It was the railroad trip from hell: the hottest day of the year, stuck for five hours on a sold out Amtrak train where only half the cars had air conditioning.

Do you know how bad Connecticut’s air quality is?  According to the American Lung Association, all of our state’s counties got a grade of “F” when it comes to ozone.

Former Gov. Dannel Malloy used to joke that southwest Connecticut has two highways, “One’s a parking lot and the other’s a museum.”  He was obviously referring to I-95 and the Merritt Parkway.  I agree with his first characterization, but he’s wrong about the second. The Merritt Parkway is not a museum but a transportation gem… a unique, historic highway we should preserve and cherish.

Oh, everyone in Hartford is still doing the usual square dance, posturing and politicking, but I doubt a special session to vote on tolls will ever happen: tolls are dead. But ‘lest the anti-toll forces should start to rejoice, they may have won this battle but the war is far from over. Because when tolls go down to defeat, there are still plenty of “Plan B” options, none of which you (or they) will like.

Nobody trusts Hartford.  If cynicism is a disease, we’re in the midst of an epidemic. Since last fall I’ve been touring the state speaking to groups large and small about Connecticut’s transportation crisis… about the $5 billion we need to just get Metro-North back in a state of good repair… about the hundreds of deficient bridges and potholed highways … and about the futility of depending mostly on the gasoline tax to fund long-needed repairs.

“Bobby” has every kid’s dream job:  he’s an engineer for Metro-North.  But “Bobby” isn’t his real name because he’s asked for anonymity so he can speak candidly about his work. “I used to love this job,” he says.  “But I still take pride in it.  Not just anybody can drive a train safely and smoothly.”

Why do many people have such scorn for those who take the bus? Forty-one million trips are taken on 12,000 public buses each year in Connecticut in communities across the state (not counting school buses). Yet, those riders are regarded as losers, not by the transit operators, but by those who drive by car.

What is this fascination that people have with monorails? I can’t tell you how often people suggest them as “the answer” to our state’s clogged roads and rails. “Why don’t we build a monorail down the middle of The Merritt Parkway?,” asked an architect at a recent meeting. To my astonishment, such an idea was once studied!

A good boss cares about his customers.  He wants to keep them happy and actively seeks out their feedback.  Such is not the case at the Connecticut Department of Transportation. The CDOT’s new Commissioner, Joseph Giulietti, has missed several important opportunities to interface with riders in his first 100 days in office.  Not that he hasn’t been working.  He just hasn’t been meeting with customers.

Public transportation is a money-losing proposition.  But Connecticut is home to one of the few profitable transit companies in the US.  It’s not CT Transit or Metro-North, both of which are heavily subsidized.  No, the operation that’s squarely in the black is the Bridgeport – Port Jefferson Steamboat Company, a.k.a. “the ferry.”

Rail commuters on Metro-North got a Spring Surprise recently:  a new timetable with slower running times.  Rush hour trains now leave earlier and arrive later than before, adding anywhere from one to ten minutes to published running times, depending on the length of the trip. But hey!  What happened to that 30-30-30 plan for faster trains?  Why are the trains running slower, not faster?  In a word:  repairs.

As I hope you can tell, I love writing this column.  As New York Times columnist Thom Friedman once said, a commentator should be both in the heating business and the lighting business… getting people fired up while providing factual support for his arguments. Well, the “heat” runs both ways, as the comments I receive each week constantly remind me.

Gov. Ned Lamont’s tolling plan is in trouble.  I knew it last weekend when I got a call from Dan Malloy. The former governor and I know each other going back to his days as mayor of Stamford, but he’s only called me once before (many years ago when he sought my endorsement in his run for a second term as governor). This time he was calling about my recent column about the Transportation Strategy Board, the panel that 18 years ago was tasked with prioritizing our state’s transportation needs and how to pay for them.

When are we finally going to do something about our transportation crisis? That question has been asked for decades… but never answered, or more importantly, acted upon.

Why can’t we run commuter ferries on Long Island Sound? I can’t tell you how often I’ve been asked that question. But as with so many “simple solutions” to our transportation woes, there are logical reasons why ferry boats won’t work.