The following blog has been lifted from the superb blog of The Great Canadian Talk Show (http://tgcts.blogspot.com/), heard weekdays starting @4pm on 92.9 KICK-FM here in Winnipeg. This blog contains facts regarding an interesting issue that should reach as many people as possible and it concerns the whole of the city of Winnipeg, not just the Bike lobby groups that seem to have taken over the running of city hall........My comments will follow this:
Wednesday, May 12, 2010
Manitoba Day crowd told Friends of Upper Fort Garry seizing Assinboine Avenue for their pet project
Today, at the site of the taxpayer-subsidized provincial park that will form the new backyard of the Manitoba Club, residents of nearby apartment buildings and other citizens were shocked to learn that the greed of the Friends of Upper Fort Garry (57% controlled by the Club) knows no bounds.
"They're crazy" said Tom, a senior citizen whose apartment overlooks the site. He spoke to TGCTS after attending the Manitoba Day tent display of the plans the entitled class have for the neighbourhood.
"Your flyer is 100% right, they don't care about us, they want everything for themselves. Take away parking?? We already have city employees with those damn parking permits taking up all the street spots. Fort Street is already congested half the time. Now they want to make it worse!"
A model of the site does not even pretend to hide their shameless sense of entitlement.
It showed Assiniboine Avenue completely closed off to east-west traffic, with parking removed, and eastbound vehicles to be forced down Fort Street and to Broadway.
When other attendees left the tent, saw our flyer, and learned that if traffic is forced off Assiniboine and onto Broadway via Main or Fort, the city of Winnipeg's own traffic engineers admit the intersection (currently a 'C') would score an "F"- would FLUNK the traffic flow standard -- they were outraged.
"How can they do this? My son's (downtown) business relies on deliveries being on time", said Evelyn, who also expressed concern that the Manitoba Club has not contributed a dime to the project yet can afford a $7 Million mortgage. "They should be ashamed of themselves for this idea".
Her friend Isabel, who also attended the tent event stated "this smelled like a big sales job, now I know why."
In an exclusive interview with Kim our Traffic Reporter, FUFG vision guy Garry Hilderman, a landscape architect, demonstrated his continuing contempt for the families and taxpaying citizens of this city.
Two years ago, at a fundraising luncheon for Heritage Winnipeg held at Hotel Fort Garry on March 28, 2008, urban blogger Rob Galston reported
"Speaking against the proposed apartment building Mr. Hilderman speculated that not only would the smell of barbeques emit from the balconies, but so would the sounds of tenants yelling at their kids."
Today, Hilderman insulted non-millionaire Winnipeggers even further, dismissing that idea that working people's or city traffic engineers concerns matter in the least, when compared to the need of the Friends to engage in social engineering for their pet project to succeed.
From: Kim The Traffic reporter
To: talk @ kick.fm
"Garry Hilderman, who sits on the board of directors for the FUFG said that "right now there are no plans to close down Assiniboine at Fort". Hildebrand went on to say those plans will be in the future.
Hilderman also said that they want to make the area safe because of all the school kids that will be coming to the park, the kids would have to cross the street back and forth to Bonnycastle Park.
He also said:
-they were in talks with the city - Planning and Property - about closing Assiniboine
-they were also in talks with the Active Transportation people as well
-there will be NO parking along Assiniboine between Fort and Main
-wants to make the area "pedestrian friendly"
-thinks more people should get out of their cars
-the FUFG will be in control of the park but the Forks will take care of the day to day management of the park
Hilderman thinks that Assiniboine should be closed down, saying that at rush hour the only way people can get onto Assiniboine from Main ( meaning from St. Boniface) was to wait for a pedestrian to cross.
He also said that if people at Broadway have to wait an additional 30 seconds so what?
He also indicated that people shouldn't be cutting through Assiniboine they should be using Broadway. "
Hilderman and the Friends -- who have no concept of how long turns at the intersection of Main and Broadway will take if it becomes an "F" and how it will affect businesses, families, transit riders, etc, also do not realize that neither Mayor Katz nor the Downtown Biz knew of, or support, their plan to take over Assiniboine Avenue, which lies outside the legal boundaries of the provincial park gifted to them by former premier Gary Doer.
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*Related post * http://anybody-want-a-peanut.blogspot.com/2010/05/ufg-unveiling.html
"I overheard the Friend that was manning this post say to a lady that the intersection of Main and Assiniboine is very dangerous, and may be closed off. "So the plan is to close off Assiniboine?" I ask. "No, no that's not in the plan right now" he assures me...."
"What's happening with Assiniboine?" I ask the Friend who's in charge of this display, "It looks like it just kind of disappears." "Yes, it gets closed off and the traffic will be routed up Fort Street" he tells me, "but that won't happen for several years" he says, obviously sensitive to the fact that some people drive cars and may not like seeing a street closed off...
Whichever way you look at it, you ought to keep in mind the cost: the lost vitality and safety that would have come from having more people living downtown, the property taxes that we had to forgo, the direct contributions by the various governments, and the indirect contributions in the form of donations from crown corporations and tax-payer funded organizations.
All of these costs were forced on us by a small handful of privileged people. There was no consultation about doing this. Just a PR campaign to get the government on their side. Two years later: "here you go ... this is what you're getting."
This scares me.
This is what you get when the privileged few are actually running the city. You people who voted?? Nobody cares.
As a concerned citizen of the City of Winnipeg, I find that the acts of city hall are irresponsible IN THE EXTREME!! As a full time driver who uses the streets everyday, I find that the bike lobbyists and millionaires clubs dictating how I am to drive and live is IRRESPONSIBLE IN THE EXTREME!!
Considering that I drive all day doing deliveries, a job I really enjoy doing by the way, I have found that making bike paths throughout the downtown core is hazardous, IN THE EXTREME, to bicyclists and drivers.
Point one, the city cannot widen the road to accommodate all of the changes they are making, so they do the next logical thing......SHORTEN LANES! This is really insane. first of all it creates the hazard of not allowing enough room for car4go vans and busses to get through, second of all, it creates the hazard of bicyclists having possible accidents or cars having accidents because people cannot judge how far away the bicycle is from their vehicle, so they swerve to avoid.
Point two, the bicycle paths have resulted in the loss of many parking spaces and loading zones through the city that make it difficult for me to do my job.
Point three, as I am driving, I have found that probably 99% of cyclists DON'T USE THE BIKE PATH ANYWAY! They like to use the middle of the lane I am trying to drive in. THEY DON'T CARE about other vehicles, they are their own little world.
Now I ask you, what is more hazardous than that??
And don't even get me started on pedestrians in this city.
Now, to the gist of this article.......
IS MR. HILDERMAN OUT OF HIS FREAKING MIND??????
Not only will closing Assiniboine create a traffic snarl of EPIC proportions, the resulting snarl will make my job nearly impossible to do considering I deliver and pick up at many businesses along Assiniboine AND Fort. I can see one thing happening if this were to come to fruition, many businesses will either go under or move to a completely different area of the city, creating a black hole in the core......I'm sorry, ANOTHER black hole in the core.
I think it is time for this city to start PEPPERING city hall with complaints, not just to the 311 service. Contact your councillor, your mayor, anybody who will listen. And if they won't listen?? FIRE THEIR ASSES. Fire the councillor who won't listen, fire the mayor who won't listen, fire the MLA who won't listen, fire the Premier who won't listen, fire the MP who won't listen, HELL, FIRE THE PRIME MINISTER IF HE WON'T LISTEN!!
Hell, if the US can do it, we should be able to as well.......
Till next time, keep rocking and UP THE IRONS!
The Monkey
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