I agree Steve and Melanie. I think Tony's response if frankly a cop out.
Basically says there was not a perfect solution so we opted to do
nothing. I think that is frankly a lame approach to a significant
problem. We live in a world where there is seldom an ideal solution.
Heaven help us if we can implement solutions that are less than perfect.
This is precisely why folks get so frustrated with government, analysts,
and policy makers. Most of us are just fine with a less than ideal
solution. We want some attempt made to solve the problem. One could use
Tony's rationalization at every level of government as an excuse to do
nothing. Which is exactly what has been done. The excuse that the city
often closes streets and os not implement detours is fine for cars
because it is no big deal to use you 2-5 liter engine to go out of your
way a few blocks. The attitude in my mind is very cavalier and I don't
think we're comparing apples to apples.
Brian Mink
Monona, WI
Steve Goldstein wrote:
On 5/8/15 12:13 AM, Melanie Foxcroft wrote:
I think this is another demonstration of why Madison doesn't receive
a "platinum" award for bicycling. This disaster is simply not
acceptable. The double standard of cars vs. bikes is too much.
Hopefully city transportation people will learn from this disaster
and do better next time.
The "city transportation people" are the traffic engineers who, after
considering the alternatives, have been forced into this decision
because nothing else meets minimum engineering standards. We all see
the logic of Tony's deliberations and conclusions.
The problem is that an engineering-only approach doesn't solve this
problem and that was the end of the discussion. If there were enough
political pressure, the discussion could have started out with the
*requirement* that the most heavily traveled bike route in the city
remain passable during one of the peak months of biking. If that were
the case, other alternatives might have been on the table --- for
example, staging the project to enable access or closing lanes on John
Nolen.
Many on this list will recall the activism opposing of the closing of
the Law Park path during construction of the convention center
achieved partial success. Tony's sensitivity to the issues shows some
things have improved over the past twenty years, but this disaster
shows we need more effective activism.
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