Today's Spotlight
Senator finds easy parking near front
The recent Watchdog series "Parking Cheaters" documented how people commonly misuse handicap placards to park for free at metered spaces around downtown Charleston. But dozens of readers also called and e-mailed about other parking abuses, including the use of fire lanes in front of stores and shopping centers.
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Watchdog Update: Lawmaker has 'no problem' parking in fire lanes
An alert Watchdog reader captured an image of state Sen. Robert Ford's vehicle parked on a fire lane July 13 at a shopping center at the corner of Sam Rittenberg Boulevard and S.C. Highway 61. Ford was spotted leaving a men's clothing store.
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Road subsidies vary in amounts
Interstate 26 may be a freeway, but keeping it and other state roads in operating condition is no free ride for taxpayers. The 22-mile stretch of I-26 from the Neck Area to Berkeley County cost about $711,000 to maintain last year, said James Law of the state Department of Transportation.
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A very expensive fill-up: $500
Station's owner agrees to pay woman's entire repair bill after water was found in gas
Fuel prices are hard enough on the wallet these days without having to fork over hundreds of dollars more to clean contaminated gas out of a car's tank and engine.
That's what Charleston fine arts photographer Julia Cart said happened to her recently after she filled her Honda Element at a Kangaroo Express station at Rutledge Avenue and Calhoun Street.
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Watchdog Update: Handicap Parking debate
Last April, Laura Kirkham was a guest at Marriott Courtyard in Columbia and noticed these materials stored on a disabled parking space.
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Project to widen Interstate 26 to get under way in August
Get ready for a lot of orange barrels, concrete barriers and lane shifts on your interstate commute for the next three years.
Widening Interstate 26 to eight lanes from the Mark Clark Expressway to Ashley Phosphate Road in North Charleston is about to start.
Workers are expected to come out on the road Aug. 4. Lane closures will not be allowed during the daytime, though the contractor might seek South Carolina Department of Transportation permission for possible closures during weekends to pour concrete when there is less traffic.
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Railways create great divide
Opponents claim train systems waste resources, others think they are solution to traffic issues
Some people just love trains and trolleys, those nostalgic forms of transportation now held out as modern solutions to suburban sprawl. There also are those who seem to despise rail transportation, ranking passenger trains somewhere between a government boondoggle and an outright threat to the American way of life.
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REACTIONS
Here is a sampling of the comments posted on Charleston.net in reponse to The Great Train Debate:
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What goes around, comes around
Train linking Charleston to Summerville is far from a novel idea
A century ago, commuter trains whisked passengers to and from Summerville faster than rush-hour motorists often make the trip today.
Even into the early 1960s, the Carolina Special chugged north from Charleston to Summerville and points north.
Alex McIntosh remembers taking the Carolina Special as a young boy in 1961.
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A magic bus for CARTA
What role will popular express route play in transit's future?
It's 4:33 p.m., quitting time for some at the Medical University of South Carolina, including Amy Blevins, a registered nurse finished with her 10-hour shift. Blevins and a long line of other medical workers wait on Calhoun Street downtown for the CARTA Express bus to North Charleston, one of the more-successful experiments in mass transit this area has seen in recent memory.
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The Great Train Debate: Do numbers add up here?
Factors include total number of people, as well as population, workplace densities
About 18 million people live in metropolitan New York City, and on a typical day, they take about 7 million trips on subway and commuter railcars. Millions more in Chicago and other major league metro areas do the same thing. Charleston? North Charleston? When it comes to population, we're clearly in the minor leagues, which raises a key question in the debate over a commuter railroad: Are there enough people here to ride one?
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Taking notes on Tennessee's test run
Would Charleston-area commuter rails have same problems?
Nashville's Music City Star, a commuter train similar to one proposed for the Charleston area, offers a cautionary tale for rail supporters here.
The good news from Nashville is that the Music City Star was put into service in 2005 for just $41 million, making it the least-expensive commuter rail project in the nation.
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Charlotte finds light-rail success
Lynx draws riders, and property values along the tracks are going up
CHARLOTTE — The Lynx arrives quietly, rolling on seamless rails that will carry about 6,300 people on this weekday morning from park-and-ride lots on the outskirts of the city to jobs downtown. The Lynx is an electric light-rail system that started running in November and quickly exceeded ridership predictions.
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Rail line wouldn't be cheap
Watchdog: The Great Train Debate
Would a commuter train from Charleston to Summerville cost $46 million, or something closer to $146 million?
"That's the sort of thing we are trying to figure out," said Jennifer Humphreys, a senior transportation analyst with Wilbur Smith Associates who is leading the region's third study of commuter rail.
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Widening I-26 will get expensive
Watchdog: The Great Train Debate
Commuter trains aren't cheap. They can cost taxpayers anywhere from $1.3 million to $10 million a mile to build. Highways aren't cheap either. Consider what's in store for Interstate 26. Planners and engineers are working on plans to add two lanes to I-26 from the Neck Area through North Charleston, about 8.2 miles. If and when the state finishes this expansion, an eight-lane highway will run through the heart of the metro area.
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Reader submitted handicapped parking incidents:
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Watchdog Video
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Tony Bartelme
Parking Privileges: The Post and Courier Watchdog team recently hit the streets of Charleston to gauge the abuse of handicapped parking system.
Post and Courier Investigations
A collection of award-winning Post and Courier special reports
The Great Train Debate
A growing number of hospital workers, downtown merchants and others are using parking placards for the handicapped to cheat the city out of thousands of dollars in parking meter revenue.
Parking Cheaters
A growing number of hospital workers, downtown merchants and others are using parking placards for the handicapped to cheat the city out of thousands of dollars in parking meter revenue.
Day Care Roulette
An analysis by The Post and Courier of state inspection reports for day care facilities reveals that parents often roll the dice with their children's health and safety when they leave them in the custody of many day care centers.
The Mercury Connection
Health officials have warned for years that many of the state's lakes and rivers are tainted with mercury and cautioned people not to eat certain fish. But the state never checked to see if people were being poisoned, too.
The Sofa Super Store Fire
A special section with every story, photo galleries and audio & video clips from the fire that killed nine fire fighters.
A three-day series of articles on why South Carolina's public school buses are the nation's oldest, most polluting and least safe.
Under Fire
An ecological jewel north of Charleston, the Francis Marion National Forest faces unprecedented pressure from developers, road-builders and other forces. The Post and Courier's award-winning series, "Under Fire," examines and exposes these and other threats.
Cops who commit crimes can remain on patrol across South Carolina because the system to stop them is broken at every stage.
The nation's volunteer firefighting system is collapsing because it can no longer keep up with demands for service, training and manpower.
GRACE BEAHM/The Post and Courier
What's Wrong In This Picture: A Post and Courier photographer recently captured this image ofCharleston firefighters responding to a car fire next to Roper Hospital,triggering an internal investigation in the department. The problem: Twofirefighters weren't wearing air packs -- despite being trained to do so inthe wake of the Sofa Super Store Fire. A captain was given a two-weeksuspension without pay, and the second firefighter received a writtenwarning.If you have your own "Smoking Gun" photo, video or document, send it to Watchdog.
