The Spirited Back Nine ...

[Progress.City]

And here is the fallacy the money is NOT FREE it came from taxpayers and after it's been filtered through DC it's about 1/2-1/4 of the money that came from taxpayers in the first place.

Worked for a state welfare department as a network architect, Turns out only about $0.25 of every dollar spent actually goes to the beneficiaries back of envelope we computed we could send $100K checks to every recipient in every program and STILL return more than half of our budget.

It's why many school districts are abandoning the federal lunch program, The expense involved in accounting for all that 'FREE' money is actually more than they are receiving from the USG for the program so that free money is not FREE after all.

TANSTAAFL or There Ain't No Such thing as a free lunch.

It was programmed for HSR. It had to be spent one way or the other on HSR. When it was returned, the Feds handed the bulk of it to California, not back to the taxpayers, not in deficit reduction. In the end, the CA economy got a boost from it, not ours.

 

[Atomicmickey]

Ah, did some Google searching that took me right back here for leaked Star Wars and found this leaked plan for Star Wars expansion at DHS. Credit @Atomicmickey

View attachment 78123

Pretty sure those plans are still current.

 

[lazyboy97o]

It was programmed for HSR. It had to be spent one way or the other on HSR. When it was returned, the Feds handed the bulk of it to California, not back to the taxpayers, not in deficit reduction. In the end, the CA economy got a boost from it, not ours. .

Who had the money to run the expensive, empty trains just to get some short term "free" money. It would have been a multi-billion dollar, high interest title pawn. A little bit of cash right now, but ultimately a much bigger hole to dig out of, and that hole would have been a poster child for why rail is a bad idea and therefore would have killed many more, better thought out projects.

 

[ford91exploder]

It was programmed for HSR. It had to be spent one way or the other on HSR. When it was returned, the Feds handed the bulk of it to California, not back to the taxpayers, not in deficit reduction. In the end, the CA economy got a boost from it, not ours. .

I visit part of the route on a regular basis, It's not happening in CA either right now the current estimates are 4x the original and climbing and the CA taxpayers are revolting along with those who are protesting in every venue (and suing the state and feds) because it will traverse environmentally significant areas.

Plus parts of the 'High Speed Rail System' will be served by BUSES not bullet trains, So the average CA taxpayer is feeling a little betrayed by Sacramento these days - remember Sacramento is getting a lot of goodies out of this project.

The CA HSR project is dead it just does not know it yet.

 

[ford91exploder]

Pretty sure those plans are still current.

It needs the coordinates for the M&G's and the Merch Carts...

 

[GrammieBee]

Nah. No comparison. I've lived in both places.

When there's a problem on I-4, it doesn't screw up traffic on the east coast. You close the beltway (Lets say, haz mat incident in Springfield for example) and things disrupt for hundreds of miles.

Accidents are a completely different story. They can back up any interstate for miles. We drive the DC beltway quite a bit, so I was talking normal heavy to backed up traffic. It once took us an hour just to get by Manassas on I-95 south of the beltway and there was no accident.
If possible, other than driving on the beltway or I-4 in the wee small hours of the morning, we have found 11am to 2pm on a Sunday is usually the best time to drive on either one.

 

[BrerJon]

Anyone know why Universal's express passes double in price on 10/21/2015 (compared to every other day in October)? Is there some sort of special event going on there for Back to the Future?

I suspect that - for one day only - The Simpsons ride will play the movie from Back to the Future: The Ride. Expect enormous crowds.

 

[Mike S]

I suspect that - for one day only - The Simpsons ride will play the movie from Back to the Future: The Ride. Expect enormous crowds.

I was actually thinking if that could be done. It sounds like it should be easy enough to do.

 

[PhotoDave219]

Accidents are a completely different story. They can back up any interstate for miles. We drive the DC beltway quite a bit, so I was talking normal heavy to backed up traffic. It once took us an hour just to get by Manassas on I-95 south of the beltway and there was no accident.
If possible, other than driving on the beltway or I-4 in the wee small hours of the morning, we have found 11am to 2pm on a Sunday is usually the best time to drive on either one.

I grew up driving the beltway. I know it quite well.

 

[Californian Elitist]

DL's a place to 'Hang Out' meet your friends without the risk of being mugged while there, That's one factor of it's appeal to locals.

Oh, for sure. I enjoy my time spent there. However, going multiple times per week... That's something I can't handle.

 

[culturenthrills]

It was just a joke about FP+. I'm sure TDR is a fantastic place. I wouldn't be caught dead at any Disney park this week. Crowds are not my thing.

In all honesty I have been lucky enough to not experience waits anywhere near 45 minutes for POC since FP+ rolled out. Maybe I just got lucky, but according to touring plans the line at WDW POC did peak today over 45 minutes for a few hours mid-day but it was under 22 minutes most of the day and it was a 10 crowd day.

Well, Pirates problems are not just FP+ related. There is also those cheap @$$ boats that they can't load the back row on that has reduced capacity. I hate to say it but I am just sad when I ride that ride now. It needs a massive rehab and they need to replace the boats. Once again Disney trying to save money is costing them more money.

 

[FigmentFreak]

It frustrates the hell out of me we cannot have an interstate that can handle the traffic around Disney.

When traffic backed up 7 miles because of Disney, there's a problem.

The state of Florida gets how much in sales tax revenue per year from Disney and we can't even manage the traffic?

I blame FP+, it's making the wait times on the interestate much worse than it use to be

 

[bhg469]

I suspect that - for one day only - The Simpsons ride will play the movie from Back to the Future: The Ride. Expect enormous crowds.

Now that is limited time magic!!

 

[ford91exploder]

Oh, for sure. I enjoy my time spent there. However, going multiple times per week... That's something I can't handle.

I agree that IS extreme!

 

[Cesar R M]

That image is old: They're gonna paint the hat orange and turn it into a carrot nose for the brand new Spaceship Olaf.

it will also blast "Let it go" as the insides will be replaced with a 530,000 RMS watt sound system. To irradiate the entire Orlando area with music.

 

[BrerJon]

it will also blast "Let it go" as the insides will be replaced with a 530,000 RMS watt sound system. To irradiate the entire Orlando area with music.

But even after all that, after the Spaceship Olaf refurb is done, they'll still leave the descent unfinished.

 

[tissandtully]

Not sure if anyone else has seen this new drone video over River Country and Discovery Island, don't expect it to be up long, also seems like a good way to get banned for life from WDW.

 

[Rteetz]

Not sure if anyone else has seen this new drone video over River Country and Discovery Island, don't expect it to be up long, also seems like a good way to get banned for life from WDW.

Surprised they didn't get caught on the spot they seemed to be operating it from the beach. They should head over to AK and get some avatar footage...

 

[dstrawn9889]

ballzy for that flight, what a way to lose an expensive drone and camera... into the lake she goes/

 

[ford91exploder]

Not sure if anyone else has seen this new drone video over River Country and Discovery Island, don't expect it to be up long, also seems like a good way to get banned for life from WDW.

I can't count the number of FAA violations in the making of this video, Idiots like this make it hard for everyone else. And considering there is low level rotary wing traffic all the time around WDW this drone is actively endangering people.