One of the things that drives me crazy about Portland: complete wing nut extremists who are in positions of significant influence, but who somehow are considered to be solidly in the mainstream because of the piss-poor job old media does of telling the truth about them.
Today's best example: Rex Burkholder, Metro Councillor.
The guy is a card-carrying member of the bike-nazi gang. He hates cars. He wants you to drive less. He makes sure that Portland roads are as congested as possible by "enhancing" major arterials such as Spokane Avenue in Sellwood with "traffic calming" devices. He's a dreamy-eyed social utopian who waxes eloquent about "community" and "happiness quotients."
He is an extremist, but nobody knows it.
A good example of his extremism: his recent post on the "Portland Transport" blog. I've pasted part of it below:
"Think of it if every residential street was only wide enough for one car to pass through at a time, going slow, sharing the road with kids and dogs and soccer games. Is there any reason traffic on a residential street should go faster than 10mph??? "
There you have it. Rex Burkholder wants the speed limit on residential streets to be 10 mph. And this guy is in the mainstream, treated as a credible adult.
I wonder what the people of Portland would think of Rex if he was actually able to implement his speed limit? After a few weeks of driving 10 mph I can guarantee you that 9 out of 10 Portlanders would speed up quickly if they saw Rex in the crosswalk.
Go read the rest of his post. It is amazing.
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8 comments:
I read Rex Burkholder's post. I do agree with one idea mentioned in that thread. We should build statepark campgrounds every 500 feet along those residential streets that Burkholder wants to restrict to a 10mph speed limit.
Drivers trying to get home after work will need the campsites to sleep in while the gridlock on those residential streets clears out.
Rex, buddy, if you hate the noise of the internal combustion engine now, wait until every residential street is jammed because, as you propose, "only one car at a time" can pass.
Burkholder said he wants kids and dogs and soccer games to share the road with all these gridlocked cars. When he was a kid, didn't his mom ever teach him never to play in the street?
Kids and dogs and already have a place to play. It's called the "backyard". OH yeah, I forgot. Metro doesn't want us to have residential lots large enough for backyards. They want the kids to play soccer on busy streets.
As Daffy Duck would say, "woo hoo!!"
There is one bit of silver lining amongst these clouds. The plan to convert the St. Johns bridge, a vital freight route, to two vehicular lanes to open up bike lanes and widen the sidewalks is DOA. At some point, common sense does prevail.
Let's hope the Sellwood bridge replacement includes two vehicle lanes in each direction.
Councilor Canfield:
Omigosh how do they let you survive? Common sense on a city council? How long can they let such a dangerous person exist?
Seriously, I'd love to talk with you. Arthur Academy is getting jacked around something fierce trying to build a school in Troutdale, and sure could use a friend in a high place.
rob@oregoneducation.org
Except for me, Metro loving tree huggers are alive and well on the Troutdale City Council.
It's funny, though. Nearly every regular citizen I've talked to in Troutdale thinks of Metro as the father of everything evil in Multnomah County. Even the so-called "liberals".
It is the policy of removing traffic lanes to bike lane stripe every major boulevard in the city that is causing traffic to spill into the neighborhoods. Then the neighborhoods complain about the increased traffic and insist on speed bumps and calming devices. Designated bike routes should be on the residential streets and only intersect with heavy traffic routes for the short segments required to access the bridges, etc. Experienced bicyclists will advise newbies to avoid the bike lanes wherever possible... they're dangerous.
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