I thought it was the oil companies, not General Motors - but I don't know
much about it, so you've probably got what I meant.

Actually no - now that I read your link, the conspiracy I'd read about (I
don't remember where) was in LA, not Minneapolis-St Paul, and it was to do
away with bus companies, not light rail.  So maybe there was more than one?
Oddly, I think I read about the LA situation in a book called Cadillac
Desert, which is about water in the west, not about transportation.  But I
could be remembering wrong, too.  It happens...

Joy

****************************************************************
Joy Hecht
and Matilda, 1989 Burgundy Vanagon

For musings about life and the vanadventures:
http://www.joyhecht.net

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:::-----Original Message-----
:::From: Jeff Palmer [mailto:jpalmer@mts.net]
:::Sent: Sunday, April 23, 2006 11:24 PM
:::To: Joy Hecht
:::Cc: vanagon@GERRY.VANAGON.COM
:::Subject: Re: Gas price war / costs of road trips
:::
:::> Couldn't agree more!  I've never heard about the 'oil conspiracy'
:::> but the General Motors/transit conspiracy is well documented.  Are
:::> you thinking of the same thing?
:::
:::http://www.lovearth.net/gmdeliberatelydestroyed.htm or google GM
:::transit conspiracy.
:::
:::Jeff
:::
:::
:::> 6.  In the 1950s (I think) the oil industry in this country took an
:::> active
:::> role in wiping out public transit to force people into cars.  (I'm not
:::> making that up - it's not just anti-car scuttlebutt!)  This took
:::> the form of
:::> buying municipal bus companies and then shutting them down. This
:::> helped get
:::> Americans dependent on doing everything in cars, with the housing
:::> patterns
:::> that followed.
:::>