For the week of March 13 - 19, 2002

Wise move

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The Sun Valley City Council took an important first step when it voted 3-1 to give $10,000 to the proposed Peak Hour Bus.

It wasn’t all planners wanted, but it was a start.

For the first time, the Sun Valley Council recognized that the city must become part of the solution to the valley’s traffic and parking problems.

As the beneficiary of local-option sales taxes and an equal partner in the Ketchum Area Rapid Transit system, the city found it could ill afford to sit back while others work on solutions to growth problems.

The risk was illustrated by the fact that in applying for start-up funding from the Idaho Department of Transportation, the Peak Hour Bus had been forced to compete with KART.

That irritated one council member who accused the Peak Hour Bus of taking the gas out of KART’s tank. It was probably a coincidence, but the amount received by the Peak Hour Bus was the same amount KART didn’t get.

Coincidence or not, the risk to the city is clear. The city of Sun Valley cannot continue to sit on its big local-option sales tax base and ignore problems created by the very economy that fattens its coffers. Or, the coffers may get raided.

Sun Valley businesses and residents need services. Workers provide those services. But more workers than ever before must commute from homes in the south valley to jobs in the north.

The valley’s only highway is clogged, and no one has figured out what to do with legions of cars when they reach their north-county destinations.

A commuter bus system is the obvious answer. Sun Valley was wise to see it.

 

The Idaho Mountain Express is distributed free to residents and guests throughout the Sun Valley, Idaho resort area community. Subscribers to the Idaho Mountain Express will read these stories and others in this week's issue.