Intermodal Transportation Centers are pretty darned popular at present. Wilkes-Barre's is going up before onlookers' "sidewalk supervising" of the project.In Scranton, I will confess, the status of that Intermodal Center is unclear to me, although it wouldn't take much to find the answer. Scranton's Center was to tie in all forms of mass transit, including that train to NYC. Can you hear me giggling out there?
Williamsport already has such a center.
Hazleton has one on the way.
Transportation must have gotten a big boost in our part of Pennsylvania from all of this inter modeling. We must be going places and getting there in one heck of a hurry, by golly, and we must have lots of choices as to how we do.
Are you kidding me?
You still can't get there from here.
And if you think I'm full of mud, just try traveling Scranton to Williamsport on public transportation. Your choices are thin; Capitol Trailways, that's it. You're looking at a six hour bus ride, two and one half hours of which is spent sitting in Hazleton waiting to make a connection.
Just so we have some idea of what an Intermodal Center is supposed to mean, let's get it out on the table in plain-speak; it's a centralized location for the transfer of travelers between air, rail, bus, cab, and rental cars.
Do any of the aforementioned existing or under construction Intermodal Centers offer connections to a single airport? Connections to any rail service? To wide and far reaching bus service? Rental cars will be available?
No to all of the above.
I somehow can't imagine someone, anyone, coming down from Carbondale on a COLTs bus, then renting an SUV to drive on over to visit his sister in Hyde Park.
Does anyone in Parsons think they can take the LCTA bus downtown to the new Intermodal Center, then hop the shuttle out to the airport?
Is this some sort of "build it and they will come" dream? If so, the price tag is a little heavy, not to mention the folly of us trying to be something we are not, not even close.
Frankly, I don't know what's going on here. I have no idea why these facilities are being built.
If you don't have "modes" to "inter" with one another, you don't need an intermodal center.
The Pardeesville bus and a Hazle Yellow Cab don't give you much to hang the term "intermodal" on, no matter how you twist and turn it. Oh, sure, that cab could get you out to the Airport Beltway, then into the airport, that would be the airport with no scheduled flights.
We don't have the modes. We don't need the centers.
First, we need the service.
Too late now, they're on the way...just like that train to NYC.
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Paul Stueber offers this poser:
"...no one could tell me if I'm supposed to drive my car to the parking lot to take a bus--or take the bus downtown to the parking lot to pick up my car."
