For the last four years it has been an article of faith that the most pressing issue facing city government is traffic. In the last two municipal elections every candidate has agreed with this statement. Both major newspapers have editorialized that this is true. Most important, in every survey we conduct Scottsdale residents tell us that traffic is their number one concern.

With that in mind last November we on the City Council voted to hire a consultant to update the city’s Transportation Master Plan. My hope was that we would receive some unbiased technical advice from transportation professionals about how best to solve our most pressing traffic problems.

I should have known better. Ten months into this contract what we have received are a series of “educational” meetings that are thinly-disguised commercials for light rail. If you don’t believe that go to the city’s web site and read the minutes of the July meeting of the Scottsdale Transportation Commission where the consultants gave an update on their efforts so far. Every word was about mass transit.

This is a classic case of misplaced priorities. When I hear from Scottsdale residents who are concerned about traffic problems in our city they are not clamoring for mass transit, they want answers to questions such as what we on the Council plan to do about traffic congestion on Chaparral and Pima roads and on Loop 101. The question of what type of mass transit (if any) to use on Scottsdale Road is important but it is nowhere near being the most pressing transportation issue in Scottsdale.

We do need some form of mass transit – some Scottsdale residents cannot or do not want to drive and we need to have alternatives available to them. But no matter what form of mass transit we pick, the reality is that the vast majority of Scottsdale residents will continue to travel by automobile. Therefore our highest priority has to be making automobile traffic flow freely and safely. Making that happen should have city government’s undivided attention.

The other problem with the consultant’s fixation on light rail is money. Light rail is ridiculously expensive -- costs are currently $70M/mile and rising. For a fraction of the price of light rail we could provide enhanced bus and/or trolley service in those areas of Scottsdale where some form of mass transit might be appropriate. If we adopt light rail it will be a raid upon Scottsdale’s treasury that will make the generous subsidies we have dispensed in the past seem like chump change.

Light Rail is also disruptive – some businesses in the path of light rail in Phoenix will be closed for over two years to accommodate construction! And light rail is out of touch with the character of Scottsdale and with the preferences of our residents.

If the residents of Scottsdale are not clamoring for light rail then who is leading the charge for it? The answer is that it is the same groups that have been pushing the Council for years to make Scottsdale more urban, with taller buildings, greater density and (now) more urban modes of transportation. That “vision” may be highly profitable for certain special interests but it is at odds with what we, the voters of Scottsdale, decided that we wanted for our city when we approved our General Plan. That plan describes a Scottsdale with open vistas and a suburban or, in some parts of the city, a rural environment.

While the advocates of a more urban Scottsdale are entitled to their vision of our city they are not entitled to subvert the desires of Scottsdale residents by conducting end runs around the voter-approved General Plan. We on the City Council have a duty to not let that happen.