As the debate over a rail transit project for Honolulu groans on, many are wondering what the fuss is all about.

What motivates those who are so passionately opposed to a project that will produce jobs, ease congestion (at least a little bit) and project Honolulu as a modern 21st century city?

In fact, it is a constellation of objections, rather than any single unifying concern, that represents the greatest threat and greatest problem for those who want a rail system.

Consider: Anti-tax folks? Anti-rail. Environmentalists who fear urban blight? Anti-rail. Residents of areas that will not be directly served? Anti-rail. Although, one must ask opponents in Hawai'i Kai and on the Windward Coast if they were equally opposed to the widening of Kalaniana'ole Highway or the building of the massive H-3 Freeway.

Then there are those whose ox is being gored, including taxi companies and others who have their own ideas about how residents of Honolulu should be moved about.

Finally, there are those whose objections have been built around a rather philosophical analysis that rests on the conclusion that mass transit simply does not make a lot of sense. This argument is most strongly advanced by conservative and libertarian organizations (Heritage Foundation, CATO Institute) who don't have much faith in almost anything government has in mind for the rest of us.

One of the best writers from this point of view is Randal O'Toole, a prolific op-ed author and member of the "board of scholars" for the local Grassroot Institute, which is opposed to our rail project.

In a recent "policy analysis" for the CATO Institute, O'Toole argued that our current fascination with rail is in part due to a profound failure of thinking and reasoning by our metropolitan planning organizations that are federally mandated committees designed to get various jurisdictions on the same page when it comes to transportation planning. In Hawai'i, we call it the O'ahu Metropolitan Planning Organization, or OMPO.

O'Toole's argument, at the risk of oversimplification, is that planners are transfixed by the idea of changing behavior as a way out of fixing our transportation woes rather than focusing on the technical fixes that might make things better.

But what if it is in fact behavior, that is, our love of our cars and our insistence on the autonomy that commuting by private vehicle offers, that is the root of the problem? Should government — society if you will — have a role in turning us one way or another on this most basic question?

That's the big issue that the debate over taxes and environment and political power has yet to fully confront.

Jerry Burris' column appears Wednesdays. See his blog at http://blogs.honoluluadvertiser.com. Reach him at jrryburris@yahoo.com.

Jerry Burris' column appears Wednesdays in this space. See his blog at blogs.honoluluadvertiser.com/akamaipolitics. Reach him at jrryburris@yahoo.com.