Couple stories from Charlotte city council doings which demonstrate that mere citizens are powerless to stop the Charlotte Department of Transportation.

First, $500K worth of sidewalks on Park Road that residents do not want and will claim stately, greenhouse gas fighting oak trees in the bargain. Oh, and if residents refuse to sell CDOT their property for the sidewalks, the city will use eminent domain to simply seize the land. CDOT flunkies want a “walkable city” — so that is that, citizens.

Second, CDOT gets city council to ratify the MUMPO long-range transportation plan — a lie of a scam of a joke of a document. But one that preserves the lone remaining, scant rationale for building more corridors of rail for $9.5b. — because the EPA will wink and nod say, yep, more rail will reduce smog. Except that it won’t. Clip-N-Save this dispatch from Steve Harrison:

The long-range transportation plan didn’t include many new transportation projects, in part because the N.C. Department of Transportation and the Charlotte Area Transit System have far less money than anticipated.

The plan assumed that CATS could build a light-rail extension and a commuter rail line by 2025 – and nothing else.

City Council member Nancy Carter asked why rapid transit down Independence Boulevard wasn’t included.

Norm Steinman of CDOT said the federal government only allows cities to include projects they can realistically pay for.

Carter later urged the city to include the southeast transit corridor in the plan, even if it wasn’t included in how it would impact emissions.

Steinman said no rapid transit project or highway has any significant impact on the city meeting its pollution goals.

He said cars that emit fewer smog-producing pollutants will be responsible for the area’s ozone reductions – not a single transit project or highway.

The air-quality plan assumed there wouldn’t be a streetcar running through central Charlotte. Mayor Pro Tem Susan Burgess said the streetcar should be included, and said it’s likely the city will receive federal money to help build a 1.5-mile segment from Time Warner Cable Arena to Presbyterian Hospital.

Steinman said after his presentation to council that the segment wouldn’t have any measurable impact on air quality. He said it’s possible it could make the air marginally worse, because CATS will have to continue to operate its Gold Rush buses until the streetcar is expanded.

Let’s go through the lies. One, the North line and the Northeast line will not be completed by 2025. No way, no how. Second lie, CATS cannot afford to build both lines. Third lie, any streetcar will increase emissions in the corridor it operates in because it will increase congestion and while not carrying any additional passengers compared to buses.

The two actual headlines are: One, we will spend $9.5b. on a transit plan that has no measurable impact on emissions. Some of us have said that for five or six years now — and were called cavemen and crypto-racists for saying so. Two, cleaner cars will make our air cleaner, nothing else. Again, some of us have urged a tight focus on gross polluting vehicles to make the biggest bang-for-the-buck improvement in our air.

But we are not CDOT, so we do not matter.