ann arbor is overrated.

A centrally located downtown property being turned into a parking lot? It’s not surprising that A2 residents showed up at city council in force to protest.

Oh, wait. The area that councilmember Margie Teall calls “the heart of the city” is already a parking lot. It’s the proposal to turn it into a police station that has Ann Arborites up in arms.

“Liberty will die,” one speaker said about the prospect of “a large city building…put on the library lot.” Well, the News printed the speaker’s words as “Liberty [Street] will die,” but we’re not so sure that they weren’t intended as spoken.

Enjoying those low, low rents and prompt repairs that have made A2 such a “renters’ market” over the past few years? Well, the market may be about to get tighter, according to a story in the new Observer. “The vacancy rate is dropping — in small increments, but dropping nonetheless.”

How does the Observer know that it’s dropping? The U’s housing office keeps detailed records of these numbers, which have been relatively high in recent years. “The office hasn’t yet calculated this year’s vacancy rate, but it’s likely to be down.” So, in other words, they’re basing the entire premise of this article on statistics that have yet to be computed, but, when they are computed, are certainly going to confirm their predictions.

Not that the Observer would make such an assertion without compelling reasons. The writer (the piece is un-bylined) has two pieces of evidence. First of all, some apartment advertising banners at State and Kingsley (a short jaunt from the Observer’s office) have disappeared. No mention of when they were taken down last year. Also, “landlords say fewer apartments are sitting empty.”

Oh, well, if they say so. The piece quotes a leasing agent and a landlord who claim that vacancies are going down, and a management company representative who talks only about how low the rents were this year. “In July, the calls for one-bedrooms went through the roof,” says the leasing agent. Normally in A2, it’s mainly squirrels and rain that go through the roofs of rental properties.

The piece is nicely timed to coincide with the beginning of the rental season under the new ordinance. Remember, kids, take what you can get — this sweet renters’ market isn’t going to stick around much longer.

Do the new luxury boxes represent a revival of the Third Reich or 19th-century prisons? The debate rages on the News letters page:

I was horrified recently by a specter on the pages of The Ann Arbor News, Michigan Daily and University Record.

It was as if an archetypal ghost, long repressed, had risen to spread on the drawing boards of the architecture firm HNTB, evoking visions of ghettoed cellblocks and sinister guard towers. Had the sobriquet “Big House'’ touched a tab in the vaporous architectural psyche?

Of course, it’s not clear that modern prisons are any better, reflecting as they do “the privatizing contemporary culture and public fetish for mass incarceration.” No matter what kind of prison the stadium looks like, someone is going to complain.

Not to be outdone, another reader today argues that iPods are the real mind-control menace, in a letter that reads in its entirety:

Regarding the editorial cartoon “The Nation’s Isolation … iPods Mark 5 Years'’ (The Ann Arbor News, Nov. 3): Apple Computer Inc. is doing a good job of brainwashing people.

Something to contemplate in our vaporous psyches.

The shortlist of names for the new high school has been announced, and a strong contender is “Skyline High,” presumably to honor the spectacular skyline of A2. “When you look around from the third- and fourth-floor of the new high school, it’s amazing what you can see,” said one school official, who apparently declined to elaborate on these sights (but presumably they will include people walking and parking on the streets at all hours of the day.)

A News reader appeals to A2’s values in an argument against the proposed stadium luxury boxes. “When did ‘elitism’ that is atypical of Ann Arbor begin to dominate U-M’s attitude toward its unpretentious ‘common-denominator’ graduates and fans?” she asks. When “indeed”?

A letter in Sunday’s News explains the real reason why buyers are attracted to downtown condos, egregiously ignored by a recent News story that focused mainly on the new buildings’ closeness to workplaces and restaurants. It’s because they’re within walking distance of a historic neighborhood with rare sights like trees, houses, churches and a school.

Jared Goldberg outlines some rules for surviving sketchy A2 landlords, unenthusiastic legal representation and his roommate’s girlfriend.

In Teen Ink magazine, college applicant Andrew R. relates the story of how he decided on Michigan over NYU and Binghamton:

I know people who go to Michigan, and one is my brother.

“What do you do for fun?” I ask him.

“Do you have a few hours?” he replies. We laugh and then he explains that the University of Michigan is in the heart of Ann Arbor, a beautiful city, so there are a lot of restaurants, malls and movie theaters.

“Yeah, but they have those in every college town,” I point out.

“What makes Michigan unique is that it is in an awesome city, but it also has a great campus with lots of fields. It’s the perfect mix. NYU has no campus; once you leave your classroom, you’re in the city with strangers.”

We look forward to finding his papers on Left Behind at the Fishbowl.

Once again, it’s time for Nordlinger Watch! This time, our esteemed columnist prints a letter from a Texas expat who hasn’t quite settled in to Tree Town (the bracketed notations are Nordlinger’s):

Dear Mr. Nordlinger,

I know you’re from Ann Arbor, and I was wondering if you had any tips for coping. I moved here about a year ago from Texas for graduate school and have had a tough time with the liberal idiocy. I’m sure they mean well [that’s where he’s wrong], but it’s almost like they lack critical thinking skills for the issues they rant about. [Almost?] Here’s a little example:

Every day from 5 to 6:30 there’s an anti-Bush rally by the post office. Sometimes I walk by on my way home, and I invariably see signs that say, “Democracy, Yes, Theocracy, No.” Recently this was combined with their shouting about how we need to leave Iran alone.

Nordlinger’s advice: “With his eye, and ear, for irony, I think he’ll do just fine.” It’s true, A2 may have many fine qualities, but a keen awareness of irony can’t really be said to be one of them.

If the police station near the library wasn’t enough to shake you out of your complacency, this letter in yesterday’s News, providing compelling evidence linking the new stadium luxury boxes to Albert Speer and Nuremberg, should be enough to prove once and for all that A2 is heading down the path to Nazism.