I wonder if the reporter from this local TV station went to a different transit forum from the one I attended Thursday night.

First, I estimated the attendance more in the 400-500 people range, rather than 200. (Auditorium: Count number of seats per row and number of occupied rows, factor in something for the empty seats in each row.)

Second, about 95 per cent of the discussion was about COMMUTER rail, which would operate on an existing rail line and which would be nothing like the Charlotte light rail system. One of the long-range plans presented does propose a light rail line, too, but that is considered much further off in the future than the commuter rail which was discussed.

(For what it's worth, I've written about commuter rail options for North Carolina in a recent article for the transit trade magazine Mass Transit.)

And, I could go on.

The good thing is that this public forum did draw a large audience, including many local and regional government officials. And, the presentations given were generally good -- even if this particular reporter did not understand them.

-- Ernest