Up until today, this year was a good one for parking your car at the Waterbury train station. New security cameras were installed and many months went by before I saw any shattered glass from car windows being broken into. Last week there was one window broken, the first I've seen in months. This morning, sadly, there were at least five.
The cars that get broken into are pretty much always parked behind the abandoned building, hidden from view from the street. The activity over the holiday weekend proves that security cameras are of limited use as a deterrent.
A better deterrent would be a real station. You know, like the one proposed by consultants hired by the state but objected to by the only privately-operated public bus company in the state.
2 comments:
Your statement that Waterbury has the only privately operated bus company in the state is incorrect. Several other privately owned companies operate local and/or commuter services under contract to the Department of Transportation. If the state decided to move the bus hub to the intermodal center, North East Transportation would have to do so.
What stopped this project was the consultant's report, which called for an additional $3.74 million in capital expenses and an annual $2.6 million in operating funds to maintain the present level of service. Also, no one was willing to assume financial responsibily for the operation and maintenance of the facility (including a police presence). When asked about who would pay the expenses, the response at the meetings I attended was that "somebody will take care of it".
The transportation center is a luxury which the taxpayers cannot afford at this time.
We need a transportation center because it provides true shelter from the elements, because it provides adequate security to ensure that cars aren't broken into, because we need clean toilet facilities.
We need the transportation center to be a transportation hub for the city of Waterbury, so that no one has to walk all the way from Exchange Place while carrying luggage or dragging children through rain or snow or sweltering heat, so that anyone in a wheelchair doesn't have to navigate that distance, all to go from a bus to the train.
If those things are a luxury we can't afford, then the United States is no better than an impoverished third world country, and we are in serious, serious trouble.
Rumor has it that the new census data is going to show that unemployment in Connecticut is even worse than anyone knows. I watched the movie Outsourced the other day, and I'm left wondering what Connecticut's future is going to be. It's going to take a huge effort and a huge amount of cooperation to bring jobs back to this state and get its economy back on its feet.
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