Have you ever gone skiing on the weekend in Colorado? If so, then you know all about the nightmare that I-70 can be. With so many top ski resorts located in Colorado, it can get quite crowded on your way up to the slopes. The state of Colorado has begun planning to widen the freeways in the hope that adding more lanes will help ease the pain of the weekend warrior. Well what do you think? Will it work? Around the world cities are having to deal with the incredibly real problem of overcrowding and massive amounts of traffic. It's getting to the point in many places that a simple 30 mile drive can take over 90 minutes, but is adding more tar, gravel and concrete the answer? Since it's something that will constantly be a problem, I doubt it. If you look around the world you will see massive efforts placed into public transit systems that are fast, reliable and hit all the major locations people go in a city. Around the world rail, bus and carpool incentive systems are taking thousands of cars off the road each day. It's something that is showing promise as a long term solution. Here in Utah our government is working on solutions like that right now.
Our Trax system in Salt Lake City is being upgraded to pick up or drop off people at the airport and reduce traffic during the ski season. While it doesn't yet reach the ski resorts, I wouldn't be surprised if an extended Trax line was in the works. This is where Colorado and similar high-traffic destinations should start looking. Not only will it help out our old friend Earth, but it will also help tourists and snow buffs get to their destinations quicker and with less hassle. Think about it. If you could fly into some snow location and within 30-45 minutes be at the ski resort with your equipment ready to go, wouldn't that make you want to come back over and over? Seeing that humans are creatures of convenience, I think it's safe to say we all would. Public transit should no longer be a dirty word in the American vocabulary, it should be a boarder's/skier's/snow bunny's/weekend warrior's best friend. What do you think? Thanks for reading, and happy vacationing.
