The Lexington Streetsweeper

Alreco, Without The EPA

2011-12-23T14:21:00.000-05:00

Last week brought news of a few more jobs for the Kentucky labor force and maybe got a step or two on the EPA regulations concerning toxic waste materials.

On December 13 the State of Kentucky announced that an Australian company, MHM Metals, would be opening a new plant in Western Kentucky. Normally that wouldn't mean much to me, except that this company processes aluminum waste by-products, and we have some aluminum plants in Ky. MHM has a proprietary process to remove all the toxic waste from the leftovers of recycling aluminum cans.

The top three reasons for location in Ky were listed as:

115-acre industrial landholding in Russellville, Kentucky
Existing buildings on site and property zoning to benefit time frame
350,000 tons per annum of salt slag and black dross (the waste product) within an economic radius and rail availability with a high-quality rail operator may further extend this economic distance

Most of us know that R. J. Corman, a high-quality rail operator, runs a train every other day from Berea to Russellville, hauling aluminum ingots from the recycler to the can factory. Anywhere from 20 to 30 cars in a train. What I did not know is that there are two other aluminum producers in Paris (Central Motor Wheel of America) and (Kentucky Smelting Technology, Inc ), both of which have to melt their materials to cast them. There is a third smelting plant in Shelbyville (Ohio Valley Aluminum) which is conveniently right on the rail line and about halfway along the line. Corman's Memphis line division is similarly situated among several aluminum smelters too.

With so many current aluminum plants around and a history of either landfilling or stockpiling this excess material, there should be much work for the new Alreco facility and the three railroads of the region.

All of this without a peep from the EPA or any mention of their “job killing” regulations.

PS, I have not heard Mr McConnell's name spoken in context with this either.

Can Raw Milk Save Local Farming?

2011-12-18T16:45:00.000-05:00

Last week I wrote about the pre-filed bill for the legalization of raw milk which made me research the dairy doings in Kentucky. Looking back at the Community Farm Alliance site archives from July of last year, I somewhat remember the news that our state's dairy farms are continuing a fairly steady decline in number.

Back in 1975 there were 22,000 “operations with dairy cows” which may not mean that they were actual dairies but probably that the milk was sold as part of the farm operations. This year, we are at 892 farms that the state considers dairies or have dairy cows. That was 58 less than last year and it will most likely fall again this year. Of that total under 30 have herds of over 500 head and may be called industrial dairies, all the rest appear to be smaller type farmers and the real producers of local milk.

The idea that Kentucky farms can produce all the milk to be consumed is understandable but the fact that we import some of our retail milk from as far away as New Mexico starts to baffle the mind. Milk that has been shipped that far can easily lose any of the nutrients that may be left after pasteurization and will probably need some supplements added. Doesn't the cost of shipping a product that far enter in to the retail price?

The State tells us to “drink more milk” and the dairy industry keeps saying that “Milk is the real thing” but our dairy farms are literally drying up and blowing away. Past legislative actions to benefit dairies have stalled due to the fear that the fees collected to pay for government loans or grants would have come from surcharges to the retail milk price. We cannot do more for our farmers by removing barriers to business, we have to find ways bill both the farmer AND the consumer for manipulating the free market.

The July article states that a farmer who is able to sell raw milk could ask a premium of about $4 dollars a half gallon but does not state why. Since raw milk sales are not legal, that sales difference is lost to the local farming community. Raw milk sales will not increase the availability or supply of milk but it may allow more farmers to add to the products that they now have. Just another way to add to the farm operations bottom line.

If the annual economic impact of a single milk cow is $4,500.00, then the impact of 10-15 head dairy herds in small communities spread over state will do more that a handful of industrial feedlot dairies, yet it is the big boys who influence regulations and laws. Why shouldn't the 99% of the farmers be “Ky Proud” and not just the 1% of industrial farmers who can buy the designation?

I will end in echoing the comments of the July article which says:

We need a way to allow farmers to dairy on a family-sized scale while rewarding them for responsible herd and land management. This means paying dairy farmers a fair price for what they produce–something that hasn’t happened for decades.

Raw Milk Could Become Legal In Kentucky

2011-12-15T22:39:00.000-05:00

In my interest concerning the availability of good local foods and my passion toward raw milk, I have learned that one of the pre-filed bill for the next legislative session is about the legal sales of raw milk. I know that not everybody shares my love of raw milk but I and my family have come to believe that drinking it has kept us healthier and for those lovers of local foods, it just makes sense.

Local foods is a mantra which has been taken up by many, as is sustainable farming and food security on the local level. That may be what is behind this bill in tis initial form.

The bill, 12RS BR 294, is labeled as “AN ACT relating to milk.” and amends KRS 217C.030 which deals with the Cabinet for Health and Family Services, the part of state government that has control over the production and sale of milk. I have no idea why this is not dealt with in an agricultural department but it is not.

The bill is simple enough, it just adds a new section talking about the legal sales of raw milk and its “permitted" producers. It sounds like something that I have been hoping for for some time now. But, there are always one of those around, anytime you have a simple allowance of something, government bureaucracy will find some way to foul the initial intent.

The first place that convolution can begin to rear its ugly head is the definition of “permitted” producer.

The normal producer of raw milk is, of course, the cow and I don't think that they need a permit but the dairy where the cow lives and the dairyman who milks her probably will. A dairyman is normally also called a farmer and farmers have been the backbone of American agriculture since colonial days. Farmers have supplied their families and the local villages with milk since Medieval times if not before. I believe that it is only since the middle of the last century, when large industrial dairies began to “produce” dairy products and relegated the farmer to the role of “supplier” that permitting became an issue.

The local farmer today, really wishes to grow and sell a good product and allowing an inferior product to leave the farm or potentially harm the consumer is the last situation that they want. Industrial farmers just need to move as much inventory as they can, because it is all about filling the contract and not feeding your friends and neighbors.

Under this new bill, any permitted producer may legally sell raw milk to the end consumer as long as it is at the farm where it is produced. That sounds good but I doubt that many of the industrial dairies would like for the average shopper to see the conditions in which the cows live. It is sometimes vastly different from the bucolic images shown of happy cows and verdant pastures. Some cows never see the light of day or green fields.

On the other hand, the permitting requirements placed upon the local farmer(dairyman) may be so onerous that attempting to comply would entail a full time staff of dozens. This is far from the concept of a small time farm family that conquered the wilderness of America.. Farmers with small or medium sized herds may not be able to meet these currently unwritten regulations.

Given the history of the inspectors of the Cabinet of Health and Family Services and their past demonstrated dislike of the dairymen with cowshare programs, the possible new regulations could surely create problems for the small dairyman.

The proposed new law also requires that all packaging be labeled in such a way that could subtly imply, through wording and “warnings”, that raw milk is inferior to the usual commercial offerings. It has been the experience of those of us who like raw milk, that we need to search out that which we feel is superior and will go the extra mile to get it. Of those I know in the cowshare “families”, we trust our dairymen and realize some of the inherent risk in the bottling process, yet others trust the government inspection system and its highly publicized and all too frequent failures.

Lastly, the bill reiterates that the raw milk may only be sold or sampled on the farm which produced it which puts the smaller sized dairymen at a significant disadvantage compared to industrial dairies and their convenient sales and delivery systems.

There is much to like in this proposed law. It brings to light the increased desire to consume raw milk and the rise in the re-localization of our basic foods. It show a desire on the part of a legislator to legalize what should be freely available, similar to the farmers market expansion we are currently watching happen. It helps bring Kentucky closer to the regulations of other enlightened states concerning local foods. It does many good things but it also falls somewhat short.

There is much to be done which will make this bill better.

Rail Progress And What It Means To Us

2011-12-11T16:06:00.001-05:00

There is an awful lot of talk going on here at the end of the year about what to expect from the railroad industry in 2012. Much of it has to do with further expansion of the freight rail system as we try to come out of this past recession.

Railroad.net is reporting that next year will come with a ton of new jobs and cites the tremendous year that BNSF posted for 2011. Some 700+ jobs in one state alone and 415 of them are new jobs. It looks like we are trying to rebuild some of our decaying infrastructure, though the railroads have been doing a decent job of that in the last few decades.

On the subject of High Speed Rail, at least a couple of the funded projects will begin actual construction in the next year and there is no hope of seeing anything being done close to here.

Inter-modal shipping is picking up in a great way here in America and the railroad are again adding capacity.

The last five years or so have seen several projects to enlarge tunnels and bridges to allow the bigger double stack trains. Norfolk-Southern is preparing to spend $60.5 million over the next two years, add 48 new employees and possibly create 400 other jobs by the end of 2014. Another expansion project could add 50 more jobs in a second location.

In Virginia, the recent holiday weekend saw the demand for Amtrak exceed the current capacity and talk is going around about the increased need in North Carolina. Even our closest Amtrak route along the Ohio River to Chicago or Washington is looking to add another trainset to the mix.

All of the above is happening in other locales, not in Kentucky. Other states are talking about adding some sort of rail facilities, both freight and passenger types. Little is being talked about in Kentucky.

One of the latest off hand comments came from Nick Nicholson, the president of Keeneland. It looks like he wants a light rail line to the track for two months of racing. Oh, and maybe an extension to the airport. I am not sure where he would like it to run and if it would use new or existing track. Maybe he is expecting R. J. Corman to operate it for him. There are numerous logistical problems to solve in that deal. It can be done but it will be a complex deal.

Speaking of Corman and his property, it appears that the Arena Area Arts and Entertainment group thinks that appropriating a necessary portion of a busy, functioning rail yard for an inter-modal passenger transfer station is an easy task. I think that Mr Corman has said that they are not bringing enough money to the table for that to occur.

Local investing in properties which could bring more rail activity is really at a standstill save for the Smucker's people. I have seen where they have purchased several pieces of property adjacent to the existing JIF plant. This gives them about 27 acres in total and space to expand to about double the production. Whether this includes expanded rail sidings I don't know, but anything is possible.

I also have been watching the Lextran situation with their remodel of their garage building. I have heard that the locals are asking for more restoration than redo and upgrade which could cost more than they have in funding. The old GE lamp plant on the other side of Broadway is empty, has plenty of room for a facility and sit on a rail line. Could this be an impetus for Lextran to think about rail.

Hold on, That is just too much wishful thinking. Lets get back to reality and savor the small gains that we are making.

Rupp Area Task Force Base Data - Flawed?

2011-12-07T22:11:00.000-05:00

I would like to thank our friends over at Barefoot and Progressive for putting up the images from the Rupp Area task force report. Some of the renderings are just for show and cannot depict any real form of final idea and others have finally convinced me that the task force may be basing their conclusions on bad data. Lets take a look.

The view of the “freed” Rupp gives a view that could NEVER be seen from the outside as the arena floor would be hidden by the support structure and the attendant side rooms. But we all know that, it is just for show.

The walking distance map from the UK campus indicates just the bare minimum, straight line distance to the campus edge and not the northern residence halls which are a few hundred feet farther. The main campus housing is still at least twice as far as is the Aylesford student housing area. Just a little disingenuous I believe.

I cannot quibble about the scale of the Fayette Mall / Downtown comparison of walking distance, but the downtown image indicates that there is housing located there without showing exactly where. The Park Plaza Apartments and some other downtown housing are strangely missing. The Victorian Square Shoppes, for all the comments about how empty they are, is shown as “big business”comparable to Sears, Macy’s and Dillard’s. Is this really how they think?

I'll skip the “mirroring” concept since it is a very long term thought.

The thought of placing a “Transferia” on an active rail yard, especially one that has seen at least a tripling of activity in the last decade from what it was, leads me to believe that the auto traffic will go through downtown to park so that one can transfer to another mode of transportation. I love the idea of catching a train to Cincinnati or Louisville, but the link to Nashville shows that it goes through Versailles and I know that the line ends there. The Bluegrass Railroad Museum owns the rest, on down to the decrepit Young's High Bridge, and if it did cross the Kentucky River it would go into Frankfort. Apparently there can be no connections to points south on the Norfolk-Southern line.

Then we come the the two images comparing the downtown density of 1907 and today. The basis of the information for 1907 comes from the Sanborn Fire Insurance maps and is quite accurate. It shows the footprints of all the structures,as captured on field surveys. Most of these buildings are two or three usable stories in height and some are just shed style structures. Both Bates and Gang used these same images to look at density, and to good effect. Using footprints alone is one thing but a better measure could be the actual total floorspace of these buildings. Ten to twenty story building replacing the 3-4 floor ones will really increase the density don't you think?

I also realized that many of the buildings in 1907 were fairly good sized livery stables, the parking garages of the day. The map of the current buildings is inconsistent in showing the parking garages, although those with some partial retail/commercial uses are shown in their entirety(one floor of the parking structure beside the 5/3^rd tower and the Victorian Square garage's lower retail). I feel that there is a real slant to the accuracy of information given here.

I doubt that this really skews the base data all that much but if there is this quantity of erroneous data out there, what final recommendation errors are there?

Planning Inertia at 85

2011-12-04T16:36:00.000-05:00

Eighty five years ago, the U.S. Supreme Court heard and decided the landmark case which established zoning as an appropriate tool for controlling and directing the growth of American cities. That same year, Lexington fell in line and created its own Planning Commission and developed a system through which to guide the city's expected growth. Four years later came the first Comprehensive Plan, a detailed guess as to how the city expand and where the needed infrastructure would be built to accommodate such expansion.

1926 is also about the time that I believe Lexington began to get away from the easily navigable and walkable city it once was. I have come to feel that zoning played a big role in making Lexington and most other cities into the suburban sprawl that we see and many of us detest.

According to Edward T. McMahon, in his recent article in Urban Land, “Zoning is merely a tool. It is a means to an end. It can be used constructively as a positive force for community good or it can be misused. Zoning is what you make of it.” and “It is good for protecting what is already there and for preventing nuisances. It is not as good for shaping the future or for improving the quality of new development.”

In fact the above mentioned case, Euclid v Ambler Realty, was brought strictly to preserve the simple and quiet nature of a small village outside Cleveland, Ohio. The Village wanted to prevent the incursion of industrial development into their then simple community. They wanted things to stay the way they were. The irony is that after sitting vacant for a couple of decades, a factory was built on the land as part of the war effort and continued as such for several more decades, probably due to existing zoning.

Zoning codes try to prevent bad things from happening while failing to lay out a vision of how things should be. Early zoning codes were simple and had few levels of each particular land use type. Many zones allowed for interesting mixes of intensity and diversity. Lately, our local codes have become more and more complex with multiple layers of residential, business and industrial zones and sometimes confusing yet similar size, setback and parking requirements. Too often we Americans believe that if a little zoning is good, then a lot of zoning is better. Both in size of development and in the complexity of regulatory requirements.

Lexington, as well as many other American cities, grew quite well for the better part of its history. Starting with residential and some minor commercial activity along its main streets, until they began mimicing the larger, older cities “back east” with their dedicated downtown commercial and societal uses. Usually a persons place of occupation was no more than a few steps from their home, if not located directly within the house itself.

Even as recent as the late 19^th century, stores and manufacturing uses were interspersed with the remaining residential along Main St as shops and lumber yards stood cheek and jowl with churches and carriage makers. There was no zoning but folks seem to have co-existed well enough to grow.

I guess it was the 1870s -1880s when our first ring subdivisions began to spring up when whole farms would be developed. They were mostly residential but nodules of civic and commercial uses seem to be sprinkled about fairly liberally and particularly at the edges. Walking distance from the majority of the housing and along the main roadways. Still, there was no zoning and we all didn't seem to mind. The convenience of the corner store made “going to town” something special.

The invention and rapid expansion in use of the “horseless carriage”, especially after the first World War, and the dramatic shift from an agrarian to a corporate society led to a need to aggregate like people and uses into larger and larger areas. The proponents of zoning felt that this new tool could help direct the inevitable growth which the previous decades indicated was coming.

These previous decades also pointed to the periodic changes in popular desires of the residents. Land uses were allowed to evolve or shift over time and as some neighborhoods, particularly in the lower economic ranges, became available new uses brought a resurgence of activity and life. The introduction of zoning brought the appearance of stability and the assurance that undesirable changes would have to leap many more hurdles than before. The longer that a certain area had been zoned as it was meant that the likelihood of change was diminished. A form of “planning inertia”.

After WWII and the “baby boom” the perceived need to alter and intensify the zoning codes led to a much more suburban model of code than had worked in Lexington's first ring subdivisions. The older neighborhoods were stable and zoning would see to them remaining so. Fancy new shopping “centers” and the automobile(with cheap fuel) made the idea of the corner grocery seem like the “old days”. First there were the interior clusters of retail and eventually the shopping strip along major roadways.

Residentialy, the zoning allowed for sprawling, single floor ranches and some split-levels with wide and deep front yards. Some of them went on for acres and acres and the zoning meant that what was next door was going to be that same. Zoning enertia was not going to let anything change in the suburbs, but a one-size-fits-all scenario brings the same set backs and parking requirements to the older “stable” neighborhoods and that begets change. Areas that at one time were allowed to front the sidewalk and serve the pedestrian residents are now catering to the vehicle and displaying a family asset to the passing world.

The above is why I take exception to the following quote from the article:

“Zoning allows developments to proceed as long as they are consistent with the current uses of the neighborhood commons or in a way that the neighborhood has agreed in advance (through the political process) to allow.”

Edward T. McMahon

Zoning will allow developments to proceed if the are in agreement with the broadly applied community standards but not always with the current uses or the neighborhood commonalities. Maybe zoning codes should be enforced by what the actual neighborhood has agreed upon through the political process. What if the developers were allowed (again) to put in place what the neighbors need without the suburban style parking and set back requirements? Many of the multifamily units in Ashland Park/Chevy Chase can barely distinguished by the general passerby but the same number of units in areas outside New Circle Rd are readily seen as apartment type places. Such places are shunned by families looking for stability in housing.

If zoning is aimed at limiting or possibly preventing, precisely those changes in the use of property that are disruptive of neighborhood character, then they can also limit or prohibit a welcome alteration which may greatly enhance the existing neighborhood character. Inertia of any type can be hard to affect and while social inertia is moving quickly(and picking up speed) our zoning inertia is dragging us back to the mid sixties.

Zoning, it is said, is about balance but it may need a bit more help to get it on its way.

Deja Vu Anyone?

2011-11-16T21:37:00.001-05:00

The city government is now looking atsomething new for their employees, a fresh fruit and vegetable cartin the lobby of the Government Center.

Building on an idea used by the High StY, Councilman Steve Kay is circulating a survey of the city's staffin order to gauge their interest. Kay, a "Y" member, apparently hasrecognized that the idea has merit.

I am unfamiliar with the extent ofvariety or the quantity of the offerings on this produce cart, butthe survey indicates that they will be those items that are “inseason”. A selection of locally grown, and hopefully organicproduce at reasonable prices could be another part of the newwellness aspect of the revamped health care package being promoted.

The first floor of the GovernmentCenter has become a fairly busy place under the Gray administration,what with the Mayors office being moved into the former ballroom. Itremains to be seen what will happen during the holiday season whichused to include many social functions for the staff.

A primary concern may be for thevegetable cart to occupy a lesser used corner of the lobby, but whatif the response is so overwhelming that the offerings, in order tomatch the purchases, grow to an unmanageable size. I assume that itwill be first come - first served, but will they park the deliverytruck out back just for storage?

What if it goes beyond the fruits andvegetables? What else can the city offer to sell to its staff (oranyone else for that matter)? Will the first floor turn into anurban market? I recall seeing a photo of the old City offices beforethey moved to the now departed Municipal Building on Walnut St (now NMartin Luther King). See it here. The old Market house was on theground floor while the City government ran out of the second floor. It was located on the corner of S. Lime and Vine St (opposite thecurrent Phoenix Building) and built before the eastern portion ofVine st was constructed in the early '20s.

Maybe what was old is new again.

A New Face On Residential Land Use?

2011-11-08T23:36:00.000-05:00

The Urban land Institute (ULI) has justabout confirmed it in their recent report What’sNext? Real Estate in the New Economy, ourunsustainable lifestyle of college graduates getting good jobs and aplace of their own, then a starter house while the parents downsizeand the grand-parents move to someplace warm to grow old together. Itwas nice while it lasted but, as evidenced by some long history, itwas an aberration and not a realistic scenario.

We have had a hint of its failure overthe last decade or so. Fewer folks are making the great salaries andbonus packages than used to and the retirements funded by 401(k)s orSocial Security have taken major hits with this latest recession (andeven before). Housing prices and the foreclosures debacle have leftmany without equity or nest egg from which t rise again. Things areNOT going to change over the next decade, even if we come out of thisrecession, so what are you going to do about it?

“To save money, more of us musteither live in larger households or in smaller units.” says theULI. I can tell you that Mrs Sweeper has been saying that forseveral years now. That does mean living in mufti-generationalhouses with the parents living in one area and the grand-parentsliving in another while the working family has the main space. Tomany people today, this sounds more like Communist Europe than thelate 19^th century standard for most of the world.

The current rate of home ownership isway higher than historically shown to be sustainable and must comedown. At the same time the rental market, both smaller units and thelarger complexes will see a rejuvenation and may see huge rate hikesfor the better maintained ones. The ULI report calls for an expected300,00 units annually to be built nationwide and I hope that most ofthem are designed to fit neighborhoods better that he standardcomplex of today.

I don't see why the apartment houses ofthe early 20^th century could blend in so well, yet theones designed after the zoning codes were refined could not. Theapartments of Ashland Park or Chevy Chase do not detract from theneighborhood but the units along Alexandria or Cambridge Drs. Seem soout of place. The larger suburban developments just about screamthat their residents are just temporary. They might as well bestudent housing.

One trend that we have seen lately,especially in the newer off campus student housing around UK, is thethree and four bedroom apartments with a central entertainment roomwith kitchen and separate bed/bath suites for the roommates. Goneare the days of shared bathrooms down the hall like in the dorms. Living off campus is more like living at home and for some it is muchbetter. Perhaps this style of apartment living could work for urbanfamilies, if we could get past the notion that all children need ayard to play in. What is really needed is the pedestrian access torestaurants, cafes, and parks or recreation centers which adds realvalue.

The decline of “McMansionized”housing is well documented but they may not be gone for long. Theymay follow the path of the old style Victorians built in the late19thcentury and be the typical housing of the multi-generational familyculture on the horizon. For a number of our recent immigrants thesituation already exists.

One scenario which exists is that withtightening lending standards, (putting down some equity andexhibiting a sound credit history) the rental market re-emerges tomeet the multifamily demand. The vacancies will fall and the rentswill rise and the institutional investor will re-enter the game. Tokeep these units affordable, many will need to be located around nsitstops and walkable commercial developments. Massive parking lotsaround these apartments will not exist.

Our older citizens will increasinglyfind that, as their financial situations continue to fluctuate theirability to be part of that “gray wave” of seniors relaxing on thebeach or cruising the Caribbean is ebbing away. Many more will beaging in place right here in Lexington.

I, along with many others do not carefor the idea of living in a “retirement community” and wish toremain a part of the whole community. As such, many of the housingunits will have to be age friendly and include the ability ofcommunity social services to be provided. This may be done incondominium or apartment style although single family/duplex arrangements may work.

Now is the time for Lexington to lookat how and where we will begin to take on these challenges. We canlittle afford to believe that keeping the long-time “stable”neighborhoods as exempt from change. All neighborhoods are changing. It is just a question of rate of change. In a matter of years,conditions may change which could swing any neighborhood in anynumber of directions. Plans should be in place to deal with suchchanges.

Which Way Is The Right Way

2011-11-02T13:00:00.000-04:00

There is a lot of posturing being done on the Internet and in the local media concerning the current status of the CentrePointe development. Much of the dialogue centers on the apparent reversal of direction in which the Webb Co. wishes to take and whether it constitutes progress or not. It all began late last month with Beverly Fortune’s Herald-Leader article, which I think that many have misconstrued.

The article leads off with the assertion that our “world famous” guest architect from Chicago has been released from the development. Yet an opening quote, which I assume is correct, says that "She completed her work. She sent her final invoice and it has been paid,". I see that as saying that her contract is done. She was not “fired”. She has completed the work for which she was contractually obligated.

I am sure that the Studio Gang firm is not desperate for work, either here or abroad, and while they may be disappointed, along with several local firms and the other activists, their life will go on. Those here in Lexington seem to be doubly disappointed since their expectations were raised to such a level without knowing the details of the contract under which Studio Gang was hired. Now the locals see no hope of getting what they want or were led to expect.

I have always been told that nothing occurs in a vacuum and certainly other events were taking place during this time, which directly affect downtown and this development. The Arena Arts and Entertainment Task Force has, during this time, been studying the Lexington Center Corp. property and the possible redevelopment or enhancement of it. Similarly the Lexington Visitor and Convention Bureau was analyzing the possible need for expanded convention facilities. Both of these processes have been done outside the intense scrutiny of us mere mortals.

A number of recommendations from the preliminary report the AA&E task force include many unfunded, pie in the sky, facilities which are largely aimed at satisfying a local need. The data from the LVCB report, presented in August 2011, focused on the desires and needs of those who may wish to come here for conventions and such. Both reports have been prepared by well known and respected folks and surprisingly arrived at some identical, basic changes in the existing physical arrangements of Lexington Center/Rupp Arena.

One item that did come to light, and something that many of us here think little about, is the apparently very real desire of larger conventions to assemble in Central Kentucky. We saw a brief glimpse of it during the WEG and the eventual glowing stories in the international press. People liked what they saw when they visited and many will look for good reasons to come back, especially if it can be written off as a business expense. Conventions will give that reason. Now we have to accommodate them and hotel space/meeting space looks to be our limiting factor.

If we do need the increased convention space, then the idea floated by the original CentrePointe plan and not the boutique hotel concept pushed by the Mayor (and picked up by the Herald-Leader) may be the prudent path to take. The LVCB report suggests that maybe a second such hotel could be needed. If the AA&E group is serious about extending the downtown axis on the western side of Rupp and adding facilities, then we may have a location for our second convention hotel.

Dudley Webb has told several others, as revealed by TV news reports, that there is a newer contract with Studio Gang which has not been fully negotiated for further work here in Lexington. We may still get our “starchitect” building and it may be a boutique hotel, but I don’t believe it will be in the center of town.

2011-11-01T08:07:00.001-04:00

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Hail! Hail! The Gang Is NOT Here

2011-10-27T23:13:00.000-04:00

Here we go again.

Today's news brings us the report that Jeanne Gang has completed her work for the Webbs. She has been paid and the euphoria, that swept through Lexington back in July, has given way to the gray clouds of the approaching Winter season. Many will obviously blame the stuffy, old conservatives of our city for rejecting the "bold" and "innovative" thinking of a Chicago architect, but others will again sigh a brief breath that maybe common sense is returning to downtown development. I wonder if we will get what downtown Lexington needs or what a number of folks (without a financial stake in it) feel would be good for our urban area.

I remember the royal flap that went on over the "boiler plate" economic study draft that was presented which appeared to be a cut and paste job applicable to many mid-sized cities, yet we still hear of a desire for a boutique hotel and enhanced art and entertainment offerings which could keep us on par with Louisville or Cincinnati. I guess that the Gratz Park Inn does not count on the one hand and the literal explosion of downtown activity which has transpired since the demise of The Dame on the other.

There are people who follow the trends of the convention business and I guess that they see a need for more space in Lexington, even if you or I do not. Mrs. Sweeper has even told me that we don't have that many conventions here, but I think that she is missing the weekly notices that the Herald-Leader lists each Monday. She may also be considering a group of 300-400 to be less than a "convention". I keep seeing good sized groups of folks leaving the Lexington Center wearing name badges and carrying he obligatory satchel or backpack full of goodies, so we do have a fairly steady flow of conventioneers coming to town. Do we need more room for larger conventions, I have no idea.

I took a good long look at the sign which has stood on the block for well over a year and noticed that the J.W. Marriott name is still proudly displayed there. They seem to think that it was an excellent idea back then and I doubt that they have changed their minds for the long haul, though there may be some blips in the short term. I also do not see Dudley coercing them into something just so another bland building can rise from the rich limestone soil. (I think that the limestone richness was wrested from that location nearly 200 hundred years ago.)

The sad part of all of this is the fate of the four other architecture firms who were chosen to participate in the lesser structures. They were going to bring some fresh, new ideas to the streetscape. We will be left with just one firm who, no doubt, will continue to spread their "signature" style across the urban landscape. The EOP style is distinctive and readily recognizable, whether it be an artistic bus stop, a downtown condo block or a satellite facility of a mega church. Much like the often used (some say overused) model of the elementary schools of the '70s from Johnson/Romanowitz, we may find that their style will appear dated sometime in the near future.

So, here we are, back at nearly the same spot which we found ourselves just about a year ago. Still waiting for an acceptable design and financing (I still think that it is a sure thing) and excavation to begin. The Gang gang is gone and the Mayor is embroiled in some serious situations at City Hall. We hear that the economy is improving, but I cannot prove that from my bank account. Downtown is looking better but there is still much to do.

Maybe, in a few weeks, we will have another wave of euphoria to get us through the winter.

If They Can Create Jobs, Let Them Start Now

2011-10-16T12:55:00.000-04:00

I voted for the first time in 1968. I guess that you can do the math but I've been voting for a long time.

For as long as I can remember, the candidates have always been saying what they will do for the American public once they get into office. I have voted for some strictly on that basis and, like the majority of you, I have been disappointed on more than one occasion. Many times it was that I was wanting a different direction than the majority. Sometimes, the winner just did not do what he promised and others, the victor was hampered at every step by the opposite party. My greatest disappointments come when they just can't get the job done.

This year, in both the gubernatorial and presidential campaigns, our candidates seem to be finding more flaws with their opponent/s than actually solving the problems at hand. In last night's presidential debate, all of the speakers told of their grandiose plans to right the government, create jobs and lower taxes, all without losing any of the gains in our American lifestyle or costing anyone any more money.

Multiple strategies and multiple directions which arrive at the same point, low unemployment and good, high paying jobs.(i.e. full recovery from this recession). I would think that most economists think that this can not be done but economists are not running for President.

These debates serve the function of job interviews and allow the candidates to showcase their qualifications and accomplishments. It is too bad that they gloss over he details of how and focus on the broad statements of a job well done while leaving out the facts to support them. One thing that they all agree on is that we need to get Americans back to work, paying taxes and growing the economy. It just has to happen AFTER they get into office. The Obama administration cannot get any of the credit for any job creation.

I have been on both sides of job interviews before and have always been more impressed by the ones who had really done something lately and not he ones resting on way past performances.

Since the election is still over a year away and we need the jobs right now, maybe we should make part of the contest a real race to see which one will create the most jobs in the next 12 months. They each have a plan which they will be allowed to implement but only if the follow the same rules. They can not use public funds of any kind, they can not use tax breaks or incentives to lure jobs and they can not poach existing jobs from other areas in the U.S. The end result should be an unemployment rate of less than 5%. The candidate with the highest total of jobs to which he can be directly linked by the end of October 2012 should be declared the winner by acclamation.

Help Preserve Our Food Freedom

2011-10-02T22:00:00.000-04:00

The government is well on its way totaking away another of your fundamental rights. Soon, you may nothave the right to enter into a legally binding contract with justanyone for the reasons of your mutual agreement. You may have to geta governmental agency to allow you to do so.

Last month, a DaneCounty, Wisconsin Circuit Courtjudge ruled that people in Wisconsin do NOT have the right to own anduse a dairy cow or a dairy herd. That is ludicrous on its very face.

Wisconsinhas long been known as “America's Dairyland” and so much so thatit has been emblazoned on their license plates for years. The localsup there are known as “cheeseheads” because of all the dairyproducts. But these people are now being told that they have noright to sell the milk that they obtain from all the vast dairy herdsin that state. Since corporations are now classified as “people”,even they do not have the basic right to use cow's milk as they seefit.

Throughouthistory and particularly American history, we have been told that thepioneers went west with their families and their animals to settlethe frontier. Cows milk was a very staple of that trek since therewere no local grocery there at the time. Little did they know thatthey were breaking the law of a state yet to exist.

TheCourt also ruled that having a private contract does not fall outsidethe the scope of the States' police power and therefore the State cantell you that any contract is “null and void” in its entirety orin part. Does this sound like a State where you would like to live?

Finally,the Court ruled that the DATCP [Wisconsin Department of Agriculture,Trade and Consumer Protection] . . . had jurisdiction to regulate theZinniker Plaintiffs' conduct. This appears to be the same directionthat the FDA is heading on the national level.

Thisis not just a Wisconsin problem nor is it solely related to raw milk,this is about food freedom and food security. With poor economictimes upon us and likely to get worse we must all now plan for ourfood safety and security. I think that leaving food safety to thelarge agri-businesses will make us more susceptible to the massivefood recalls which have populated ti news of late. These recallshave only grown larger and more frequent with the consolidations ofthe mega farms concept and the agricultural lobbying done by a selectfew corporations.

Thisis why I now urge you to support HR 1830 currently making its waythrough the House. I may not agree with all that Ron Paul advocatesbut this is one that we all need to back. The key points of thisbill are:

We believe that there is a fundamental right to produce and consume the foods of our choice including raw milk.
We believe the federal ban against transporting raw milk for human consumption across state lines is a violation of our rights.
We should be free to obtain raw milk from sources outside our own states' borders.
We demand the termination of an unjust law that interferes with the exercise of our legal right to consume raw milk.
We support passage of HR 1830 into law - a bill that would effectively end the interstate ban.

Ifyou agree with me, please sign the online petition to support HR1830. Go to www.farmtoconsumer.org/hr1830andthen help spread the word. I think that our food future depends onit.

Willl American Industry Step Up?

2011-09-26T23:17:00.000-04:00

Lately, the President has brought forth a new effort to get people working again. One of the more local public works jobs, which would really create jobs, is the rebuilding of the Brent Spence Bridge from Northern Kentucky to Cincinnati, Ohio. Now, all we have to do is sell this idea to Congress.

Back in the day, Congressmen used to have "knock down - drag out" battles over which one would get a job creating (pork barrel) project like this. Many of the projects were just to get jobs and not do anything else, but this will replace an aging structure which carries roughly twice the traffic it was designed to carry. This is a real economic development project which will impact the entire region. Not only does this bridge connect Cincinnati with its southern half of the metro area, it holds Interstate 75 and Interstate 71. I -75 is one of the most heavily traveled Interstates in the eastern half of the country.

The Brent Spence Bridge carries traffic flowing from Detroit to Miami, from Chicago to Atlanta and from New Orleans to Cleveland/Pittsburgh. That could easily be one fifth of all highway freight traffic in the eastern U.S. Existing rail infrastructure will not allow the railroads to pick up the slack and the Ohio and Mississippi rivers are limited in just how far they can reach and the aging lock system.

Other Interstate bridges are beginning to show similar wear and tear, as evidenced by the Sherman Minton Bridge of I-64, from Louisville to Southern Indiana.

Why, in a time of high unemployment, should two of the most powerful members of Congress, Mitch McConnell and John Boehner, who just happen the represent the states on either side of this important highway link feel that pushing this project forward is wrong. Is it because this is a public works project expected to cost billions? Would it be due to the timing being under a Democratic president? Both Brent Spence and Sherman Minton were Democratic Congressmen, so the Republicans cannot assist in their repair/replacement?

Maybe these types of construction projects should be funded by the folks who use them the most. Maybe time has come when we the American taxpayer should let the American consumer pay for Interstate repairs. Have any of our American corporations (the ones sitting on well over $2 trillion in cash) come forward to pay for the infrastructure which allows their businesses to thrive? The trucking industry and independent truckers pay hefty fuel taxes and usage fees in order to keep the goods rolling and private autos pay their fair share of gas taxes, yet the Federal Highway Trust Fund is still shrinking to the point that it cannot pay for all necessary repairs. Clearly, there needs to be a better way.

As Rob Morris pointed out the other day in his new blog CivilMechanics, jobs are created when there is a demand for goods or services. He is dead on in his assessment this time. The Interstate bridges are in disrepair, so there is a need. Construction jobs are becoming very hard to come by, so there is a need. Government funds will only add to the mounting deficit, so there is a need (to not add more debt). People on both sides of the river still have to get to the jobs that they still have, so the need is there.

The needs are many and the funds are few, so when will American industry step up to the plate?

An Entertainment District Saturation Point?

2011-09-05T16:30:00.002-04:00

For many years, we have followed the mantra of "build interesting retail and the folks will flock to it" in trying to rejuvenate our downtown. It is not just here in Lexington but all across the country. We did it when we built the Lexington Center and we are doing it today. Build the retail and the people will come.

Back in the '60s, when we came to realize that our downtown was losing it luster, we tended to blame crime, outmoded buildings and the daily problems of traffic congestion (usually exacerbated by the railroad running through town). Our solution was to partake of the new federal program of Urban Renewal and rid ourselves of the eyesores and trouble spots.

First, the trains had to go.

Rail traffic was waning particularly passenger rail traffic. 1960 saw the fall of Union Station and eight years later the tracks were ripped up. One of America's life giving arteries was bypassed with the Interstate and New Circle Rd. and the industries felt the need to be near the new artery. Many special use buildings could not be re purposed and they fell into disrepair. The activity and the vitality that they used to bring to the area simply ceased to be.

Then, getting into and out of town had to be made easier.

With the railroad gone, the former alignment became a prime location to east-bound part of a one-way couplet of streets to expedite traffic flow. New Circle had been built to allow traffic to bypass downtown (especially for long haul trucks and cars) but now the new Main and Vine setup made it easier to get into and out of downtown proper. It also made it easier to get through town and with little to stop for, that is what people did.

Downtown, the financial and legal center of Fayette County.

The area immediately around the (now old) Court House slowly evolved from businesses to banks and lawyer's offices. The banks grew and grew, always moving into larger and larger buildings while the lawyers took space in whichever parts were not taken by others, as long as they were a short walk from the Courts. Finding lunch which did not come from a lunch counter or a high end restaurant was a challenge. So much so, that I usually left downtown to get lunch and then get back. Several building resorted to furnishing their own cafeterias for their staff, they were very much a wasted space for much of the day.

We'll build a focal point, a cultural focal point.

The early '70s found the University's Memorial Coliseum straining at the seams for every home basketball game. Lexington needed a prime tenant for a new civic arena to which we could attract conventions and concerts. On paper it made sense, so much sense that everyone else was doing it too. We also had to allow plenty of space for the local retail to develop where they would take advantage of the increased foot traffic. By eliminating the possibility of obnoxious or unsavory business in the area, folks would flock to this focal point in droves. I think that we made our mistake when we removed the existing residential for parking and then refused to convert said parking to any retail use. Take away your customer base and fail to build in services, what do you think will happen? We ended up with a great place to play (and watch) basketball and little else.

National championships and sprucing up.

Lexington (and Rupp Arena) was one of the last of the smaller communities and arenas to be chosen for the NCAA Men's Basketball championships and in the early '80s there was a flurry of activity to get downtown ready for 1985. We needed another downtown hotel and while we were at it some more office space, so we got started on the World Trade Center block and eventually the Festival Market building.

The idea of festival markets was in full bloom at that time and many major cities wanted to have one. Most of them were built to augment a local popular or natural feature so as to make it a focal point. Ours was built AS the focal point to go along with Rupp Arena which, though well used, was being by-passed by many of the conventions and major concerts. Retail shops on the first two floors and a food court on the third and an indoor carousel forced one to walk through the shops to get to the food and get back to work. Conversely, the Quincy Market (one of the first) in Boston was set up just the opposite way. The retail was overpriced and of such a mix that many failed to make it through the early years and eventually the whole place went under.

A little farther away on E. Main St., the World Coal Tower( a 50 story dream of Wallace Wilkinson) also failed and the City quickly stepped in to create a temporary park on the property and had dreams of building an Arts district around the Main and Lime intersection. They acquired (with State help) and demolished some older retail buildings and then waited for the patrons on art to donate toward some magnificent project. We are still waiting.

The NCAA Tournaments went well but nothing of such prominence has been held in Rupp since.

Events and festivals.

In the past decade or so, the focus has been on drawing the folks from the suburbs downtown, and especially on days when there is little else going on. A downtown Farmer's Market on Saturdays or Second Sunday bike activities where one can park close to the action and then escape quickly. It still forced those attending to drive to and from any event.

One bright spot has been the evolution of the Thursday Night Live series and the Gallery Hop Fridays. Both events begin before most people leave downtown yet last long enough that others may join the fun once they get home from work. It also helps that more downtown residential has been built for those who want to live downtown, but units for folks who have children or need more than two bedrooms are in very short supply. With more residential will come the demand for more retail and not the other ay around.

So, what now?

We have a new pavilion in Cheapside and a growing list of restaurants and bars along Main and Short streets. From Victorian Square to the Esplanade, just about all new retail is some sort of entertainment establishment and that may not be a good thing. What is the saturation point for the downtown entertainment district? How will we know that we have too many restaurants and bars? Can we build a downtown on just an entertainment district or do we need other shops and services? If we can get folks to live downtown, will they still have to go to the malls to get simple needs other than food and drink?

Just last week, I heard that the Skybar may go the way of Bakers's 360 and for the same reasons. But their place will be filled with the Parlay Social (a Prohibition lounge) and the Henry Clay Pub to be opened at 112 N. Upper St. (next door to Lexpark offices).

Is there a saturation point?

Park(ing) Day Is Coming Up

2011-08-27T21:29:00.000-04:00

This year I am getting ahead of this.

I have written about this annual event before but always after the fact.

Park(ing) Day is scheduled for Friday, Sept. 16, 2011 and that is just over three weeks away. Park(ing) Day is when you can take over a parking space for the day and turn it into your idea of useful urban space. More information is available here as well as a downloadable license (pdf).

I don't know that Lexington has participated in this annual event before but I cannot think that some of you folks will not try it sometime. We have some very fine parks here in Lexington and many of you will probably agree that there is a large unused park right in the middle of town, but this is your chance to create your very own park for a day.

I would not go for placing one in the Hamburg Pavilion lot or even along Southland Drive. Chevy Chase shopping center or Meadowthorpe seem like more appropriate candidates. Downtown would give you the most exposure, but who wants to set up right on Vine St?

So, who wants to set an urban park in a parking slot for a day? Let me know where yours is and I will try to get as many photos as I can and will post them here.

Get ready, Park(ing) Day is coming.

Are You Driving Less?

2011-08-24T21:52:00.000-04:00

The New York Times is saying that we, as a nation, are driving less than we used to. Here in Lexington, I am not sure that is the case.

The Times is basing its conclusion on the weekly gasoline report put out by MasterCard in what the call the Spending Pulse. The gasoline report is one of several reports which look at the transactions gathered from around the country.

Demand for gasoline is down and, according to the report, falling rather steeply. As of Aug. 19, the weekly demand is off 4.2% compared to a year ago and 0.8% compared to last week. I don't think that it is due to high prices as the national averages there are declining also. While up over last year, the prices have fallen 4 cents from the week before and the price for oil itself is falling recently.

America is consuming at least two million barrels of gas per week than we did last year. Did we just quit taking our Sunday drives or are we driving more fuel efficient autos? Did we stop driving to work or are we making more efficient trips when we do? Lexington streets still look like they are clogged with traffic at the same times every day and it still take a while to get across town during rush hour, so are WE driving less or are others doing a better job than we are?

The Times concludes that, as an economic indicator, less gasoline pumped = fewer miles driven and economic activity has declined.I think the we have just decided to quit wasting so much of it and we are better off for it.

What do you say? Are you driving less these days?

Some Of Today's Gleanings

2011-08-12T21:52:00.001-04:00

Just a few things that we picked up this week.

As we all know, the W. Short Street corridor has become the hotbed of activity and dining lately and is the de facto heart of Lexington's entertainment these days. The Fifth Third Pavilion has been a catalyst as well as the demolition of the CentrePointe block, and things are not done yet.

A new sign went up on the building at the corner of Short and Broadway announcing the anticipated opening of Shakespeare & Co. While I have heard about this for almost a year, this is a little firmer indication of another fine dining experience in downtown. Visiting the website menu really makes me wish that it was just a little closer to being open.

Shakespeare & Co. began in the Dubai, United Emirates in 2000 and has grown to nine in Dubai, several in Abu Dhabi as well as Syria, Qatar, Bahrain and other international locations. On Monday, June 06, 2011, a U.S. federal trademark registration was filed for SHAKESPEARE AND COMPANY. This trademark is owned by Edward T. Saad, and a mailing address of Lexington, KY 40507 and remodeling work has been ongoing for longer than that. This will be another welcome addition to Lexington.

On the other end of the corridor we have the former site of Mia's which has also been undergoing some construction work. The roll-off dumpster is gone and the facade has been painted, so something is going on. I recently heard that a former chef from Bakers 360-the casualty of being at the top of a building and alienated from the street- is planning to open sometime this fall. I am continuing to gather information.

Mia's, of course, took their revised concept across from the Soundbar on South Limestone and are joining the college crowd just in time for school to start. Ole Hooker's Bait n Tackle Bar n Grille apparently has been working the kinks out over the summer and is now ready to roll.

Speaking of exciting corridors for new dining and entertainment, I cannot leave out what is happening on Jefferson St. Stella's, Nick Ryan's and Wine + Market are now joined by the Apiary catering company (who also want to add a sit down restaurant) and a burger joint where Cuppa: used to be. The Green Tavern is still doing well with the Transy. crowd but I hear that even bigger thing may be in the works.

In anticipation of the BCTCS campus being occupied soon, I hear that Alltech (the WEG sponsor) is looking to do something with the old Rainbo bakery building at the intersection of Sixth and Jefferson. Some sort of adaptive mixed use which would include a restaurant and some retail. The Coolavin Apts. may change to student housing and with the park right there(so is the Hope Center) there is certainly a way to bridge the railroad tracks so that they could get to school safely. Alltech would be clearly looking ahead.

Several blocks away at Sixth and Lime, of course, is Al's Bar and if all of this takes place, just think of the trolley loop that could be created for a decent "pub crawl".

So, there you have it. Any thoughts?

Welcome To The New Reality.

2011-08-08T23:48:00.000-04:00

It has been a while since I have posted but there have been so many things going on.

The debate in Washington about the "crisis" of the long term debt problem has everyone quarreling about how one side has let the other down. That there will be no let up in the demand that we live within our means, that continue to grow more and more meager everyday.

The TEA Party and many of the Republicans state that we are a nation of people who should be self reliant who will rebuild our nation from the ground up. Very many of those same folks cannot even feed themselves should the grocery stores fail to receive their truckloads of supplies.

The American people have become more and more reliant on the Highway Trust Fund (HFT) to finance the road infrastructure in America and that Fund is reliant on the Federal Gas Tax. Our demands that our car get better gas mileage and that we keep fuel prices low, and especially, the demand that we NOT increase the gas tax, have rendered the HTF insufficient to repair, much less expand, the national road system.

Now we hear that most of the 18.4-cent tax per gallon of gasoline set to expire Sept. 30th. That is at the end of the Federal fiscal year. If the wrangling over extending this is as rancorous as the debt ceiling issue, we may not have a gas tax this time next year. The individual states would have to enforce their own increases and allocate for their own highways. 50 different ways of calculating the fees, 50 different methods of collecting it and 50 versions of allocating toward transportation projects. This could have a devastating effect on the trucking industry.

States which currently have a sparse population could see their highways wither away and become dirt roads. Parts of states with larger cities (think of the area from Washington, DC. to Boston) may get their roads paved but the paths to other portions of the state may be just that - paths. Lexington, Louisville, Bowling Green and Northern Ky could see all the road growth - or we could actually see regional rail.

But what if we followed the lead of Mitch and Rand and did not raise the fuel taxes in any way? The Federal government could then no longer help us, nor could the State. Each individual would have to fend for themselves. Rugged individualism would have to be instilled in all of us. Can't you just see it now, Mad Max right here in Central Kentucky? No, somehow I think that we would all have to cooperate and pull together.

Melissa Lafsky has it right when she says that "our inability to raise the gas tax is at the heart of our economic decline" . We want to cut taxes on all the wrong things. We only tax about 60% of the total tax base and that is leaving a lot of cash on the table.

Today, the City of Williamstown granted tax breaks to the creationist theme park to the tune of 75% over thirty years in addition to the $40 million in incentives from the State. If this project is not good enough to go it alone, then why do it at all? I'm just saying that that is a lot of money for something which may be dated and faded in 30 years, then need new incentives to "freshen" it up - or replace it.

The hard liners on not raising taxes are adamant that they will not inflict higher taxes on corporations. The same corporations who are sitting on $2.5 trillion in liquid cash and not expanding or hiring because they don't have local customers. Those local customers are not showing demand for products because unemployed(or underemployed) folks cannot pay for stuff. Nor can they borrow the funds to pay for things.

So, the final results are, private industry will not create jobs, the Government is not allowed to create jobs, the gas tax will not pay for transportation construction jobs, the social safety net jobs will be reduced and our rugged individuals will rebuild America.

Welcome to the new reality.

Are We Really No. 6

2011-07-25T21:52:00.000-04:00

So, Kiplinger's has sent a reporter to Lexington - or better yet, a Senior Associate Editor - and soaked up the essence that makes Lexington a No. 6 city for best value as a place to live. I am glad that they focus their magazine on finances because they missed it on geography. Lexington is NOT a Northern Kentucky city. We, and our metro area are very definitely Central Kentucky, North Central, but very Central Ky.

I don't know how long this editor stayed in town but I will wager that she was escorted around by a member of Commerce Lexington. She has the wording of the advertising brochures down pat. The part about keeping the small-town feel while believing that we are the center of the horse farm world, the basketball world, the Southern charm world and just about any other world that you could think of. Don't get me wrong, we have an impact in all of them but we do not drive what happens in those worlds, we just go with the flow.

Healthcare and the new expanded hospital is a good thing and the University is the largest employer, but the divide between the professionals and the rest of our "diversified" work force is very stark. A few haves and many have-nots exist side by side here in Lexington, and a few more have-nots every day. Lexmark, though a major company, is not a huge local employer.

Her comments on physical growth and the self imposed limitations on Fayette County's rural lots sizes do not reflect the thoughts of home buyers, as the cost of real estate here is higher but when averaged with the rest of the metro area will become affordable. Such affordable housing is much harder to find in Lexington proper.

She also implies that the city is buying pastureland, but the PDR is only buying the development right of said pastureland ( from the folks who would not be allowed to develop it in the first place).

She describes downtown fairly accurately and notes some of the successes and hopes for the future, although her characterizations of the events at Cheapside only point out how few and seldom that they occur. I still feel that any private group should be able to rent the facility for a fund raiser or get together along the same lines as renting a park shelter in some of the parks. We should not believe that all functions are to supplied by the city.

Her housing costs appear to be solely for Lexington and not for the rest of the metro area and as someone who has looked for a place with FOUR bedrooms and a family of 4-5, such places are very hard to find in that limited range. Not all households are young professionals or retired couples but the small family types who WANT to live downtown are priced out of the market.

"Why its fun" We have Keeneland and the University of Kentucky Wildcats basketball to cheer for. Keeneland for six weeks a year and basketball for 3 months (if you can get a ticket) and each event totals about 23,000 souls at a time. UK football boasts nearly 2.5 times that number but only 8 times a year. From there, when you take away the dining and drinking around town, most folks find that there is precious little that is affordable to hold their interest.

Lastly, to the mayors comment "wears itself like a loose jacket, it’s not so sophisticated that it’s predictable. We’re not pretending to be something we’re not.”. We may not be sophisticated but we are predictable and we are ALL pretending to be that which we are not. Some pretending downward and some pretending upward, but pretending just the same.

The Property That Southland Didn't Take

2011-07-20T20:26:00.000-04:00

I heard today of another investigation into the possible uses of the old Todd's Trace Apartments, or what is now known as the Pennington Place dump. This would make about the fifth time that someone has asked about the property and what could be done to redevelop it.

Since it has been basically abandoned for several years now, all the apartments have been broken into and at least two complete buildings destroyed by fire, there is no way that it could be rehabbed and the only solution is to start with a clean slate.

I have given my thoughts on how the area should have been redeveloped when I wrote this back in January. Unfortunately the church is proceeding with its plan and there is not another large religious entity set to do something similar. I also do not want another large piece of tax revenue generating property to be designated as tax-free as long as our city needs the funds as the do. No, somebody rally has to make this a viable development for both the city's and their sake.

What makes this so tough to work with is the lack of easy access to the major roadways. I still think that, at some point, the dependance on the personal automobile will be removed and since this location is at the intersection of two main roads and it is a straight shot to downtown, some sort of mass transit will suffice for most new urbanists who may live that far out.

Still, today's urban developers are not that forward looking and a quicker access is desired in order to work a deal. The property is hemmed in by two, less than stellar areas, the business along Woodhill and the declining neighborhood of duplexes and townhomes with a growing reputation for crime, and a successful shopping area on Richmond Rd. Residential, and especially up-scale residential, without a different orientation and access would be a hard sell in this location.

So many of late seem to think that the current design process for the CentrePointe block will bring about a winning solution and a certain Herald-Leader columnist and blogger believes that we should apply a similar one to the Lexington Center redesign, so should we get the mayor involved and do something here? How about some suggestions from you, my readers.

What would you place in this difficult redevelopment area? Remember, the church took a similar sized chunk of apparently unneeded commercial land so a shopping center may not be viewed as possible. The French Quarter hotel works, but do we need another series of lodging units, either extended stay or otherwise? Give me your ideas and I will post them and send them on to the mayor.

First The Trains, Then The Planes, Then The Roads?

2011-07-19T23:58:00.000-04:00

Back in August of 2009, I wrote a piece about a little known Federal program called the Essential Air Service in which the government reimburses major airlines to serve smaller rural communities. This year it runs to the tune of nearly $200 million and still our air carriers claim that they cannot make any money. Today, Delta Air Lines announced that it “can no longer afford” to serve 24 of the rural airports that they picked up in the merger with Northwest Airlines.

From what I can gather, it is not all about the corporate decisions to leave folks high and dry but the "style" in which these passengers desire plays a factor. Everybody, I guess, wishes that their airport be a modern and useful airfield, with the latest in air comfort and speed, but when you cannot fill the existing seats of the propeller type planes - then you will not fill a larger regional JET. Nor can you fly to the 29 major hubs from just Anyplace, USA and expect to get good slots in the landing pattern.

The Essential Air Service subsidies are slated to expire in 2013 unless Congress decides to extend them but in this current fiscal state I would not hold my breath on that. The current Republican strategy is to cut out anything that does not help corporations but may do some good for the common man. The highways that we cannot maintain will have to do for these 24 cities and probably a similar number next year - and the year after.

This is also just one decision made by one airline, how many more will be coming in the days ahead? Deregulation was supposed to free up the airline industry to be responsive to the market demands and to foster more competitive scheduling and pricing. The Essential Air Service subsidies were to equalize the opportunities for the rural cities which could not run with the big dogs, but also could not stay on the porch. If things continue as they have in the past five years, even the big dogs may not be running like they have been.

Many of these small cities got a big boost from the railroad systems and some of them owe it all to the railroads. These railroads brought life into a lot of places in the expanding western territories. For years they were THE way for people to come and go for long distance travel.. The automobile and the airplane helped bring those days to an end, so what is expected when these modes are no longer economically viable? When the rural areas no longer have air service and the states and federal government can no longer build and maintain the roads. What will we have then?

Other countries are considering (and building) systems of high speed rail with feeder routes of more moderate speed which connect to the more rural communities there. Somehow, that doesn't fit in with our concept of a modern world... yet.

A Cowshare- Business As Usual?

2011-07-18T21:35:00.001-04:00

The cowshare program to which I belong is having a bit of difficulty lately.

The whole thing dates back to when the health authorities in Ohio and Kentucky along with their Federal counterparts began harassing the farmer for delivering what the cow owners were expecting, just plain, raw milk.

Cowshares work a little differently from a normal dairy whereas the farmer sells shares of his cows to a group of people. Very much like a syndicate would own a race horse or other property. They then pay for the maintenance and care of the property and receive a dividend of the product which results. For a racehorse that would be a share of the purses won but in dairy cows it would be the milk produced. That is produced daily. For me, my two shares result in two gallons every week Sometimes it is sufficient, sometimes it is too much.

Our farmer is an Anabaptist from Mississippi who raises cow and other farm animals for the simple joy of producing the highest and best quality food that people can buy. To him, farming is not a business where the bottom line is profit or loss, it is a living where he can work hard, provide for his family and others and do what the Creator put us here to do.

This mindset and philosophy runs contrary to the general direction of the world today and that is where the cowshare program begins to have difficulty. Several years ago, when they were located in Northern Kentucky and the harassment took place, our local agencies sought to remove this type of program and/or force it to be like all the other agri-businesses. Despite all the talk of the movement toward locally grown food or the organic foods movement, the state and federal governments only want them to conform to the big business model. Our farmer was forced to sell the existing farm(at a loss), file bankruptcy, move the herd and establish themselves on a leased farm. In effect, to start over.

Again, our farmer (and we of the cowshare program by extension) are being forced to look for a new location. A location where the farmer can put down roots and continue to provide the nutritious food that we members want and expect. This is whee it becomes real difficult. Because of the current financial situation, banks are not willing to lend to farmers who are not really operating as a business, the ones just getting by but still paying the bills. Trying to operate within such a narrow, confining box is proving very difficult for us all.

Our farmer reminds me of a Mennonite, although I guess that he could be called a "Mennonite Lite" as he drives a truck and they do use the Internet, and the way they approach farming is somewhat reminiscent of the Amish.

I actually learned today that the Amish population in America is growing (10%) and growing even better in Kentucky (15%) in the last two years. Studies reveal that new Amish settlements are established about once every three weeks. The states of Pennsylvania, Ohio and Delaware which are usually known for their Amish communities are actually losing out to states like Kentucky and New York. The truly unfortunate part of the foregoing information is that roughly only 10% of the Amish today receive their primary income from farming.

Might they be another example of how our big business before farming attitude is eroding the country?

Again With The Grocery Stores

2011-06-30T21:40:00.000-04:00

Grocery stores are in the news again.

The Business Lexington recently broke the news that I have been sitting on for a few days so I guess it is okay to talks about now. The Kroger store in Chevy Chase has had a parking problem for lo these many years. About as many years as since the returned to a Chevy Chase location. As they made the stores bigger, the problem just got bigger too.

The first building that I remember on this property was a Colonial Alber's grocery store and, like Kroger, they sat back off the street with parking in the front. At that time, the entire block of Lafayette (now Marquis) Ave. was filled with houses and commercial businesses had yet to encroach. This and a sister store on Southland Dr were their only foray into the Lexington market. Built in the mid 'fifties, in ten years they were gone.

Masters TV & Appliances had moved from the present Charlie Browns spot and stayed until a Higgin's KRI branch opened. Neither one lasted very long. Then came the Piece Goods Shop, a fabric and sewing store, which lasted until the very early '70s.

Kroger, which had had a presence in Chevy Chase since before the war (WWII), had moved to the 500 block of S. Upper St., then decided to return, tore down the old building and (if I recall correctly) brought the building a bit closer to the sidewalk squeezing the parking a little in order to bring in the delivery trucks to the rear. Over the years, they have had two expansions and have approached their 40,000 sq. ft. limit for the B-1 zone. Parking and the increase in population/area from which they draw has become a greater and greater mismatch, even after they acquired additional property.

A possible solution, placing the parking on the roof. Hey, why not, it has been done successfully in Florida. (I guess that goes along with Florida's own Fark tag.) My feeling is that the engineering and the space necessary for the ramps up and down is going to be too costly and that it might be better to excavate for all the mechanical, food prep and offices. That would leave much more of the ground floor for sale area.

I like the idea if it being right up on the sidewalk (10 feet back)and a possible cafe style seating area. Even a art style bus stop could be designed into the facade. Bring back the old type display windows and an awning and you have the urban feel of the rest of Chevy Chase. It does seem strange to be talking about parking solutions in such a walkable neighborhood as this is.

The title does say stores - plural - so what is the other one.

A legal ad in the Wednesday Herald-Leader stated the intention of applying for a couple of liquor licenses for the old Joe's Crab Shack location on Nicholasville Rd. near Regency Center. Also, within the last few weeks, an amended development plan was approved for a mystery tenant and the 15,000 sq. ft. structure is clearly labeled as a grocery and an attached liquor outlet.

Do we know any small footprint stores which would like to keep its plans quiet for a while?

The name on the legal ad was ......................Trader Joe's.

Finishing What We Started

2011-06-28T22:15:00.003-04:00

Does anybody remember this piece of topiary and how it was to look during the World Equestrian Games?

This wireframe of a raring horse was planted with 7 varieties of clematis representing the 7 continents from which the games contestants came. It was placed more than 2 years ago and the plants were to be tended and fed so as to be in full bloom during the games. It is supposed to be a legacy of the games for the "Horse Capital of the World", yet it seems to be dying back.

Last year the vines had risen to the height of the base of the neck, now they barely make it to the hindquarters. Someone has really fallen down on the job of maintaining this piece of public art.

The State Government and the Horse Park were the main driving force behind the WEG and the Lexington Government basically tried to move heaven and earth to be ready in time for the games. The did move a lot of earth. But this topiary is on State property(the Court House Plaza) and the City made many announcements with it as a backdrop. Both entities seem to lay some sort of claim to it, but I don't think either of them are doing much for it. Could the change in administration have had this much effect on things?

Similar type questions may be asked about our street trees downtown. Since I have been working downtown the street trees on Main St have been put in three times and the trees that were originally put in under Urban Renewal are all gone.

Does anyone remember the well shaded plaza in front of the "Gold Bank", otherwise known then as Citizens Union? Or the benches under those shady trees? All gone. Something about the public using them during the day.

Our downtown street trees have been placed in tree wells and either mulched or surrounded with a grating of some sort. Then we just sit around and watch the weeds take over, the brick pavers buckle and the iron grates lift due to the roots being confined to the wells. Eventually, the trees encounter stress or disease and begin to decline and die. We have an urban forester on staff but he and his crew are kept busy looking at what we can do next, while the present situation continues to devolve.

Sometimes, looking for the next big thing just gets in the way of finishing or maintaining what we have. We are continually painting the doors and windows and ignoring that the foundation leaks.

Public And Semi-public Spaces

2011-06-21T23:10:00.002-04:00

Since my last post, I have been trying to be cognizant of how we also maintain our private open spaces as well as the public space I spoke of earlier. This would be the sidewalk cafe type spaces that our downtown restaurants are allowed to use in order to bring vitality and vibrancy to the streets of Lexington. Some are the patios around the campus area and some are the tables and chair along the newly widened sidewalks downtown.

The front porch dining and drinking areas near campus are all on private property but the mess that can be left behind from a good nights partying has to go somewhere. I believe that most of the establishments really try to patrol after themselves on the big nights but when it is just a small crowd and the litter is miniscule, I know that there can be lapses. I watched as the patio at the "World Famous" Two Keys has being hosed down the other day and as the water rolled off on to the sidewalk, it carried a fair amount of cigarette butts into the new rain garden facility, joining some that were already there.

I know that the sidewalk abutting a property is the responsibility of the property owner, as pertains to repair and snow removal. Some of them actually do such repair and clearing. Just who is supposed to maintain the rain gardens and keep them clear of debris is unknown to me. I do think that the adjacent property owners should not be helping to pollute things further.

The sidewalk cafes add just the right touch to our downtown dining atmosphere and the addition of some mature shade trees would help even more. It is a shame that we have been either selecting the wrong species or damaging the ones that are installed, but we have switched out trees on Main St. at least three times since 1972. Our downtown trees never get to the nice shady size which is good for sitting out under. Most diners need their shade.

The shade comes in the form of table umbrellas, but what is good for the diners is not always good for the pedestrians passing by. I need to duck or tilt my head whenever I (6'4") pass by these areas, although Mrs Sweeper (at 5'3") walks by unimpeded. The tips of those stays would poke me right in the eye.

The restaurant servers who work these tables are pretty conscientious about keeping the area clean but the the bar areas can get quite messy. It may be the alcohol or the age/mindset of the patrons. Go figure.

In general, I think that it is the total mindset of Lexingtonians that is at fault. Have we not noticed that with the indoor smoking ban and all the outdoor "smoking stations", out sidewalks and especially the street intersections are still filled with butts and wrappers. As I left work the other day, I saw a few ladies exiting the rear door of the circuit court house, one of them lit up, and headed over to the parking garage. After a few quick puffs and before she could enter the elevator, she flicked a half smoked cigarette into the street. She was walking past a receptacle for said butt at the base of the steps, but hers went into the street. I am not sure that I could find a better example of public service and disservice in the same package.

If we really want to change our city for the better, we will need to make a major adjustment to our civic attitude.

My Ideas From Greenville - Without Making The Trip

2011-06-17T00:13:00.000-04:00

The word is filtering back from the Commerce Lexington trip to Greenville S.C. about the lovely landscaped public spaces and the many shaded garden spots which dot their downtown. The implication is that we here in Lexington could and should do similar spaces. We can, but it would not be the same. I don't think that we know HOW to treat our public open spaces.

For the most part, we are pigs when it comes to using our current public space downtown and elsewhere.

I was at Thursday Night Live, an idea that we borrowed from Greenvile, and watched as our young, vibrant revelers began their evenings drinking festivities and the aging rockers mixed with the other downtown dwellers, all to some really decent music. Some were there to be seen and some were there to partake of a free event so graciously provided by sponsors there to take your money any way they can.

On the one side there were the roped off sections of the bars and restaurants along Cheapside and alcohol flowing as quickly as they could bring out a fresh supply. Tables, chairs and patio umbrellas for those who got there early. Lots of smiles, handshakes and hugs and kisses all around. There is one tree on that side of the pavilion and the area around the base, just a patch of bare ground, was used as a staging/storage space for the outdoor bar. Nothing like what is described from Greenville.

On the old courthouse side there are two trees and their patches of dirt which were used for some seating and stroller parking or just plain walking over. You see, the sidewalk was filled with sponsors booths and a couple of expensive new autos on display. Not a blade of grass in either of them. Between the bourbon beer truck, the new autos and the food/wine tents clustered at the front "entrance" to the space there was no space left to get around. The lush greenery spoken of in Greenville is not to be seen in Lexington.

Between the kids, the dogs, the jostled drinks and the sometimes breezy gusts of wind, by the end of the show the ground is littered with spilled food (with or without containers), napkins/wrappers, cigarette butts and who knows what all. Were we all raised to do this kind of thing in our own homes? I don't think so. So, why do we do it in our cherished public spaces.

The new Court House Plaza is no different. The grassy lawn is beginning to show stress and wear along the edges of the pavers and the vegetable oil stain from the Kettle Korn booth of last falls Spotlight Festival is still visible. Chewing gum blotches and butts are a common sight no matter how many folks they have sweeping the place each morning. Young children running from fountain to fountain and sometimes a discarded or forgotten article of clothing will join the wet litter at the drain. Why do we do this?

Our new, wide sidewalks and their environmentally correct rain gardens are sparsely planted and occasionally weeded, but the litter which shows up in them is usually left for a few days. I have noticed that they have irrigation tubing, for when it is really dry, but it is supposed to be buried in the mulch and not laid out on the surface. Since we have spent so much money of designing and building these things, shouldn't we act like we are going to maintain them correctly?

Should I even mention the Phoenix Park? Have we not abandoned that to the "homeless" and others who are down on their luck? This park, with the intellectually enhanced library on one side and a fountain and mock stream on the other for the non-readers. How else would the parents let their children play and climb on the rocks, when it is plainly signed as prohibited? The park benches are all scratched and faded as are the lighted bollards while graffiti mars the few tables there. Do we even care about this place?

Thoroughbred Park is too far east for most downtown people to get to and Triangle Park is being rebuilt ( I can't wait to see how quickly we can get to work on that one) and still we want to take over a portion of the CentrePointe block - as public open space. Are we nuts? We don't take care of what we have in the way of non-revenue producing property and we are asking for more.

Greenville has spent three decades bringing their streetscape plan to life and has some apparently beautiful downtown trees while we are on our third set of saplings along Main and Vine since they went one-way back in the early '70s. There is no reason to bring ideas back from these quality cities if we do not also bring the will to use them in a sustainable manner. Private property owners can evict and prohibit those who abuse their open space or they can charge sufficient fees to cover the maintenance or repairs. Public spaces have no such luxuries.

We HAVE to quit abusing our public open spaces.

CentrePointe, Why Now?

2011-06-13T23:33:00.001-04:00

The other day I indicated that I believe that the CentrePointe project will begin to move forward - sometime this year. I know that many of you will say that the recovery has not come that far as yet, but I think that things are starting to break.

It has to do with the economic effort known as QE2, or a second round of quantitative easing. This is a way of increasing the money supply and (in a manner of speaking) stimulating the economy. This latest round is winding to a close at the end of the is month and some investor fear that capital may begin to flow away from the emerging markets and back to the safety and security of the American dollar. That could be why the story that I was told featured a large Spanish equity trust and the desire of said trust to invest in American commercial development. I wonder, are the Spanish moving their money before the coming restructuring of the Euro by the European Central Bank?

The figure that I heard was nearly $40 million in advance and the rest to follow. That would be enough to start CentrePointe, no matter what the eventual project will look like.

For the next few weeks - the DDA and the planners of the Fourth of July have the block until the 10th I suspect - nothing will be apparent concerning impending construction. I even doubt that this years Spotlight will be able to use the space, and frankly, I think that the Short St. corridor is the better location. I am keeping my eye out for someplace to put the fill which needs to be removed (Oliver Lewis Way Phase II?) and the fleet of trucks to haul it. The dry heat of August and September could make downtown Lexington quite dusty this year.

I think that the clock is ticking.

CentrePointe. What do I know about it?

2011-06-10T21:21:00.000-04:00

TrusT Facade renovation

Last night Mrs. Sweeper and I went downtown, not to the Thursday Night Live but, to the gallery opening at Gallery B. I am not particularly fond of the group who played last night and I do like looking at good art. The guys from the new TrusT bar were there showing off their "signature" drinks and talking about the upcoming grand opening. I will say that if they are taking as much care in details on the inside as the are on the outside, the place will look fantastic. The new facade is looking nice.(see left)

There are some folks downtown who are making things neat and clean.

The artwork was interesting and sometimes I think that I can do better (and times when I know that I cannot) but it all looked a bit pricey. Maybe I just don't know real art when I see it.

We then did wander down to Cheapside to see if we could run into some friends or at least some folks that we knew. She says that I cannot go anywhere without knowing someone and this night was no different. We even got introduced to some new people, and as usual, when folks find out what I do the topic moves in a singular direction - CentrePointe.

CentrePointe. What do I know about it? Have I read anything about the new plans and how forward thinking it is? What is my opinion? Well, where do I begin? I usually start by trying to gauge their thoughts and just why they have them. Then I try to counter their passion for making this space a socialist common area from what used to be (and still is) private property. One woman last night is looking for an enclosed play area for the children living in the recently built condominiums and apartments. She also wants NO hotel and NO residential of any kind on that block, as we are getting overbuilt in residential downtown. It came as a surprise to her that most downtown dwellers are single or childless couples and that many condos are rented out - not owner occupied.

Many people are of the old school of thought, that we need more retail to bring folks back downtown, while I know that the retail will return when the residents do - and not before. We have tried the "bring retail" method before and the "bring offices" method, now we are on the "bring entertainment" kick to revitalize downtown. So, now we have offices in old stores and new bars/restaurants in old offices and some struggling residential redos in both.

The conversation then turns to the things that are missing. Specific, non-mainstream, limited appeal types of venues and facilities that the infamous "they" need to provide for some of us older folks. The old folks are not the only ones who do it, in fact it is most prevalent in the younger "creative class" ones that I hear from. I rarely hear the words "We need to..." it is always "They need to provide...". When someone does come along and announce their proposal for a solution, the chorus then rises "But that is not what I want".

Ms. Gang and her group were here and the endured the heat of the old courtroom and the cacophony of opinions from young and old, knowledgeable and not and pledged to involve our local talent. I hope that she likes herding bees. Ms Gang is talented and has some good ideas, but if what I heard in the last week is true, she will have to work very quickly.

The City will be utilizing the CentrePointe "pasture" for music and food vendors during the Fourth of July festivities, but soon after that I am expecting and announcement that funding is in place(not coming but in place) and excavation for the parking levels will break ground very soon - like before Fall. What will rise above them is anybody's guess, but they will sit above them soon.

If you were Dudley and the funds were in hand, would you go with what you have approval for or wait for a new round of controversy. Would you build on the limited good will that has been generated in the community or do you tweak again the design that many say is a timeless facade befitting our emerging downtown?

CentrePointe. What do I know about it? Maybe nothing, but I am going to wait and see.

Lextran, Really On The Move?

2011-06-01T21:30:00.000-04:00

Look at what I saw on the lot at Lextran. It appears as though they have taken delivery of some new vehicles and have applied a new look to them. One or two of them looked to be shorter units and destined for the areas with lesser clientele.

My best hope is that they will not clutter them up with the tacky ads for the Lottery and such just yet.

Now, they need to get on with their new headquarters.

Choices, Lets Talk About Them

2011-05-18T00:13:00.002-04:00

Everybody is talking about it. IT is everywhere that you turn. IT is the talk about the rising price of gas, of food, of just about anything that we buy-from household goods to daily utilities. Everything is going up. And there is nothing that we can do about it. We are stuck.

We are just going to have to get used to it. There doesn't seem to be anyone who can do anything about it. So we get mad about having to pay more at the pump and complain that the oil companies did this to us. By golly, we are Americans and gas should only cost around $1.50 a gallon. I hear that Europeans pay roughly twice as much as that, but I don't care about the Europeans and what they do with their time and money.

Somebody should make the oil companies do more for us – not to us. Somebody should make it easier for us to do what we want in order to get through life. We should be able to live anywhere that we want and be able to go anywhere that we want and anytime that we want. Oh, and it should be cheaper.

Folks that somebody is us. We, the people of the United States. And nobody did this to us, we did it to ourselves.

Our choices of where to live are predicated on the availability of cheap gas. Our abundance of electronic gadgets is built on the availability of cheap power. Our shopping centers full of mostly over packaged, soon to be obsolete goods are there due to cheap imports – which is also due to cheap oil. These are our choices. They weren't forced on us by government planners, they were chosen by us by our own free will.

I can remember $0.35 - $0.45 a gallon gas when a neighborhood kid could make a few bucks mowing grass for under a buck's worth of fuel. When you could walk to the gas station and back home in just a few minutes. I can remember when downtown was just a quick bike ride or bus trip away. Those days are about as far off as a quick bike trip in to town from Hamburg or South Point. Nobody make people live out there and nobody make them drive their autos in to town. Those are choices of free will.

I can remember when subdivision development patterns began to use the cul-de-sac as an enticement to quiet suburban living. Cul-de-sac lots were desirable and they carried a 10 – 20% premium on land cost, but the choice was worth it apparently. We do have so many of them. We now know that these cul-de-sac areas, and similarly less connected street patterns, can increase the per capita cost of fire protection services by over 400%. Other government services may be increased likewise. Again, choices of free will.

I can remember when an auto vacation involved many days, not hours and special trips used trains while very special ones took airplanes. When they built the Interstates, folks did not want to be tied to scheduled departures of the trains but still tolerated it for the airlines. Now that the trains are gone and the airlines require such a hassle of screening, we are left with the long road trip and the high cost of gas. This is a result of the choices that we made.

What other poor choices have we, the people of the Unites States, made that we will look back on with regret? What choices will we make in the future? Will we be willing to re-think our cul-de-sac subdivisions in a reasonable manner? Will we be forced to re-think the distances that we will have to move ourselves to work, play and shop? Will our food come from longer or shorter distances? Will our energy sources become more local, sustainable and renewable?

Are we up to the challenge of these types of choices, or are those days gone too.

Food And Some Of Our "Bad" Habits

2011-05-16T22:44:00.002-04:00

The other day I may have riled some of my readers with some comments about a local “good foods education” program. I meant no disrespect but there is much more in the way of food access and awareness which needs to be taught. There are not enough of these grass roots organizations to adequately rid our urban areas of the food deserts that we know are there.

Food deserts are basically defined as areas of few(if any) grocery stores and other dining places. Fast food drive-ins would not qualify as a dining place in my book and many others. I am also beginning to realize that the chain grocery and supermarket stores are not much better for the “not-so-savvy” consumer and those highly susceptible to marketing techniques.

Today's supermarket is not designed to sell good healthy food for a fair price. Actually it is just the opposite, sell a high margin item for whatever price the market will bear and really maximize the profit. Those items are generally highly mass produced, full of chemical preservatives and full of sugar(though lately it is all high-fructose corn syrup). High margin items are most likely to be placed on sale in order to entice you to come in for all the other high margin items. The money is in the volume of product not the individual item itself.

Supermarkets will average about 500 square feet for every 10,000 of the whole store in fresh fruits and vegetables. In the “big box” style stores (Meijer, Kroger Marketplace, and others) the ratio is probably much less. The rest is all processed, and many are highly processed, foods of varying nutritional value. And it is all designed to sell the cheap stuff.

Consider the typical grocery store design. Nice wide aisles and plenty of space for comparison shopping? Hardly. There are displays to maneuver around and dangling racks everywhere you look. Think of it as traffic calming and impulse suggestions. The more that you see something the more you want it.

Even product location is important to impulse buying. Why is the dairy case in the very back of the store where you have to pass just about everything else just get a carton of milk or a dozen eggs. Then the bakery off to the side which pulls you past some other things that you may not know that you need.

The store atmosphere is very important. Why do they keep the darn place so cold, like the AC in on frostbite? The simple answer is – human instinct. We humans tend to prepare for winter when we chill and that means stockpiling for the winter ahead. People, they are playing with our heads.

Now consider the products that are placed there. Products produced in such volume that no one farm could generate it all. Dairies with bucolic names that have to have thousands of cows being milked 24/7 in order to supply it all. Products that have almost no local representation and are shipped in from thousands of miles away. Food, food everywhere and not much of it worth eating.

In this day of energy conservation and the entire country wishing to cut back on energy usage, the modern supermarket is an energy HOG. Keeping the store to sell stuff takes massive amounts of air conditioning effort. Largely windowless walls lead to increased lighting needs and refrigeration cases and storage add to the energy footprint. Massive parking lots as heat islands in summer and frozen tundra in winter, it is no wonder that supermarkets make difficult LEED projects for creating “green” buildings. There is much that can be done, both in changing our shopping habits and changing our supermarket design. The latter will follow the former.

Lexington's two newest urban grocery stores are a start in the right direction, though they probably follow the normal convention on product placement and energy usage, but the industry will not turn on a dime as the saying goes. It has taken us nearly 80 years to learn our bad habits, how long or what dire situation will help us or cause us “unlearn” those habits?

Food and Farm Freedom

2011-05-10T22:15:00.000-04:00

Several things have popped up on the radar today and most have something to do with relocalization of food. I am surprised that our local champions of farming and good local foods have not been shouting this from the rooftops. On Monday, the 16^th of May there will be a rally in Washington, DC for Food and Farm Freedom.

You say to me, Sweeper, we have our farms and our Farmers Markets and they all are growing. But there is also a growing movement within the FDA to gain control of all that. Take this from Natural News.

The freedom to grow, sell, and buy clean food is under serious attack. The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has made it clear that the agency is not a friend of food freedom and that it is willing to do whatever it takes to go after those involved in the "Slow Food" movement in order to protect corporate interests.

Corporations have noticed that the organic foods movement is making big strides and gaining “market share”. Why else would the mega-foods companies use their considerable clout to lobby the FDA to change the rules for organic products. I will assure you that these changes will not strengthen the rules for anybody. The new rules are noticeably weaker than the European standards and make it so that the factory farms of America can sell you the same old schlock, but labeled as “organic”. An organic label for which they can charge more in the market place.

At the same time, they(the FDA) are starting to ramp up their attacks on small farmers who are finding “niche” markets providing what the big companies don't want to be bothered with. Last summer, they raided the farm of Dan Allgyer, an Amish farmer in Pennsylvania, whom the agency accused of illegally selling raw milk. Raw milk is legal in Pennsylvania. That did not matter to the FDA agents and other law enforcement officers, they raided anyway. They confiscated (that is stole)pictures and other material while threatening “regulatory action” if the situation was not “resolved”

This is a similar tactic used on the farmer that has put together the cowshare program to which I belong. It is documented that they lay in wait for a weekly delivery of milk to the share participants and accosted both the farmer and the owners. The stress was so great that it brought on reactions similar to PTSD and recovery time took months. Lately a simple “farm inspection” has initiated another round from which we are just now getting back to normal. The bottom line is that the FDA is not out to help the general public consumer or the small farmer (the ones who built this country), they are out to protect those who fund their work with lobbyist dollars – big business, the mega farm agri-business corporations.

The Farm to Consumer Legal Defense Fund (FTCLDF) has actually filed suit against the FDA on behalf of raw milk. The FDA has responded to the suit with statements like “There is no absolute right to consume or feed children any particular food” and, amazingly, “There is no generalized right to bodily and physical health”. Do the rights to eat food come from the FDA or are they in place to protect our rights to eat healthy food?

It is for these reasons that food advocates are banding together to put on the Rally for Food and Farm Freedom at Upper Senate Park on May 16 to push for justice. It would be nice if some of the locals would have a rally here in Lexington, but I have not heard of one. I am beginning to think that the high-tech creative class jobs and the folks that do them, do not care that the FDA is not on their side. Is the Fayette Alliance aware of this rally? Can they pull something together on short notice? How about the various farmers markets? Or the Good Foods Co-op? Is somebody doing something?

Knox Van Nagell responded to a comment of mine (on ProgressLex) the other day with: “Through matching Federal, State, and local funds, the PDR program “purchases” the development “right” from local farmers, and holds this right in perpetuity…resulting in conserved farms that will continue their agricultural operations for the future. “ It is my hope that these “agricultural operations” will be of the small local farmer rather than the agri-business type.

There is nothing about any of this in the local press.

Comments On The Rise Of Food Prices

2011-05-08T23:57:00.001-04:00

U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton has raised the alarm on rising food prices.

"We must act now, effectively and cooperatively, to blunt the negative impact of rising food prices and protect people and communities," she said at the U.N.'s Food and Agriculture Organization headquarters in Rome.

The U.N. estimates that 44 million people world wide have been pushed into poverty since last June because of rising food prices, which could lead to desperate shortages and unrest. Clinton said the world could no longer "keep falling back on providing emergency aid to keep the Band-Aid on."

She called for countries to adopt better policies and "to encourage everyone to respond to rising food prices not with failed policies of the past but with a sounder approach."

Some of those “failed” policies may include the following: During the 2008 crisis, the world's biggest rice producers — Thailand, Vietnam and India — curbed rice exports to protect domestic supply, leading to record high prices. The price of wheat, meanwhile, shot up last year when Russia imposed an export ban after severe drought damaged harvests. Ukraine, another major grain exporter, also imposed export quotas because of the drought.

Time magazine has reported the a major cause of rising food prices may well be the much discussed “climate change” that the world is undergoing.

The hidden story of 2011 has been the record-breaking rise in global food prices. Global corn prices April 2010 and April 2011, while wheat prices are up some 60 to 80%. Exactly why food has gotten so expensive in recent months is the subject of an ongoing debate

Some of the causes may be simple inflation or that the competition for food grains by the biofuel production process which has not lowered local gas prices in any appreciable measure. Natural disasters, like the recent rains and subsequent flooding, which are plaguing the Mississippi Valley currently along with the growing world wide consumption certainly do play a big part. But maybe the largest part is just the greater and greater distances that food has to travel to get to our family tables. The distances and methods of travel which require fossil fuels, the same fossil fuels which are accused of aiding the global “climate change”.

Most all of us realize that locally produced food is better for us and is better for the local economy, but usually carries a premium on price due to the volumes that individual producers can generate. Factory style farms will win out on economies of scale yet temper that victory with reductions in health benefits from crop monoculture, increased processing to combat bacterial or germicidal contamination or just the forced completion of the natural growth cycle to comply with the shipping schedule. Unlike the winemakers who used to advertise that “ they would sell no wine before its time” many fruits and vegetables are today picked in an unripe state and chemically treated so as to arrive on the store shelves looking like “just picked”.

Research and better farming practices have increased crop yield lately throughout a majority of the world but we are now seeing “climate change” or rising temperatures during the growing season begin to reduce some of that. Combined with the greater use of petroleum based fertilizers or genetically modified seeds or insecticides / pesticides allowing for the overuse of many historically rich farmlands and the documented rise of herbicide resistant “superweeds”

Might these also fit into the category of “failed” policies and the more sound approach to food production be a more localized and sustainable methods which got us to this point? I would much rather have lamb from Kentucky than the ones that come from New Zealand. It has to cost less to grow and slaughter here. Milk production should cost less if you removed all the processing involved with replacing the desired qualities that were eliminated through pasteurization. Farmers should be able to sell for less if the costs of hybrid or GMO seeds and chemical fertilizers could be decreased through natural methods. These possibly failing policies which were once alternatives and are now requirements.

The Where Of Transportation Funding

2011-05-04T22:43:00.003-04:00

The U. S. Conference of Mayors has spoken up about local infrastructure investments, in particular, transportation funding for urban areas. The fact is they want more of it.

The mayor of Atlanta, Kasim Reed, has said that there should be more focus on “pressing metropolitan transportation infrastructure needs” and not “low -priority highway expansion projects”. That is right invest the money in the cities where the economic growth will occur. Places like Atlanta.

The U. S. Conference of Mayors has released the results of a survey of their members concerning such transportation investments and of the 176 cities which responded, 93 % feel that cities and metro areas should receive a greater share of the federal funds. Not only that, but it should come directly to the cities and bypass the state bureaucracy altogether. That sounds good doesn't it? Bypass the state and the MPO and use the money to do transportation that we like. I wonder what Lexington's position was on that.

If the money does NOT come directly to the cities and in greater levels, then only 7% of mayors voted to increase the federal gas tax. That would be the usual source of the federal transportation funds which has not kept up with the needs both in the cities and the rest of the country. You know that we are running approximately $20 billion a year behind in just maintenance work and not counting new road projects. How do you think our mayor voted on that one?

96% of mayors voted for increased transportation funding with 89% supporting a gas tax increase (if that money will be spent locally) and 65% if the money will be spent on public transit. With the price of gas rising, the use of hybrid and electric autos increasing and the per capita miles driven falling there is a question of where the funds will come from. What did Lexington say about that?

In the United States, metropolitan areas account for 86 percent of employment, 90 percent of wage income, and over the next 20 years, 94 percent of the nation’s economic growth, but they are burdened with the nation’s worst traffic jams, its oldest roads and bridges, and transit systems at capacity. Simply put, these areas are receiving significantly less in federal transportation investments than would reflect their role and importance to the nation’s economy.

U. S. Conference of Mayors

The Lexington area reflects the above statement well except for the part about the bridges and the transit system. According to the Transportation for America site the majority of bridges in the Lexington area are not that deficient and most around here will say that the Lextran buses are mostly empty. I am not sure about the bridge info but the Lextran rumor is totally false.

Now here is a real good question, if as the USCM website says:

The U.S. Conference of Mayors (USCM) is the official nonpartisan organization of cities with populations of 30,000 or more. There are 1,210 such cities in the country today. Each city is represented in the Conference by its chief elected official, the mayor.

Why did so few cities participate in this survey? The had a return rate of just under 15% and as this PDF shows the list is dominated by the smaller communities.

The answers to my questions as to Lexington's responses are-- apparently we did not give any. We are not included on the list of 176. So, what do yo think the answers SHOULD be?

Time To Set Some Goals

2011-05-03T23:30:00.000-04:00

The Planning staff has proposed and the Planning Commission, along with the Mayor and a large part of the Urban County Council, has agreed that maybe we have many more items to think about than just continuing to expand the urban growth boundary. So, that largest part of the process is out of the way...right? I don't think so and neither should you.

To a majority of the general public, the Comprehensive Plan is merely some pretty colors on a map and some generalized statements about the intentions to get, what might be called, progress down the road. The Plan is more than this but so often it involves decisions on what can be done in the newer “greenfield” areas and “stabilizing” the existing (possibly declining) neighborhoods while leaving all else in a holding pattern of “status quo”. This time around I hope that the concentrations will be on things other than spreading growth and keeping what we have. Lets try to actually determine what is the best use of our urban landscape.

The phrase “highest and best use” is often thrown about as what is desired for any particular piece of property, yet that usually means something different to different people, commonly influenced by the level of involvement or ownership in said property. Sometimes the highest use and the best use are diametrically opposed to each other and can be viewed in reverse depending on your desires for the overall community.

CentrePointe and the old Lexington Mall property, two of my favorite subjects, are prime examples of how we can see thing differently.

The CentrePointe block, as has often been said, occupies the very center of Lexington and many would have you believe that a smattering of buildings, none more than four stories, and housing uses which waxed and waned on an a variably, oscillating schedule so as to usually be out of sync with each other. Rarely would one use feed off another to the benefit of all for both the daytime and nighttime or after hours schedules. What some called the best uses were far from the highest uses and even the proposal, as a highest use, was criticized for not being the best use.

The former Lexington Mall, built on a filled in portion of the original water company reservoir, started off as a somewhat regional shopping destination and then fell upon harder times as the retail world (and the fickle consumers) marched off to bigger and better things. Thirty years and minimal updating will do a number on buildings, just ask the Lexington Center folks. What may have been the highest use for the property soon became not and maybe an auto-centric religious use will end up not being the best use in a post carbon transit world.

These are but two examples of what situations currently exist throughout Fayette County, from the underutilized parcels of abandoned apartment complexes and former roadside motels to the maze like subdivisions full of cul-de-sacs which limit walkability and provision of efficient public service. How would one propose to bring the highest and best uses to these areas? Should we alter the uses or the way that these uses are exhibited? These are the questions that I think should be answered and planned for. Leaving the status quo should not be an option.

Proposing wholesale changes for large underutilized properties or existing residential neighborhoods is NOT the way the Planning Commission has worked from its inception. For nearly 85 years the commission and staff have fielded proposals from property owners and developers to approve or deny as they see fit. Still, the general impression of the public is that the staff has directed (and placed) the wrong uses in some very wrong locations, while others are angry and confused when they are denied uses that they feel are very legitimate. As I said before it is perspective.

Will this be another NEW way of doing planning? Will we see walkability brought to our outer suburbs or will we see the suburban style redevelopment of our currently walkable neighborhoods? Will we see more single child (or less) households or will we see more multi-generational housing units? We are now seeing home ownership rates declining and that will probably not go back up any time soon, if ever. Newer home buyers are looking for smaller units in walkable areas, so what will become of the larger houses on ½ acre or ¼ acre lots? Where will these folks walk to in the sprawling cul-de-sac neighborhoods that we have now? This is the year that we need to ask these and other harder questions. This is also the year that we should get some answers to these questions.

Today the Council's Planning and Zoning Committee heard a presentation about the upcoming goals and objectives which should be coming from the Planning Commission by the end of the summer. Both the Council and the Commission need to hear from the public and not just the typical “movers and shakers” of the past. The LFUCG Planning page has recently added an email link just for this purpose. Do not hesitate to let them know how you feel on any of these topics and let me know how you feel too.

What Do You See In Your Wallet?

2011-04-23T00:38:00.002-04:00

The American economy is coming back. At least according to most of the news reports that you hear. Wall Street is again climbing to within a thousand or two of its peak in October of 2007 and the corporate bigwigs are getting their outrageous bonuses, despite the so-called limitations that were enacted. It seems like these guys are winning the lottery every year. But I have not seen this recovery in my wallet.

In this recently completed first fiscal quarter, many of the railroad companies that I follow are now reporting that they have done very well. Over at CSX, the reported revenue climbed 13% to a record $2.8 billion, operating income at an all-time high of $773 million(up 22%) and an operating ratio at 72.5 compared with last year and also a record. Not bad for having many severe winter storms to deal with and a steep rise in diesel fuel prices.

Union Pacific also had problems with the weather and fuel prices but that didn't prevent them from chalking up some equally impressive record gains in revenue, operating income and ratio. Overall U.S. Rail volumes have remained above the typical carload growth rates for the first quarter. Shipments are up, revenues are up and profits are up, but I have not seen it in my wallet.

The workforce headcount for all 7 of the Class I railroads increased by 4.4% over last March's count and the majority of that came in the maintenance of way and structures group. Our railroads are beginning to upgrade and expand their infrastructure for the anticipated uptick in demand for freight. Remember that these guys are not interested in passenger rail, high speed or not. Rail travel of every kind is growing all across the U.S. But I don't see the benefits of that growth showing up in my wallet.

I read someplace the other day that the large multi-national corporations based in America have roughly $1.3 trillion in liquid assets which they are holding on to. That is trillion with a T, and yet they are not actively working on creating jobs or investing in America's growth. They are just sitting on it.

Are they waiting on the government to create to jobs? I don't think so. If the government began creating service jobs then the TEA Party would claim that they are expanding government. If the government began creating construction jobs then the taxes would have to help fund the building projects. Private industry will not create these service or construction jobs because the general public is unwilling to pay the full and unsubsidized cost of such a venture nor can the return on investment be fully realized in the now standard depreciation timetable. We have let the Wall St economy call the shots for so long that they can no longer help the little people while failing to maintain a reasonable, or sustainable growth rate. They have taken us to the brink in the past and we seem willing to let them continue an their merry way again.

Wall St has led an effort to subtly bring about a stealth redistribution of wealth and we have willingly bought into the apple. Mass production and automation have consistently brought lower production costs and cheaper prices but have also resulted in fewer jobs and social benefits are the first to be affected. We want the former and complain about the latter. And we go along with it. The Wall St CEOs eat from the big table and we wait for the trickle-down to reach us. I haven't seen it in my wallet.

I saw on the news this morning that John McCain, the former Republican presidential candidate, was in Libya to meet with the rebel coalition and discuss some sort of aid. There was also some comment about using the frozen assets of Gadhafi and supplying weapons and medical aid. Is this not a redistribution of wealth in the country of Libya? From the rich and powerful to the working masses? I guess it is good enough for them but not for America. And what about the comments from The Donald the other day? That the Libyans PAY us for the moral support(and a few specially aimed Cruise missiles) so that when we win the war for them, we would take( not pay for) all the oil that we need. Don't you just love where Trump's heart is at? I'll bet that I never see that show up in my wallet either.

What I DO see in my wallet is a pending 10% (Mrs Sweeper says probable) pay cut in an effort to balance the budget.

Sometimes, One Can Make A Difference

2011-04-21T22:20:00.003-04:00

I received a comment today to an older post about the trolleys and Chevy Chase. I infer that this reader found the scuttlebutt going around, concerning the alteration of the Blue Route trolley, was suspiciously the similar to what I had proposed. I too, thought the same thing when I read the 5th District newsletter which came out last week. Does the Councilman read my stuff or does he have friends that do. Either way, the thought of being useful gives me a good feeling.

Below is the text from the newsletter;

For the past several weeks, I have been working with LexTran to devise a Colt Trolley route that would circulate through Chevy Chase then back downtown with a stop by the Lexington Farmers Market. I am pleased to inform you that on April 30th, the Blue Route Chevy Chase “Hop” will do just that.

The trolley will run from 10:00 a.m. until 1:00 p.m., and LexTran estimates that a full loop will take approximately 20 minutes, arriving at either end of the loop in 10-minute intervals. The Blue Route will maintain its Main and Vine Street course with the following deviations:
• Old Vine to Woodland Ave.
• Right on Woodland Ave.
• Left on Maxwell/High St. to Euclid
• Right on Euclid to Ashland Ave.
• Right on Ashland Ave.
• Left on Main St. to Jefferson St.
• Right on Jefferson St. to 2nd St.
• Left on 2nd St.
• Follow Regular Route to Old Vine at Woodland

There are some discrepancies in the newsletter and the posted trolley routes and times on the LexTran site. First, while April 30 is a Farmers Market day, if the route begins at 10 (the LexTran site says 11:30) those who get downtown after that will find far fewer good choices to pick from. Second, the route needs to go beyond 1:00 (LexTran says 2:00) if those who ride from downtown for lunch are to get back in a timely manner. And lastly, I hope that LexTran quickly updates their list of destinations along the route as this new alignment greatly expands the current list.

I guess that I can also claim at least a 66% success rate in being right about the Corman railroad display track at the corner of W. Main St and Oliver Lewis Way. I had theorized that they might place their existing large boxcar along with the two locomotive shells, or they might place the steam locomotive there. As it is they just put the two display units, so I was somewhat right.

Greying In Lexington

2011-04-15T00:06:00.002-04:00

I read an interesting piece the other day out of St. Louis County, Mo. Interestingly enough, St. Louis County and the City of St. Louis are not a merged government nor is one inside the other. The city of St. Louis is called an independent city and is separate from any other city or county in Missouri. This story had to do with the suburbs and exurbs of the city of St. Louis and their governmental futures.

In the once bustling communities on the outskirts of the city proper, many aging baby boomers are now finding that their comfortable homes, designed for life built around the auto and deemed a safe place to raise kids, have become much more quiet in the last few years. Most of the kids have been raised and sent off to college, but the parents have remained and life has taken on a whole new set of challenges. These places are becoming the land of the empty-nesters.

Homeowners in communities like these seem to have just two choices when this happens, move downtown or move away completely. Rarely will it be in their best interest to remain as they are.

These homeowners will look much closer at the availability of shopping and the need to drive everywhere. They will be less inclined to vote for tax increases for schools and parks. Their need for medical services and transportation will increase. Their isolation will grow as their ranks thin and the look and feel of the neighborhood will change as they can participate in the daily activities of suburban life.

This environment is a product of the monoculture of development that has been the norm since the sixties. Building block upon block of cookie-cutter style houses, each one similar enough to its neighbor that they could be easily confused at night. All of the daily needs of the residents are carefully placed far enough away so as to not intrude on the calm residential feel of the area. There is no way to remain in the neighborhood while downsizing or even getting out to the market or community center to shop or visit friends. Such neighborhoods are designed and built for one thing, raising kids.

Think of it like you would a thoroughbred horse operation, laid out and developed for specific uses in a certain pattern. Very difficult to use for other crops be they animal or vegetable. Any change from one style to another is costly and unprofitable. And seldom do horses grow old on a typical breeding/racing based horse farm.

For many, this rollover of neighborhoods is natural and cyclical and has been going on for decades, but honestly the older neighborhoods (pre-1950) were not of such sweeping magnitude as those built in the '60s and later. The creation of Levitttown in New York brought examples of larger and larger subdivisions and the autos and Interstates made the possible. When you reached the end of particular phases of child rearing, you just moved. Today's economy will not allow such luxury.

The subdivisions of the last half of the last century also were built with housing stock which was designed for active families. They had great rooms and vaulted ceilings, three car garages and pools. Fine for raising a growing family or entertaining but way too much for an aging empty-nesters or a widow to take care of. Should we make our elderly move from their homes simply because we forgot to plan for their needs as they aged?

Other communities have begun to see their populations dwindle in these types of developments and with it a decline in tax revenue. This decline is accompanied with a rise in demand for services both of the transportation and emergency medical variety, many of them very specialized in nature. Lexington is fairly lucky in this regard as all of Fayette County is covered but the examples from St Louis County is a compilation of small cities and many unincorporated places. We shall see these same problems arise here but the impact should be lessened.

The upcoming Comprehensive Plan process will give us a chance to consider how we can set about to correct some of the possible problem areas and prepare solutions. Now is the time to begin thinking about it. How will you like to age in Lexington over the next ten years?

This Weeks Rail Thoughts

2011-04-12T00:05:00.002-04:00

I have been kind of quiet on the subject lately, but the things that I have been reading in the past week have brought the regional rail idea more to the fore.

First off, the work that R. J. Corman Railroad is doing along side the Rupp parking lot and the intersection of W. Main St and Oliver Lewis Way is progressing smoothly. They have installed a fairly short (and steep) section of track that branches off of the main line just south of its crossing at Second St. This track then runs up a nearly 6% grade until it levels out parallel to the crest of the embankment which overlooks the rail yard.

This clearly has one sole purpose. To display some of the various rail equipment used by the Central Kentucky Lines portion of Corman rail group. They are also almost ready to place the rail under the new bridge now that the drainage and electrical line placements have been resolved. There is a location for a transformer pad and what I'm told will be a “glass house”. I am supposing that this will look similar to the architecture of the aviation facility in Nicholasville and will be used to protect some railcars (and /or people) should they establish a dinner train style operation. A Corman spokesman has continued to say that the railroad has “no formal plans for an excursion train”but all the construction, both here in Lexington and in Midway are some of the many pieces that “need to come together before an excursion train becomes reality.”

In Midway, if you don't know, the track runs right through the middle of Main St. and leaves little room for a long train to stop without blocking one of two city streets. The right of way for the railroad actually is wide enough for two parallel tracks without eliminating traffic or parking. The railroad is working with the City of Midway in building such a parallel track and doing some streetscape improvements.

Neither of these two track work projects are part of the TIGER (Transportation Investment Generating Economic Recovery) grant recently awarded for track upgrading on several of the Corman lines in a few states. One more piece of the puzzle was the wye that they re-established near Christianburg and provides a beautiful place in which to turn a train.

Corman has nearly quadrupled the amount of rail traffic on the line to Louisville in the 5 or 6 years that he has controlled it and its soon-to-be-completed upgrading will allow more freight traffic just in time for the price of fuel to make long-haul trucking cost prohibitive. The trucking industry has not made their trucks any more fuel efficient than the auto industry has cars. That said, the idea of a regional commuter rail service to Louisville, though interesting, is made just a little bit harder.

I hear of many commuters who travel from Lexington to Frankfort or Louisville daily who say that they are willing to go by rail, but I am not sure that they have thought it completely through. Many of them have found their efficient route via auto, and many of them avoid the normal rush hour snarls of downtown. If they were to go by rail and the station is downtown, then they are now a part of the traffic that they have so far avoided. There is also an added level of commute time involved which needs to be considered. For all of their talk, we are still at least ten years late in beginning to think about commuter rail service.

On the topic of High Speed Rail, it now seem clear that the Republican majority in the House is set on erasing all gains that the present administration has attempted to make. Without requiring vastly more fuel efficiency in autos and trucks and better alternatives to the fossil fuels we currently use, I think that they are wanting the country to live in the status quo. Other countries are not so conservative about it.

We cannot let the market decide about these things. Consider this. Based on extensive research Airbus committed, back in 2000, to build a massive 4 engined aircraft seating 500-800 passengers. The demand would come from the Asian market and a large part of that from China. Boeing, interestingly enough, came to a eerily similar decision. With the emergence of the Chinese market and the need for large numbers of people to travel between China's major cities and internationally, this looked like a sound decision. Now, 11 years later, one and just one southeast Asian airline has taken delivery of any of these super jumbo jets. That is one A380 out of the five ordered. Boeing has sold none of the passenger models but has orders for the freight versions What, pray tell, is the difference in the past 11 years. China's high speed rail.

This decision was basically an economic one. One 16 car-long 300 km/h train set costs roughly $80 million and seats 1050 while one Airbus A380 costs $360 million and seats 650. You can do the math.

Although the A380 is perhaps the most fuel-efficient large airliner in the sky today on a per-seat/km or seat/mile basis, figures from Airbus and Siemens show that at A380 burns nearly six times as much energy per seat/km as a modern high-speed train. The Chinese will buy from the Western world, but not if what they can build is cheaper. The Chinese have built over 6300 miles of high speed rail line in the past 10 years and the Europeans are continuing to expand their high speed routes while we worry about who will or will not benefit from building it. The answer is definitely the Chinese, they win if the build their own and the win if we don't build ours.

We Need A Real Energy Policy

2011-03-31T17:35:00.002-04:00

Once again, an American president has called for a reduction in oil imports. Once again the “leader of the free world” is making an effort toward energy independence, albeit a token one, that many are skeptical can succeed. I also do not believe that it will succeed because the American people have been told that we will succeed if we want to. Former President Bush said, “We are addicted to oil” and as true addicts, do we really want to get off of this addiction?

Funny thing about this new reduction plan, just like all the others before, it is short on details. It is not a road map to oil independence like some would like and it really doesn’t point to an eventual goal like the recently announced European Union plan. A one-third reduction of our 2008 import level would bring us down to 7.4 MBD, a possibly attainable level. It would be step one in our road to weaning ourselves off of our addiction.

"There are no quick fixes ... We will keep on being a victim to shifts in the oil market until we finally get serious about a long-term policy for secure, affordable energy," Obama said.

There are no quick fixes to addiction withdrawal and currently most Americans believe that any stepping down from the existing levels of consumption should be done by those who are the most hard core users. Man, see how much more bad off they are than I am?

We could also produce more of our own oil, but how is using more of a local drug any better that using somebody else’s product? In the end we are still addicted and we will need more, and more and more… More local drilling will not solve the problem, in fact, it will only make the problem worse. Currently, we rely on foreign imports for roughly half of our daily needs. American vs. Arabian oil or American vs. Colombian coke, does it make any difference?

Previous presidents have made similar promises on energy imports, calls for cut-backs, pleas for “voluntary restraint” in oil usage. In fact, all fossil fuels are being urged to cut-back since we know what it has done to our environment. That ecological damage is now so great that it will take nearly twice as long to undo as it took to get us to the point that we recognized the damage done. From the toxic bayous in Louisiana and Texas to the massive scars of mountain top removal in Kentucky and intermittent spills along the coasts of Alaska and the Gulf of Mexico, the damage costs are so great that we now want to prevent the EPA from even trying.

Americans have allowed this situation to exist for far too long now. Either by ignoring the handwriting on the wall (the oil embargo, the wars in oil rich countries, etc) or believing that should we ever run out, that our technology will save us. It has now become a political football, each party has solutions to which the opposite party will object and neither can convince the American people to abide by. So on it goes, no long term goal and no short term changes in the rising status quo.

Of the four areas identified in the most recent proposal, no political party will endorse them all. More local production (drill, baby, drill) will not sit well with the democrats and environmentalists, while the fostering of natural gas vehicles will cause the cause a restructuring of the existing fuel delivery systems. More efficient cars and trucks is only thought of in the context of gas mileage and not better mass transit or high speed rail. Lastly, the alternative fuels card is aimed directly at the auto industry not any other fuel users. Oil is still used as home heating fuel in many areas of the Northeast and a changeover will cause much gnashing of teeth.

At roughly 20 million barrels a day (and half of that imported) we really should stop and think about how much of that is truly NEEDED. A great deal of it is abused, strictly by the decisions that we have made about where we choose to live and work. Those decisions are compounded by our choices of how we get between the two. How much of the travel that we do is really necessary and do we do it because it is cheap. Remember, the “drive till you qualify” method of looking for a place to live may really be a thing of the past.

Analysts and experts said Obama's goal is ambitious and that truly reforming U.S. energy use would involve sweeping changes, including possible fuel taxes to encourage Americans to change their habits, which could be politically toxic

The goal is certainly ambitious and sweeping change will be involved, but whether by governmental edict or by global demand for the remaining fossil fuel, our resulting energy needs will march to a new drum beat. The fact that it has NOT happened in our lifetime yet, in no way indicates that it will never happen. We continue to see polls where a high percentage do not approve of the sitting president’s actions/positions on energy so I feel that most of us would like to go back to the days of $.25 a gallon gas and an open road. The corporations that took us from there to here don’t want to go back and have made it difficult to do so.

The people are not wrong and the corporations are not wrong, so we will just have to blame the President. Good luck with that.

Power For The People?

2011-03-29T23:11:00.002-04:00

Do you remember a few months back when the guys over at ProgressLex were complaining so vehemently about the power poles along Euclid and the new Oliver Lewis Way? Well, I hope that they don't get hold of the concept going around in New Jersey by their electric utility.

http://www.infrastructurist.com/wp-content/uploads/utilitypole.jpg

PSE&G for putting up solar panels on their power poles and tying into the grid as a way to supplement power production. They are aiming at 40 megawatts annually by 2013. And a number of whining NIMBY's in town are really up in arms about it.

Some want to whine about the fact that they are there, others about the fact that they are not on every pole and still others that they were not asked (or told) before the collector panels were put up. The Deputy Mayor in one town came out and said that they were just plain “horrible”. (Something about this sounds familiar.)

I can see the good behind an effort to “untie the sky” and try to get as many of the power lines underground as possible and we did just that under the Urban Renewal project along Main and Vine back in the '70s. Do you see the results of that in the controversy and demise of the CVS store this past year? A forgotten location of an underground power vault can mess up someones whole day.

What does this hold for the future in Lexington, on the placement of solar collectors or wind generators should a private entity wish to invest in them? Will they be allowed on roofs of our larger downtown buildings? Will a private homeowner be allowed a residential sized wind generating unit, either on the roof or in the back yard? Will they become as ubiquitous as the satellite dishes mounted all over town?

To me, the pole mounted collector is not a big problem. I may prefer to see them arranged in a more vertical shape to more conform to the height and scale of the pole. I would also like to see more research into the application of a spray-on paint type of collector which uses nanotechnology. Put that on the pole and blend it into the background. I find this to be a beginning of the design curve not dis-similar to the table top sized VCR's, the projection TV's and the 12' cable dishes in the yard. We need to install the first units and then refine down to the best possible end result. Before the next new system comes along.

We Don't Wage War On Things we Love

2011-03-27T22:49:00.003-04:00

Google the phrase “war on cars” and you will surely find several references to ongoing diatribes from The Heritage Foundation written by Wendell Cox but there will also be some fine rebuttals and one of the best lately is by Todd Litman. Litman is the executive director of the Victoria Transport Policy Institute in British Columbia,Ca.. and has done numerous studies on traffic not only in Canada and the U.S. but internationally. The real story is that those who are claiming that there is a concerted effort to eliminate the automobile are making this whole thing up.

As far back as the late 1990s, The Thoreau Institute and Randall O'Toole was writing that this so called “War” was roughly comparable to the earlier “Wars on Poverty, Drugs, Crime and (now) Terror” except that this was a war that the American people should NOT engage in. Considering how all of those other “wars” have gone (and with large amounts of direct funding from the government) this new “war” should be looked at as a failure from the outset.

One of the claims has been that the skirmishes in the “war” began back when the Interstate Highway System and High Trust Fund was created. The highways that were supposed to link cities without running through cities and funded from taxes imposed on ALL gasoline sales, but the social engineering (that they are so afraid of today) intervened took the major interchanges into the city centers and through many existing (low income) neighborhoods.

It is probably more accurate to say that the initial sniping was back in 1935 with Wheeler-Rayburn Act which intended to regulate the electric utility companies. Such utilities were also parts of holding companies which owned the streetcar and interurban systems of America. Strangely enough the streetcar companies were where the electric utilities got their start, providing power for the trolleys and selling off the extra to customers first along the lines and then to the rest of the area. By 1935, the electric companies “extra power” and sales far outstripped its usage by the trolleys. Streetcars, once they were torn away from their private subsidy, then had to compete with the automobile which was (and still is)subsidized by the government. We can see the results of that today.

Transit became the mode of choice for those who were either on the lower levels of society in most cities or the typical white collar worker in the larger metro areas. As these ranks have swollen with the growing sprawl and the continuing stagnation of wages(especially in the past decade or so) potential transit users have been left out due to the subsidy imbalance. Thus began the push for better transit in the mid-sized cities of the U.S.

Transit advocates persuasively argued that, due to youth, age, or disabilities, some people were simply unable to drive. Society owed these people as much mobility as the auto offered everyone else, so society should subsidize transit. But behind this argument lurked a belief that mass transit was better than personal autos and that we would all be better off if we could go back to the late-nineteenth century when most cities had streetcars but no one yet had cars.

The belief alluded to in the second sentence above does not include the idea that no one would be allowed to have autos but does provide for the choice to use one or the other, and even both.

It is the claims of social engineering against the automobile and its elimination from cities that fuels the rhetoric of today's battles. These claims may work in other communities, but Lexington is not actively working to eliminate the automobile. What we would like to do is balance the equation a bit and fund all modes on a more reasonable level.

All of America is not “at war” with the automobile, in fact most of us revere our car more that most all that we own.

The family car used to sit “out back” either in the driveway or in the garage. The garage was a small wooden shed type structure, unheated in the winter, some distance from the house and usually neglected to the point that it sometimes barely stood up by itself. Today it sits proudly on the driveway in front of the house, guarding the wide overhead door which dominates most facades and proclaims to all comers “our homes may be on par with each other, but I am the status symbol that you should be impressed with”. In the '50s, the good car was kept in the garage while the old workhorse auto was left in the drive or on the street and today it is the work vehicle that is hidden in the back and the show car on display. Americans love their cars.

American's buy cars, primarily due to marketing(another type of social engineering), not because they need to get from point “A” to point “B”, but to show just how far they have progressed up the social ladder. Today's autos are tricked out with so many extras, most of which we don't need, some we don't use and a few that we just don't know about, yet we buy them(at premium prices) because those just one step up the economic ladder have them. We buy cars that can go 130 mph. and are limited to 35 – 45 on most urban roadways. We buy cars with four wheel drive and never go off-road. We buy cars with all the comforts of our living rooms so that the 25 minute commutes will not inconvenience us and then use it less than 1/10 of the day on average.

It will not be the government planners or the social engineers who will wage the “war” on the driving habits of the American public. Most likely it will be those whom we have willingly thrown our support behind and our now hard earned money toward, the auto and petroleum corporations which have enticed us into this mess where we now find ourselves.

Where do you see yourself in the next stage of the situation?

A Surprise And A New School Of Thought

2011-03-24T20:36:00.002-04:00

I received an email yesterday from a recent reader informing me that this blog had been included as an entry on one of their blog lists. The link that was supplied indicated that I was one of 40 international bloggers writing about living in the suburbs and a quick scan of the list revealed some blogs from which I have tried to take my inspiration. I was really quite flattered. I quickly passed on the good news to Mrs. Sweeper since I was feeling real good about myself.

Then, I spent a great deal of time last night reading most of the other links and I am not so sure that this is a good thing. To be sure, they do have a balance of positions. Everything from the rabid “we have to move to the suburbs” to the “man are they going to be sorry someday” type of blog post from around the world. From those selling the myths of suburbia by retelling the myths of downtown to those who claim to see the despair of massive decaying home tracts. I think that they may have done a Google search on the word “suburb” and took a random sample of them all.

Oh well, exposure is exposure. I will take the good with the bad.

One of their links did cause me to contemplate the continued, less than cost effective, manner in which we use our schools. Take for example, the use of buses to get our students to and from school. Can it or should it be done a better way?

The first thought was to find out which portion of the annual school budget is used for transporting students and is it required. Finding the Fayette County Schools annual budget online is not an easy task and even then it would be an old one, so I took another tack. I looked at their fast facts.

They have 250 buses on the road daily, burning an estimated 2,200 gallon of fuel, to haul an estimated 34,000 students to 50 separate locations (and back) and covering approximately 15,000 miles. That is in a day.

Their start of school year enrollment is stated as 36,900 so that means that an astounding 92.1% of all enrolled students ride the bus. Daily. That makes 7.9% who walk or are driven by parents.

Why is it then, that there is always a traffic nightmare when passing any and every one of the 50 individual schools, morning and afternoon. The number of parent driven autos dropping off and then picking up the non-bus riding students is impressive. It also makes it difficult on those others of us trying to get to work on time.

I suppose that the 34,000 number could be the total daily rides and not students and that would cut the amount of students carried to about 17,000. That results in 46% who ride the bus daily and 54% who arrive some other way. Now we are talking a more reasonable figure.

But, do we need to pick up and deliver students to school when their parents clearly demonstrate that they for the most part are willing to do it? Our state law says that a public education needs to be provided but I know of no requirement to provide for transportation to and from said education. Have you seen the long lines of idling autos lined up in front of and looping around most of the schools in the hour before dismissal time? The environment would benefit greatly if all these carbon belching vehicles could be held to a minimum. Would it not make sense to route at least some of the existing public transit services to the schools and have a portion of the trip accomplished that way?

The development patterns of the past 80 years, and particularly the last 40, have contributed more to the time and distance needed to provide the services like school buses and public transit than they have in the rest of recorded history. We seem to be working at crossed purposes when we build in a lack of connectivity and demand that a service, supposedly delivered as a courtesy, be extended through a convoluted, circuitous path and expect our streets to remain tranquil and serene. Good luck with that.

I guess, my whole point here is that with the school district spending over $11,500 per student and a great deal of that in transportation costs how much more effective could they be by spending that money on class room work instead? The cost of fuel will continue to rise and the distances could get longer, so now is the time to consider/plan for a viable alternative and all options should be on the table. What is the sense of burning 2,200 gallons of fuel a day for 46% of he students and the parents burning probably half again as much for a remaining 35-40% while being taxed for both the schools and Lextran.

As an aside (and final thought), this would also add some stability to the school calendar since the calling of school for snow would depend on the parents decision of whether their child attends in inclement weather or not. Classes will be held, it is up to you to get your child there.

Are There Also Suburban Myths?

2011-03-21T07:52:00.002-04:00

Ann Bransom had a great column in Business Lexington on Dispelling the Downtown Myths which attempts to convince some our suburban residents that downtown is not so bad. I love being downtown and being part of the new vitality that has happened in the past decade.

I have worked downtown for nearly the past forty years and have seen a lot of changes over that time, most of the changes have been for the positive. Many of the old stores and restaurants that I frequented when I began working are gone, moved to the suburbs or replaced by others. Stores that I went to with my parents are long since sent to the mists of history. If I were to stop an calculate it, I feel that the decline began in the late'40s, at the end of the war, and any new stores after that time would stay in business only for 20 years or less. Those in the food and entertainment business probably lasted just 10 years, max.

I used to tell my friends that it took over 25 years to realize the downtown had fallen so far and that, even with Urban Renewal, it would take roughly twice as long for it to be brought back. It took no work at all to bring about the decline but it will take a huge effort to reverse it. Many who have grown up in the suburbs and have no knowledge of how it was, be it here or anywhere, may see it differently but the walkable sections which they call downtown were the epitome of the American dream in the early 20^th century.

The combination of zoning and cheap energy led to the development pattern which we all call auto-centric sprawl. The culture today feels that driving a mile or more to buy groceries or other goods, even gasoline, is an inconsequential situation and just a fact of life. At the turn of the last century, those living in subdivisions similar to Aylesford area, and later the area just the town side of Chevy Chase shopping center, could either walk or take the streetcar to adequate retail and usually not travel over a quarter of a mile. Most subdivisions were located within a 1 mile radius of the court house up until the mid '20s which is when both automobiles and zoning began to take a major hold on urban development.

Farm folk, the original rural dwellers, are used to traveling distances to get to town, either to purchase supplies or bring their products to market. Even going to church meant a bit of travel just to get to the meeting house, but there was an ebb and flow of goods and services between them and the city folk. The direction of the flow of services now appears, to me, to be one way-- out of town, because I don't see these commuters bringing and goods with them.

The goal of the current subdivision dweller is to have a house on a good sizes lot, a decent back yard on a quiet street. One commenter said “Many people like living where they have a big yard and quiet streets where their children can play. Their is nothing wrong with that.” but from what is can figure, the typical lot size is roughly one third smaller, the house is one third larger and the street, unless it is a cul-de-sac, is not as quiet as our older areas. Streets are not a place for children to play, either in places like Meadowthorpe, Castlewood or Gardenside, although looking at historical photos of the old days it was probably a lot safer then.

I don't have figures but if more neighborhoods had more retail sites within walking distance, then there wouldn't be as many cars on the road, not as many parking lots and all the streets would be safer. Would you believe that just about all the streets in the previously named subdivisions have a 50 foot right-of-way cross section? Meadowthorpe and Gardenside were done in the '50s and '60s but the others predate the invention of the automobile. Woodland Park and Loudon Park areas date from the 1880s and could not have anticipated the auto, but their streets are wide and I can't put my finger on the reason why.

Many a suburb dweller will claim the they are tired of paying for the upgrades to downtown since very few of them will spend large amounts of their time there. I will assert that more of us taxpayers in older areas are paying extra for the services being delivered to the new suburbs. Since we all are paying equally based on property values and our infrastructures are already paid for(probably twice or more times over), then our taxes are going for the newer services benefiting the newer areas. What has the EPA all bunched up is that we are accepting lesser quality new infrastructure for the taxes levied.

All in all, I think that those downtown enthusiasts have had to live with the evolving downtown myths while the suburban area myths have been perpetuated as a desirable lifestyle based on unsustainable situations.

Learning from Japan

2011-03-16T20:10:00.001-04:00

By now we have all heard of, and been shocked by, the devastation of the natural disaster in Japan. We watch it daily on the nightly news and shake our heads at the images of utter destruction, human misery and suffering. Then, there is the added peril of the growing nuclear radiation threat from the damaged power plants.

I heard from a friend, that some folks on our west coast are fearful that enough fallout and radiation could drift over here and cause wide-spread damage to property, crops and people. I am not so sure that it will happen but it could. But what about Lexington's preparedness for a similar sized disaster.

Way back in 1967, when we were near (or at) the height of the Cold War, Lexington had a plan for community shelters to protect residents from the dangers of “fallout”. This plan had its own section in that year's Comprehensive Plan and Lexington had many buildings designated, signed and stocked for such emergencies. The plan was simple in concept, but really quite simplistic.

At the time (1965), there were only 185 buildings usable for shelters and they could hold approximately 140,000 people out of an average daily population of 155,000. In dealing with fallout, maybe there were too few public spaces allotted but what if we were considering a massive earthquake along the New Madrid? Where would we go for community shelters then?

The “plan” divided the city into four areas; Downtown, UK Campus, VA Hospital and US Public Hospital (now the Federal Prison). Now, here is the fun part, all people assigned to the first three areas were REQUIRED to walk to the shelters since the streets “must be left completely free for police, fire and other authorized emergency vehicles”. The people making their way to UK were coming from Loudon Ave., The Shriner's Hospital and nearly out to Turfland Mall. Those going to the VA (that is the old Va on Leestown Rd) had to get through all the industrial areas with limited connecting streets and sometimes no sidewalks.

All of them walking.

I remember the ice storm of 2003 and all the streets that for several days became impassable. Now consider that ,in the event of an earthquake, all the streets would be littered with not just trees and wires, but piles of rubble and trash with no stable structure in sight. What is the plan for community shelters at that point? Where would most people go if their whole subdivision were leveled and they had to walk? I don't think that most of us are prepared for any like that.

The 1973 update of the original plan did little more than revise the numbers and switch from the VA Hospital to all of the major medical centers in town. It appears that some driving would be allowed but that walking would still be the preferred mode to get there. Still, we are talking about “fallout” here and basically nothing else in the way of sheltering during a community disaster.

The Cold War waned and the global threat of nuclear war seems to have let us get beyond planning for such contingencies, so all subsequent Comprehensive Plans have let the idea of “community shelters” just fade into the mist. Nothing of such a magnitude as the events in Japan have happened in our lifetime, in Lexington. We do have to remember that most of our suburban housing is farther than 1/2 mile from the nearest major intersection or shopping center. Planning for major disasters is still ongoing and information is readily available through the Division of Emergency Management (DEM) but the idea of citywide community shelters being identified and easily reached by a the populace is NOT being done.

Where will you go for shelter in instances like these? What would do if it wasn't there? Will you be prepared?

How Do You Feel About Public Transportation?

2011-03-15T16:43:00.001-04:00

The American Public Transportation Association (APTA) is predicting that ridership on America’s public transportation systems will increase should gas prices reach $5 a gallon.

We, here in Lexington, are already seeing a steady increase in Lextran’s monthly tallies and there will be more to come. Of course, we are speaking of just a local city’s bus system and not any type of regional transit or intercity passenger service. It is our lack of planning for and implementation of any regional service that will stifle our ability to enhance the local economy.

APTA President William Millar said in a prepared statement. "We must make significant, long-term investments in public transportation or we will leave our fellow Americans with limited travel options, or in many cases stranded without travel options."

Well, I wonder who those stranded will be. Do you think that it will be the wealthy drivers of those fancy SUV’s or the less well off suburbanite located out off Man o’ War Blvd.? Looking at the Lextran route map, I think that there will be a great deal of those who will need to travel more than a mile or two to work and get groceries.

Better yet will be those who are employed in our ring cities and towns and have to commute to places like Frankfort and Georgetown. You remember, places to where we used to have rail service. Carpooling will become popular again, but will it be enough for everyone?

Lexington government workers will not be immune either. More and more of our firefighters and police personnel live out-of-county and commute in. Quite a few of the city’s other administrative jobs are held by non-residents of the city.

Lextran could, of course, strive to become a regional transit agency more along the lines of TANK and TARC in Northern Ky. and Louisville. Those agencies cover areas outside of their home counties and even cross State lines. This movement would mean serious negotiations and agreements with our surrounding neighbors and an expansion of the existing taxing authority just as a basic funding source. The local Tea Partiers would love that, right?

All of this and not a word about connecting the three major cities of Lexington, Louisville and Cincinnati by passenger rail. I don’t’ think that we will get real serious about that until we get near $7 or $8 gas. It may already be too late to get started. Using the existing freight rails is not a realistic concept, as they will be hauling the goods that are now moving by truck.

So, how good do you feel about how well you will get around when if gas gets to $5 a gallon?

Lexington As A Business?

2011-03-13T20:15:00.002-04:00

I have been hearing the new mayor saying for a while, like many others before him, that the government should be run like a business. That business principles should be used in the running of our or any government. To that I would like to ask - Do we have a particular business model in mind?

Is there a business model that applies to government?

Businesses usually are formed for the purpose of making a profit. The larger the business the larger the profit. Businesses typically perform some kind of service for which they can charge a fee and good businesses will charge a large enough fee to cover their costs AND make a profit. Entrepreneurships will make enough profits to allow small families to get by and possibly support a few others as employees. Corporations will use the money of many investors and split the profits among them as dividends.

Non-profits provide services for which they charge a nominal fee and they may solicit money from willing benefactors consisting of individuals and corporations. Should a non-profit have funds left over after all programs have been completed and salaries paid, then new services or programs may be considered or undertaken.

Governments, on the other hand, are put in place usually to do for the citizens what they cannot, or will not do for themselves. They work for the general public good an taxes are collected to ensure that such services will be funded to their proper levels. Governments are not supposed to make a profit but they should collect enough in taxes to enable themselves to properly provide such services.

What business model would work best for a local government?

Lexington's government is a corporation primarily for legal reasons of liability and as a non-profit needs to charge some nominal fees, solicit from the citizenry(otherwise known as the usually willing benefactors) and provide services in return for those fees and funds. There should be NO profits to be distributed to the investors or returned to the willing benefactors. All the proceed should go to provide for the general citizenry.

So, what happens when the need to provide services exceeds the amount of funds gathered from the various sources? What would a corporation like FedEx or UPS do if the costs of fuel rose above a certain point? What have the airlines done when fuel and personnel costs rise? Did they go back to the investors or did they go to the users of the services? FedEx and others have raised their fees and the airlines have applied many new fees along with fare increases. Such fiscal moves are thought to be unheard of for government.

Should we manage our government like some of our larger, successful corporations? The ones where the CEO is paid at 300% the wages paid to the line workers and massive dividends are distributed to the stockholders. In this case, the services are being provided to those other than the investors/benefactors and governments just don't work that way.

Just what business model would you like to see for running government?

Giving Mr. Farmer A Hand

2011-03-10T00:24:00.002-05:00

I commented the other day about the deplorable conditions of our streets and the possibly diminished prospects for actual repair in the near future and probably the long term future.

I also see that the Councilman for the 5^th district has reported to his constituents that he is opposed to the expansion of the city's urban services area.

I will chair the LFUCG Planning and Zoning Committee, where I will oppose any additions to the Urban Service Area and will have a vote and a voice on issues related to city's Comprehensive Plan.

Well, now that is out in the open. Ain't nobody going to stand up to that kind of talk. Is anybody going to ask for large expanses of new land for development with the economy the way it is?

Just what kind of topics do you think Mr. Farmer should have an opinion on? I believe that we should have more neighborhoods like Aylesford and the early Ashland Park portions of the Chevy Chaser circulation coverage area. You know, the parts where everybody can walk to the store or school and maybe even the pub for a toddy in the evening. Some of these things are missing as get to the subdivisions which were built in the '60s and later. What do you say Bill, is this something that you can get behind?

I see that you are all for upgrading and repairing the storm sewers of your district. Can we change the way that the residents keep creating more impervious surfaces which places the rainwater, that used to soak in to the ground, into piping designed for considerably less capacity? I don't think that we are getting that much more rainfall, on a yearly basis, than we did 80 years ago, we just expect the old style pipes to handle it. What started off as houses with yards for the kids or maybe a small garden are now entertainment spaces designed like an extension of our family rooms, paved patios and pergolas included.

I have also mentioned the trolleys coming to Chevy Chase like you want. Some folks say that that would be just free mass transit for the well off in the area to get downtown. Others see it, like I do, as a way to get downtowners to a little bit farther away on their lunch hour. (the trolleys won't run all the time, that is what buses are for.) I, myself, don't see the Chevy Chase residents giving up their autos for a trip downtown. A short jaunt of a walk for the normal person but maybe a bit much for those past middle age.

Can we have a discussion, a realistic discussion, on what we may have to do should the relatively cheap energy that we have grown up with start fading like a Cheshire cat, leaving us with a sickening grin of memories. Will our newer subdivisions realize that they will be faced with decisions about major changes which may be needed in order to survive? How can you effectively route pedestrian traffic to distant facilities in a neighborhood fraught with cul-de-sacs and dead ends? Will we end up with houses being remodeled into store fronts for some local retail? You do remember that many of the shops in Chevy Chase started out that way, don't you. (Go around back of those places on the south side of Euclid and check it out.)

There you have a few of the topics that are ripe for consideration in this next Comprehensive Plan process, anyone have some others? Let us give Billy Farmer a hand.

Thoughts On This Winter And Beyond

2011-03-07T22:50:00.000-05:00

This past winter has been very rough on our streets and the rising gas prices will be even rougher on our wallets in the months (and years) ahead. The state has already announced their pothole repair days along the Interstates but the local roads are really showing signs of deterioration in some locales.

The one spot that comes to mind first is the Avenue of Champions. The portion just west of the Rose St intersection. It always seems to be in a state of collapse into a pothole. One day they will just have to excavate all the subsurface and solve the problem for good.

Elsewhere there are developing problems on Chinoe Rd, in the s-curve south of the traffic light at Lakewood Dr. Boy is it getting rough. Speaking of the Lakewood light, does anybody know why it is still there?

I remember that when I was growing up there was a problem getting out onto Chinoe from the side streets and that there were quite a few residents with power and wealth living there. I am sure that they were the ones who requested and got that light. But times have changed. There are now more ways to get out of the side streets and the traffic on Chinoe is not as intense. So, why is the light still there? Should there not be some mechanism to remove traffic signals like this?

Then there is High St. from Ashland to the center of downtown. Alligatoring of the pavement every so often and some potholes that have formed and been patched, yet are beginning to fail again. I am sure that you know of others around town in the same shape.

The Division of Streets and Roads's budget has taken a big hit this winter with all the salt use and overtime for the drivers. There may be enough to work on the potholes now but the budget for next year is being asked to be trimmed by 4%. Just in time for the petroleum based material sued in roadway repair to rise by double that. At this point we may have to live with failing roads.

Lexington has not left itself in a good position to deal with rising oil prices. We have spread our residential subdivisions far from the supposedly centralized shopping and service providing commercial areas. The occupants of those subdivisions will fight for the services which they believe that they are entitled, but they will want everybody else to help pay for them.

At some point, and I believe it will be soon, we will have to make some very tough choices about where we will live. I think that I have set myself up fairly well but even I will have to make some more sacrifices.

These are some of the topics that we will have to tackle during the next deliberation on the Comprehensive Plan, and that is coming up soon. Sooner than you think.

Chevy Chase, The Trolleys And Other Happenings

2011-03-06T21:20:00.000-05:00

I picked up the latest Chevy Chaser the other day and saw where the Business Owners group there are exploring the possibility of being added to the Blue (or Main/Vine) trolley route.

The last that I have spoken of this was back in August when I suggested adding the Woodland Triangle shops into the route. The Chevy Chase folks want to bypass that idea and team up with the restaurants on Main and Ashland to make a longer loop.

As their proposal is described, they would take their extension from the existing turn at Woodland and Vine/Central and continue on instead of turning left. They would go to Ashland and proceed to High St and the Chevy Chase area proper. Then, returning to Ashland for a run up to Main St. and then back downtown.

I, on the other hand, would proceed to the next street and turn right on Kentucky Ave., run up by the park and turn right on High St. Then loop around the Triangle, head straight down High, past Ashland to the Euclid/Fontaine intersection where I would hang a right. After another right onto Ashland, would proceed to Main St for the run downtown.

This route would limit the number of left hand turns for which we have no dedicated timing at the signalized intersections, while passing a larger number of businesses or points of destination. The expected extra cost could be split among a larger number of participants and the distance is not significantly more than the alternative. There also would not be any repetitive travel by backtracking over the same street in both directions. It would open up the possibility of a noontime stroll in Woodland Park, or a picnic of take out from some of the restaurants along the route.

While on the subject of Chevy Chase, I also see where they will be losing another of the neighborhood churches. The Greek Orthodox Church at Tates Creek and Melrose has been given permission to head farther out Tates Creek and build a new, larger facility on the corner with Rebecca Rd.

This location is right across the street from the exit of Immanuel Baptist Church and right in the middle of the mega-church row. It just happens to be on the other side of the street. I have a friend who attends this congregation and she tells me that they can rarely fill the seats that they have, much less do they NEED a bigger building. This is just one more instance of neighborhood churches leaving to become “available” to their constituents.

Funny thing is, this could have become my neighborhood in my teen years. About the time I was 10, my mother toyed with the idea of moving from the area around Woodland Park and joining a few of her sorority sisters in the spacious suburbs. She went so far as to find a lot and sketch out the type of floor plan that would suit her and our family. Next, she found a builder and convinced my father to go along with the scheme. Everything was a go, until she found out that we kids would have to go to the County schools. This was pre-merger of the schools which occurred well before the merger of the governments.

We would have to ride the big yellow buses and spend some hours in traffic both morning and evening. This did not set well with her.

At this time Tates Creek Road was a narrow two lane country road and a dairy across the from the lot she had chosen. Our new house would have been quite some distance from shopping, any other entertainment and the rest of our relatives, who then resided not more than 6 blocks from our current home. I would have grown up a much different person had we moved.

Well, my mother backed out of the deal, but the builder took the plans, made some slight modifications and built the house on the corner of Rebecca Rd and Tates Creek. On the town side of this photo and across the street from what will be a new church.

I am kind of glad that I did not move to the county, it would have given me a different and wrong slant on life. I am a city kid.

How Do We Deal With The Potential

2011-02-22T00:05:00.003-05:00

There lately was a post, on the net, concerning the potential of the City of Lexington. The author commented that none of the places that he had lived before could match the offerings available here in Lexington, yet that is not quite enough for him(or other young professionals). Lexington, he claims, could be so much more, as could many other cities across the U.S. Lets take a look at the common failings of Lexington, as detailed by this author.

The criticism basically begins with the look of downtown and the overall appearance of things. On the positive side, there are “many wonderful old buildings “ and many are worth saving and repairing as long as it is someone else's money being spent to do it. Development decisions are not solely determined by the look of the final product. Need and financial viability are also necessary to even up the return on investment. Great looks are just icing on the cake.

There is also the subject of “far too many empty lots” and that is a valid comment, as long as we are not just staring at the CentrePointe block when we say that. There are plenty of others, with as much development potential near the center of town, that have struggled through adversity without success.

The numerous parcels along W. Short St., which provide parking spaces during the day for offices and for the entertainment district at night, are necessary because our young professionals cannot live downtown. They HAVE to commute.

Some lots on N. Mill St., between Short and Second, have been proposed for a multi-story residential building to be filled with condos – expensive condos. Nothing that the usual young professional with a small family could live in, these were to be million dollar plus type units. Does anybody continue to call this a failed project?

What about the lots/lots on the west side of DeWeese, across from the National City Building? How long have these formerly well designed structures been gone and nothing to replace them? Another failure?

Will we call the CVS venture a failure because of the reviled suburban design or the unwillingness to pay for the relocation of some underground utilities(something desired) plus the redesign of a corporate model? Could this whole block benefit from a good design and still make it without a parking garage?

I see two locations, one on either side of the Calvary Baptist Church, and both former sites of auto dealers which hold good potential for some sort of downtown development. They are currently being used for surface parking and thus wasted in terms of generating tax revenue. Further south, on Limestone, the University holds several parcels with high development potential.

All of the foregoing are within a few blocks of the Main/Vine couplet and immensely develop-able, but there are others just a little farther out. The former Popeye's Sign Co. block was proposed for a 7 story mix of condos and retail which is now down to 20 townhouses and a two-story restaurant. Quite a difference from something that was supposed to be of similar density to the Lex across the street. When are we going to hear the rising ground swell from the young professionals, to do something with these lots and the various others nearby?

I do remember when a small handful of young go-getters bought into some of the most rundown locations with the intentions of renovation and gentrification. They did not wait for it to get done, they went in and did it. They did not ask for someone to change ideas to suit them, they presented ideas that they could make work for them. Right now, we have someone working very hard on a building, which for all intents and purposes, is in direct line for the Scott St spur of the Newtown Pike Extension project.. The old Scott Hotel building is looking very nice and is a historic structure. It should take a minor adjustment to realign the spur road to avoid this labor of love.

When it comes to the assessment of the “ugly modern “hi-rises “, I think that we have to allow ALL styles and ages of architecture or we will have folks calling for the total removal of split-level ranches and the like. Even the formerly bland Lexington Center complex looks better than it did when built, so there is hope for some of them.

Will these problems, along with the ones of suburban sprawl, the crumbling shopping rows and the public transportation system be fixed easily? Not really. The price of oil and private transportation may take care of the sprawl question. They may fall into the same level of disrepair that we saw in the inner city when it becomes prohibitively expensive to live there and work in the city. The shopping centers may have to re-purpose themselves with mixes of uses which will serve their local constituents.

The public transportation element? It will only get better when we use it more. Consistently full buses or trolleys will bring more frequent runs and better timing. Requesting routes to more destinations, and then USING them will go far in bettering the system for all.

I guess, what I am saying is that we can't just whine and complain about what some won't do for us or how we don't like the way that they did something. We may just need to get on board and then begin to steer a bit by shifting the balance of the ship.

Rail Accomplishments

2011-02-03T21:45:00.000-05:00

Well, here is an interesting piece of information. Norfolk-Southern, in 2010, has played a big role in industrial development and generated a lot of new jobs. Not bad for a years worth of work.

Out of 67 new industrial sites and 28 plant expansions, was even one in the Lexington area? Has Lexington industry added any new carloads to the more than 132,000 mentioned in the announcement? Were a few of those 2,000 jobs in the Central Kentucky area? I don’t think so.

It appears that roughly a third of those location and expansions dealt with alternative fuels production or distribution. I doubt that we will have any of those here as long as “Coal is King”. As for coal being hauled by rail, there are still many rail abandonment requests, in Kentucky, made annually. We talk of growing crops for bio-fuels and research on production, but I don’t see it moving very fast.

Lexington does have a growing industrial area on the north side, just where Citation will cross the N-S mainline and there were 2 new or expanded facilities placed in operation recently. Our very own Big Ass Fan Company, manufacturers of some of the largest industrial ventilation fans known, sits right along the rail line and nary a rail spur in sight. Will they be shipping everything by truck? God, I hope not.

Then, basically next door, we have the relocated Kentucky Eagle beer distributor who, I would think, could benefit from a rail spur also. Ironically, they moved from Angliana Ave. and direct access to the rail yard. We don’t brew this stuff here. It has to be shipped in from somewhere else and if it is not coming by rail (we know it can’t come by pipeline) then it must be by truck.

Our local factory for construction cranes, Link-Belt out on Palumbo Dr., removed their rail spur a few years ago but are in the expansion mode themselves They will be unveiling more of their telescoping crawlers in the near future. These must be shipping by truck as well. Thankfully, the industrial lead that is there services International Paper, Kentucky-Indiana Lumber and the Young warehouse complex on that road.

Lexington is losing some of their industrial customers, but that doesn’t mean that we have to lose the industrial spaces or facilities. Things like incandescent light bulbs are a thing of the past and maybe the existing building cannot be re-fitted to the newer technology, but whatever may replace the products/buildings could still use an efficient shipping/receiving mode that rail provides.

The railroads, or at least N-S, appear willing to assist in the work. Is our economic development effort working closely with them and others? I don’t see any evidence of it but I could be mistaken.

In terms of some positive railroad news, the R.. J. Corman rail group is working hard in the Rupp Arena parking lot with what looks like the anticipated boarding site of a Lexington version of the “Old Kentucky Dinner Train”. Honestly, I saw what appears to be drainage and sub-base work under the Oliver Lewis Bridge. As you can see here, we are looking back at the Arena with clearly some drains, set just wide enough for some tracks and at the lowest point of the earthworks. The alignment veers left and then back right and parallel to the parking lot pavement with just enough length for several cars while leaving the locomotive under the bridge.

Looking in the other direction it sweeps in a curve right into an existing track of the yard. This track has been the location of the unloading of the sand train, but it seems to have been shifted to the right in this photo.

I have also noticed that at the corner of W. Main and Oliver Lewis Way, they have leveled a spot for, probably, some corporate identity display. If it is similar to their display in Nicholasville, I would expect the current Corman boxcar and two locomotive shells, all decked out on a gorgeous red livery, set on rails to proudly proclaim that they are in Lexington to stay. This is not as exciting as an announcement about regional rail but if this will bring revenue service to Corman rail, then I am all for it

How nice would it be that, if next year, Lexington could be one of those N-S locations and the recipient of some of those jobs? Something to work for.

Growing Old In Lexington? (2)

2011-02-01T23:10:00.000-05:00

Since we all realize that we will end up elderly at some point, it is now commonplace to think and plan that, in the future, an assisted care facility and maybe some visits from the kids is a done deal. You would think that we would site our planned facilities a little bit better.

It is only since the end of World War II and rise of the “Baby Boomer” generation that the idea of nursing homes and assisted living facilities has exploded as an industry. The image of the “The Waltons” TV show, where a multi-generational household lives and solves their everyday problems makes for great nostalgia, but it is not a lifestyle for today’s modern family. Living with your parents, or even fairly close to them, is looked upon with distain and loathing. I think that it is something about having to be self-sufficient and making a life for yourself. Whatever the reason, in today’s world we have an ever increasing number of places to house our elderly.

Mayfair Village is located on Tates Creek Pike across from the Lansdowne Shopping Center. Hardly a great distance when measured form door to door, but there is a busy, four-lane divided highway and a very busy parking lot without a single sidewalk in sight.

Sayre Christian Village is off Camelot Dr and probably 1,000 feet, as he crow flies, from the Tates Creek Center. Winding through the neighborhood, down the hill and along Wilson Downing Rd makes walking to the center about three times as far, especially if you are going to the grocery.

Richmond Place is on Rio Dosa Dr. and not far from the Locust Hill Center but getting there without encountering heavy traffic and no traffic light is not something most seniors want to do.

Public funded facilities are not much better. Connie Griffith and Ballard Place, both located in the very walkable downtown are nowhere near a supermarket, pharmacy or general shopping type stores.

Church supported senior housing in the downtown area like Christ Church apartments or Central Christian’s place on Short St. have full access to the shopping that is downtown but again groceries and drug stores are a long way away.

These are just a few of the many elderly care facilities in Lexington but they all require driving somewhere for the basic necessities of life. Even recreational needs like walking to or in the park with the grandkids, or swimming, or….you name it, you HAVE to drive somewhere to do it.

Our seniors just don’t fit in out in the suburbs, stuck at home, unable to drive (or walk) to see friends, sometimes unable to do for themselves. They are then relegated to the facility of their children’s choosing (kind of like warehousing them for the time being) and visited by them if they have time. There they are safe, secure and we know where they are when we want to go see them.

Both of my sets of grandparents lived within a fifteen minute walk of where I grew up and I visited often. My aunts(one on each side) lived with them and we all got together on a regular basis. None of them went to a long term care facility. My maternal aunt did decide to retire to Florida when her circle of friends here began to dwindle and she could no longer drive. She had cousins and friends in Florida, but they were in the same shape as she and she soon returned to Kentucky, settling a block or two from where she had been.

Where we place our elderly care facilities is not so much an issue of land use or being allowed by the comprehensive plan or zoning because they are allowed in just so many zones. But where in those zones is the more important question. The higher density residential for the able bodied is usually placed adjacent to the shopping center and the elderly buffered just a little by less intensive uses some distance into the neighborhood. They don’t create as many peak hour trips as the apartments and shopping so their traffic impact will be minimal and won’t disrupt the neighborhood. We place them in the neighborhood but we don’t incorporate them into the neighborhood. And we wonder why they tend to just wither away.

We all will have to make a choice someday, either about your parents or yourselves, or it will be made for us. It seems to me that we should be working to make those decisions easier on ones who have to live with the outcome of those decisions.

Those are some of the things that we should be working on right now.

Growing Old In Lexington?

2011-01-31T23:32:00.003-05:00

I grew up in one of Lexington’s streetcar suburbs. The old mule cars ended a route just two blocks(and a hundred years) from my front door and in their heyday the streetcars went down the middle of my street. Progress marches on and the tracks were rerouted a little farther out in the expanding subdivisions but they were never more than a block from the house. Sadly, I came along 12 years after they ended their run and I never saw them.

Many of my neighbors did see and used them to get from home to downtown and some of the other destinations at which they stopped. It was one if the reasons that they bought in the area. Houses close to shopping, entertainment and recreation. It was also a neighborhood where folks could grow old and still easily get the necessities of life. With the streetcar they could get downtown to major shopping or they could walk to the local market or pharmacy, get their hair cut or meet friends at the local eatery. It was a neighborhood designed for multiple generations to live together, a real social network.

As a young fellow, I knew all of the families on both sides of the street and the people on the other side of the block. I knew where the kids(what few there were) lived and which of the houses were home to the sweet old ladies. I watched as couples aged, the husbands retired, the widows followed their spouses and the houses sold to others or became rentals. Even lost friends as their parents moved to the suburbs, but that was the way of the world in those days.

My next-door neighbor was a retired high school teacher whose eyesight was failing her. She had taught at the high school just a half a block from our house. She rented out a room to another lady who helped care for her, but we all kept an eye on her. As I recall, she lived there until about 6 weeks of her death.

On the other side, on the corner, was a retired doctor and his socialite wife. He was friendly to us kids but she never took time to talk to us, unless it was to shoo us away from her husband while he was working in the yard. The drove their late model Cadillac to Florida every winter and back in the spring, till that one year of the accident on the way back. Their estate sold the house for apartments soon after.

These stories are repeated, house by house, as you go around the block. The retired State highway engineer (where I saw my first old drafting equipment), the retired antique dealer, the retired preacher, and so on and so on. These people bought in this neighborhood, not as an investment but, as a place to live and grow old. These folks bought for the long term.

These are also not the type of subdivisions which have been built in the past 60 years. Today’s suburbs are built for the automobile. Nothing is really as close as a few blocks, especially when those blocks feature many cul-de-sacs and winding roadways. A 5 minute walk to the store is not the same as a 5 minute auto trip when you’re up in years, just ask the lady who drove into the grocery on Romany Road a while back.

The reality of today’s suburban living is, that it is for the children of the “Baby Boomers”. Children who chose not to live like their parents, in modest sized cottages, just like their parents who chose not to live in the old Victorians I the old town sections. Status usually led us to want more land and a bigger house, which now is more than most of aging population can take care of. Then there is the mobility, the constant mobility, moving for job, for family, for downsizing. Retire to where the grandkids are, except the aren’t in just one place, they are all over the country. My grandparents houses were stable, all through my younger years. So was my parents place, right up until my dad died and my brother and I took it over. Forty-five years in one place, just like it was designed for.

These are the types of residential subdivisions we need to see more of, don’t you think?

Testing Milk

2011-01-28T23:34:00.001-05:00

I am glad that I don’t drink milk from the typical dairy conglomerate.

I read today about frequent inspections and discovery of abnormal and illegal levels of antibiotics in older dairy cattle, on their way to the slaughterhouse. Those levels of contamination could also be in the milk on our store shelves.

What is that you say, why doesn’t somebody do something about it? Well, the F.D.A. had intended to start testing the milk from those farms found to be repeatedly marketing “tainted” cows. That is, until the dairy industry cried foul and pressured state regulators. Something about having to dump millions of gallons of milk that they could not store or sell while waiting for the testing to be completed. Hold it until it passes or recall it when it fails, either way it would be costly to the industry.

Dairy industry spokesmen will be the first to tell you that our milk supply is safe, that every truckload of milk is tested for four to six common antibiotics used on dairy farms. What they are NOT tested for are the other drugs not usually found on farms, yet found in the livestock prior to slaughter. The farms which repeatedly fail these tests are the one to be singled out for more rigorous review.

It is true that the number of “tainted” cows is a small fraction of the dairy cows making their way to slaughter, but it is a warning sign-an indication of possible future problems. By knowing my farmer personally and how he treats my animal and those of my fellow herd owners, I know that I will never receive milk from a “tainted” cow. Nor will my milk be mixed with that of a dairy with more lax standards. I like the consistency of the small, local dairy.

The F.D.A. had intended to start with the new year and test the milk from about 900 dairy farms. That’s right 900 repeat offenders. They would test for about two dozen antibiotics(not the typical six) and also for flunixin, a pain-killer and anti-inflammatory of popular usage on dairies. These are items that I don’t want(or need) to show up in my milk or my body. I don’t want to go to a doctor and have some unintended residue conflict with whatever he prescribes.

The major sticking point is that these expanded tests could take a week or more to complete. Large dairies depend on timely delivery to the processing plant and the store shelves, so any delay is seen as a bad thing and keeping the cows producing is a necessity.

Public health officials have warned us about the possibility of a proliferation of drug residue in the water systems, especially in large cities, and in the ground water from improper disposal of drugs. Do we now need to worry about our supposedly safe food supply?

Boy, am I glad that I don’t drink “store bought” milk.

You?

Get Ready For The Plan

2011-01-20T19:25:00.002-05:00

Amazingly, it is just about time for the Urban County Planning Commission to begin preparing the next comprehensive plan. The Comprehensive Plan is the document that guides the decisions concerning land use, transportation, density, services and other elements of Lexington’s development.

The usual principal issue is whether or not to expand the Urban Services Area boundary, but this cycle - given the recent economy- it may be more secondary in the upcoming discussions. With the explosion of foreclosures and the relatively stagnant home construction situation, the home builders could be working on the built up excess for a year or two.

Now may be the time to look at how our city could plan for the possibility of much higher fuel prices, the effects of “Peak Oil”. How will people get around to shop, go to school, socialize or even make a livelihood? Will we be more dependent on mass transit or will we need more localized places of social gathering? How do we plan to grow old in neighborhoods that were designed for young families and very auto dependant street structures?

One of the points in Mayor Gray’s campaign was to make Lexington’s neighborhoods more walkable and thus more livable. The Obama administration, especially through the Secretaries for HUD and Transportation, has promoted making cities more livable and many of the recent transportation grants have been decided on a livability index.. Now it is our turn to stress to the powers that be, our desire to reside in a truly livable city.

The Wall Street Journal recently reported that “millennial's” or Generation Yer’s have shown a dislike for the housing choices of their parents. Many of them are shying away from the suburbs and looking for a more urban lifestyle. Many want to be in a walkable, bikeable, downtown area. Someplace that is more vibrant for more hours of the day than the cookie-cutter subdivisions where they grew up. Lexington has a limited supply of locations like that and as the demand rises, so will the prices.

Many of you who read this blog ARE interested in Lexington development and making our city better. So I ask you to gather your thoughts, send them to me, ProgressLex, North of Center and others. Let’s get something moving toward making Lexington the city that it can be, if we only try.

Regional Rail Topic Comes Up Again

2011-01-16T21:15:00.001-05:00

I am quite unsure just why this has not made an appearance on the Kentucky.com site yet, but the State Journal in Frankfort reported last week on a proposal for commuter service between Lexington and Louisville. Two trains, each running in three times a day, from Winchester to Louisville with stops in Lexington and Frankfort and (get this) in place by October of 2012.

Wow, with a blockbuster announcement like this one would think that the Herald-Leader would be all over this. Passenger service to the state capital and Louisville three times a day. Estimated cost to Frankfort is a low, low $8 one way. R. J. Corman and CSX would make a bundle on this and add in the stop proposed at Keeneland and there would be nothing stopping these guys.

There is nothing more that I would love to see than passenger rail to both Louisville and Cincinnati on a regular basis, but I see this path being fraught with delays and legal trouble. I think that we are too late in beginning this effort and that the advocate pushing it is dreaming about the eventual cost of start up.

To date route to be used has been known as the “Old Road” to many of Kentucky rail buffs and the majority of it is now leased and used by Corman as a freight route. From what have read of the agreement approved by the Surface Transportation Board, CSX has limited Corman to basically the weekly aluminum ingot trains and sand, cement and some general merchandise runs. The latest addendum, I believe is the ability to haul material for the repair and maintenance of the railroad so that they can facilitate their side of the federal “TIGER” grant of $17,551,028. This project is known as the Appalachian Regional Shortline Project. CSX has not allowed any revenue passenger service over this line and has shown reluctance to even talk about it.

The trackage from Winchester to Anchorage, Ky. Is outside the normally defined Appalachian Region, so I wonder if it is the focus of the grant work as the intent is to refurbish roads in Ky., Tenn. and W. Va.

The person behind this proposal, is the new industrial recruiter in Frankfort. A local position for the city, not a state position. It is noted that he has extensive background in rail planning, both stateside and in Iraq, but there seems to be major gaps in his gathering of fundamental existing conditions.

The article states that a stop is intended to be placed at Keeneland which currently has no rail spur. The closest rail line crosses the Van Meter Rd., about a mile from the back gate of Keeneland and surrounded by horse farms. This line is owned by Corman, but it is the line which goes to Versailles, not Frankfort The “Old Road” crosses S. Yarnallton Rd nearly 5 miles distant and although there used to be a flag stop there, it has long since been transferred to private ownership.

This hindrance will also plague the announced intention of the owner of Greenbrier Resort to run a special trainset from the resort to Keeneland, and back, as part of their strategic partnership to pull in the high rollers of gambling. Theirs may be larger in scope as there is no direct route from Huntington, W. VA to Lexington and they will have to route through Cincinnati. A time consuming trip, nearly 10 hours, as I have recounted here before.

The price tag and time frame are also a question in most folks mind. Those knowledgeable rail fans, from whom I have heard, all question the validity of $40 million to upgrade the track and build stations. Then there is the cost of personnel and operations. Many larger cities which have regional rail, still have to have subsidies which run into the millions, and they have much larger commuting populations. 80 to 90 mile an hour travel between Lexington and Louisville is a possible goal and one that we should have reached long before now. (Wait, we did. Back in the ‘70s when they completed the Interstate.)

80 to 90 mile an hour rail travel between Lexington and Louisville is still a ways off.

Roads Can Be Tricky And Dangerous

2011-01-09T12:30:00.000-05:00

I took just one week to arrive at our first traffic fatality of this year and we came very near making it a full week.

Last night, in the cold and dark of a winter which is barely started, our old nemesis struck with the help of some seasonal friends. The nasty roads decided to team up with a little snow and ice to reach out an punish our hapless drivers.

I really think that something should be done to hold these cruel villains at bay. For many years now they have preyed upon our drivers, young and old alike. Maybe there should be a law to prohibit them from conspiring with each other to commit dastardly deeds like property damage, sometimes amounting to large sums of money, injury and even death.

I used to think that it was the drivers themselves, but that cannot be the case. Auto drivers have been around for just about a century and surely know how to handle their autos. They have to take tests in order to get permission to operate an automobile. I have heard that many people believe these tests are quite difficult. I didn't think that it was so bad but Mrs. Sweeper says that it was my eyes that caused the problem.

I also realize that it not just the wintertime conditions which are the culprits, these things happen all during the year. Roads are slick in warmer weather when they team up with rain and fog. Trees and fences, both wood and stone, sometimes get in the act but a road is usually not far off(probably giving encouragement). How can we get these fellow to stay away from each other? What is a safe distance to keep them apart.

Roads have been around for a long time. Just about as long as people have been moving from one place to another. Is it just in the last century that roads and their friends have become dangerous? If I remember correctly, European roads used to be friends with roaming bands of highwaymen, helping them to attack and rob unsuspecting travelers in out-of-the-way places. It seems that they have been at it for a while, but lately they have upped their game.

I have heard of some fatalities occurring when the roads are behaving themselves and the weather is calm and beautiful. At those times I feel that drivers are just hoping that the roads and their friends will come out to play. Sometimes, maybe the roads are just too tired to care. That is when the automobiles get to play their tricks on drivers

This a photo of a sleeping road just being lazy

Come to think of it, roads are designed and built by man, so could it be sometimes, just sometimes, that roads may be forced to lie in places that they just don't want to be? Places that good self-respecting roads just shouldn't be seen? Are roads predestined to go bad or are they inherently evil?

I guess that we are lucky to have a dedicated police force and an equally alert news media, so that when the extremes of weather occur they caution us about the roads (and their tricky friends). Sometime they warn us about the portions of roads which just go and hide themselves, usually under water but sometimes under entire hillsides. It takes a lot of work to get them to come back out again.

I have come to the conclusion that roads, and that includes their local cousins, the streets, can be very tricky and unpredictable. Any time that you venture out on them, you have to be very careful and vigilant, especially when there is bad weather in the neighborhood. They will conspire to get you.

There, now you know a little more about roads and their friends. Be careful when you go out on them, they will always be up to something.

Southland's Mall Error

2011-01-05T23:10:00.003-05:00

I have often written about the former Lexington Mall property (also here) and the problems that the city has had in finding a solution. I have also written about other underutilized properties in Lexington and even mentioned one very near the mall location. I now believe that the solution which has been brought forward will not be in the best interest of our city, or even the entity purchasing the former mall.

The plans for the Lexington Mall were approved in 1969 as an answer to the Fayette Mall, which was itself an answer to Turfland Mall being constructed finally after being approved in 1961. Each of the locations was adjacent, or very near too, an intersection on New Circle Road and an entry to the center of the city.

The New Circle loop was completed in November of 1969 and hailed as the solution to the cut-through downtown traffic. It was also became the interception ring for all regional shopping trips coming from as far away Morehead, London and Liberty Ky. Shoppers could get on at any of the intersections and quickly get to many regional shopping areas. Such were the thoughts of the time cheap gas, good roads and a trip to the big city.

The era of cheap gas and multiple vehicles per family along with good roads and the Interstate completion helped to redefine how commercial interests assessed their prime locations for shopping centers. It is these same assessments that many planners and city officials are beginning to question as the environmental and traffic problems associated with parking lots (both runoff and air quality), congestion and non-vehicular access factor into a livability index.

As the downtown retail began to feel the effects of the loss of out-of-town traffic and the local first and second ring subdivisions found that they too could get to shops across town (without going through town),even the larger churches began to take notice.

Churches, like small retail, historically located in the neighborhoods where the residents could walk to services. Many street corner churches were established in the early nineteen hundreds, most sprouting up soon after there were a sufficient number of congregants in the area. Almost none of them originally had any parking lots as the expected their folks to walk to church.

People like to, or used to, identify with their particular congregation and would continue to attend even when the moved beyond a convenient walking distance or aged beyond walking ability. Churches soon had more people coming from some distance than there were from the surrounding streets and parking became a weekly problem. Add in the mid-week and other services and the “spiritual backbones” of the neighborhoods began to weaken in the neighbors eyes as the need for parking grew and the spaces started to vanish.

The downtown “legacy” churches began to creep into the adjacent neighborhoods just as the insidiously as the commercial and office buildings and their parking needs grew, but the subdivision street corner ones just packed up and moved to greener fields. Those who could do so took on the image of mega-churches with their massive acreage and parking for all. Out there was room to grow, space to build those things that large congregations need.

Churches began to take on many commercial facets and started to sell religion as a commodity and benefits, therefore they needed to locate like commercial shops. They needed to be on major roads, with a large edifice and easy access and they needed to cast as wide a net as possible. Now, churches and retail need the people to come to them rather than taking themselves to the people. Could this be why buying online and getting delivery by parcel truck is becoming so popular?

Churches will not have someone like UPS or FedEx come to their rescue, to deliver the services to their door. They, like many others who have become dependant on automobiles, will have to find ways to weave themselves into the neighborhood lives of the masses again, especially if the time of $5 gas comes as predicted. Their locating in large buildings on major roadways, though meant for ease of access, will then be more prohibitive to those who will need them most.

Southland Christian Church, in buying the old mall, may have picked the least useful underutilized property in the immediate area.

View Lexington Mall in a larger map

Across New Circle Rd is the abandoned apartment complex originally built as Todd’s Trace Apartments. Sitting on nearly the same total area as the mall, these multi-family structures have been vacated for some time and are actually declared uninhabitable. They almost MUST be demolished. There is no drainage problem, nor has there been any. True, there is no direct access to either major road but the parcels are very visible from both the interchange levels. A primary factor for locating a church facility for the future should be the extreme accessibility to the neighborhood and this property fits the bill. I feel that this neighborhood does not fit the demographic which the church has in mind as its congregants or its object of major need.

Physically, the property is probably more conducive to redevelopment for a religious facility than the mall structure. I can visualize a well placed, environmentally sustainable building nestled in some of the existing trees with a calming natural meditation garden. I imagine something like a cross between the Christ the King Cathedral and the Unitarian location on Clays Mill. There could even be enough remaining space to maintain a community garden or local farmers market.

Just something to think about.

Lies And Myths

2010-12-27T22:40:00.000-05:00

I have come to see some of the almost blatant lies which have become the myths of advertising these days.

I grew up in the times of the “muscle car” and the “thrill of the open road” images in auto commercials. Ads at that time stressed getting out and driving just about everywhere one could go. I also remember that there was usually some small type at the bottom of the screen warning about a “closed course” and a “professional driver” which would indicate a less than typical driving experience. Young boys and even more “younger” thinking men fell for these clever slights of photography and images. They did so by buying cars which spent more time stuck in traffic than they ever saw on open road.

Car designs of the ‘60s and early ‘70s were moving through the aerodynamic styling of sweeping lines and “fins” to the constantly increasing size of engines and their resultant horsepower ratings. Gas was cheap (relatively) and the Interstate system was reaching a semblance of completeness, but the commercials still showed the particular model, alone on the road and usually winding through some spectacular scenery. Where do you find people in real life driving like that? Today’s commercials are still trying to sell the same thrill of whipping your new car through city streets and open country roads, free of all other traffic or impediments. Why don’t you try that some morning, on the way to work along Nicholasville Rd?

My dad would love to take the family for a ride in the country on Sunday’s. I think that I learned a lot about local geography and history while doing so. We would drive for a few hours and end up at some interesting state park or other small attraction, grab a bite to eat and then head back home. Before the Interstates, this was an all day thing but eventually it took less time although we went farther. These days it is almost a chore to head much farther out of town than 30 or 40 miles. My trips to Louisville or Cincinnati are budgeted for well in advance.

Today, I heard a radio commercial which encouraged folks to get out an drive, to see sights up and down our Interstates, to get off on our back roads and visit’s the remote locations of Kentucky. It was our Tourism industry at work. Where do you think that they will be when gas passes $5 a gallon? Oh right, I forgot. I wrote the other day about our wonderful electric vehicles which we will be driving soon. Our remote tourism locations, in the usually pristine countryside, will all be equipped with charging stations (and not more than 40-80 miles apart). I guess that I shouldn’t say anything about the massive power lines which will need to cut through the landscape to supply these charging stations. Then again, maybe not.

Have you seen the ad campaign by Kentucky-American Water about their “gift” of the property which holds Lakeside Golf Course and Jacobson Park? Next week they are claiming that they will make a New Year’s present of it to the City. What a crock.

They held the prospect of that property being developed as a threat over the citizens of Lexington during the “negotiations” of condemnation proceedings back in 2005. The “settlement”, which in my opinion was a capitulation, agreed to was for the KAWC to hand over the recreation property (that so many had grown up thinking was city property) in return for not continuing or even considering such condemnation actions in the future. They are just abiding by their agreement, but if it makes them look good, at a time that they really need to do so, then so much the better. If KAWC were really interested in doing what is best for the people of Central Kentucky, then their corporate decisions would be based on the social needs of the customers and not the capital needs of the shareholders. The myth here is that private corporate decisions are better that government mis-management, while both may be equally dangerous.

How about the idea that our “smart phones” and their “apps” are so much smarter than we are? Yet for all their smart features, they spread more personal information than a neighborhood gossip, its just that their facts are true. If you are using some of the more popular “apps” and you have entered any personal information, then it may be safe to say that several online tracking companies have a file on you(and know more about you than you think. Your location is being tracked, automatically, by most of the top “apps” used today. If you are texting, tweeting or surfing the net for extended periods of time, then there are several companies who know your daily routines, maybe better than you do.

These companies are not (currently) allowed to single out your information, but it may be aggregated into similar profiles and built into a “demographic”. A demographic is usually fairly generic, but these people know where you live, where you work, where you play, what you eat and drink, what you like to do for kicks and many other things. You can be tracked 24/7/365, and you gave somebody permission to do so whether you know it or not. You cannot turn it off even if you wanted to.

Our smart phones are creating the myth that we can get more things done quicker and therefore we are getting smarter. I feel that if we let the phones do it all for us, we will forget how to do it when we don’t have the phones for a while. It is like having that GPS with turn-by-turn or step-by-step directions and no one will remember the way to anywhere should the batteries fail. I learned to get places by trial-and-error which most young folk have no patience for these days, but I get there just the same and most times faster than the GPS.

I don’t have a cell phone, much less a “smart phone” and I don’t have OnStar in my car (that I know of). I also know that I usually will NOT be the only one on the road when I drive somewhere and someday Jacobson Park may feel like Woodland Park, just an over used area that used to be a ways out of town. And I know that I don’t buy into all the myths and lies told on television.

Some Milestones

2010-12-17T23:10:00.000-05:00

This past week has been one for milestones, especially in transportation.

To begin with, there was the first delivery of a Nissan Leaf to a customer in Redwood City, California. The Leaf is the first mass produced electric car which is priced for the average person, around $33 thousand a pop but with state and federal rebates the final cost is about $20K. I have discussed electric autos before and I still believe that the controversy of “range anxiety” will still cause some folks to hesitate on such autos. Eighty miles on an 8 hour charge just doesn’t seem like a lot.

The new owner, a west coast tech guy, had a charging outlet installed in his garage last Friday after he was informed that he was chosen to be the initial owner. Not bad for a first car although he has some experience with electric bikes and his commute is only about twenty miles round trip.

Then came the delivery of the first Chevy Volt. This car is not totally electric since it has a gasoline engine to assist when the battery pack runs out. The Volt has an estimated range of 40 miles, about half that of the Leaf, on a full 8 hour charge and is best re-charged from a 220-volt outlet for that length of time. I somehow see that as slow cooking a roast in the oven EVERY night in addition to the regular cooking and HVAC usage. I am not sure that my KU budget can stand that.

The first owner here, came on the other side of the country - in New Jersey. In this case, the buyer is a retired airline pilot who traded in an older Prius for the Volt. After a career behind the controls of, what I consider a very inefficient travel mode, he appears to save the planet by driving more fuel efficient vehicles. The cost of the Volt runs a bit higher than the Leaf at approximately $41 thousand (or $34.5K after rebates) and charging from a regular household outlet will take much longer.

Our new owner of the Volt did interrupt his trip to Florida to fly back home so that he could take delivery, but then he left it at the dealer’s lot and flew back to Florida for the rest of his vacation. So much for his save the planet attitude.

Then we come to the 10th anniversary of America’s “high speed” rail, the Acela.

Amtrak’s attempt at high speed train travel is still going strong despite the efforts of previous administrations to gut both Acela and Amtrak. The Acela service has survived and even become quite popular as an alternative to both I-95 and flying in the Northeast Corridor. They have carried more than 3.2 million passengers in fiscal 2010 and rider-ship is up substantially in the past five years. It will be interesting to see what they figures do with increasing animosity toward TSA screenings at airports.

Acela’s passengers have generally welcomed the possibility of faster service with some hoping for similar service to Japan or Europe. In this business world, time is money and traveling from downtown to downtown by rail(particularly with real high speed rail) will be done nearly as fast as airport to airport is today. Amtrak has now captured 55 percent of the Boston-New York air-rail market now that the electrification, long delayed by the Reagan and Bush(I) White Houses, was completed in 1999.

Paul Krugman recently noted that it has become obvious that America, once the nation of builders, now cannot build those projects of heroic infrastructure any more. The average age of our “Capital Stock” (our structures, equipment and software) is rising, modestly in the Residential and Non-Residential elements but drastically in the Government items. Our highways and Interstates (Government) are decaying as are our railroads (Non-Residential) just not at the same rate. Our bridges and tunnels need replacing but we claim that it is too expensive.

I wonder where we will be on Acela's 20th anniversary.

More On Wayfinding Signs

2010-12-10T22:50:00.000-05:00

I wrote about the new way-finding signs back in the middle of October. Then it was about my feelings on the arrangement of the destinations and how they differ from the standards of the Federal government. Today, I wonder about the decision to put all the locations on ONE single panel of the sign and not separate panels for each.

When these signs were first discussed, I thought that they were envisioned as standard sized, individual destination panels which could be assembled into a larger unit and displayed on some kind of a support system. This would allow new destinations to be added should they be built and changes in the naming of those which sometimes do so.

This arrangement was clearly NOT followed and now we are beginning to see the fallacy of not doing so.

These signs are designed specifically for automobile traffic, even those in the downtown area. They are only readable from the side facing the oncoming traffic. Should you be walking along the new sidewalks we just built, but going the opposite way of the autos, these signs are useless. Pedestrians can use these signs only a small portion of the time.

I have already pointed out that they lack any approximate distances or correct order of destination, but for pedestrians this is crucial information. The signs out around New Circle Rd. (definitely auto-centric) and the one right downtown (should be urban friendly) are identical.

Lexington really does want to expand its downtown destinations and points of interest, but these signs are designed to be a point in time system. Where is the flexibility to add new points, especially those which would fall in between existing ones? What would happen if one of the points were to undergo a naming change?

A name change? Well we will see about that very soon. It looks like our Lexington Legends will be renaming the old ball park next year when the agreement with Applebee’s expires. I guess that no one saw that coming.

I have also noticed a lack of any destinations other than historical or entertainment type points of interest. Do we not want anyone to find our civic or legislative buildings, specifically for those who are new in town?

I heard someone, the other day, refer to these signs as “for the WEG”. I believe that this proposal was in the Downtown Master Plan as something that should be done and not just for downtown. Most of the proposed signs were not up for the WEG, nor are they all up today. The thoughts behind this project meant well but the way that it has been implemented leaves a little to be desired. The money has been spent (and mostly out of town) but it may not be too late to salvage the entire program. Maybe some of our local sign makers can suggest a way to “not throw out the baby with the bathwater” and, using the current poles and bases, design a better solution. I don’t mean do it gratis either.

If we are going to do a way finding system, then lets do it right.

Would You Like To Be Sued For Growing Food?

2010-12-05T13:13:00.001-05:00

I do have a great interest in urban agriculture and growing more of our food locally, but I hope that nothing like what happened in Clarkston, Ga. ever happens here.

A local landscaper bought a piece of property, upon which former owners had grown vegetables -at a profit- and set about raising a hobby garden, in the back yard. True it was a nearly two acre back yard, but it was a hobby garden. I know several folks, who if the had almost two aces, would put in a wide variety of hobby scenarios (flower gardens, outdoor model trains, etc.) and I believe that all of them would be legal. But this gentleman raised so much edible crops that he couldn't give it all away and resorted to local markets.

That is where the local zoning laws got him. His land was producing too much for the zone. His lot was apparently considered a commercial operation and therefore, not permitted in the zone. Is it possible that such a thing could happen here?

A former neighbor has a house and they own the vacant lot next door. There used to be another vacant lot on the other side, and this neighbor maintained gardens in both spaces, as well as the back half of a parcel approximately a half a block away. This fellow's passion was flowers but I remember some vegetables along the way. None of these spaces could be thought of as commercial but they could supply a good portion of the surrounding households with nutrition if it needed to. Fact is, I don't think that it went afoul of the law, either then or now.

In the case in Ga., the gentleman was eventually allowed to get a zone change, but has been saddled with the expensive fines and penalties as well as the cost of the zone change.

To those of you, who like me, wish to see more urban agriculture and more locally grown food, we must be cognizant of the laws and the possibilities under them. We must also strive to make them allow for future situations and not just restrict past abuses (real or imagined). Zoning laws, by and large, are not written with backyard food production in mind.

While many food activists cite urban agriculture as crucial to establishing locally sourced food systems, zoning laws present challenges. What distinguishes outlaw tomato plants from a legitimate commercial operation is not always clear.

Another point of contention could be the raising of chickens(see what they are doing here), which I don't think is against any local zoning laws currently, although most herd animals are prohibited. The keeping of horses, even inside the Urban Services Area limitation may be allowed.

Cluck (a Sarasota Fl. chicken advocacy group), which has been active for a year and a half and has about 300 supporters, says chickens would make Sarasota more attractive for a younger, hipper crowd. Children who think their food grows at the supermarket can see where it really comes from.

Where should we Lexingtonian's stand on this subject?

ProgressLex Is Back Blogging

2010-11-29T21:20:00.000-05:00

Welcome back to ProgressLex.

To be honest, I have missed you and am looking forward to more spirited conversation and ideas. I may just have to slip out of character and find my way to Buster's on the 8th.

There is a full truckload of things that NEED doing here in Lexington and most of them, I fear, are subjects that most folks will not be comfortable with. As with most places, the paradigm shift in thinking is usually reserved for the other guys and Lexington, as well as ProgressLex, is not immune.

Cell Phone Usage In Cars

2010-11-22T13:10:00.003-05:00

Americans are about to extend their backlash toward the Obama administration again.

The Secretary of Transportation, Ray LaHood, has recently said that driving while using a cell phone is so dangerous that technology may soon be installed in our cars that will disable said cell phones, while the car is in motion. Not just the driver’s phone but all the phones in the vehicle. Passengers too, will not be able to talk or text while the car is in motion.

I don’t really see this as a major inconvenience and for one would welcome it. I cannot count the times that I have witnessed drivers, with cell phones to their ears, navigating through parking garages or lots or busy street intersections, concentrating on driving and talking but NOT on cyclists or pedestrians. This is usually during either the morning or evening rush hour, not a great time to be driving with just one hand.

Now, here comes the backlash.

Most of the printed comments that I have read are concerned with “what happens during an emergency?”. This is a legitimate question, but what percentage of today’s normal, driving, cell phone use is during an emergency? Had you been in an accident, would you not be stopped? Had you witnessed an accident would you have stopped to render aid? No, most of our normal cell phone use is calling about useless, unnecessary rambling which could have been done prior to starting the automobile, not to mention the texting of teens who may be passengers and sometimes in the same car.

Many equate the driving and talking on our extremely rural western Interstates with the vastly different, urban expressways and intense downtown traffic of our large cities. I may lean toward the relaxing of the regulations in our western rural areas much like we do our speed limits, but care must be used in such matters.

The majority of the comments have been on the regulation of personal freedoms. People feel that they have the ability to drive and talk, or text, read books, apply makeup and a myriad of other things—all without proving that they are able to do so. The police log books (and cemeteries) are filled with examples of the inabilities of drivers to fully control their vehicles while being distracted by something else.

But let us switch for a moment to the subject of the in-car systems of OnStar and the less well known Sync technology.

OnStar, at its very base is just a cell phone built into an automobile. OnStar has been sold as a safety and emergency response system, but it is just a cell phone. Granted, it is connected to all elements of the vehicle, controlling windows, doors and even engines and does NOT have to be activated by the driver. The system may be turned on by the company at any time (and without the driver’s knowledge) for public safety or national security reasons. (Think of it, your supposedly private conversations could be heard and recorded without your cell phone even being on.)

Should your auto be stolen, the company can locate, disable and recover it but that also means that they know (and can record) EVERYWHERE you have been. How many times have you been to the fast food burger hell or the local drug store (or porno palace?), you know, places that you may not like folks to know that you frequent? And who may have access to this information without your consent?

There are even phone apps built to access certain pertinent data about your auto, although many folks will never need or understand it. How easy is it for a nefarious hacker to appropriate this data for his desires? Can he sell it to someone as information gathered by legal means? Are you willing to go along with that intrusion into your life, or do you want “some” government regulation?

I don’t see these systems being disabled by any technology which could be added to either our autos or our cell phones. Thusly, I feel that whatever is unveiled will be able to; a) be location and/or temporal aware so as to override the disabling for emergencies, b) have some sort of override code which could be triggered by the user and verified by 911 agencies, and c) allow those in extremely rural areas to use cell phones depending upon a controlled set of circumstances.

In any event, I find this to be a lesser intrusion to our personal privacy that the TSA searches.

In a quick update, a recent survey found that 63 % of American voters favored a ban on cell phones while driving. I don't think that it is only 36% of our drivers who are the problem.

Looking at "Fresh Start" Part 2

2010-11-09T22:17:00.000-05:00

Continuing with my comments on Mayor-elect Jim Gray's "Fresh Start" platform and actions that he proposes to take in his new administration, today we will look at his thoughts on neighborhoods and others.

Cities thrive when neighborhoods thrive. A healthy neighborhood has churches, schools, recreational facilities, and shopping within walking or short driving distance. This affords neighbors the opportunity to “meet up” with one another as neighbors and gives them a sense of place and belonging. I grew up in a small town that had all these services, and more, close by. In Lexington we have subdivisions larger than my hometown that are isolated from these basic services. That’s got to change. As mayor I’ll work to create better neighborhoods throughout Lexington.

Is there any neighborhood in Lexington that its residents think could not get better? The eternal question has always been "Who's definition of better are we using?" I'll ask you all, "What would you change about the neighborhood where you live or work?" and "How many of your neighbors would change the same things?"

My guess is that most would not change as many elements or as drastically as you would like. I also believe that you would not go along with many of your neighbors, as most Americans will look out for themselves first. I will tell you that my ideas for "improving" many neighborhoods would not go over well with those who live there. That said, lets see what Mr. Gray thinks.

Here are some other efforts I’ll undertake as mayor to support Fayette County neighborhoods:

Do business in the open. No backroom deals with any special interests that affect neighborhoods. When we discuss issues that affect neighborhoods, people who own homes there will be at the table.

I have to assume that he is talking about established neighborhoods here. Lexington's new subdivisions generally take place where there are no existing homeowners who will remain in the area.

Most of the conflicts arise as the developer reaches the remaining acreage, or full build-out, and those who were told, probably by a well meaning but less than knowledgeable realtor, that the land use for the remaining property will be the same as their unit. Unfortunately, due to demand or market situations, that may not remain true. As I have repeated here often, the retail follows the residential and once the residential reaches a tipping point, the commercial area will begin to fill in. In the older sections of town, that meant neighborhood retail but in today's world, the retail is all concentrated of the fringes and at major intersections. Even where it has been planned for over a decade, the residents do not want neighborhood shopping.

Interspersing higher density residential in these same neighborhoods is considered an even more heinous travesty.

Direct each department – police, code enforcement, building inspection, planning, traffic, etc. – to have a designated liaison for neighborhoods. That person will be responsible for navigating the bureaucracy to get questions answered and action taken quickly. The liaison will log every question or concern, describing it, the date it came in and the action taken. Quarterly the people in those jobs will meet to review current issues, define trends and recommend additional action if appropriate. Their reports will come directly to me as mayor and be shared with council members.

Wow, with personnel and staff time at a premium during the slow economic times, can you imagine what it would be like if we really did recover quickly? After having pared the individual divisions to the barest of essentials, we now want to add liaison duties. This sounds like an additional duty for the 311 call takers or for the neighborhood liaison function which currently exists in the Mayor's office. One call to a single person who can determine which agencies/divisions are affected rather than multiple calls, asking for immediate response, to multiple offices who won't get together to compare notes for several months. This appears to a level of bureaucracy that is NOT needed.

We may need better training for 311 call takers or more folks on the mayor's staff, but this proposal is just wrong.

Activate a city land bank, an idea that’s been around but never become reality. When code enforcement and building inspection identify abandoned or chronically neglected properties that are a blight on a neighborhood, we must use the power of the city to take them over and return them to productive, responsible private ownership.

A city land bank sounds like a good idea and I do approve of it. What is proposed here sounds like it is in direct opposition to the process used by the PDR program.

Under PDR, individual property owners apply to enter the program, receive funds and not allow their property to be developed. Whether it could be developed or not is irreverent. This proposed program appears to not be a voluntary forfeiture of the land and possibly a violation of Kentucky's eminent domain law. This law and the high cost of urban land has prevented the city (and most well meaning development interests) from moving forward on repairing some of our most blighted properties.

Kentucky law does not allow the use of municipal funds to be used to acquire property for non-municipal uses. We cannot take from a private entity to sell to another private entity. I am not even sure that the Municipal Housing Corp. could do it.

In the '50s and '60s, when we saw a significant industrial boom, it was a group of local business types who bought large chunks of available land for resale to corporations wishing to build manufacturing plants here. These same types of investors are today finding spaces for businesses in the electronics or medical research fields but no one has tried this in the residential realm.

The mayor, as always, can have a huge impact on bringing folks to the table but I see an extremely limited pool of philanthropic dollars to draw on.

Plan to create neighborhoods, not just subdivisions. For existing neighborhoods, examine our zoning and planning process to make it easier for them to function as small towns not just bedroom communities.

This action would go hand-in-glove with the first item, making neighborhoods livable. To accomplish the redesign of neighborhoods/subdivisions will take nearly a paradigm shift in residential living patterns. The addition of walkable shopping areas to existing neighborhoods would mot likely involve 1 or 2 of the centrally located blocks (yes, entire blocks) in order to create the mix of retail and civic building necessary to the small town feel(or function). I don't see many of our non-downtown residents agreeing to this.

Short of gasoline prices rising above $10 a gallon and energy prices even more unaffordable, I see most Lexington residents (downtown and non) clinging to the style with which they have become really comfortable.

Recruit philanthropists for projects to grow our parks system using models like Louisivlle’s Olmsted Parks.

This is the way to go, but as I pointed out above, the pool of philanthropic donors is very, very shallow and the needs are growing.

I will work with our university leadership, students, and citizens to ensure neighborhood issues surrounding student housing are heard and addressed, and not just one-sided; everyone’s voice deserves to be heard. Simply put, Lexington is dependent upon city residents as well as the students who live and study here.

The student housing situation, both near campus and in some of the outlying subdivisions, is not going to be a simple fix and the parameters are constantly in flux. I think the any solution that we implement today will need to evolve, in order to keep up with the ever moving targets of both the students and the university.

As mayor, these are some of the things I’ll do to energize economic development and create good jobs here:

Elevate economic development to a cabinet-level position within my administration to make planning for economic development front and center in all city initiatives.

Economic development, otherwise known as job creation, will now be a top priority without adding any positions to the government payroll. The planning for these new jobs may end up being the sole reason that the government pursues any new project, from street repavings to a new City Hall building.

Job creation sometimes seems to run contrary to the interests of business. Many industry models are moving toward doing more, but with fewer employees. Automation has been the mantra of manufacturers for the past 40 years, including robotics to build autos, in the large factories, down to larger delivery vehicles to do route sales like the beer trucks (and other vehicles) which clog our downtown streets on a daily basis.

Should we accomplish the goal of dispersing the neighborhood retail throughout our existing suburban areas, we may find that we need more delivery personnel (hopefully driving smaller vehicles) to negotiate the local streets and reach all locations in a timely manner. Local people delivering local products to local outlets in a walkable, shopable neighborhood, finally what Lexington really needs.

Create a one-stop shop for people who want to start, or expand, businesses in Lexington. This ‘entrepreneur’s clearinghouse’ will also keep an index of Lexington entrepreneurs to help connect them with each other and in touch with the community’s needs.

This reads like a description of an App for one of those 4G wireless devices complete with facebook and twitter

Target employers and industries that we want in Lexington, and then work relentlessly to bring them to town.

We will take any new job creation under our new cabinet-level commissioner, but we really just want certain types of employers and just the clean types of industries. If we target the high paying, clean industries our troubles will be over.

Recruit three new corporate headquarters to Lexington.

I'm betting that this cannot be done in the next four years, given the current economic times, although it does not say how large of a corporate headquarters they need to be.

Define clear goals so that we can measure our progress to report to the community and see where and when we need to make changes.

Create an assets inventory of existing businesses and a strategy to leverage and grow them.

Identify business development best practices among benchmark cities like Louisville, Madison, Wisconsin and Ann Arbor, Michigan, to confirm how we’re doing.

Create a plan aligned with UK’s Top 20 initiative to ensure that as the University grows, Lexington is able to attract and employ the best and brightest talent.

Actively mine our university graduate lists for folks who have achieved success elsewhere, and target them to come home and launch businesses here.

All of these are just making a chalk mark on the wall in a rainstorm or measuring the snowfall in a blizzard, you don't really know how you did until it is all over.

This is enough for today. Next the plan on aging and using business practices in LFUCG.

Looking At Mayor-Elect Gray's "Fresh Start"

2010-11-08T19:00:00.001-05:00

A few years ago, I looked at Mayor Newberry’s “Vision 2040” and what it really had to say. I will now try to look at our Mayor-elect’s “Fresh Start” document from his campaign and see if some of these thing are really doable. They are in no particular order but in how I see things.

One of Jim Gray’s, major themes was the “big hole” left in downtown and what should be done with downtown as a whole.

The public outcry over the destruction on the CentrePointe block in 2008 made it clear how deeply our community cares about its downtown. I led the fight to get a better project because what was proposed didn’t make economic or cultural sense. We failed, and a block that held some of our richest history and was home to a lively entertainment scene for the next generation is now a grass field. That sends the wrong message to the bright young people we need to ensure Lexington’s future.

While the CentrePointe project is stalled and the building are gone, I still feel the good that all that has happened in downtown has been because of and not in spite of the controversy of CentrePointe.

As mayor, these are some of the steps I’ll take to give Fayette County the urban center it deserves:

Carry out the Downtown Master Plan that was created with broad community input.

The Downtown Master Plan, as with all other Lexington plans, was developed by those who have direct interest in or understanding of, but that still leaves out a majority of our citizens and draws from a limited number of viewpoints. The Plan is painted with a very broad brush and citing the CentrePointe block as a problem is a small detail. Many of the public portion details of the Plan have been implemented, or begun to be implemented as funding has become available. Private property rights are NOT controlled by the recommendations of this Plan.

Create design guidelines that will give developers a framework for projects that respect our past and enrich our future.

This as another good place to move forward and it is a shame that, as Vice Mayor, Mr. Gray did not make more progress. Design guidelines have been recommended since before he was elected to Council and he has chosen not the push for any, until now. As a design professional, these types of guidelines are "right up his alley" and he has a whole staff who could assist along these lines. One of his employees even served as chairman of the Planning Commission. The Planning Commission would be the body to send forward such guidelines to the Urban County Council for adoption. Chances lost or delayed maybe?

Make TIF (tax increment financing) a tool for urban stimulation and transformation. I’ll accomplish this by working with and encouraging developers who envision projects, like the Distillery District, that celebrate Lexington’s unique heritage.

Many communities already use TIF as a tool for urban stimulation. Our first was for CentrePointe and the council should have expanded the area to at least the blocks bordering the specifically affected block. As it is, the only place the TIF funds will be generated, and can only be spent, is the CentrePointe "field" and some publicly owned property which, of course, does not pay taxes to be incremented. This may be an oversight of the council but it should have been argued about when the council, not the developers, instigated the TIF. On the other hand, a TIF is also in effect for the Distillery District and until the developer follows through on his commitments, little stimulation can be realized.

It is also my hope that TIF will not be used for redeveloping JUST for unique heritage sites.

Study what works downtown – the Farmer’s Market, the 4th of July Festival, Second Sunday, Thursday Night Live, the Kentucky Theater’s summer classic series, our Roots and Heritage festival – and support private/public partnerships that create more activities to draw people downtown.

This, of course, has been going on for more than a decade. The Farmer’s Market, the 4th of July Festival, and Thursday Night Live have been progressing steadily and tweaked along the way, sometimes under duress, but almost always for the better. The others are all gaining followings and some importance of their own. I find it interesting that the Spotlight Festival, a rousing success according to most folks, is left out as something which "create more activities to draw people downtown".

Incorporate planning for parking in all downtown planning. People expect a place to park when they come downtown.

Now, this is an idea that I can disagree about quite vociferously. Parking should be a private matter. Government should NOT be in the parking business. During the nineteenth century, and before, when you rode your horse or carriage to town for the day, you left it in the care of a private businessman - at a livery stable or corral. This type of service was not supplied by the government, nor should it be today. The idea of incorporating parking in planning should be from the private side alone.

There are places farther on in the "Fresh Start" document where Gray speaks of alternate types of travel and using Lextran. We will get to them later, but if we will be using more alternate transportation then we won't need as much parking.

This leads us to urban planning in general.

We’ve settled for too much development that doesn’t respect our culture and our landscape. I’ve spent 35 years building a nationally recognized design and construction business. I’ve learned that if you’re not going in the right direction the only way to change is by creating a new approach, making a plan to get there, and working hard every day to make it happen. We need leaders who can create a plan and stick to it. We must encourage responsible growth to grow our economy but also ensure we’re doing it the right way-in a way that fits Lexington and protects this unique place for future generations.

Lexington, along with most other cities have developed in the same ways for the past 45-50 years. Many of these methods have been encouraged by the automobile and the prospect of unlimited cheap energy. Some of us can see the end of that on the horizon yet nowhere in this next section is it mentioned. I have seen at least three "new directions" for planning and they all seem to end up looking the same.

To promote a new beginning in Planning, as mayor, I will take these actions:

Create a Commissioner for Preservation, Planning, and Economic Innovation to modernize and consolidate our city’s splintered planning and development agencies. This will eliminate bureaucracy and provide a clear path for growth.

As it currently stands, both Planning and Historic Preservation are under the direction of the Commissioner of Public Works while Economic Development is under the Mayor. I would question why we need to add commissioners, when we have no funds to pay them. Planning seems to "play well" with Economic Development and I see this as one more level of bureaucracy on a path to growth.

Maintain full funding for the Purchase of Development Rights program and its urban equivalent.

Many people see this as a general waste of money, or a subsidy of our wealthiest horse people. It has helped preserve our farm land from urban development but has left in the control of those who will not use it to the best advantage of all when we need it to produce food for Lexington in a post carbon age.

Step up enforcement and develop a system of incentives to assure that abandoned and neglected buildings and land within already developed areas are used to their fullest capacity. Areas like vacant mall properties, the former Springs Inn, and others must be utilized properly to moderate demand for converting farmland to other uses.

In the past four years on the council, I think that we can all see where this has gone. An example of the Lexington Mall is that an unused mall with its sea pf parking lot will become a worship center, still with a sea of parking lot. The building will be re-purposed, yet the basic shape and activity levels will barely change. Maintaining an auto centric land use on the periphery of our neighborhoods will not add to the walkability by a simple addition on two sidewalks across barren parking, when suitable alternate transportation is available.

Many under utilized properties have been identified and yet little has been done to incentivise a majority of them in the past four years.

Support, encourage and promote homegrown projects that make use of our unique place and people, like the Distillery District, Town Branch Trail, and the Bourbon Trail, to provide services and entertainment for our citizens and to attract visitors as well.

While it is nice to see some of our homegrown projects come to fruition, we must try and see that these projects have a wider base upon with to support them. Distillery District still needs much more private money than they do public assistance and that private money is harder to come by. I still find it difficult to spend public money on an entertainment area which will benefit private investors to a higher degree than the public coffers.

Create a set of measurements to tell how well we’re doing in protecting farmland, making sustainable development a reality and creating environments for our citizens to enjoy. Using these measurements we will report every year on our successes, failures and plans for the future.

Now, this one is a really difficult one to understand. Firstly, most measurements over time have to reflect a constant set of community values and admittedly ours seem to change constantly. Also changing is our understanding of sustainability and what we can do to enhance it. I see it as similar to the CATS testing in the schools, a constant changing of how we measure our progress.

Encourage infill and redevelopment while avoiding expanding the urban services boundary. Four years ago I was the first candidate to call for a moratorium on expanding the boundary. We held the line and I will continue working vigorously to protect the rural landscape.

I think that this is just "feel good" hype. If Mr. Gray felt that the CentrePointe project was all wrong due to the economy, then any expansion of the Urban Service Area would be all wrong. Holding the line on expansion mean that we will be building up in the older neighborhoods and particularly downtown. Protecting the rural area comes with a price in the urban area and protecting the existing neighborhoods means putting extra pressure on urban expansion. This will be a very tough job. One that most all previous mayors have claimed to address and still it is a needed priority.

This brings us to something I am not sure any is willing to really solve. It will take just too much work.

EASING THE TRAFFIC HEADACHE

I’ve met a lot of people in this community since I began running for public office eight years ago. Almost to a person they have two things in common: they love Lexington and they hate the traffic here. Most feel they spend too much time stuck at lights, dodging construction projects and crawling along our major arteries. Downtown, meanwhile, struggles to create a walkable, shopable environment while autos zoom by on fast-track one-way streets. It’s frustrating and wasteful for individuals. They feel powerless because it’s hard to live and work in Lexington without driving but driving itself can be so hard. It diminishes the quality of life for the entire community, decreases air quality and adds to our already big carbon footprint. We’ve gotten here because traffic engineering is in a silo, often trying to play catch-up when growth patterns have created logjams.

As mayor, these are some of the steps I’d take to do things differently and begin to unsnarl Lexington’s traffic jam:

Identify communities that have successfully addressed systemic congestion, study their approach and bring those lessons to Lexington.

It is as if Lexington had not done this repeatedly over the past 40 years. On the other hand, Lexington has been held up as an example to many other cities and has won numerous awards. Studying someone else's solutions to their problems will work if we have their problems.

Step up creation of bike lines and develop incentives for using alternative transportation, including LexTran, to get more cars off the road.

Great idea.

The Newberry administration built more bike lanes than all other mayors combined so this will be a major feat if it can be done.

LexTran made great strides in demonstrating their convenience of travel during the WEG and has already announced major upgrades to their services and equipment. All of this for getting more cars OFF the road. Should all these efforts succeed, then I ask , why do we need more parking downtown or at any of our other destinations?

Develop a process for public and stakeholder input when road construction projects are in the planning stages – not when pavement’s about to be torn up as happened with the S. Limestone project – to avoid unnecessary disruption and inconvenience.

This is a laudable goal and stakeholder involvement should probably be made mandatory.

Expand regional transportation planning beyond the current Metropolitan Planning Organization, which includes only Fayette and Jessamine counties, to include all of our Central Kentucky neighbors.

The MPO should be expanded to include all of our neighbors but we have seen what has happened in the past. The BIG city wants to tell the smaller brethren what is needed without knowing what is wanted. The MPO is a clearing house for state and federal dollars and the smaller cities will see this as a siphoning off of their rightful finding. They already do not get what they deem sufficient for a project and fear that they will see less in the future. The current MPO is housed in Lexington's Planning Division and would need to be separated and enlarged to cover any extra area. Is he advocating to the ADD to take on this function?

Make the timing and coordination of stoplights a top priority for the Traffic Management center to ensure efficient traffic flow throughout Lexington.

Many communities from around the nation have looked to Lexington for guidance on traffic control. In my opinion, maybe we should take a few pages from Louisville's book. Specifically the part on inner city intersections controlled by stop lights. From my experience, many of these intersections work like usual four way stops, allowing a few autos through before switching to the cross street. Cycles are very short and no one street gets a huge volume advantage over a lesser one. No one is left sitting in a queue and everyone feels that they are getting somewhere. There are also many intersections where signals could be removed or replaced with four way stops without altering the traffic flow.

This is a big, complex problem and we’ve got to involve planning, economic development, neighborhoods and businesses in not only improving traffic flow but also attacking the actions our community took – or failed to take – that got us to this point. There is no one solution and there’s certainly no quick solution but unless we start thinking and acting differently congestion will only get worse. I can move us in a new direction.

Mr. Gray is correct that Lexington has taken - or failed to take - some very important actions. Some of the actions taken include; vast areas of subdivisions filled with cul-de-sacs, acres and acres of housing with little connectivity between them and long distances from any local shopping, schools and parks located more appropriately for driving to instead of walking, and wide arterials intersecting with wider still circumferential roads which create basically impassible situations for anyone other than drivers. Attacking these problems will mean altering many of the regular notions that folks have about our city and their neighborhoods, the same neighborhoods that they believe the new administration will be protecting. I have often toyed with the idea of showing how the streets from early last century would look if they had been allowed to be built similarly. I feel that it would be nearly impossible to go from downtown to New Circle Rd. and beyond that, simply a nightmare.

Rebuilding our suburban neighborhoods to include walkable shopping and recreation areas will necessarily mean changing what most people find desirable about where they live. Such wholesale changes will require more than incentives to get Americans to change their lifestyles. Making all of Lexington into a walkable city is more than we are willing to spend.

Coming soon, I'll look at some more of the "Fresh Start" plan.

Things That Maybe We Should Be Doing

2010-11-01T21:30:00.000-04:00

There are some things that we should be planning for, especially during this mayoral election cycle, rather that bickering about who has or has not done enough in the past four years. We should be talking about looking to the future in concrete terms, not just rosy sounding platitudes.

This past weekend, the state of Indiana and Progress Rail Services Corp. announced the intention to reopen a long closed industrial plant in Muncie, Ind. Progress Rail Services Corp. is a wholly owned subsidiary of Caterpillar Inc., a U.S. heavy equipment maker that has been moving aggressively into the rail business lately.

Why is this important to Lexington and Central Kentucky? Well, for one, it displays a coming revitalization of American industry. Something that our region desperately needs.

Caterpillar has long been known for their bright yellow construction and mining equipment, but recently they have been looking to get more into the railroad business. To that end, Caterpillar purchased Progress Rail Services in 2006 to repair and rebuild locomotives and freight cars for Class Is, passenger railroads and private owners. Although started in 1983, one reason that we may never have heard of them, is that much of their business is in other countries. They have more than 130 facilities and most are overseas. The Muncie plant will be largest project tackled by Alabama-based Progress Rail.

The situation took a sharp turn back in August when, due to an advantageous position of the autos bail-out, Progress Rail bought Electro-Motive Diesel Inc. (EMD) from General Motors Inc. Funding for the $820 million purchase came from the private equity firms Berkshire Partners LLC and Greenbriar Equity Group LLC. I see no direct connection between Berkshire Partners and Warren Buffet’s Berkshire Hathaway Inc. other than they both see American railroads and their attendant corporations as good business investments.

Although EMD's headquarters, engineering facilities and parts-manufacturing operations are located in LaGrange, Illinois, just west of Chicago, they do all final assembly in London, Ontario CANADA. So much for a “buy American” plan for our American railroads. EMD has also languished a distant second to GE in the American locomotive industry. This new plant will give Progress Rail locally produced locomotives to comply with the “buy American” requirements of publicly-funded passenger rail contracts.

Reports have it that this 740,000 square-foot facility and its 75 acre property will have a test track and allow the company to pursue transit-rail business. The site originally was home to a Westinghouse transformer factory and will require minimal redevelopment as it has rail lines built-in and rail access.

Transit/rail, would that be the streetcar or regional light rail that we see spoken of by the Obama administration and so easily dismissed by the Republican leadership of Congress? Will these 650 new jobs, which should come on line sometime in 2012 or later, be ascribed to the recovery efforts of Democrats or the Republicans? Will these 650 employees and their resultant boost to the local economy be a legacy of the “disastrous auto bail-out”?

When will Lexington seek out these types of developments? When will Central Kentucky realize that we need these types of jobs, not just high-tech or medical jobs? Toyota works well for us but they are not the only transportation manufacturing game in the world. We have one of the foremost rail building companies in the central U.S. and we should be looking toward their view of the future.

According to Association of American Railroads, through 2010’s first 42 weeks, 13 reporting U.S., Canadian and Mexican railroads originated 15.7 million carloads, up 9.8 percent, and 11.4 million containers and trailers, up 15.1 percent year over year. If the oil prices do rise steeply, as others have predicted, then the long haul trucking industry will be hit hardest first. Rail has been proven to be ten times more efficient than trucks per ton/mile traveled and we should be jumping toward this future, not shying away from it.

Public Art On Display

2010-10-27T22:00:00.000-04:00

I received a note from the "Storm Drain Girls" today and they are finally finished. Blake and Cynthia have done a beautiful job.

Below is a tally of their accomplishments and I also welcome Blake as my newest follower.

27 locations
30 finished storm drains!
1 curb painted per request by the Lexington Police Department

1. Mechanic and Limestone
2. Limestone and 6th
3. Limestone and Short (2)
drains near the Justice bldgs and Giacomo's/Mia's
4.Limestone and Church
(near George's deli)
5. Short and Broadway
6. Clay and High
7. Stone and High
8. High between MLK and Hagerman
9. Main and Jefferson
10. Maxwell and Rose
11. Eastern and Main (2) one on each side
12. 3rd and Limestone
13. 3rd and Elm Tree Lane
14. Elm Tree Lane and 3rd
15. Clay and Central Avenue
16. Central and Clay
17. Old Vine and Vine
18. Vine and Old Vine
19. Euclid and High
(near Buddy's patio)
20. Double Storm Drain on Euclid and Woodland
21. Euclid before Rose Street
22. Rose and High
23. Jefferson and 3rd
(across from The Green Lantern)
24. High at the YMCA
25. MLK and Main street
26. Main street ~The Kentucky Theater (2)
(this one's for you Freddie!)
27. Main and Rose
and
1. Curb at Main and Rose Street

I don't have a photo of all their work and I was not the first to notice or blog on their progress, but I have found that their project is one that has captivated the whole city. It has stirred up almost as much press as the HorseMania display.

Speaking of the HorseMania, I see that they have begun corralling the steeds in preparation for winter and the fund-raising auction. I saw many of them this time around and was asked the other day if it would be another decade before we see a new set of horses and artists. Don't you think that it would be a hoot if the had them all on display in the CentrePointe "pasture" and held the auction there?

I also witnessed what may be called "performance art" although it may have been a free spirited young lady just having a little fun. There she was dancing to the music on her iPod in front of the fountain in the Court House plaza.

This is something that we could stand a little more of, don't you think?

I Stand Corrected

2010-10-25T22:15:00.000-04:00

I made a mistake in last nights post. I took Mr Gray at his word and used his math for the cost of the S. Limestone project. I should not have done that.

According to the morning Herald-Leader that claim is FALSE. It did not cost $7,000 a foot, it was more like $5,000. It also was priced for far more than paving as I said last night.

This was a project that had its beginnings in the Town-Gown meetings between the University and the City. If I recall correctly, the Vice Mayor was initially part of that committee and may have kept attending through their recommendations. The Downtown Development Authority also included it in their Downtown Master Plan, which Mr. Gray served on is some capacity. It is also unclear whether he was still attending when the final plan was passed.

One thing that is not unclear is the vote that Mr. Gray cast to NOT decrease the budgeted amount. With the economy in decline and some certainty as to funding from Stimulus money( not like the CentrePointe deal) or other Federal money, Gray and the rest of the Council went along in approving this street rebuilding. It WAS much more than your normal, seasonal repaving.

From the comments that I have read about the project, I believe that some property owners and businessmen looked at this as "just another pie-in-the-sky, city plan" and, if it gets underway, it will be like the house-flipping shows on TV. This was an "extreme makeover", not just putting lipstick on a pig.

The contractor also won the job, not on the lowest bid but on the best bid. The only other bidder could not make the original finish date, ATS not only completed on time, but under budget despite the unforeseen extras found while excavating Lexington's history.

I can only hope that the Herald-Leader has better things to say when the S. Lime/S. Upper/Scott St intersection is rebuilt in the next few years.