Yes, I’ve heard whisperings on the wind for a while that Apple was coming out with a new tablet computer.  And, like any other impending Apple announcement, rumors was all that would be provided.  Being the patient sort, I’ve long since stopped groping for such tidbits, as I know that Apple will dish out the info when they’re good and ready.

But, being as I’m also keeping an eye on the market for a new Apple notebook since the near-death of our PowerBook (my lovely daughter being its attempted killer, the weapon being a cup of coffee), I did have my hopes up for this one.  A tablet, you say?  I was gearing up for something like this little number from HP:

What they put out was this:

It’s called an iPad.  Essentially, it’s more than an iPhone and less than a laptop.  It’s Apple’s answer to a Netbook, those pared-down notebooks with just barely enough power for you to read your e-mail.  And upon first look it seems like it’s a device that I could get into.  I’ve considered an eReader for a while, mostly for the purpose of getting my newspaper subscription without all the hassle of actually getting a paper, and I’ve often wanted something portable for just surfing the web or typing like mad during NaNoWriMo.  So, looking over the specs, I was nodding and thinking that if I had the five hundred bucks to spare I could really consider this.  It is an eReader, but it also comes with all the goodies available for an iPod Touch only in a larger format.

Also, just think of the possibilities for a nerd-boy like me!  What dorky Star Trek fan and gadget geek hasn’t pined after a PADD, those hand-held touch-screen computers that the crew carries around?  I sure would love to have one, and this iPad looks to be just that: A hand-held computing device with a touch screen.

That is, until I realized its limitations.  Mainly, it’s not even a computer.  It’s a computing device, an accessory that you need to tether to your desktop or laptop so that you can update it and sync it with the data you already have.  It’s far too much like Star Trek’s PADDs in that both aren’t really meant for using as a full-scale computer but are instead an extension of a computer (in the show, PADDs only accessed information from the ship’s central computer).  Further, it’s literally a large iPod Touch in its function, as it shares an operating system and is limited to what apps that Apple has allowed to be sold in its stores.

I need not also say that on a limited budget in a time where I would rather simplify things instead of spread my time and effort around to multiple toys, it’s something less than what I need.  I need a replacement for my computer, not an extension of it.  Here’s a formula for what I really want from Apple:

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That’s right, Apple! I want a REAL Mac Tablet!  Wouldn’t that be slick?  Say, a 13 inch touch screen with a real computer behind it.  Forget the twisting hinge of the HP up there, I can live with the on-screen keyboard when I’m on the go.  That sounds extremely nice and simple, a true all-in-one computing device that can run my Photoshop and InDesign and Scrivener and still be easy enough to curl up on the couch with and read an eBook.  And wouldn’t the combination of Photoshop and a touch screen just make life so much easier?  I mean, there just comes a point where you’re just using your Mac to dock your iPod, iPhone, and now iPad and keeping it tied down when what you really need is to take some of that and recombine it back into a real, fully functioning computer.

Please do this, Apple.  I promise we’ll buy an iPad to go with it, since my wife just wants one to check her e-mail.  I would prefer something with a bit more meat.

That’s also the title of a book, by the way.  It’s a fairly decent one written by a St. Paul author.  The book is actually a quick read, short and rather fast-paced, but the story is engaging and it zips along at a healthy clip.  The book isn’t exactly focusing on streetcars, but they do serve as a historical point of reference: The main character’s father is a streetcar driver at the time that the Twin Cities Rapid Transit was on the verge of dismantling the entire system.

A quick side note: I’ve seen the opinion that the biggest mistake of the removal of the streetcar lines wasn’t that it shouldn’t have happened at all, as many of the lines were unprofitable for the private company that was running them, but that some lines should have stayed.  If you take a look at the three light rail lines that we will have running in the near future, Hiawatha, Central, and Southwest, these all basically follow some of the busiest lines from the old streetcar system.  Had the streetcars been kept running on just the lines that got the heaviest use, we would be talking about just making improvements to our rail transit system today instead of trying to rebuild it from scratch.  Anyway, continuing on…

My previous post griping about cuts to mass transit in my neighborhood made mention of the Southwest light rail line.  There are three stops planned in my fair city of Hopkins.  One, the Blake Road station, is at the intersection of Blake Road and 2nd Street North and is of no consequence to this blog post.  The other two are closer to my side of town, the Downtown Hopkins station at Excelsior Boulevard and 8th Avenue South and the Shady Oak station, which is currently in the middle of an industrial area at the intersection of Excelsior Boulevard and 17th Avenue South.  Plans are in process to create an entirely new mixed use residential/commercial neighborhood around the Shady Oak station, which, incidentally, is not on Shady Oak Road or even close to Shady Oak Lake.

Of greater consequence, it seems, is that the Downtown Hopkins station is, like Shady Oak and its namesake station, not actually in downtown Hopkins.  The city already sort of shot itself in the foot with the rerouting of Excelsior Boulevard in the 1980s (1990s? I’m not sure), as the original route went straight down what is now called Main Street.  But, instead of allowing the on-street parking to be removed for the purpose of making the road two lanes in each direction, the city got the county to shift the road two blocks south to preserve the parking and pedestrian spaces downtown.  So, kudos to the city for being able to preserve the downtown area, but they’ve been scrambling to maintain a viable business district what with everyone now zipping past two blocks away.

The Southwest line will be of no help, as the Downtown Hopkins station will essentially be a quarter mile walk from downtown Hopkins.  I know that at some point the idea was floated to attempt to get the light rail to be routed much, much closer, but it was something that was apparently shot down long ago.  This light rail line has the unfortunate characteristic of many of the suburban bus routes: A focus on park-and-rides outside of Minneapolis with a goal of just getting people downtown.

The City of Hopkins is looking to rectify this with, yes, a streetcar.  The plan (PDF, page 19) to turn 8th Avenue South between Main Street and the Downtown Hopkins station into a boulevard with wide sidewalks and classic downtown-style buildings to get people to walk from the station to where the businesses are is pretty much a go, but one thing that they want to do is also provide some sort of shuttle as well.  One method, what I hope is the preferred, is a streetcar.  The idea is that people are taking the light rail because of the perception that rail transit is far superior than busses, so that’s what should be provided.

I agree, and in so many ways I want to ask: Why stop with just those three blocks?  Why not have a route that takes people up and down Main Street as well?  Why not do like the City of Minneapolis is hoping to do, as they have a plan in place to replace their high-frequency bus routes with streetcars?  Heck, why not extend a streetcar network beyond downtown and funnel people both into downtown Hopkins and to the light rail stations as well?

Yes, the initial investment in streetcars is so much more than busses.  I mean, with a bus all you have to do is buy the vehicle and send it on its merry way down the streets that already exist, right? Long-term, though, the bus just isn’t as financially attractive.  Busses have a higher replacement cost, as they need to be replaced much sooner.  The energy cost is higher, as the fossil fuels used in engines today cost more than the electricity used for streetcars.  Busses also destroy the roads much faster, as their considerable weight puts much more wear and tear on the asphalt than a car.  And the overall image of a streetcar is just that much better.  We all love those exhaust fumes, right?

About the only thing that busses have over streetcars could also be their biggest disadvantage as well.  It’s easy to just buy a bus and decide it’s going to go down a certain street.  But it’s also just as easy to take it away, as I’ve learned a couple times in just two years of living on what I had assumed was a higher-frequency mass transit line.  Streetcars have permanence.  The tracks and canternary take some effort and money to put in, so chances are that if you decide to put your home or business near the streetcar line that it’s not going to just go away any time soon.  In an age of disposability, it’s reassuring to know that something like your means of transportation will be there for you for years to come.

So, yes, I am sitting here with the improbably hope that, since the light rail line won’t be trundling down Main, a streetcar will pass close by my house someday.  And I’ll be able to hop on and head out to do my shopping or (by that point) head to work, or I’ll take it to the light rail station and head into Minneapolis.  Until then, I’ll just suck it up and ride my bus and keep on wishing until they bring the streetcars back.

This is my bus stop:

Or, at least it should be.  The city, or, at least I would venture to guess it was the city, had gone through the expense of putting up the shelter as busses were stopping here on a regular basis.  And with this shelter being a mere block from my house, it was mighty convenient.  Heck, even as we were searching for a house to purchase not much more than two years ago one of the things I was looking for was proximity to mass transit.

What I didn’t expect was that Metro Transit would cut back on service for my bus line, only a few months after we purchased the house.  This is now my bus stop:

It’s nearly half a mile away.  Now, instead of coming down Main Street and passing by my street, the bus goes only as far as five blocks away before it heads south.  And I don’t have a shelter to wait in anymore, just a narrow strip of sidewalk where it appears that area planners never really intended for a stop to be, something that gets really treacherous when there’s mounds of snow and ice building up.  In all fairness, the shelter by my house is still used during rush hour times.  But I tend to not use the bus during those times, and I also tend to be traveling with a toddler or later at night.

When they did the original cut, Metro Transit did start an hourly local shopping bus that went past my shelter and connected me with the main route into Minneapolis during the day.  That was nice for a while, but that particular route has been cut completely.  It’s discouraging and frustrating, as one of the things that I enjoy about this location is the proximity to transportation, both current and future (more on that later).

While the mission of Metro Transit is to provide service for communities in the area, and I understand that when the budget gets tough then things need to get cut.  But the cuts seem unfairly cruel to suburban routes as opposed to the city routes.  When a route that serves neighborhoods in Minneapolis has cuts in service, it means that the bus will be coming every 7 minutes as opposed to 5 minutes.  When a route in the suburbs faces cuts, it means that the bus won’t be there anymore.

Am I being a bit selfish?  Well, partially.  When your bus is just a half a block away it’s a lot easier to just head out the door a few minutes before it’s scheduled to show up and catch it, then if you miss it it’s not that big of a hassle to just go back home and kill some time before the next one comes along.  And it’s certainly nicer during inclement weather to be able to stand under a roof while waiting.  So, yes, when I have to haul a toddler half a mile I take even more time out of my day to take off long before I need to so as to make sure that I don’t miss the bus, lest I have to wait another half hour for the next one.  And, let me tell you, if it’s raining on a toddler the toddler gets crabby if she’s cold.

But I am speaking for my fellow residents.  I speak of the people in these apartments that loom over my bus stop, who tend to be transit dependent:

And the people in these townhomes, who tend to be elderly or disadvantaged:

The apartment dwellers I feel for, as they already had the elementary school next door shut down.  An unfortunate side note is that they also bus their children five miles away instead of sending them to the school within easy walking distance, so these parents that had the rare opportunity to be heavily involved with their childrens’ school are now strangely punished.  The townhome residents I am particularly mired on behalf of.  More than once I have met a confused, old resident, one that is in no way fit to walk the mile from those townhouses, finally make it to the new stop after waiting an abnormally long amount of time at the sheltered stop, wondering where the bus is.

Mass transit should be easy if Metro Transit wants people to actually use it, and it seems to me that easy means providing regular service at obvious locations like bus shelters.  Things will be easier come 2015, when the Southwest Transit Light Rail line comes through my fair city on its way from the outer ‘burbs on into Minneapolis.  And more frequent, if the Hiawatha Line’s 15 minute headways are any indication.  But, the nearest train station will still be a half a mile away, and I do worry about what will happen to my bus service.  While the quick service into Minneapolis will be appreciated, it will bypass a few of the locations that I currently use the bus to reach, like the St. Louis Park Rec Center just off Excelsior and (even more egregious) the current preferred route will bypass Uptown altogether as well.  So, while I have one improvement to look forward to, I do fear the loss of the bus service I currently enjoy with the arrival of the light rail.

That is, unless they cut my route further even before the train shows up.  When that happens, I fear that I may have to resort to the gross expense of a car, as I doubt that I can get my wife to move any closer to Minneapolis.  Less frequent bus service I could handle.  No bus service is a pain.