandfather had a grassy berm behind his house with lots of those telephone poles with the collectible glass insulators still on them. He said it used to be the streetcar, back before they tore it up.
And sure enough, when you look at old maps, there it is, going all the way to Galveston.
We had one of these near my house when I was a kid, and more of that trail comes through the city I live in now. Every time I see them I just get mad because even my tiny hometown used to have a train station with multiple trains a day and now nothing.
