Public Transportation, Sustainability, and Corruption

From where you’re sitting right this minute, can you take public transportation to the airport? Many of your answers will be in the affirmative.  Maybe you’re in Paris, and you take the RER to De Gaulle.  Or maybe you’re in my home town, Philadelphia, and you take Septa to PHL.

But for most of us in the U.S., the answer is no.  And what does that tell you about your local government’s commitment (by which I mean its real commitment, vs. what they’re telling you) to eco-consciousness and sustainability? 

Several times a year, I drive my car to Los Angeles International Airport (LAX), park it, leave it for a few days, then come back and drive it home.  It’s a source of frustration to millions of people like me—and you—who understand that we’re defiling the environment simply to support some sort of ongoing corruption.  It must be corruption, mustn’t it?  Is there another explanation for the fact that the second largest city in the U.S. (that happens to lie in the most progressive state in the union) can’t figure out how to get public transportation to take us to the airport?

If you believe the people who designed this mess and work so hard to keep it in place care one iota about the concept of sustainable energy/transportation, I don’t know what to tell you.