Mayor Gray berated Pepco for its slow progress in restoring power after this weekend's storm. Gray's Hillcrest home was also without power.

I wonder how angry the mayor would have been if his house had had power. Dutch news is also on top of the power outage, because the one Dutch PBS journalist's house has no power. It's funny how that skews one's view.

http://nos.nl/artikel/390866-hittegolf-en-geen-airco-in-dc.html
Google translate: http://translate.google.com/translate?sl=nl&tl=en&js=n&prev=_t&hl=en&ie=UTF-8&layout=2&eotf=1&u=http%3A%2F%2Fnos.nl%2Fartikel%2F390866-hittegolf-en-geen-airco-in-dc.html

DC's power outages from this weekend's storm lie predominantly on the edges of the city.

Isn't that the part of the city where the vistas are destroyed by overground power lines?

An Ohio Congressman added an amendment to the transportation bill banning federal money for Cincinnati's streetcars.

That gives Cincy voters a clear choice.

DC taxi drivers threaten to strike ... and worry that penalties imposed for minor infractions are too high.

Sounds like a plan that has incentives for compliance. Shocker!

by Jasper on Jul 3, 2012 8:52 am • link • report

Same reason why the earthquake was national news, it affected all the big journalists here.

Maybe I need to read/point this out on greater greater cincinatti but should someone point out that going from downtown through some dense neighborhoods and evenutally ending up as a major university the exact opposite of "a street car to nowhere"?

It feels like if someone judged the entire effectiveness of one of our metro lines just by looking at the terminal stations.

by drumz on Jul 3, 2012 8:59 am • link • report

RE: Ohio Congressman targets streetcar funding

Curious to see that the backlash against earmarks has, in this case, swung the pendulum past the centerpoint. Traditionally everyone (regardless of party) was against earmarks except they were delivering it to their own constituents.

by Bossi on Jul 3, 2012 9:00 am • link • report

And reading a little further, his amendment is pointless since the project has already received funding (including federal) and has broken ground. So this is pointless grandstanding that is meant to appease his base by sticking it to a. the liberals, b. the out of touch city folk c. people who need to understand that we can't spend money we don't have (unless its for a highway interchange) d. all of the above.

And judging from the comments it seems a lot of people are really excited about the streetcar in cincinatti.

by drumz on Jul 3, 2012 9:07 am • link • report

One of the WTOP guys most certainly did NOT go easy on Pepco's president this morning, repeatedly asking him to respond to criticism of the utility's response and telling him to stop answering the questions as if he were being coached by a PR person. Good radio.

And I seem to recall the last time DC's taxicab drivers went on strike, the response was a collective shrug.

by anon on Jul 3, 2012 9:12 am • link • report

ahh, it's been a while since I've seen the 'ol "transit crime" argument. From the Silver Line article:

"Rail opponent David LaRock said the Silver Line will bring traffic, crime and higher taxes to Loudoun."

So building transit will generate all 3 of these? What does not building transit generate?

by bryandc on Jul 3, 2012 9:14 am • link • report

@bryandc
What does not building transit generate? Uh about $270 million in construction costs plus around $10 million in operating costs?

by movement on Jul 3, 2012 9:30 am • link • report

@ anon:One of the WTOP guys most certainly did NOT go easy on Pepco's president this morning

Standard fare @WTOP. They hate PEPCO. It's one of their favorite punching bags. I assume their 'glass-enclosed nerve center' lives on PEPCO power. And since they're in far NW, there's a good chance they've got nothing right now.

Good for getting the president on. I kinda feel bad for the PEPCO PR folks, because they get whacked all the time.

But great radio it is. Especially because the PEPCO knows what's coming and is reasonably prepared.

Fun fact: Wiki tells met PEPCO is a left over from a DC streetcar company selling excess power.

by Jasper on Jul 3, 2012 9:59 am • link • report

@movement:What does not building transit generate? Uh about $270 million in construction costs plus around $10 million in operating costs?

Sure. And Loudoun can put that in the bank and not get traffic, crime and higher taxes?

by Jasper on Jul 3, 2012 10:00 am • link • report

@movement, how much does not building the Silver Line in Loudoun cost in additional road & highway costs, lost tax revenues for the development planned around the stations, lower property values & thus tax revenue for the homes within a 1/2 to 1 mile of the stations? Anyway, the Silver Line Phase 2 to Loudoun issue has been debated to death on GGW.

Hope the Loudoun board will vote to approve the Phase 2 extension, so the project can move forward without having to spend a year or more to revise the planning and agreements to only extend it to Dulles. Then the DC Metro conversations can move onto what are the next improvement and expansion projects to consider.

The old transit brings crime argument is really stupid for the Silver Line to Loudoun county. What, the po' folk in DC are going to take the Metro all the way to Ashburn to break in homes, rob stores, and then take the Metro back? What, they can't drive out there in cars? As for bringing traffic to Loudoun, should have brought that up before the Greenway was built.

by AlanF on Jul 3, 2012 10:01 am • link • report

To be fair, PEPCO with its record is legitimately under scrutiny. OTOH Im not sure they've done much worse than Dominon this time.

What mainly bugs me about WTOP is that in hours and hours of coverage, they manage to avoid mentioning the words "Climate Change". That of course they have in common with most of the media. One meterologist on NBC apparently had the guts to mention climate change, and WaPo is FINALLY mentioning it.

The effort to igone the elephant in the room is amazing.

by AWalkerInTheCity on Jul 3, 2012 10:13 am • link • report

@Jasper: I assume their 'glass-enclosed nerve center' lives on PEPCO power. And since they're in far NW, there's a good chance they've got nothing right now.

You can bet that have a back-up generator. Lotsa people in the suburbs have them.

by goldfish on Jul 3, 2012 10:14 am • link • report

The Loudoun board just voted in favor of Metro expansion into Loudoun by a vote of 5-4. Reid was the 5th vote.

by JackRussell on Jul 3, 2012 10:41 am • link • report

Re the taxi strike - We can't have the Capital of America hamstrung by third-world taxi service. We have the worst taxi service in country. It's embarrassing.

by JD on Jul 3, 2012 10:45 am • link • report

Call me naive and idealist for expecting minimal levels of service from a company, but I think the critiques of Pepco and its constant outages are mild. The responses here that Pepco is being unfairly attacked for its service record is either a bizarre example of inside the beltway thinking, or the product of Pepco PR flacks astroturfing the comments section.

I have lived in tornado country where the power grid took a direct hit several times a year and never worried about outages longer than an hour.
I have lived in the ancient infrastructure of post-industrial New England, where heavy coatings of ice and snow are a fact of winter, and we never lost power.
I have lived in Latin America, where the power infrastructure was under attack from guerrilla forces, and we had fewer outages of shorter duration than here in DC after mild storms.
And yeah, the power lines were above ground in those places too.

When we lived 30 miles from the Canadian border in early 1970s Minnesota, deep in the woods, and with a mile of dedicated power lines to our house, that was the last time I worried about the power going out as much as I do here.

Pepco service record would be a scandal and a shame anywhere else in the world, let alone in our national capital. So, I'm not feeling bad for Pepco. If ever there was an excuse to push for municipal utilities, Pepco is it.

by Alger on Jul 3, 2012 10:58 am • link • report

@ Alger:The responses here that Pepco is being unfairly attacked for its service record is either a bizarre example of inside the beltway thinking

I didn't say that. Just said that PEPCO is a favorite punching bag for WTOP. I did not say they didn't deserve it. I was observing a media-reflex rather than PEPCO's service.

by Jasper on Jul 3, 2012 11:17 am • link • report

The Loudoun board just voted in favor of Metro expansion into Loudoun by a vote of 5-4. Reid was the 5th vote.

Commence lawsuit phase!

by movement on Jul 3, 2012 11:33 am • link • report

I wish that more of DC's woeful taxi drivers would simply "self-deport."

by Bob on Jul 3, 2012 11:45 am • link • report

@Jasper: That wasn't really directed at you, I have some backlog on this issue from other posts.

by Alger on Jul 3, 2012 11:48 am • link • report

PEPCO is definitely a punching bag. Dominion's response has been surprising. This was one of the if not the largest outages for them and they have struggled at times to find crews to work on the outages. They're making great strides. PEPCO has arguably had a better response this time (first time ever?). They may have done a better job of bringing outside crews to assist their efforts. Most of the issues are not with the supply or distribution of power. For the most part, the problems are trees and lightning. There's not much that can be done about that since this storm was exceptionally strong. It bothers me when blame is shifted to PEPCO and Dominion for things that are not their responsibility though. It is often up the local jurisdiction to remove debris and trees.

by selxic on Jul 3, 2012 11:48 am • link • report

One other thing: DDOT and persons interested in reducing reliance on personal automobiles in DC have to put pressure on the mayor and the taxi commission to do even more to modernize DC's inept taxi service. Clean, reliable taxi service is just one more element of an overall urban transportation strategy, just like Metro, buses, street cars, bikes and walking. It is also very important to business and convention visitors who are important economic driver in the city. It's too important to be entrusted to a broken political process. If true modernization displeases some cabbies, so be it. They can find another line of work.

by Bob on Jul 3, 2012 11:49 am • link • report