Strange, daily commute points to unfilled need

This Inland Northwest can be a strange place.

This past summer, I was floating on a tube in Liberty Lake when a 4-inch fish leaped onto me, swam "upstream," and then bit me on the chest. Twice.

Swimmers were running to shore like some low-budget "Attack of the Panfish."

But nothing compares to my daily commute to and from work. That's when the real crazies come out.

This morning's commute began with my noticing that the car in front of me is a Sunbeam.

"Get a car, not a toaster!" was my neighborly thought - and I'm once of the nice guys in the sea of drivers.

My first tricky maneuver is to enter Interstate 90 westbound via the construction-inspired chicanes of the Pines onramp. Here, in a merge lane shrunk to the size of an actual toaster, cars merge crisply without incident.

My hand wave is a full five-fingered gracious salute to the civility of the other drivers as I think, "These are just the kind of people that send timely thank-you notes. It's a pleasure to drive among them."

It's a pleasure that doesn't last long.

The next exit I pass brings me to The Wailing Wall, where the wide lanes along the Argonne exit accommodate officers writing tickets along the cement-wall-lined shoulder.

Most often, it's a clearly marked patrol car grabbing a four- wheeled "fish out of the barrel," but there have been a few stealth police vehicles disguised as soccer-mom Volvos as well.

At the Sprague exit, I don't have time to think about one of Spokane's greatest, but least known, attractions. I call it the Scotch House - the house built "on the rocks" to the south of the freeway.

But there's no real time to admire the engineering.

With all the grace of the Huns attacking ancient Rome, hordes of drivers are attacking from the Sprague onramp, hell bent on merging. Most of these drivers, eschewing I-90 construction, have silently flowed up Sprague to wreak their sudden havoc.

I hit the Maple Street exit, my only timely avenue to crossing the river and another lesson in human nature.

The two left lanes turn onto Maple and proceed across the bridge, so they have a long line of cars waiting their turn each morning. Ill- mannered "line jumpers" dash through the right lanes to play chicken for possession of a bridge lane.

The drive home at night isn't much better. The traffic usually comes to a halt about the time I hit the Scotch House and I think, "Make mine a double."

By Argonne, drivers I call "the chosen few" take the exit to bypass long I-90 lines, drive across Argonne, and immediately re- enter I-90 from the other side.

I pull off on Argonne, head up Mission, avoiding the long freeway lines, eventually reaching my driveway. Tomorrow I'll do it all over again.

Why do I do it?

Because I'm typical. Because, until gasoline rises to $3 a gallon and makes strange bedfellows of us all, I don't consider the bus any more than they considered me when the STA announced their cutbacks.

The bus is Playfair or Natatorium Park without the nostalgia. It's an old fighter with no more title shots in his future. Visit the high schools and ask about bus travel. It has no style.

There is only one mass transit option possible for our area that can inspire invigorating social change for our area - light rail. Even the North-South Freeway offers only more of the same commutes.

But light rail could transform our very core, from Coeur d'Alene to downtown Spokane and eventually the West Plains with a "the future is now" endeavor that can only grow into a moneymaker.

Seen Sprague dying in the Valley? Send light rail down Sprague and watch it revitalize.

The abandoned big boxes will be transformed into shops, restaurants, offices, small businesses, and all sorts of other possibilities. Wouldn't a truly linked Inland Empire, breathing cleaner air, make our area more attractive to new employers?

I'm not saying abandon the underprivileged by denying them acceptable, reliable transportation. We always need to provide for everyone's transportation needs.

But that doesn't mean strict adherence to the status quo. I am saying they would benefit even more from a growing local economy, fueled by true change, just as much, if not more, than anyone else.

We owe all taxpayers a true, fiscally sound, forward-thinking solution to transportation.

Copyright 2004 Cowles Publishing Company
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