Below is an excellent little analysis of a couple of items destined to be rubber stamped by our paving council this evening. This comes from a small local listserv*:
On just about every City Council Agenda you’ll find ‘sleeper’ items — seemingly innocuous — but which have huge implications in future.Twenty-or forty-years from now, if someone asks, How did this happen? How did it get this way? What were they thinking?, these are the kinds of items that caused ‘it’ to ‘get this way’.These items will almost certainly get little or no discussion Tuesday — yet they deserve thought and discussion as surely as The Edgewater did.66. Felland Road Sanitary Sewer Phase 2 — This is what opens up an area to development — the sanitary sewer. So, here we are, along Felland Road, out in the Town of Burke [far east fringes of Madison], spreading further and further out. I’d love to see a list of names on the Front Page of the State Journal, above the fold, of individuals who will benefit from thi$.
80. MATC Parking – Look at the disaster MATC surface parking is already. When Plan Commission questioned MATC about their paving plans, a while back, we suddenly — coincidence? — saw a flurry of “news” stories about how MATC kids can’t find a place to put their cars. Has this item been thoroughly aired? — and discussed? Will someone pull this item off the Consent Agenda — and challenge MATC on what they’re doing out there?
On the Felland Rd water & sewer: I’d add something that this particular quoted author has said before: “No water, no development.” I’d also add that the city is making a huge mistake in not making bottom-line sustainability demands before approving the water system. For starters, that would include, the most rigorous sustainability, inclusivity and accessibility standards possible (net zero energy homes, walking-oriented, completely interconnected with the rest of the city on a neighborhood street grid, 95% car-free, frequent public transportation, housing affordability levels fully mixed in, and that match the city’s current demographics, etc.).
On the MATC issue: in this age of straitened budgets, high unemployment, and environmental destruction (thanks to our car-oriented lifestyle), the parking lot whiners at MATC deserve no taxpayer funded bailout for their wasteful campus design. And the people who live downstream from the proposed paved acreage should not have to pay by having to suffer from the increased flooding that will result. More paving = more flooding.
In both cases, we are hardwiring our city for waste, unsustainability and economic & ecologic rigormortis forevermore.
It is very, very unfortunate that we have a council that is so uniformly unable to analyze, anticipate and reflect on the long term implications of their votes. The mayor is, of course, a lost cause. Corporate. Bought & paid for. A mindless cash-seeking robot. But one would think that at least the nominal progressives would question the stupidity.
Instead, we’ll have to duck as they wield their well-worn rubber stamps.
*The author usually likes to fly beneath the radar, thus, the post shall be left unattributed, unless author requests otherwise.