ann arbor is overrated. » Blog Archive » Greenway Meeting Highlights

Greenway Meeting Highlights

We just returned from the first part of the City Council meeting on the greenway (it went into closed session for a while.) Some highlights:

The first speaker on the issue, whose name we missed, began, “Once upon a time I was a citizen. Now I stand before you apparently a NIMBY.” She continued, “a couple of people have asked me, ‘Hey what about New York?’” but quickly demolished this argument that has apparently been so essential to the pro-DDA position: “Have they ever asked New Yorkers what they think about their crumbing sewers and water mains?” She then encouraged listeners to imagine themselves in the following scenario: You wake up in your condo at Ashley Mews, do some shopping in Kerrytown, have coffee at Zola and “now you want some green space.”
When it was urban planning Dean Douglas Kelbaugh’s turn to speak, he wasn’t there, and Old Fourth Ward Association stalwart Chris Crockett stood up and introduced herself instead. A slightly bewildered-seeming Hieftje told her that there could be no substitutions for speakers.
Dan Faichney, a planning student*, stood up and gave a speech that outlined a few main points to support the DDA’s plan. The only part of it that could have been considered inflammatory was his characterization of the greenway as an “environmentally irresponsible” plan with the potential to “undermine Ann Arbor’s reputation as a place for everyone.” Loud booing followed.
A pro-greenway speaker asked those in favor of the greenway (that’s how he worded it — he didn’t mention the specific Easthope proposal) to stand. Everyone around us stood, and we couldn’t see anything. We didn’t notice anyone who was standing in the standing-room-only chamber sit on the floor to signify their non-support.

* UPDATE: We goofed. He is a U of M student, but not a planning student.

58 Responses to “Greenway Meeting Highlights”

Kelbaugh bailed? Damn.
posted by Anonymous on March 21st, 2005 at 9:06 pm
Does anyone think that Hieftje is no kind of name for a man to have? How the hell are you supposed to say that? And does anyone think he looks a bit creepy?

I have never wanted some green space, unless that is a new euphemism for marajuana - which apparently most of the people who went to this meeting must have been smoking to stand in support of the greenway.

Ann Arbor, a place for everyone? Certainly it hasn’t been for me. Finally, it is surprising that all the tools in this town want so much green - I thought that was a Spartan kind of thing.
posted by DrMandrake on March 21st, 2005 at 10:15 pm
BTW, Mr. Faichney is no UM planning student, though I respect him for facing the charming, polite environmentalists.

What irks me is the simplistic self-righteousness of the “greenway” crowd. Somehow in their minds they are the heroic underdogs fighting for mother earth against the big, greedy developers and city hall who want to rape the planet. We are so educated and rational in this Athens of the Midwest, aren’t we?
posted by Brandon on March 21st, 2005 at 10:27 pm
what does NIMBY mean anyways?
I saw that lady as i watched on pubic access. She had some frightening earings. I’m all for the park at first and williams. Otherwise rumor is they will be tearing the place I’ve lived at for 4 years down to be the entrance into a parking structure from Ashley.
posted by Bez on March 21st, 2005 at 10:46 pm
Fuck. I should have gone. I had a whole speech planned out and everything.
posted by Ben on March 21st, 2005 at 10:48 pm
lol I just googled NIMBY, not in my backyard. I guess i must be NIMBY litterly, directly behind my house is that surface lot. I prefer a park. I think the greenway is probably a pipedream, but a park there vs an 8 story parking structure, easy choice for me.
posted by Bez on March 21st, 2005 at 10:51 pm
oops, I’m not sure why I thought he was a planning student.
posted by ann arbor is overrated on March 21st, 2005 at 11:00 pm
Can I find a transcript of this meeting anywhere?
posted by Some Arab Guy on March 21st, 2005 at 11:27 pm
Ahh, good ol’ pubic access…
posted by Anonymous on March 21st, 2005 at 11:33 pm
Are you making this up AAIO? Someone wants to live in the overhyped Ashley Mews complex, go to Kerrytown and Zola, and then they can’t walk a few blocks for their greenspace fix?

Are the NIMBY charges of these blogs getting through to the homeowners associations? Now they are up against Big Developers, City Hall, and Planning Students on Blogs?
posted by Anonymous on March 21st, 2005 at 11:41 pm
AAIO, gotta hand it to you - you scoop the Snooze, send yourself as a reporter, and skewer city hall all in one neat bundle.

Happy to report that my neighborhood doesn’t have any crises going on except for what’s going to happen to the old Food and Drug on the corner.
posted by Edward Vielmetti on March 21st, 2005 at 11:49 pm
I’ve been reading Ann Arbor is Overrated occasionally, but haven’t posted anything before.

I grew up in Ann Arbor, stuck around for a few years after I could have left, and then decided I was bored and wanted to see more of the world. I ended up in Berkeley, which seems to be a big magnet for ex-Ann Arborites.

One of the things I really enjoy about Berkeley is all the neighborhood businesses and neighborhood business districts, such that from just about anywhere it’s possible to walk to grocery stores, restaurants, and other establishments. I liked that about growing up in North Burns Park too, and I’m glad to see that some people in Ann Arbor are trying to continue that in the downtown area. I’m wishing the newer areas of Ann Arbor were built to be walkable as well, rather than the subdivisions and strip malls that keep getting built.

One thing I miss about Ann Arbor is the accessability of the park land. Neighborhood parks seemed as common as neighborhood shopping districts do here. From various places I’ve lived in Ann Arbor there has been easy access to the Arb, Bird Hills, or Island Parks, all of which provided access to the rest of the parks along the river and formed what I suppose could be called a greenway. When I think of what’s nice about Ann Arbor, as opposed to what’s overrated, parks and open space immediately come to mind.

We’ve got huge amounts of beautiful open space here too, but it’s mostly up in the hills and not nearly so accessable from home. What we’ve got here is more akin to biking out Huron River Drive, and is also quite nice, but not the same as having it all right there.

We’ve also got our “greenway” on rail right of way here, a long linear park on top of a subway tunnel. It seems to work as a long line of neighborhood parks, but it’s considerably wider than I remember the Ann Arbor Railroad right of way being. Our greenway continues north from Berkeley into Albany and El Cerrito, where the BART train tracks are elevated rather than underground. There, rather than a nice looking park with an occasional ventilation shaft, it’s a park with noisy trains going overhead every few minutes. It’s not at all a pleasant place to be.

This is where I’m confused about the Ann Arbor greenway proposal. What’s shown on the greenway map as the greenway looks to me like a rail bed. Is the idea to run a path along next to the railroad, or to do a rails to trails type project? If the former, I’m having trouble picturing where there’s room for it. If the latter, I can see parts of it coming out nicely, but it would still be awfully narrow and removing a railroad hardly seems like a sound environmental position.
posted by Steve Gibbard on March 22nd, 2005 at 3:26 am
As another Ann Arbor ex-pat. I live in Boston now and we have a couple of greenway like things, one courtesy of ol’ Freddy Olmstead hisself.

So, my question is, where can a fella like myself find out more about the greenway project in Ann Arbor.
posted by Colin Johnson on March 22nd, 2005 at 7:09 am
AAiO, ’cause I told you he was one of my students last semester - but I was teaching planning to undergrads, and not planning to planners.

Bez, you’re in one of the houses on Ashley that backs up to the 1st/William site? I very much doubt they’ll be tearing down any houses; any access to the site from Ashley (either ped or vehicle, regardless of what they end up doing on the site) will most likely be through the empty lot in that row, which is owned by the city. (Which means you have your sideyard to worry about too…)
posted by Murph on March 22nd, 2005 at 8:36 am
Steve, the greenway is expected to run roughly along the tracks, but not replace them. The Ann Arbor Railroad (an actually profitable freight company!) still uses them.
posted by Murph on March 22nd, 2005 at 8:38 am
Pretty interesting meeting last night.

I learned quite a bit:

1. Easthope told us directly…and I mean directly…that he was doing what he thought was best for his ward. I have to say that I have an awful lot of respect for him for admitting that. This is as big of a NIMBY (or is it IMBY?) smoking gun as you are ever going to see. He told us that it is every man/woman (ward) for itself in so many words. Those of you who have either taken Econ classes or Poly Sci classes that focus on negotiating….or have seen Russell Crowe’s research proposal in “Beautiful Mind”, remembering the hot blonde….know that ‘every man for himself’ leads to mediocrity and often stalemate. Not good.

2. Carlberg openly admitted that affordable housing, as laugable as the city’s definition of ‘affordable’ is, is impossible in the downtown area without subsidies. While I applaud her for recognizing this, I find it very difficult to understand why some of our citizens cannot see the cause and effect both their unwillingness to hold to any long term Master Planning, their strange obsession with short buildings, and their desire to make even more buildable land into parks.

3. Pretty neat that AAIO, Arbor Update, Past the…, the Bunker, and other great local blogs have reached the point that they are fostering public discussions of local issues. Kudos.

4. It’s also great that the Urban Planning students were recognized at the meeting. They would do well to listen to you more.

5. Now that I have heard more about the proposed greenway: have any of you aside from Brandon (or was it Murph?) walked along the proposed route. It should be called “Indiana Jones’ Green Walk of Death”. How do they propose to widen the path, get over the myriad roads that cross its path every few hundread yards? And don’t forget the creosote. Better give your kids a bullwhip and a sidearm before you send them on a walk along this thing. OK, a little hyperbole…but I’m really hoping that they get some hard numbers together, as I’m not sure they understand how expensive this proposal will be. I’m all ears though, and I’m certainly willing and interested to hear more.

6. We are about to get into a “Parks Arms Race”. Why council members brought up Columbus and Madison to “prove” that we had an average number of parks is beyond me. Each city has its own unique set of circumstances….fiscal health, demand for housing, state subsidies, etc. etc. It is not an apples to oranges issue, and it confuses things even more. I think in the next few years we will see neighborhoods press for greenbelt dollars so that they can add parks to their area. From the rhetoric I was hearing, citizens will look to increase the available park land by at least 25%. I don’t know how this is going to happen.

However, I believe that this doesn’t concern many of the people in Ann Arbor, so I think that we need to get to the bottom of how much green is enough within the city for these citizens. To restate my previous position, I feel that there is adequate parkland in Central Ann Arbor. I can think of 5 parks off of the top of my head that I can reach from my place of business by foot in less than five minutes. That is enough for me. I recognize that my position is not the only one, though.

7. The procedural confines of the city council agenda prohibits the proper debating of the issues at hand. In the spirit of finding a compromise between those wishing for more green in Ann Arbor, and those like myself who are desperate for density, I offer that we all meet at my bar at a convenient time so that the Friends of the Greenway and the supporters of the DDA proposal can discuss their perspective on things. I’m sure that Murph or Brandon can haul an Urban Planning prof. down here to host the event as they will have some experience in handling design charettes. I’m 99% sure that I can get Rene Greff down to give a detailed explanation of the DDA proposal. If the bar is open, I will donate all of the profits to the Sierra Club.

I am forwarding this offer to Mr. Easthope, Ms. Wong, the Mayor, and the rest of the city council.

What do you all think?
posted by todd on March 22nd, 2005 at 9:20 am
Oops,

Cut and paste error. I lost a paragraph in item #6 between the 1st and second paragraph. Sorry for the confusion. Ignore the second paragraph.
posted by todd on March 22nd, 2005 at 10:08 am
I can find myself alone hiking, kayaking or exploring in five minutes from any point within AA boundries. The funny thing is I have never seen the woman with the earrings while fishing or floating. Or any of her pals. Maybe they don’t know a giant underused greenspace already exists. (Don’t tell them please.) Maybe AA should just pass a milleage to purchase Ypsilanti. There is plenty of affordable housing already underutilized and the river and green parks go right through the middle of town. But then we’d have to rename AA Ypsilanti. And that would be a waste to a good name.
posted by ypsidweller on March 22nd, 2005 at 10:12 am
Anyone read “The Napoleon of Notting Hill” by Chesterton? I’m ready to lead an army of fellow OWSers in battle against the infidels from the other wards.

(I have an open Field Marshal position; contact me if you’re interested. Patriotic OWSers ONLY.)
posted by Dave on March 22nd, 2005 at 10:39 am
IIRC, didn’t Boston build a greenway-like park over a ~10 lane superhighway near it’s downtown?

I guess Ann Arbor’s greenway would be kinda like that, except in some (if not most) places it would be less than 10 feet wide and crosses somewhere around 15 roads in under 2 miles.

http://www.aagreenway.org/site/images/maps/greenway_map_large.jpg

But, I guess my vision just sucks bacause I fail to see any merits to the AA greenway proposal.
posted by James on March 22nd, 2005 at 10:46 am
Hmm, I just did a lot googling, and I see that Boston’s politicians are still ironing out their greenway plan, but my point remains that Boston’s greenway is much more feasible than A2’s since Boston now has a pretty wide strip of land to work with.
posted by James on March 22nd, 2005 at 10:56 am
James — that’s a great idea; let’s put Jackson/Huron/Washtenaw totally underground and build the greenway on top of it! We’ve got plenty of money in the greenbelt fund to do it, right?
posted by Murph on March 22nd, 2005 at 11:14 am
the Little Dig

It’s perfect–submerge Huron-Jackson which is a high-speed artery that cuts through several neighborhoods so the enviros will like it, allow us to design a public works project that emulates Boston so the state will be excited to spend the money, but slap it with a lesser name that reminds us that AAIO after all

Murph, this could be your legacy
posted by Matt on March 22nd, 2005 at 11:39 am
Yeah, I agree. It’s City Council’s DUTY to explore all idiotic and ridiculously expensive proposals that could add more parkland to the city, such as the greenbelt, the greenway and the newly proposed Huron-Jackson little dig tunnel/greenway.
posted by James on March 22nd, 2005 at 11:56 am
Bez- Your choice with the DDA proposal is a park and a parking structure (and, if I had my way, a parking structure with a green space on top, like the Phoenix Plaza in Plymouth) or just a park.
With that parking structure comes more people living downtown, more businesses, more impetus for public transit, more people able to live in the place that they work… Or, a park that’s likely to be utilized only a couple hours a day by a fairly small number of people.
I realize that green space is prettier to look at, and I’m not discounting your feelings, but I’m asking you (by proxy for other greenway supporters) to think about the bigger picture.
The appelation “NIMBY” is apt because it implies a vision that only extends as far as one’s own property. Please, take a minute and think about the rest of us, especially those who cannot afford to live downtown now, but would like to get more use out of a functioning city.
posted by js on March 22nd, 2005 at 1:09 pm
While I have not heard from Ms. Wong yet, I have heard from three council members. All are interested, and one will be in attendance.

I will let AAIO know when I hear more. If nothing else, I think that this meeting will be downright fun as long as everyone is polite.

Murph and Brandon, I need your email addresses.
posted by todd on March 22nd, 2005 at 1:20 pm
The “Beer Hall Meeting” replaces the “Town Hall Meeting.” I like it.
posted by Dave on March 22nd, 2005 at 1:40 pm
Dave, I think it’s perfectly reasonable. It’s just a shame that anybody ever tried to separate the one from the other, and a shame it’s taken so long to put them back together.
posted by Murph on March 22nd, 2005 at 2:16 pm
Man, if only I was unemployed. I really want to put together an aalittledig.org site to mock the aagreenway.org site … and I really want to start Friends of the Parking Structure, if only for the ironic T-shirts… Off to a real city via rail this evening to, among other things, engage in an act of civil disobedience by photographing a piece of public art:

http://www.boingboing.net/2005/02/06/chicagos_public_scul.html
posted by Scott T. on March 22nd, 2005 at 3:24 pm
Todd, I will be there. When is your meeting? Send me an e-mail.
posted by OFW insurgent on March 22nd, 2005 at 5:09 pm
Todd, be sure to post the results of your proposal. I’d like to attend.
posted by Ryan on March 22nd, 2005 at 5:22 pm
JS,let my ask you this , would you want 8 stories of car alarms going off all day and all night in your backyard? Plus a year of construction? The one surface lot in front on Ashley is bad enough. Put 8 levels in back with horns echoing all day and night and I’ll be moving on. I don’t think a parking structure at that location will encourage people to live downtown, it will just allow more to drive downtown and park closer.
Also Murph the city (dda or whatever) has made an offer with my landlord to trade the empty lot on Ashley and build a new small apt. building for him in exchange for the property i’m currently at. I do have surprisingly affordable rent at this location presently but I bet it wouldn’t be so in a brand new building if I had an opportunity to move into it.
posted by Bez on March 22nd, 2005 at 6:03 pm
I feel the issue is essentially a choice between a greenway that might benefit one neighborhood, (and I do mean might - parks are not a panacea for other problems,) or downtown planning policy which will benefit the whole city.

I believe that growth downtown, under the right guidance - which is what we’re here for - will help keep ann arbor an accessible place for everyone who wants to live and work there. the availability of quality places to live downtown, in my opinion, directly influences the life and creative potential of a city. the more places to live, the greater opportunity to organize as a neighborhood (ironically,) or open a store, or create cultural space. for everyone.
in a rarefied situation, in which there is a small and fixed amount of desirable space, a city becomes a place for the elite - the six-figure income types - who can afford the overhead of an oligarchic market.

if ann arbor wants to keep itself accessible - not just to college students and executives, but aspiring professionals, writers, artists, political organizers, small store owners - it has to proactively seek out this accessibility. the paradox - frustrating for every progressive - is that in order to create a good quality of life in a city, one must make sacrifices of attractive, but misguided, ideas. the greenway concept is one such idea. isolating land and creating a barrier between the west side and downtown is poor planning. writing off the single package of downtown property definitively available for affordable development is poor planning. not only that, it says to the business and people who have already been driven out by higher prices: you’re not welcome here.

well, when that’s the message of the city, people do leave.

to say development on the site is bad for the environmental health of ann arbor is to make an uniformed joke - someone should ask friends of the greenway if all that impervious blacktop has been relieving stress on local sewers all these years.

to me this is an issue of fairness. I believe in fairness. I don’t believe in using public assets to aggrandize the private dreams of the old west side. I think there are better things to do with the sites than that.
posted by dan faichney on March 22nd, 2005 at 6:07 pm
I find it odd that someone who was OK with living close to a large factory for many years now has a problem with living near a parking structure.

Also, today on my walk home I made sure I paid close attention to the part of the proposed greenway off of the Miller/Huron area. Basically, the only way you could turn that strip into “parkland” is by ripping out the railroad, removing a ton of earth (since the railroad currently runs on an elevated ridge/mound at least 10 feet in the air for 100s of meters around the area I was in), and then spending another ton of money on landscaping. All this to create a strip of “parkland” that would most resemble a highway median or grassy backalley since it would run tightly between a number homes, businesses and private parking lots.

Basically, anyone who actually believes that this greenway is a good idea is a complete idiot. Clearly, the greenway proponents are using the greenway has a thinly veiled smokescreen to hide their actual agenda of blocking development.
posted by James on March 22nd, 2005 at 6:28 pm
James the former Eaton factory was light industrial, nothing disturbing at all. 8 stories of of car alarms and whoop it up frat boys leaving Connors at 215am would be much worse. Ehhh, maybe this will be the inpiration to get myself out of here after 20 years, Austin might be cool.
posted by Bez on March 22nd, 2005 at 11:15 pm
Frat Boys? Try soccer moms and SUV dads from the suburbs of Detroit–that’s who this parking lot would be for.

How about putting a park on top of the parking lot, but make it a roller hockey court like that scene from Clerks? And maybe a Tony Hawk style ramp too. Then the skater kids will have a place to play downtown without being oppressed by all the signs saying no skateboarding in this liberal paradise. Instead of some grassland for Yuppies, which probably would have chemicals poured on it anyway, and they probably woouldn’t pick up their dog shit either, make a space for kids. Even the OWS can’t be anti-kids. That’s harder than being against puppies.

I do think we need a central park downtown, because it is ridiculous that the summer concert series has to take place on a parking deck. I’d vote for the surface lot near D’Amatos as something adjacent to Main Street and seal off a couple blocks on spring and summer weekend nights for pedestrian malls and put the tables in the middle of the street for dinner. They did this in Charlottesville VA and it worked great. Actually I wish we could remove the federal building and turn that area into a park but that won’t happen. A park down in the drainage ditch on First and William will be for nearby residents not everyone and Liberty Sq park is never used but something adjacent to Main and pedestrian friendly could be cool.
posted by Matt on March 22nd, 2005 at 11:35 pm
“[W]hoop it up frat boys” in a college town? Who would have thought?

Good and bad comes with UM being in AA, but as has been expressed elsewhere on this thread and others, drive south to Adrian for a vision of AA without UM.

Anyway, they can have the chain faux-Irish pub - I don’t get the attraction to that place.
posted by Jason on March 22nd, 2005 at 11:40 pm
Jason-

They have good soup and let me sit undisturbed in my corner reading for a good few hours with a Guiness. That works for me.

Although whoever told me that Guiness was cheaper at Ashley’s… I got it served almost fucking warm, and it was over $5 a pint. Although I’m too shy to point such things out. Also, it’s the closest place to Angell, and I have to do something when the English class lets out early.

… greenway, right. Not liking the idea, but have no time to really care. I think that’s how most things get pushed through in this town. Reminds me of the Onion article from last week about the man who spent 10 years to make sure a pool wasn’t built in his town.
posted by Jen on March 23rd, 2005 at 1:38 am
Update:

Well the council is very supportive of the idea, and in particular Easthope (his stock is rising for me) thought it was a great idea.

Nary a peep from either the Friends of the Greenway or the Sierra Club. It may take a while for them to respond.

The more I look at the Greenway, the more I think that the proposal hasn’t been thought through. Those of you who witnessed the council meeting saw that ALL of the City Council memebers were for a greenway “in some form”. I don’t think that this has been thought through.

I wrote before that I liked the fact that the proposed greenway was in a floodplain for the simple reason that it doesn’t take away buildable land. That doesn’t mean that it is practical.

For those who don’t know, it was common practice to soak railroad ties in creosote or arsenic. Without getting into a discussion of creosote and why it is bad, I’ll instead talk about arsenic.

We all know arsenic doesn’t go well with cheerios, but the reason that it is bad to purposely install vegetation near arsenic is that as rain (and flood) water slowly leeches out the arsenic, it will hit a point where it is dilute enough for plants to uptake this nasty heavy metal without dying. These plants are now edible for the animals that we will be attracting to the site by installing a parkway. If you take a walk next to the train tracks, you will notice that there isn’t much/any vegetation sticking up through the gravel. I suspect that we are dealing with some toxicity.

This leads me to the second point. Why would we purposely not only attract animals to a dangerous train, but actually encourage children and dogs to walk near a track? Or are they proposing that we fence in the entire greenway? That doesn’t sound very pretty.

I have yet to hear anyone say that we intend to rip up the railroad, so I’m really starting to think that this is a very, very bad idea.
posted by todd on March 23rd, 2005 at 8:26 am
You hit the nail on the head, Todd. The train tracks are too narrow and cross far too many streets to be sucessful. Just look at where Leopold Bros bar is located - the tracks would cross Madison, Main, Ashley, First - all in the span of a block. Not to mention the whole Huron area. And what will this narrow path of green look like? The train tracks take up the majority of that corridor - there would be little room for green, and beyond that, the train tracks go through some of the ugliest landscape in Ann Arbor. Fingerly lumberyard. The warehouses. It is just an asinine idea from the start, and I simply don’t see a single argument for it that makes sense whatsoever! Plus the poisons, an issue no one has yet discussed but might rattle the bird brains of the NIMBY housewives who buy overpriced organic whol food fruit and might have problems with little Margaret Wong Juniors running around in an arsenic field. In Dr.Mandrake’s little $75 million pipe dream world, these Greenway idiots would take a dose of shut the fuck up.
posted by DrMandrake on March 23rd, 2005 at 8:45 am
Bez- Ah, then you’re just against living in a city.
Cities have noise, dear Bez. That’s a signifier of their activity. Perhaps you’d be happier in the suburbs, where I hear it’s quite quiet all the time…
posted by js on March 23rd, 2005 at 9:32 am
Jen, if I was the one who said that about the Guinness, I apologize, although I haven’t been to Ashley’s in ages and when I did I never drink Guinness (or anywhere else, come to think of it).

Conor’s is actually quite enjoyable during the daytime–I know of several quiet corners and it’s fun for game days. Friday and Saturday nights it looks like the ninth circle of hell.

I agree that the whole Top of the Park concert thing as it stands is really bizarre, but “they” probably should have thought of that a long time ago when shoving all those 154 parks all over the place. Interesting point about the arsenic, Todd–I didn’t know that.
posted by Lazaro on March 23rd, 2005 at 9:37 am
Conor’s was a cool place to work mostly undisturbed on my novel, and they even let me plug my laptop in behind the bar. But $5 for a pint of Guinness is too much, even for Ann Arbor. And yeah, I wouldn’t want to go anywhere near that place on the weekend. I don’t get it either.
posted by Dave on March 23rd, 2005 at 10:04 am
Lazaro,

To be clear, I’m not 100% sure that we are dealing with arsenic. It is something that needs to be looked into, however, since they aren’t planning on removing the tracks (and hence the ties), it is not a problem that will magically go away if the ties are indeed arsenic-soaked.
posted by todd on March 23rd, 2005 at 10:18 am
Sorry JS I have no interest living in suburbia. I’ve been here 18 years, no car anyways. But thanks for pointing that option out. If I do change my mind maybe you’d like to sublet? I hear the commute from Ypsi is hell.
posted by Bez on March 23rd, 2005 at 11:37 am
Bez- Ypsi? Where’d that come from? Because I said suburbia? Or are you just high?

More to the point, Bez, cities have noise. If you can’t take the noise of a parking structure (which is, you know, pretty quiet generally. Aside from the construction, which if you gripe about I can only believe that you desire Ann Arbor trapped in amber), you should live in Dexter. Or Chelsea. Or Saline. Or, hell, out in the ‘burbs of Ann Arbor.
posted by js on March 23rd, 2005 at 2:02 pm
I was under the impression you live in Ypsi and need another parking structure to choose from. My last comment on the topic. Have a nice day.
posted by Bez on March 23rd, 2005 at 10:51 pm
Way to go on that one, Bez. My brother is thinking about living in Ypsi, and commuting in to Ann Arbor. Why? Because even with the parking fees / tickets / gas money / car maintenance, he’d save a significant amount of money.

And that’s sad, because he actually enjoys the city from what I can tell. He also detests the suburbs, and prefers to be within walking distance to driving anywhere. Hell, for what I was paying for a room in a student ghetto rental last year a decent number of blocks from a bus stop, I could have rented an entire house in Ypsi or any number of surrounding cities. Yes, I know the area is going to be more expensive. But it’s ludicrous as it stands now, especially since there’s adament opposition to affordable living. So guess what? People are gonna commute, darling.

But that’s this city, I guess. God Forbid we have affordable housing. We might get some unsavory characters, and the YMCA is bad enough.

That was sarcasm again. Just making sure you caught it.
posted by Jen on March 24th, 2005 at 2:29 am
Bez would rather have everyone commute rather than risk hearing a car alarm even once.
She’s an “I-got-mine” pseudo-liberal.
posted by js on March 24th, 2005 at 2:09 pm
That empty lot on Ashley used to have an auto repair shop. About 15-20 years ago, when a parking structure was proposed for the surface lot on the north side of Ashley (never built), two houses on the site were to be demolished. After much discussion and protest, the City decided to move the houses to new locations across the street in an effort to maintain affordable housing downtown (or at least appease those who protested the loss of the low-income apartments). One house was successfully moved kitty-corner to the southwest side of Ashley and William and the other was supposed to be moved to the former auto repair shop lot.
Lo and behold, it was determined that the soil on this lot was too contaminated to be used for residential purposes. The house was eventually given to the owners of the Birkenstock store on 4th Ave., along with some money to help pay the moving costs, and they moved it to Miner Street to live in. (The effort was dubbed “The Miner Miracle” and crowds turned out to watch the all-day move up Ashley to Huron, to Main, to Summit, to Miner.)
The whole parking structure thing was quite a fiasco at the time (the structure at Ann and Ashley also came out of this same effort) and parties on both sides of this latest battle would probably benefit by researching that bit of Ann Arbor history.
The bottom line is, that empty lot on the south side of Ashley is still contaminated and unusable for housing unless it is cleaned up first.
posted by Tom on March 24th, 2005 at 5:10 pm
js, you have Bez all wrong…I know him and he isn’t the suburban type…in fact he works a job that puts him in contact with street drunks (students and non-students) all day. I can’t blame him for voicing a little statement in support of some peace and quiet. You are being unnecessarily harsh in your inditement of him as a suburb-loving chick. (where did THAT come from anyway?)
posted by OFWinsurgent on March 25th, 2005 at 9:22 am
Ah! I just realized who Bez is! And I concur with OFWi on the background, even if I haven’t lived around there in a while… *half-sarcastic, half-serious sniff*
posted by Lazaro on March 25th, 2005 at 10:46 am
Bez rules.
posted by OFWinsurgent on March 25th, 2005 at 7:37 pm
Well I tried being civil with JS, all’s he did was hurl instults my way. So here’s one for you JS… Your a joke as a journalist, 1/2 the musicians I know in this town (and I know lots) laugh about you and your ass kissing column. Your a walking cliche. My final post.
posted by Bez on March 25th, 2005 at 7:51 pm
ewww, don’t go there bez! (ad hominem attacks)
posted by OFWinsurgent on March 25th, 2005 at 7:55 pm
Yeah Bez - keep it above the belt. js is cool.
posted by Dr.Mandrake on March 27th, 2005 at 10:20 am
And I want to say also that 1/2 the musicians in this town are a bunch of wanker idiots whose opinions mean absolutely nothing and whose musical careers should have stopped at playing the recorder in grade school.
posted by Dr.Mandrake on March 27th, 2005 at 2:41 pm
Bez- “Your” is not “you’re.” And here I thought everyone hated me because I make fun of them… Now I find out it’s because I’m an ass-kisser? (Not bad for not having a column run in 6 months…)
posted by js on March 28th, 2005 at 1:21 pm