Tuesday, March 07, 2006

What's in a Name?

An article in the Deseret Morning News says that UTA will unveil the name for their commuter-rail line tomorrow. In the article, UTA says they ruled out Wasatch Area Rapid Transit because it could be shortened to WART. Let's hope they don't call it Wasatch Front Area Rapid Transit. W-FART is much worse then WART. Since it runs the entire length of Davis County, I say we call it Davis Area Rapid Transit or DART. Mayor Rocky Anderson probably wouldn't like that. Maybe we should call it the Rocky Rocket, except, Davis County commuters probably wouldn't ride it then. Coming up with a name for commuter-rail isn't as easy as it seems.

3 comments:

Former Centerville Citizen said...

The DART idea sounds cool, but eventually it will run from Brigham City down to Utah County, so a name has to be more inclusive than that.

My fear is that they'll come up with some lame name. Maybe it shouldn't have a name, just as the bus system doesn't. Saying "Honey, I'm taking the train to work today" sounds perfectly fine to me. I guess I'm not very creative.

Heidi said...

I think Wasatch Front Rapid Transit is good, since, after all, commuter rail is supposed to eventually extend down to Utah County as well. WFRT may not be as easy to pronounce as one word, but I agree that just saying "hey, I'm taking the train to work today" should suffice.

Mark Fotheringham said...

Well, the official name is "FrontRunner." Kind of pretentious, but not bad. I don't expect people will actually use the name, however, since the one syllable "train" is much easier to say than this three syllable moniker.

I was really hoping for a single syllable, acronym-based name, but I guess it is too late now to suggest "The Wasatch Area Transit" so that you could announce, "Honey, I'll be taking the...." Wait, I guess that wouldn't work.

Perhaps, The Overland Ogden Transport (TOOT), or the Trekky favorite: Wasatch Area Rapid Peoplemover (WARP).