February 13, 2013

Kudos to the parents at Holy Cross Catholic School who last week organized a press event to show just exactly how dangerous the St. John and Quincy intersection is after the city hastily changed the push button traffic crossing signal to a signal that now simply blinks yellow all the time.

The city sent a spokesman for the Public Works Department along with a city engineer to speak with the concerned parents about the changes at the stoplights. But instead of constructive dialogue, we got a condescending lecture full of platitudes and inaccurate statements from the PR guy and a bunch of techno gobble-de-gook from the city engineer. Seriously?

For the record, the stoplight at St. John and Quincy was indeed upgraded in 2007 when the new sidewalks were installed as part of the improvements outlined in the St. John Corridor Plan, so the city’s argument that the traffic signal there is outdated falls. As for costs, the traffic light “heads” can easily be replaced with LED lights for much less than the quoted $300,000 per signal, not only saving taxpayers money, but also putting control of the signal back where it belongs, in the hands of the people who use it to safely cross the street.  But, never let facts or the safety of the general public get in the way of an opportunity to offer concerned parents a heaping load of bureaucratic psychobabble. Just another example of big government telling its citizenry to be quiet and take our medicine. This li’l doggie ain’t drinkin’ that Kool-Aid, thanks.