A few stray thoughts first before I get to "Redistricting for Dummies"
I'm driving home when an SAPD marked car comes behind me on Bryant Raceway, lights and siren, northbound. I pull to the near curb; I also notice no one else in 4 lanes reacts at all. People, they are called "emergency calls" for a reason, get out of the way!
Another peeve of mine; driving S Chadbourne, I have learned to get in the center lane. On that section we have 4 lanes and parallel parking. I have had to stand on the brake to avoid tearing off an idiot's door three times this month. Driver opens the door without a glance back. I wouldn't mind taking the door and costing them instructive money, but the part where I untangle the detached left arm from my grill guard; that might give me nightmares.
Redistricting: what a FUBAR! SD 25 State Senator Jeff Wentworth has had a bill on the table since his first term on the issue. His proposal; at the decennial redistricting put 4 Rep, 4 Dems and a retired judge emeritus both parties can agree to, and that body draws lines. Legislature still has to approve or not, but coming out of such a body, Legislature is likely to approve.
This FUBAR, We have the San Antonio court, drew up new lines. The Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) told that Court to try again. Then parties to the lawsuit appealed to the Washington, DC Circuit Court, claiming racial/ethnic discrimination. The Texas response on that: "Yes your honors, we did our best to Gerrymand districts to Republican advantage for the next ten years, but we were discriminating against Democrats, not any racial/ethnic group covered by the Civil Rights Act." This rather unique argument so surprised the Court, DC retired to chambers and might rule by this time next month.
The San Antonio Court has a hearing this Wednesday, the 15th. One can hope they have maps drawn as a fall-back, I do not expect an agreement between litigants. IF the San Antonio court puts its map in place, both major Parties can have June Conventions, with Primary elections April 17th but that is looking dicey. San Antonio has until Feb 20 to do what SCOTUS said was its job, maybe they will.
Yeah, this is "political junkie" land. Most of you have families, jobs, and hobbies. This is my hobby, I read Court rulings for fun. We may have a Texas Primary or even a "split" Primary in our lifetimes, that is now up to the Courts.
Showing posts with label pedestrians. Show all posts
Showing posts with label pedestrians. Show all posts
Monday, February 13, 2012
Sunday, March 08, 2009
The Times They Have A'Changed
I have been busy this morning changing every appliance in the house to "spring forward". Thanks to our gov't nannies, I get to re-familiarize myself with all the household electronics twice a year. Right now, I'm trying to decide whether it is more cost-effective to continue my search for the manual on my new watch or just go buy another one. I guess that could chalk up to economic stimulus except that I'm sure a new watch would have been made in China.
Some stray thoughts on this fine and expedited Sunday morning.
I went to the sidewalks meeting at Lincoln. City staff has done some really good work. They had a map showing a 5 year history of pedestrian/vehicle accidents, 250+ total. As one member of the public commented, right at one per week. Higher than we might want, maybe less than a tax-increasing emergency. They did not have data on age/cause/even time of day. For instance, we saw one cluster of four at S Chadbourne and Av. L A fellow ventured "hey, there's a school there". I mentioned, purely in passing, yes, there is a private school a block south and around the corner, BUT, right there we have a beer-joint. Any connection; nobody had that info. Just pointing out, there might be some details worth fussing about, but there will be at least one more public meeting (no date yet) and the public is invited to chime in online. My opinion, if you bother to e-mail, staff WILL read it, they genuinely care about doing this right.
The consensus was new development; absolutely. As to existing streets, there lies the rub. Folks, I live on Bryan St. a three block long residential. It Ts into Bell, it is a short-cut to nothing, the kind of street kids play on without having to interrupt their games very often. As I told staff, if you were to come along and promise all my neighbors new sidewalks with zero assessment, they would tell you to go away, we don't need the construction nuisance.
Now, turn the corner from my house, walk north on Bell St.; taking your life in your hands, we have gone from a comfortable neighborhood stroll to 40 MPH dodge-cars and that's if everybody is obeying the speed limit that day. Otra vez, to cure that, some of the houses west side of Bell are right on the road, build a sidewalk, we're in somebody's living room AND charging them for removing their front porch. Look back to my earlier post, I asked, if we decide a sidewalk on one side works, do both sides pay, or do we just assess the lucky guy who gives up part of his lawn?
Aside from such quibbles, staff has done a bang-up job on this. A good point raised was how much pedestrian traffic increase we might see, if the pedestrians felt safe on a sidewalk as opposed to playing dodge-car. If we build it, will they come? I like to think so. I see people actually drive to, then walk along, Concho St. along the river. Might be the scenery, but day after day, same view, I don't think so, they are looking for a safe place to walk off calories. Give them that safety in their neighborhoods, they might walk there. Lots of benefits from that: pounds shed, healthy hearts, a community-watch by-product, heck, if we ain't careful we might get to know our neighbors!
By and large, we came from the meeting impressed that staff has a handle on prioritizing a good idea. There will be another such meeting, it is not yet scheduled, but I will say this: if you are interested, attend. Unlike some "public" forums of days gone by, staff is not "telling" us what is about to happen, they are really listening.
I almost missed my Sunday morning services (the network news shows) on account of the time change. Since I didn't miss them, I will save you the trouble; You missed NOTHING! The party in power is lying and mis-characterizing the party out of power, which in turn is outrageously lying about the new administration. I'm shocked, shocked I say to hear this.
San Angelo has so far been insulated from this downturn. We are fretting about 5% unemployment, a figure Michigan would die for. Housing has slowed, but local developers are still building. The "underwater" mortgage market isn't here, our home values actually increased about 4% last quarter. Realtors who are taking unemployment elsewhere might be scrambling here, but they are still selling houses. The oilfield is taking a hit, but Karnak predicts that will turn around.
We have seen our new President advise investors to "buy", something I have never seen. BTW, following that bit of advice Thursday, the market dropped 7%. Might be why former Presidents stayed out of the investment counseling business. OK, give him a break, he's on a steep learning curve. Markets can live with more or less gov't control, but what any market lusts after in its heart is STABILITY! ie. if the investor invests, the rules won't change next Tuesday.
Trivia exercize for the political junkie: Google "Aaron Schock". Not everything out of the Land of Lincoln is an embarrassment to his name.
Stability being too much to wish for, in the interim Karnak is putting his limited money into canned goods and hard metals.
Some stray thoughts on this fine and expedited Sunday morning.
I went to the sidewalks meeting at Lincoln. City staff has done some really good work. They had a map showing a 5 year history of pedestrian/vehicle accidents, 250+ total. As one member of the public commented, right at one per week. Higher than we might want, maybe less than a tax-increasing emergency. They did not have data on age/cause/even time of day. For instance, we saw one cluster of four at S Chadbourne and Av. L A fellow ventured "hey, there's a school there". I mentioned, purely in passing, yes, there is a private school a block south and around the corner, BUT, right there we have a beer-joint. Any connection; nobody had that info. Just pointing out, there might be some details worth fussing about, but there will be at least one more public meeting (no date yet) and the public is invited to chime in online. My opinion, if you bother to e-mail, staff WILL read it, they genuinely care about doing this right.
The consensus was new development; absolutely. As to existing streets, there lies the rub. Folks, I live on Bryan St. a three block long residential. It Ts into Bell, it is a short-cut to nothing, the kind of street kids play on without having to interrupt their games very often. As I told staff, if you were to come along and promise all my neighbors new sidewalks with zero assessment, they would tell you to go away, we don't need the construction nuisance.
Now, turn the corner from my house, walk north on Bell St.; taking your life in your hands, we have gone from a comfortable neighborhood stroll to 40 MPH dodge-cars and that's if everybody is obeying the speed limit that day. Otra vez, to cure that, some of the houses west side of Bell are right on the road, build a sidewalk, we're in somebody's living room AND charging them for removing their front porch. Look back to my earlier post, I asked, if we decide a sidewalk on one side works, do both sides pay, or do we just assess the lucky guy who gives up part of his lawn?
Aside from such quibbles, staff has done a bang-up job on this. A good point raised was how much pedestrian traffic increase we might see, if the pedestrians felt safe on a sidewalk as opposed to playing dodge-car. If we build it, will they come? I like to think so. I see people actually drive to, then walk along, Concho St. along the river. Might be the scenery, but day after day, same view, I don't think so, they are looking for a safe place to walk off calories. Give them that safety in their neighborhoods, they might walk there. Lots of benefits from that: pounds shed, healthy hearts, a community-watch by-product, heck, if we ain't careful we might get to know our neighbors!
By and large, we came from the meeting impressed that staff has a handle on prioritizing a good idea. There will be another such meeting, it is not yet scheduled, but I will say this: if you are interested, attend. Unlike some "public" forums of days gone by, staff is not "telling" us what is about to happen, they are really listening.
I almost missed my Sunday morning services (the network news shows) on account of the time change. Since I didn't miss them, I will save you the trouble; You missed NOTHING! The party in power is lying and mis-characterizing the party out of power, which in turn is outrageously lying about the new administration. I'm shocked, shocked I say to hear this.
San Angelo has so far been insulated from this downturn. We are fretting about 5% unemployment, a figure Michigan would die for. Housing has slowed, but local developers are still building. The "underwater" mortgage market isn't here, our home values actually increased about 4% last quarter. Realtors who are taking unemployment elsewhere might be scrambling here, but they are still selling houses. The oilfield is taking a hit, but Karnak predicts that will turn around.
We have seen our new President advise investors to "buy", something I have never seen. BTW, following that bit of advice Thursday, the market dropped 7%. Might be why former Presidents stayed out of the investment counseling business. OK, give him a break, he's on a steep learning curve. Markets can live with more or less gov't control, but what any market lusts after in its heart is STABILITY! ie. if the investor invests, the rules won't change next Tuesday.
Trivia exercize for the political junkie: Google "Aaron Schock". Not everything out of the Land of Lincoln is an embarrassment to his name.
Stability being too much to wish for, in the interim Karnak is putting his limited money into canned goods and hard metals.
Saturday, November 08, 2008
Walking around town
San Angelo has been shaken awake recently. There have been two pedestrian fatalities. This caused the issue of sidewalks to be brought back before the City Council with little notice or citizen input. This issue had been very much overwhelmed by issues such as the storm water mandates, and hadn't been looked at much for almost 2 years. The council and staff are quite open about how this happened.
At the last council meeting, the staff brought the council some ideas on a sidewalk ordinance for new developments. The discussion went on about sidewalks, and old neighborhoods, and commercial districts, etc. until someone finally reminded them that the real issue here is not just sidewalks. This is about transportation and safety.
For years (pretty much since WWII), transportation has been reduced to motorized transportation. Cars, truck, trains and planes: That was the only transportation that mattered. We were in love with our cars. Mom and the kids would hop into the station wagon and drive the half block to the neighborhood store. Neighborhood stores vanished from many neighborhoods, and by the 90's, the mall, an island of stores in a sea of parking spaces, was the new hunting ground for the SUV and the family. Entire neighborhoods were built where the front door was only used to get the mail or for special occasions. People drove out of their privacy fence protected garages onto alleys that were only usable as extended driveways. Neighbors had to make an effort to see each other outside of their cars. This is far different than the neighborhoods of the early 1900's, when towns were laid out so that everyone could walk to work, and sidewalks were a luxury to keep mud off shoppers feet. Many towns had sidewalks before paved streets, at least down town, because foot traffic was the major form of transportation.
Times are changing again. People are becoming health conscious, and realize that riding everywhere contributes to obesity. They have realized that using the SUV for a quick trip to the convenience store wastes a lot of money when gas prices are as high as they were (and will be again.) People are starting to think that polluting less by driving less might not be such a bad idea. Many neighborhoods actually like it that their kids can walk to school. Just look at the results of the last 2 bond elections for confirmation. And some people are actually discovering that when they walk through their neighborhood, they have time to actually meet and talk to their neighbors. They get to participate in that friendliness that west Texas is famous for.
With all this new found interest in non-motorized transportation, problems are showing up in many areas of the city. San Angelo is not a very walkable city. Ideally, you should be able to walk from any place in the city to any other place in the city safely. Throw in public transportation (buses primarily) and you should be able to shop and conduct most business without a car, provided you have enough time. This is currently not the case. Not even close. Just for fun, try to get to the CVCOG office (just off loop 306) or the SAISD administration building by walking and using the bus. It can be done, but it won't be an excellent adventure.
We need a new approach to transportation and transportation planning that includes non-motorized, non-vehicular transportation as a major component. When a plan for a new development is submitted, it should account for pedestrian and bicycle traffic, as well as cars and trash and emergency vehicles. That may mean sidewalks or pedestrian lanes, crosswalks, tunnels, overpasses, etc.. New development plans should show more than just how cars leave the area. They should show foot paths to schools, shopping, parks, churches, etc.. When neighborhoods are revitalized, all forms of traffic need to be addressed. We need sidewalks on some streets, such as 19th and 29th, but we also need a plan so people can safely walk to those sidewalks. Sounds like one of the first challenges for our traffic engineer once he is on board.
Let me make one thing clear: the city hasn't been ignoring this problem. They have done a fairly comprehensive bicycle and pedestrian plan in the SAMPO. It is a good starting point. The problem is that it is currently not part of regular, day to day transportation planning. That is one of the goals of the plan, but the reality is that we're not close yet. One only had to listen to the discussion at the last council meeting to see that. It is obvious that we haven't brought developers on board yet. The city has also a number of projects competing for limited engineering resources so when the storm water wheel squeaked, it got the priority.
Transportation in our city is changing. We must become more pedestrian and bicycle friendly, or at least less dangerous and hostile. We need a plan that in addition to pedistrian districts, includes pedestrian feeders, connectors, and arteries, just like we have for motor vehicle traffic. We need an integrated plan where pedestrians are not an afterthought or footnote. Sidewalks will be a part of any pedestrian planning, but they are just a tool like crosswalks and signs and lanes, etc.. Pedestrian safety won't be achieved until from start to finish, pedestrians are as much a part of any transportation and traffic planning as automobiles.
At the last council meeting, the staff brought the council some ideas on a sidewalk ordinance for new developments. The discussion went on about sidewalks, and old neighborhoods, and commercial districts, etc. until someone finally reminded them that the real issue here is not just sidewalks. This is about transportation and safety.
For years (pretty much since WWII), transportation has been reduced to motorized transportation. Cars, truck, trains and planes: That was the only transportation that mattered. We were in love with our cars. Mom and the kids would hop into the station wagon and drive the half block to the neighborhood store. Neighborhood stores vanished from many neighborhoods, and by the 90's, the mall, an island of stores in a sea of parking spaces, was the new hunting ground for the SUV and the family. Entire neighborhoods were built where the front door was only used to get the mail or for special occasions. People drove out of their privacy fence protected garages onto alleys that were only usable as extended driveways. Neighbors had to make an effort to see each other outside of their cars. This is far different than the neighborhoods of the early 1900's, when towns were laid out so that everyone could walk to work, and sidewalks were a luxury to keep mud off shoppers feet. Many towns had sidewalks before paved streets, at least down town, because foot traffic was the major form of transportation.
Times are changing again. People are becoming health conscious, and realize that riding everywhere contributes to obesity. They have realized that using the SUV for a quick trip to the convenience store wastes a lot of money when gas prices are as high as they were (and will be again.) People are starting to think that polluting less by driving less might not be such a bad idea. Many neighborhoods actually like it that their kids can walk to school. Just look at the results of the last 2 bond elections for confirmation. And some people are actually discovering that when they walk through their neighborhood, they have time to actually meet and talk to their neighbors. They get to participate in that friendliness that west Texas is famous for.
With all this new found interest in non-motorized transportation, problems are showing up in many areas of the city. San Angelo is not a very walkable city. Ideally, you should be able to walk from any place in the city to any other place in the city safely. Throw in public transportation (buses primarily) and you should be able to shop and conduct most business without a car, provided you have enough time. This is currently not the case. Not even close. Just for fun, try to get to the CVCOG office (just off loop 306) or the SAISD administration building by walking and using the bus. It can be done, but it won't be an excellent adventure.
We need a new approach to transportation and transportation planning that includes non-motorized, non-vehicular transportation as a major component. When a plan for a new development is submitted, it should account for pedestrian and bicycle traffic, as well as cars and trash and emergency vehicles. That may mean sidewalks or pedestrian lanes, crosswalks, tunnels, overpasses, etc.. New development plans should show more than just how cars leave the area. They should show foot paths to schools, shopping, parks, churches, etc.. When neighborhoods are revitalized, all forms of traffic need to be addressed. We need sidewalks on some streets, such as 19th and 29th, but we also need a plan so people can safely walk to those sidewalks. Sounds like one of the first challenges for our traffic engineer once he is on board.
Let me make one thing clear: the city hasn't been ignoring this problem. They have done a fairly comprehensive bicycle and pedestrian plan in the SAMPO. It is a good starting point. The problem is that it is currently not part of regular, day to day transportation planning. That is one of the goals of the plan, but the reality is that we're not close yet. One only had to listen to the discussion at the last council meeting to see that. It is obvious that we haven't brought developers on board yet. The city has also a number of projects competing for limited engineering resources so when the storm water wheel squeaked, it got the priority.
Transportation in our city is changing. We must become more pedestrian and bicycle friendly, or at least less dangerous and hostile. We need a plan that in addition to pedistrian districts, includes pedestrian feeders, connectors, and arteries, just like we have for motor vehicle traffic. We need an integrated plan where pedestrians are not an afterthought or footnote. Sidewalks will be a part of any pedestrian planning, but they are just a tool like crosswalks and signs and lanes, etc.. Pedestrian safety won't be achieved until from start to finish, pedestrians are as much a part of any transportation and traffic planning as automobiles.
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