RTD activism on YouTube

This blog is not the only RTD rider activism happening online. I was browsing some YouTube videos today, and there is quite a bit of interesting activism when you search for RTD. (Feel free to ignore the awful RTD PR pieces about FastTracks that somehow forget to mention the project's excessive cost overruns and very likely possibility of delay.)

Instead, most of the videos are related to eminent domain issues and RTD's abuse of eminent domain for its building of new transit. Now, I am not necessarily one to say that transit agencies and other governmental or quasi-governmental agencies shouldn't be able to use eminent domain for the greater good, but there is a human cost, and RTD has a very long and poor reputation of using eminent domain but not paying fair prices for the private property it decides it needs. 

Here is an interesting video about a Latino family in East Denver and their struggles with what they see as unfair use of eminent domain by RTD back when it first built the original light rail line in the 90s:

Here is another video produced by Colorado Inside Out on RTD's dual role as a transit agency and developer with FastTracks:

I'm not a huge fan of Jon Caldara and the Independence Institute, but I do appreciate their bringing issues of eminent domain into the public spotlight. In the next video, Jon Caldara interviews a family being ousted by RTD so they could build a parking lot and potentially 12 stories of retail on the site of their own family business. 



I am all for expanding much needed transit in Denver through RTD's FastTracks, but the unfortunate reality is that RTD as an agency isn't exactly being the best neighbor when it comes to taking eminent domain rights against private owners without fair compensation. The couple in the video above have no problem with the RTD project themselves, but feel (rightfully) screwed over when their property is being taken for private redevelopment use. And they are not alone. According to the Rocky Mountain News, more than 180 property owners will have some or all of their properties taken by eminent domain, sometimes using it for redevelopment. Unfortunately, the Supreme Court in one of their most egregiously wrong rulings has made the legal precedent for cases just like this in Kelo V. City of New London.

Of course, RTD can still avoid egregious use of eminent domain, have profit arrangements with landowners or other more mutually beneficial solutions. Instead though, RTD uses the broad powers of eminent domain to kick out longtime small businesspeople and redevelop their own businesses at that same site (I am sure it does this to make more money for itself). Just another case of RTD looking after only itself instead of the community it purports to serve.