Resident Concerns – Meta Carpenter
June 8, 2016
We recently invited those opposed to the Greenway to email their concerns to a list of politicians and others involved with forcing this fiasco on us. With permission, we are sharing some of those that have been forwarded on to us by the author.
If you have sent such an email to the powers that be, and would like us to post it, please send a copy to us at fightback at stopthegreenway dot com. Please include information on how you would prefer your name to appear: Full name, initials, anonymous, etc.
Poorly thought out and definitely not listening to OUR concerns. They’ve been ignoring them all the way.
MY concerns, for anyone that cares which doesn’t include supporters of the Greenway Project-
ACCESS to buses for people with special needs: If this was my sister she would not be able to get to her bus in the morning or evening and going through the alley, like they suggested is OH SO SIMPLE would imvolve building a ramp, and having a girl who can’t walk without someone holding her hand to squeeze between the two cars that then have only the option of parking in the garage. And THEN we’d have no way of WATCHING for the bus. Alleys are NOT meant to be the main entrance and exit rout. If they wanted to buy up a whole row of houses like they did before and do this.. SURE! Go ahead… but then there’s still my OTHER concerns that haven’t been addressed AT ALL!
MAINTENANCE: Will the park board be in charge of mowing and plowing this as well? How about fixing of the paths when they crack? If so I’m not very confident that it will get done! As in I’m calling bullshit on that. Will they also plow the alleys so people don’t get stuck while using their ONLY access to their house? I’m also going to call bullshit on that.
FLOODING: These people obviously don’t live here since they don’t even know the history of this location. This used to be a lake next to a swamp. We have trouble with flooding WITH our nice open sewers and drainage grates, what is this going to do to peoples basements? What will this do to the water table for the rest of the neighborhood? Will it retain water in the nice spongy dirt? Will it affect their sewers?
SEWERS: How will residents repair/access the sewer lines should they need to be fixed? Are you going to pay to have them rerouted to the other side? Would that cause strain on their neighbors sewer lines? Are you just going to bury them and pretend they don’t burst or clog ever? I mean that’s what you’re doing to all of North so hey, why not the sewer lines?
CRIME: What will you provide as security? Will there be horse and bike riding police all over this stretch? Seeing as it’s difficult to even get police where we want them in CARS I’m doubting this as well. You’re goingto create a LARGE strip of land that’s near impossible to access by vehicle, and very easy to access by a-holes on foot/bike, possibly even aholes that LIVE on this Greenway. Trouble douchebag neighbors (thanks to the previously mentioned police issue I expect that number to rise as well when police don’t want to meander through long unmaintained alleys and hike through yards to go to calls here) get EXTREME access to vulnerable bikers/runners. Great, just what we needed in North. No one is going to use this bike path for recreation, at least not unless they’re not packing and EXTREMELY ready to use.
Comments
Mark Wallek
June 17, 2016 at 3:56 am
The “greenway” is not wanted by the residents of the neighborhood, that much is obvious. I live a block away and having lived here off and on equally since 1952, I can say that this obnoxious abomination is NOT any contribution to what was once and I would hope would be again a peaceable neighborhood of single family, owned by resident, homes. The choice of colors is idiotic and sophomoric. “Greenway” implies something organic, of the natural order. A cow watering trough and colours to upchuck to are such an incredible waste of money that it sickens me. The fact that the vast majority of resident owners don’t want this, and the ignoring of this, is disgusting. But the ridiculous execution is enraging because it’s absolute rotting tripe and no boon to this area. I won’t even go into issues of policing and emergency response or handicap accommodation. Ryback shoehorned in a sloppy and ill executed biking system that’s years away from viability here northside, where as a teenager I could bike anywhere in the Jordan and surrounding neighborhoods at any time of night. Today? No, we do not need an amateurish and ill executed abomination so people can have a feel good adventure on the northside during the daytime. We need crime reduction based on a demand for a change in how many resident behave. We need ordinance enforcement relative to property upkeep and vehicle maintenance and numbers. We need sloppy uncaring absent property owners to cease inflicting themselves on our neighborhood with their placement of bad tenants. We need the mayor and our council representatives to state clearly that they are for our single family home neighborhoods and will actually do something to help we residents protect these homes for future families to grow up in.