As the World Turns

 

 

"You don't need a Weatherman to know which way the wind blows."

--Bob Dylan

 

 

From another correspondent...

 

"I don't know who keeps bringing up the idea of two-way streets for Spring,
Market, Elm, Bank and Pearl....

 

The traffic has moved very well for 30 years the way
the streets are now...

 

Get the People in the community
and the business community as a whole involved with their opinions...

 

Do they really have some concrete reason as to why it is better than the traffic pattern we now have in the city."

 

______________

 

I've heard the discussion of the merits of two-way versus one-way streets for a number of years now.

 

 Although my memory is not faultless, I believe I remember a time when Elm Street was two way. (my grandfather lived on Elm Street, and I spent a lot of time there. I listened to the adults discussing it) Similarly, I believe I remember Market Street as two way. I don't think I remember Spring Street as two way.

 

I have a hard time believing that the conversion of one way streets to two way streets is a panacea. Likewise, I can't believe that the conversion would be a problem for the City either. I've seen any number of befuddled drivers practicing the ultimate in traffic calming--putative one ways--as they make the incorrect assumption that an unfamiliar New Albany street is patterned after most streets they have encountered in their lives, as they turn the wrong way onto a one way street.

 

Too many accommodations have been made to the automobile. Downtown New Albany is a part of the city predating the car. Ironically, it is the part of the City most encumbered by hoop-jumping on behalf of the car. A vibrant, functional, walkable city allows automobiles into its space on its terms, not on the interlopers' terms. For too long the car has held the upper hand in the ordering of our downtown.

 

 

Some of those who have crafted the recent and recognized rebirth of our city have asked that two way traffic be the norm. Just as in the past, those holding the high cards, called the turn to one way streets, now we must let those holding the hot hands direct us forward.

 

I'm sponsoring a resolution to forgo studies to tell us that one way streets should yield to two way traffic. We paid for a study in 2007. Let's follow that study which said that Pearl, Bank and market Streets could be immediately converted to two way traffic. Mr. Rosenbager, at the last Council meeting , stated that given intersections could be studied for a "couple grand" apiece. Two intersections on Spring Street, at Vincennes and at State Streets, and two intersections on Elm Street, also at Vincennes and at State Streets may need additional study to allow for their conversions. If that's the case, we may be facing a cost of something considerably less than $20,000; a far cry from the $60,000 figure suggested by some.

Can't we direct that additional spending in a more productive direction?

 

Implementation of the two way conversion itself, will cost something. Much of this cost will be covered by federal funds, we are told.  New signs will be needed. The existing street lights will need to be adjusted for two way traffic. New striping of the streets will be required. We don't need to spend new money on a study to reiterate what we've been told before, and what many of us know to be true.

 

If we need additional input into the decision to convert or stay with the status quo, let's use the charrette as our method of gathering information and forming consensus. We have the expertise to chart our own course and make our own decisions on this rather simple matter. 

 

Let's today, make our own way.      

 

 

Monolithic Indifference

Let's open up the old mailbag...

 (originally written as one post, now divided for your  convenience)

Our first correspondent disagrees with the notion of a resolution before the Common Council of the City of New Albany. This resolution is titled, " Resolution Recognizing the Value of Human Labor in the Collection of Tolls in the New Bridges Project". Our correspondent avers,

 "Again, the bridgeS project sucks.  I just can't see how a few tolling jobs would even pay for itself, considering all the problems it would create, much less give us a return on the project as it now stands.

What am I missing?"

 

What you may be missing, dear reader, is the value of the light of day shone upon a fingerprint-less heist. You may fail to recognize that something close to $3 Billion will be withdrawn from our local economy with scarcely any return to that economy, in the form of daily jobs on that specific project, for the next thirty or so years. Those jobs-not-filled represent all of the daily activities in the lives of citizens-not-added to the ledger of participation in our collective well-being.

 

Those jobs-not-filled represent debts-not-repaid to the veterans of our serial wars. Unfulfilled  are opportunities to help those wounded, damaged, returnees who can't quite work their way back into our society.

 

You may be missing the intangible value of calling attention to the fact that those who lead the Bridges Authority, and claim to speak on behalf of others have never once, truly, listened to the wishes of many of those on whose behalf they claim to speak.

 

You may miss the fact that in the face of monolithic indifference, a body of elected officials has the opportunity to say to those who will not listen, simply, that, "if we had some say in this process we might consider that those whom we represent have to live, they have to feed their families, they want to participate in their communities. And, to do those things they need jobs. And, since this project is designed to extract nearly $3 Billion from our lives, we should be compensated in some small way. We value funding the necessities of life over convenience, speed and efficiency." 

 

A body of elected officials has the opportunity to make that statement. A simple statement will not cause the indifferent ones to move away from their chosen path. Efficiency and speed; the drone warfare of commerce and travel will out. But, a simple vote to say that, at least in one of the communities, we see what is happening, what is planned, what we value as a metro region; a simple vote is not asking too much from the elected officials who represent the ones who won't be heard. 

Your Money's No Good Here

Jimmy Buffet's heading out to San Francisco. The white pants are being put away. Plaudits and platitudes about the heroism of the workplace echo throughout the land. It is Labor Day.

Here along one border within the nation, we are bowing to the supremacy of speed. We are allowing the bottom-line geeks who have somehow become transportation planners to determine that we need no hand-to-hand contact to float the Two Bridges Boondoggle. We shall, as those grandees determine, engage in the transportational equivalent of drone warfare. The over large Two Bridges plan has an over large price tag which must and will be funded by intermittent heists of the populace hereabouts. (Set aside for now that New Albany will bear the brunt of increased pass-through traffic of the cheapskates who don't want to pay an extra eight dollars to visit Aunt Ginny or buy something in Indiana.)

The  choice method of collection, which only the bottom-line geeks chose, is NSA-style gantries that collect photos of people travelling under them, and then sends a bill to the address listed on the license plate. Or it collects data on the number of trips and deducts money from a prepaid account. Or it gets a signal from a transponder carried by frequent bridge users.

The hands-free stick up is the next best thing to off-shoring jobs. It may even be more egregious than off-shoring jobs,  since no jobs were created in the first place.  The nation and the region  has a veritable army of unemployed persons who could benefit from a job as a toll taker. The nation has an actual army of discharged, damaged, and disillusioned veterans from its serial wars. On another National Holiday the land will echo with plaudits and platitudes about the sacrifices and heroism of those who served our country in the military. Why not put up or shut up, and allow dignified work as a toll taker to help these soldiers reenter society? Why are these jobs seen as something to be so assiduously avoided?

Speed. Efficiency.

At one of the recent events held at the Marriott in Clarksville by the meme troupe of the Bridges Project, I asked why there are no toll booths. Why, in light of chronic unemployment, and in light of re-assimilation problems for veterans do we not, at least, have the prospect of getting some jobs out of the deal? Since the project has been force-fed to the locals, designed and built according to those on high, why not, as Mary Poppins would say, just a spoonful of sugar to help the medicine go down?

I asked the questions of a member of the Kentucky Transportation Cabinet. His response was that in the interest of speed and efficiency toll takers are passé. They are an unnecessary impediment to people barreling through the region. Those unemployed are of no concern in the grandee scheme of things. In yesterdays Courier-Journal an article about IBM quotes a professor of Law, "We don't build companies to serve Wall Street. We build corporations to provide goods and services to a society and jobs for people." Should not even a higher expectation apply to publicly-funded, publicly-owned projects?

The Transportation Cabinet representative said the gantries are needed to promote efficiency in transportation. I wish someone had thought of that when the discussion involved light rail.