A STREETCAR NAMED CROOKED AND INEPT:

In my eight years in Washington, I have come to love its fabled streetcar project. I say “fabled” because as of this writing, we do not actually have any streetcars. No, wait, that’s wrong. We totally have streetcars. What we do not have are streetcars that actually ferry passengers hither and yon, rather than sitting in storage or going on endless test runs that all too frequently end in flames. The project has been hilariously mismanaged from start to (never-never) finish, though it would be a lot more hilarious if we hadn’t spent millions upon millions of taxpayer dollars on it.

Nonetheless, I am sad to hear that my fair city may terminate its streetcar service. We’ve got the tracks, we’ve got the cars, we’ve got a whole lot of new buildings along H Street that were counting on its existence, so we might as well just run the silly thing. Particularly since failing to do so has implications for future development.

I think canceling it is good, since it tells developers that it’s a waste of time bribing politicians who don’t stay bought. The long-term benefits of that seem significant.