Anti-mass transit tirade

Especially in this economy, newspapers like The Record of Woodland Park love the revenue they get from automobile advertising. But The Record goes further, employing reporters who write endlessly about the woes drivers face on the road and at the motor vehicle agency, but ignore the low quality of most bus and rail service.

In congested North Jersey, the former Hackensack daily stubbornly refuses to recognize that mass transit -- not the automobile -- holds the key to residents' future mobility. So here comes so-called transportation reporter Tom Davis today with a Page 1 tirade against the proposed light-rail line that will connect Tenafly, Englewood and other communities to Hudson River ferries and PATH trains. They haven't had passenger rail service since the 1960s.

If you read this lavishly illustrated story carefully, you'll notice how much positive information is missing and how the reporter quotes  only a few people's fears about noise, pollution and traffic jams -- conditions that have existed for decades from busy freight-railroad traffic along the very same Northern Branch. This reporter is not much of a journalist.

One crucial detail Davis is careful to omit to make his anti-mass transit case is that trolley-like, electric-driven light rail will be far quieter than the polluting diesel locomotives originally proposed, as well as more efficient and user-friendly. Plus, systems like it will help cut our dependence on foreign oil. Have you ever heard about how General Motors bought up trolley lines in major cities and closed them down to juice the sales of automobiles?

The first critic the reporter quotes is a man who only occasionally commutes into the city. The second critic is a bus patron. The third is Englewood Mayor Michael Wildes, a relentless self-promoter and immigration lawyer, who says people are concerned about runoff from cars left in parking lots all day. What about runoff from all the cars in the huge parking lot between Palisade Avenue and the old Englewood railroad station?  Why hasn't he ever expressed concern about runoff before?

Davis has been a transportation reporter for many years, but he has refused to expose the incredible noise, pollution and waste of fuel  from all the moguls, fat cats and hip-hop stars flying their multimillion-dollar private jets into and out of Teterboro Airport.

You won't find any education, development, municipal or quality of life news about Hackensack or Teaneck in the paper today -- none was reported -- but you'll find about 10 court, crime and traffic mishap stories, plus two more about cops. Giovanna Fabiano, the Englewood reporter, comes up with a story about security alarm fines upsetting residents and business owners. She continues to ignore downtown traffic jams, an open-air police firing range and the segregated elementary and middle schools, though.

Northern Branch light-rail Web site