After Los Angeles, Atlanta may be America"s most car-dependent city. Atlantans sentimentally give their cars names, compare speeding tickets and jealously guard any sidestreet where it is possible to park. The city"s roads are so well worn that the first act of the new mayor, Shirley Franklin, was to start repairing potholes. In 1998, 13 metro counties lost federal highway funds because their air-pollution levels violated the Clean Air Act. The American Highway Users Alliance ranked three Atlanta interchanges among the 18 worst bottlenecks in the country. Other cities in the same fix have reorganized their highways, imposed commuter and car taxes, or expanded their public-transport systems. Atlanta does not like any of these things. Public transport is a vexed subject, too. Atlanta"s metropolitan region is divided into numerous county and smaller city governments, which find it hard to work together. Railways now serve the city center and the airport, but not much else; bus stops are often near-invisible poles, offering no indication of which bus might stop there, or when. Georgia"s Democratic governor, Roy Barnes, who hopes for re-election in November, has other plans. To win back the federal highway money lost under the Clean Air Act, he created the Georgia Regional Transportation Authority (GRTA), a 15-member board with the power to make the county governments, the city and the ten-county Atlanta Regional Commission co-operate on transport plans, whether they like it or not. Now GRTA has issued its own preliminary plan, allocating $4.5 billion over the next three years for a variety of schemes. The plan earmarks money to widen roads；to have an electric shuttle bus shuttle tourists among the elegant villas of Buckhead; and to create a commuter rail link between Atlanta and Macon, two hours to the south. Counties will be encouraged, with generous ten-to-one matching funds, to start express bus services. Public goodwill, however, may not stretch as far as the next plan, which is to build the Northern Arc highway for 65 miles across three counties north of the city limits. GRTA has allotted $270m for this. Supporters say it would ease the congestion on local roads; opponents think it would worsen over-development and traffic. The counties affected, and even GRTA"s own board, are divided. The governor is in favor, however; and since he can appoint and fire GRTA"S members, that is probably the end of the story. Mr. Barnes has a tendency to do as he wants, regardless. His arrogance on traffic matters could also lose him votes. But Mr. Barnes think that Atlanta"s slowing economy could do him more harm than the anti-sprawl movement.
单选题
The author"s presentation of Atlantans" car-dependence is meant