I am glad they are making progress on the Highway 65/ Broadway resurfacing. As a lifelong resident of Ward 6, I travel that stretch of road almost every day, and I can definitely say it needed some attention.

Normally, I would be eager for its completion. Normally, anyone on my side of town would be. But with this construction project, the cones may soon be going away, but the inconvenience of single lane traffic apparently will not be.

I have yet to talk to one person who thinks this is a good idea. Obviously, those I talk to live near me so my bias is clear but remember, we are the ones who will continue to be inconvenienced by this “decision” for the foreseeable future.

None of us really get why we are cutting the number of driving lanes in half on the main road most of us use everyday just to make the city more….Blue(?); Why we think a center suicide lane is a safe idea with all the business and street turn options on that stretch of road; Or, why anyone thinks these bicycle paths will ever be used by enough people to even pay for the paint.

We also don’t understand why a mayor and council members that will not be affected in the least by this decision were able to be the deciding votes over the majority of businesses and residents that will be affected by it daily.

That is not how democracy is supposed to work. What if Wards 3 through 6 all outvoted Wards 1 and 2 and made Fountain Street a one-way from Mayo Clinic to Highway 13 to make room for some bicycle lanes. One could argue the result would be far more bicycle traffic there then on a busy highway next to jack braking semi trucks.

Of course, it wouldn’t be appropriate for those of us who rarely use Fountain Street to cut the driving lanes in half for the residents of Wards 1 and 2 who rely on it everyday to get to work and back home again. Just as it would not be appropriate for the mayor and oddnumbered wards to join forces and democratically pave over all the parks in even numbered wards; or to place a new landfill in the center of a ward that drew the short straw in a tie-breaker vote.

The wishes of the people actually affected by a vote should be considered above the wishes of those looking from afar.

I have been told by many this Broadway lane decision was made long before any actual voting took place because we needed the state’s permission to even do the (winter, non-peak hour) traffic study that allegedly swayed everyone’s opinions towards a three-lane option.

I don’t know if that is true, but after witnessing the manner in which this vote and tie-breaker unfolded, it would not surprise me as we marched toward its inevitability regardless of all the objections by relevant citizens and businesses and heard its praises by the unburdened.

Decisions are to be made in a representative democracy, for the people, of the people and by the people, not in spite of the people. It is time for the city to reconsider this absurd and wholly unpopular idea before it is too late.

Paint the lanes — all four.

 

Brian J Anderson

Albert Lea