Latest news and analysis re (updated) Young Circle Roadway Project in #HollywoodFL will be on Friday afternoon! Hint: Hollywood residents and Downtown Hollywood Small Business owners continue to be dumbstruck about the CRA's attrocious public engagement effort of the past three years.

Updated May 4th - Have been trying to get my hands on some video of the consultant's public presentation Tuesday night and to the Hollywood CRA Wednesday morning so that everything that I've written here would make more sense after you've gotten both Points of Views.
Unfortunately, looks like I will not have that up until after Noon on Monday the 6by. 

Sorry for the delay.

My blog post about Tuesday night's public presentation of the Young Circle Roadway Project at the Lippman Multi-purpose Community Center, and, the expanded presentation made by the consultant on Wednesday morning at Hollywood City Hall before the Hollywood CRA Board of Directors, i.e. the Hollywood City Commission, will be up on my blog after lunch on Friday, sometime after 1 pm.

Check it out when you can and learn how truly dumbstruck so many concerned and well-informed Hollywood residents and Downtown Hollywood Small Business owners continue to be about the Hollywood CRA's attrocious public engagement effort of the past three years, which has been much-discussed on this blog with increasing degrees of incredulity.
That is, an "effort" that has been completely inadequate to the task of properly vetting this ill-considered and poorly-designed plan publicly "supported" by... the same pseudo-civic and business groups and about two dozen people who show up at most of Hollywood's myriad civic meeting. 

(I know because I'm one of them.)

But diversity and different points of view? Well, no, not so much. 

I've not really seen that at any of the many meetings about this subject that I've gone to the past three years.

The consultant preaches to the choir of people who want to believe in "experts" and dismisses all logical questions by people with open minds and a critical eye. 
And anyone who thinks the plan actually doesn't solve the problems that people in Hollywood would like to see addressed.
Someone like me.

The Young Circle Roadway Project is certainly NOT supported by the great number of people you should expect for a project of such magnitude, one that has the real potential, if adopted and implemented, to permanently ruin dozens of struggling Young Circle businesses, as consumers and residents choose to permanently change their current consumer buying and behavioral habits because of what will not only be endless construction, but their simple and understandable belief that it's far better to drive north or south via cut-thru's in local neighborhoods, the last thing people need, rather than drive single-file thru a gantlet of round-abouts on US-1 that the consultant describes like the magic beans in "Jack and the Beanstalk."

And late this afternoon came the following news fromn our friend Brian Bandell, South Florida's number one real estate reporter:

Costa Hollywood Beach Resort condo-hotel faces $40M foreclosure lawsuit as developer can't sell all units. Here we go again! https://t.co/GMaco9fIMz pic.twitter.com/Tfqv4ZDAsH

— Brian Bandell (@SFBJRealEstate) May 2, 2019

Not good news.

Dave 

Hallandale Beach Blog: http://www.hallandalebeachblog.blogspot.com/ 

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Csaba Kulin and I re the Long Trail of Broken Promises, Alibis & Excuses from City of Hallandale Beach's elected officials, City Manager Miller and Police Chief Flournoy re self-evident safety problems for residents/visitors along NE 14th Avenue; photos

Looking south on NE 14th Avenue from Atlantic Shores Blvd., Hallandale Beach, FL. March 31, 2014 photo by South Beach Hoosier.

Below is an email that was sent this afternoon by my friend and fellow Hallandale Beach & Broward County civic activist Csaba Kulin to Hallandale Beach Mayor Joy Cooper and the following: Hallandale Beach Commissioners Anthony A. Sanders, Alexander Lewy and Bill Julian, City Manager Renee Miller, Police Chief Dwayne Flournoy, Assistant City Manager and CRA Director Daniel Rosemond, City Attorney V. Lynn Whitfield, along with dozens of other HB residents, both those living on or near the heavily-traveled NE 14th Avenue corridor who have been under assault since that road first began construction in February of 2013, as well as those who live elsewhere but commiserate because it's a perfect example of finger-pointing in this city by both elected and appointed officials at Hb City Hall.

The construction revolves around some desperately-needed storm water pipes, after the city has has had years and years of flooding, especially in Northeast Hallandale Beach.

Keep in mind as you read this that this small city that's only 4.2 square miles to begin with, has some tangible geographical constraints that make getting around difficult even in the best of times, and especially during the tourist season, which makes the mess that's been taking place along NE 14th Avenue especially problematic: we have both the Atlantic Ocean and the Intracoastal Waterway on the city's east side, with 1-95 to the west, plus numerous impassable canals.
This, in a city with ONLY ONE east-west street that runs throughout it -Hallandale Beach Blvd., where traffic goes to die in SE Broward and become part of gridlock history.

This is made worse by the fact that we have less than a handful of two-way north-south streets east of usually gridlocked U.S.-1/Federal Highway, the road that serves as the very spine of the city, interconnecting it to the City of Aventura and Miami-Dade County to the south and the City of Hollywood to the north. 
U.S-1 is one of just two two-way north-south streets that span the length of the city, the other one being State Road A1A/Ocean Drive over on the beach, which again has Hollywood to the north at its intersection with HBB, and the Village of Golden Beach and Miami-Dade County to the south.

-----

April 9, 2014

Mayor Joy Cooper,

I am sorry you had to experience the indignities of obscene language and gestures the same way as the law abiding residents of N.E. 14^th Avenue had been subjected to for well over a year.

I asked the City Commission a number of times for help. Mayor, you tried to pacify me with promises, City Manager Miller did the same and Police Chief Flournoy said that as “manpower” allows he will enforce the One Way Street violators.

During the March 17, 2014 City Commission Meeting  I stated that we only saw one time a police officer handing out traffic tickets. You did NOT believe me.
I have proof from our police department that only two tickets were issued during the past four months, both on November 30, 2013.

When I met with Police Chief Flournoy on April 2, 2014 he said that “even those two citations should NOT have been issued”.
Chief Flournoy told me that ’signage and markings on N.E. 14^th Avenue are NOT sufficient and the citations would not stand up court’. The Chief said that ‘it is the city’s responsibility to properly mark the street and install proper signage’.

In my opinion it is inexcusable that our city is unable to mark and install signage to make a One Way Street legal. The City placed our residents in danger and created a risk of liability for the City in case of an accident.

Mayor, we like you to tell us when will the City install legal marking and signs so the police can start to enforce the law immediately?

Please do NOT tell us that we have already suffered over a year and we are used to the danger so a few more months do NOT matter.

The residents of 14^th Avenue hope to see the legal markings and signage by the April 22, 2014 community meeting to be sponsored by the City. 

The City Commission has two main functions, making policy and oversight of the operation of the City. We hope that in your oversight capacity you investigate who knew what and when in this unfortunate misunderstanding and share it with the residents.

I attached a couple of pictures to illustrate the current situation on NE 14^th Avenue.

Sincerely

Csaba Kulin
President, Fairways North, Inc. 

Looking south from 600 NE 14th Avenue.

-----

The self-evident lack of concern the City of Hallandale Beach and the contractor involved in this project have shown for the safety and health for the residents in that area, who've been treated like prisoners in their own neighborhood, is nothing short of shocking, even by this city's infamous low standards.

Over the past year, from my visits to Csaba and Susan's home, I've taken LOTS of photos illustrating the points that he makes so well above, and have accompanied him when, together, we've measured the distance across Atlantic Shores Blvd. and compared it to the much-shorter distance on NE 14th Avenue, since for reasons that defy logic and common sense, Comm. Alexander Lewy is strangely insisting on changing the parking equation on NE 14th Avenue -once the construction is finished- to angled parking, just like on Atlantic Shores Blvd..

This, despite the fact that it was already changed from angled to its heretofore parallel parking-to-the-curb status a number of years ago so that additional numbers of parking spaces could be created for residents and visitors.

Why would Lewy and the city intentionally want to go backwards in time and create more problems?

It's a reasonable question to ask: Why would a HB City Commissioner who is required to resign his post in August (in order to run for the FL House 100 primary) suddenly wants to micromanage parking in this area full of angry residents when he was completely unconcerned 

with the negative effects of this botched construction project, to say nothing of the very self-evident safety points that Csaba has repeatedly made? 

It's very, very curious.

In any case, angled parking on only the east side of 14th Street is FAR TOO SHORT an area to safely maneuver, since the lack of space necessary to properly back-up without being IN the road, allows no margin for error for drivers and those already on the road.

It's obvious the first time you see it -and yet...

I've taken tons of photos of Atlantic Shores Blvd. and NE 14th Avenue proving these points, so...

Looking south on NE 14th Avenue from Atlantic Shores Blvd., Hallandale Beach, FL. March 31, 2014 photos by South Beach Hoosier.

Even today, after over a year of haphazard construction and coating the area and the inside of residents apts. & condos/cars with dirt, and after I myself have nearly been hit about three separate times by cars driving on the sidewalk or driving the wrong way, the City of Hallandale Beach can't explain why there never was a mobile watering system in place that would keep the massive amounts of dust down to a minimum, as is typical of projects this large that involve moving and shifting tons of buried dirt, road and asphalt.

When you add the large number of residents living in the area just feet away, many who suffer from existing health problems, it really makes you wonder why so little intelligent thought was 

given to this project's cumulative effect on them in the first place, and how little attention to detail there is in general at HB City Hall under the current crew, since they had plenty of time to put remedial actions in place.

But they didn't.

As for the HB Police Chief, you can see for yourself by the recitation that Csaba makes above, despite knowing what he did, when he did, and despite the persistent and legitimate public complaints from Csaba on behalf of his own tenants and neighbors along the street apprising him of the problems, along with the pleas of others, Chief Flournoy has yet again failed to act and respond in a satisfactory manner for HB residents, and once again failed to give the public the sort of serious response they were entitled to.

Instead, for all practical purposes, Police Chief Flournoy just shrugged his shoulders.

Just more of the same sort of unsatisfactory attitude and results from him we've come to expect over the past few years.

Surprise!

So guess who fell off the truth-telling bandwagon and got back to his familiar logrolling ways in the Miami Herald? Yes, Maurice Ferre of the Miami-Dade Expressway Authority; FL state Rep. Jeanette Nuñez is 100% correct -the MDX is overstepping its boundaries. Facts show they are arrogant and territorial as hell, and it's clear they want to expand their fiefdom!

View Larger Map

So guess who fell off the truth-telling bandwagon and got back to his familiar logrolling ways in the Miami Herald? Yes, Maurice Ferre of the Miami-Dade Expressway Authority; FL state Rep. Jeanette Nuñez is 100% correct -the MDX is overstepping its boundaries. Facts show they are arrogant and territorial as hell, and it's clear they want to expand their fiefdom!

My comments are after the spin.

Miami Herald

Letter to the Editor

MDX is doing its job

July 7, 2013

Re state Rep. Jeanette Nuñez’s June 30 letter, MDX is overstepping its boundaries:

The Miami-Dade Expressway Authority (MDX) was created by the Florida Legislature and the Miami-Dade County Commission in 1994 as an agency of the state. Seven of MDX’s board of 13 members are appointed by county commissioners and six by the governor. 

On March 19 and June 18, 2013, MDX held public hearings on the rate issue for State Road 836. The MDX Board voted 7-5 in favor of the 70-cent option over the one for 60 cents. This new rate starts the summer of 2014. 

The toll policy and new toll rate were studied, discussed, debated and publicly aired for several years. We are no more a monopoly than the Florida Department of Transportation or Florida’s Turnpike. MDX staff and I, as chair, visited every county commissioner and as many city mayors as would see us to review plans. We were before several editorial boards, on radio and TV talk shows. The Miami Herald covered the toll issues amply and fairly. 

In the six advertised public meetings, two webinars and two public hearings, there was minimal participation. In the last public hearing MDX received the objection and concerns of seven legislators and five mayors preferring 60 cents rather than the 70-cent toll rate per mainline gantry. 

In the same Miami Herald edition, there were other articles on government expenditures for Jackson Health System’s $830 million “wish list” and the county water and sewer department’s pipe plan. Florida’s Turnpike implemented a $12 million-a-year toll hike recently. 

Freedom is not free, and progress has a cost. Americans, and Miamians, well understand that our infrastructure needs drastic repairs. As painful as toll increases are, doing less than our best would be more painful to travelers. 

MDX gets no money from Washington, Tallahassee or Miami-Dade County. If any of these governments wants to help MDX financially, we would gladly review our decisions. 

For seven years Congress has failed to adequately fund the U.S. transportation needs. Bridges are failing everywhere, even, unfortunately, our own Bear Cut Bridge in Key Biscayne. Many local cities, like the growing Doral, are concerned that traffic pains will slow growth and affect quality of life. 

Good public policy requires difficult decisions for all of us. MDX is not overreaching. MDX is doing its job. 

Maurice Ferre, chair, MDX, Miami

A few weeks ago Ferre seemed to be trying to play the all-too-rare voice of reason in Miami-Dade County by opposing fare hikes of this stealthy body most people in M-D not only DON'T understand, but instinctively hate -for good reason.

Unfortunately for both residents and common sense, that was all a mirage, since he's now back to playing the role of sycophant to the hilt that's been his designated role since he's fallen to the outer fringes of relevant politics and public policy.

It's really great that the Herald's feeble-minded Editorial Board is so bereft of any common sense that despite this being known as one of THE most apathetic and least civic-minded regions in the entire country, they run this piece without any mention whatsoever that Ferre is the former mayor of Miami -and wannabe mayor of M-D County- so that all the legions of 

know-it-alls from Aventura to Florida City who moved down here since Hurricane Andrew hit, and as we know, think they know everything -many of them, Jets fans, of course- can have some useful context to better understand a pol calling for more money for his latest crew of insiders.

Naturally, to make the whole log-rolling effort complete, Ferre compliments the Herald.

How did I know THAT was coming?

Experience!

The original Letter to the Editor that Ferre's spin exercise was trying to undo was this bit of spot-on truth-telling:

http://www.miamiherald.com/2013/06/29/3475954/mdx-is-overstepping-its-boundaries.html

Miami Herald

Letter to the Editor

MDX is overstepping its boundaries

June 29, 2013

Miami-Dade County commissioners created the Miami-Dade Expressway Authority (MDX) in 1994 to ease traffic congestion and establish local control of toll revenues. Two years later MDX took over the five busiest roadways in the county — the Airport, Dolphin, Don Shula, Gratigny and Snapper Creek expressways. While its foundation and the original intentions of MDX were necessary at the time, in recent months, MDX has overstepped its boundaries and taken advantage of its de facto monopoly over Miami-Dade’s major roadways. 

MDX originally approved a fixed toll rate of 70 cents for the Dolphin Expressway in March, and after a 60-cent alternative was introduced, it called for a public hearing where community members and elected officials could voice their opinions on the matter. On June 19, voice them they did. 

In fact, I and several colleagues from the Miami-Dade legislative delegation attended and condemned the toll increase at an MDX board meeting. We asked the board to pass the less costly alternative, a 60-cent toll per gantry. Nonetheless, the motion for the lower toll failed on a 7-5 vote, even in the face of widespread public opposition. 

Therefore, the MDX board went about its business — not the people’s business — and passed the resolution increasing tolls to 70 cents per mainline gantry and 30 cents per ramp gantry. Before this change, the roundtrip tolls from my district in southwest Miami to downtown were $2.50. If the new tolls are implemented, the cost would rise to $4.20. Commuters who use the expressway will see an increase in what they spend on tolls when the new charges begin next summer. 

MDX has vastly overreached its boundaries as a quasi-governmental body and I hope to remedy the situation for my constituents legislatively before the charges come into effect in June 2014. To borrow the term coined by Roll Back Tolls, MDX is practicing “tollation” — tolling without representation. 

Even though MDX is a state-sanctioned agency, there are systemic inadequacies within its structure. I’m worried that MDX is not held properly accountable for its decisions because there are no elected officials sitting on the board and it has not prudently explored other options to finance future projects. I’m also worried about MDX’s apparent monopoly over tolls in Miami-Dade County and its inability to engage in active listening with the public. 

This decision to raise tolls portrays MDX as having little concern for the economic well-being of the resident, and I will remain adamant in supporting my constituency on this controversial issue. 

Jeanette Nuñez, state representative, Miami

-----
As always, you can read much more analysis on other problems associated with the arrogant folks at MDX at Transit Miami, where they've been hip to what MDX has been doing for as long as I've been -expanding their fiefdom.
http://www.transitmiami.com/

Transit Miami @transitmiami https://twitter.com/transitmiami
"Transit Miami is an online web journal dedicated to advancing smart growth oriented land use policies, and mutlimodal transportation in South Florida."

Jeanette Nuñez's profile on the Florida legislature's website:
http://www.myfloridahouse.gov/Sections/Representatives/details.aspx?MemberId=4524

Is tonight the night you stop procrastinating and start getting better informed about Hallandale Beach and its future?

Come out Tuesday night at 6 p.m. and become better informed on the day-to-day and long-term issues directly affecting Hallandale Beach and its future Quality-of-Life, and meet some of the city's most concerned citizens who keep tabs on what's happening -and what isn't.

Then again, you can always continue procrastinating about attending and blaming others for why you don't know what's going on in your own city, and continue to believe that it's someone else's responsibility to make it the sort of well-managed, upbeat place it ought to be, since the evidence is clear that the current mayor, city commission and city manager aren't up to the task, despite their recitation of boilerplate catch-phrases at public meetings.
It's your choice.

Commissioner Keith S. London Resident Forum
City of Hallandale Beach Cultural Center – Room 107
Tuesday, March 15, 2011, 2011- 6:00– 8:00 p.m.

According to Comm. London, the following topics will be discussed:

a.) Traffic and gridlock conditions in and around Hallandale Beach.

b.) Proposal to institute two-way traffic on N.E. 8th and N.E. 10th Avenues at a cost of over $1,500,000.

c.) City of Hallandale Beach Parks & Recreation Master Plan proposals and upcoming meetings of Saturday, March 19, 2011, 10-12:00 a.m. at Ingalls Park, and 1-3:00 p.m. at O.B. Johnson Park.

d.) Ben Gamla Hebrew Charter School application to be heard at HB Planning and Zoning Meeting – Wednesday, March 23, 2011 1:30 p.m.

e.) Traffic Calming Devices to be discussed at HB City Commission Workshop on Monday, March 28, 2011 6–8:00 p.m.

Any other subject you would like to discuss

South Florida Needs to Emulate Pembroke Pines Approach re Roads/Traffic: ACTION!

My comments follow the article.
___________________________________
www.sun-sentinel.com/community/news/pembroke_pines/sfl-flbpines12xxsbdec16,0,1462881.story
South Florida Sun-Sentinel
Pembroke Pines rebuilding I-75 ramps at Pines Boulevard
Lanes to be closed weekends, nights; work to go on 14 months
By Michael Turnbell
December 16, 2008

Pembroke Pines
When the Pines Boulevard interchange at Interstate 75 opened in 1985, the area was considered out in the boondocks.

The Pines interchange, like others along I-75, was built to rural standards with high-speed curves and little space for merging onto the connecting road.

But what worked then doesn't hold up under today's traffic-choking volumes.

That's why the city is replacing the interchange's wide, curving ramps with straight ramps — one exit for both eastbound and westbound traffic — that join Pines Boulevard at right angles similar to exits on Interstate 95 in south Broward County.

"When you come off 75, everybody's moving at a high speed and then they have to quickly merge over to the left onto Pines," said Pembroke Pines Mayor Frank Ortis. "It's a huge safety issue."

The new ramps will create two, four-way intersections on each side of the overpass and lead drivers exiting I-75 to a traffic light, instead of directly onto Pines Boulevard.

Four new traffic signals are planned for Pines Boulevard — two at the new exit and entry ramps and two at 145th and 148th avenues, which are the entrances to new shopping centers on the east and west sides of I-75.

On the east side, drivers headed in and out of the new Shops of Pembroke Gardens, built by Duke Realty Corp. of Cincinnati, are using a temporary signal at Pines at 145th.

On the west side, developer KRG/CREC of Indianapolis can't open Cobblestone Plaza shopping center until the traffic signal at Pines Boulevard and 148th is installed.

Ortis said he has asked the state to activate the 148th Avenue signal ahead of the project's January 2010 completion.
Drivers can expect lanes and ramps to be closed at night and on weekends.

"We are asking motorists to be patient while we reconfigure the interchange during the next 14 months," said city engineer Joe McLaughlin said.

Although Pines Boulevard is a state road, the city agreed last year to take over the job from the Florida Department of Transportation to accelerate the road work.

The city is paying for the $11 million project upfront. The state will reimburse the city in 2012, when it originally expected to have funds available to do the work. Developers on both sides of I-75 are contributing $2.6 million plus covering any cost overruns.

Michael Turnbell can be reached at mturnbell@sunsentinel.com, 954-356-4155 or 561-243-6550.
-----------------------------------------------------
I loved when this first opened up because going north on the new I-75 on my way back up to Chicago/Evanston, after coming back home for the holidays down here (at my mother's then-place near The Falls, at S. Dixie Highway and S.W. 136th Street, once you got up towards then-western Pines, you could really, really FLY!!!

The only place in South Florida where that was true.

It was very similar at the time to parts of I-75 South, south of Tampa-St. Pete going towards Port Charlotte, where I'd always make a pit-stop on my trips south and visit a friend, who had already become a popular high school English teacher in his first job.
That was back when Charlotte County was the fastest-growing county in the whole country, full of Midwestern transplants, can-do enthusiasm and Cubs and Reds ball caps.

Miles and miles of wide roads with no cars on them!
Especially at night!!!

Those roads were so much fun to ride.

Sometimes, you wouldn't see another car for 2-3 miles, and when you did, they were going at least 80 or so.

And naturally, almost without exception, at least once before you got to Palm Beach County, you'd hear the great beginning storm percussion of Christopher Cross' Ride Like the Wind, so you'd have no choice but to turn up the volume and sing along, especially the iconic Michael McDonald back-up vocals. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pt9wULOlc6o

I was born the son of a lawless man.
Always spoke my mind with a gun in my hand.
Lived nine lives
gunned down ten.
Gonna ride like the wind.

And I got such a long way to go.
To make it to the border of Mexico.
So I'll ride like the wind.
Ride like the wind.
Ride like the wind.


Our little Broward mini-Autobahn!
How I do miss it!

In the past 20 years, the closest thing I've experienced to that kind of fun driving, especially after being in the cramped Washington, D.C. area, where speed is just an abstract idea, was heading west on I-66 on Fall Sunday afternoons when the Redskins weren't playing, and my friends and I would head out to the bucolic hills and mountains of West Virginia for the day.

We'd get up early Sunday morning and after the prerequisite stop at the IHOP or Denny's and back on the road by 8 a.m., as long as we studiously avoided the areas known for attracting the "brunch crowd" or "horse crowd" going west, we were set for a nice steady speed with music to relax and just unwind.
(That's one of the things that I miss the most about being down here, surrounded by flat land and traffic -that tangible sense of movement with winding hills )

And coming back to Arlington, with the sun going down over the hills and the foliage whizzing past us, and starting to pick up WBZ-Boston or WCBS-New York on our car radio around 7 p.m., well, it was easy to forget for a while what sort of new mini-crisis would greet us the following day, the big Beltway news story which you'd have to have an informed opinion on.

I especially recommend that you consider the comments below of Pembroke Pines Commissioner Angelo Castillo, within the context of his longer comments:

"...Implementing better traffic management solutions citywide continues to be a top priority for all of us at City Hall. I think it's important to note that while other cities talk about traffic, we in Pines are actually doing things to make things better. That's what our residents demand -- action, not talk...."

That guy is 100% right.

Reader comments at:
http://www.topix.net/forum/source/south-florida-sun-sentinel/TLMR9QIRO7CL7VFTE

A Year Later: HBB's 2007 photo illustrates Golden Isles Dr. construction debacle

4743 Golden Isles Drive, Hallandale Beach, FL looking north towards Hallandale Beach Blvd.
City of Hallandale Beach, Golden Isle Drive, Golden Lakes Apts.
March 2007 photo by South Beach Hoosier

The following comments were in Draft cold storage for a year and have now been de-frosted for your education.

I recently had the opportunity to talk to one of the few honest and hard-working Hallandale Beach city employees I've encountered in the three years I've been here.
Yes, there are a few, but they aren't a quorum.

He was someone who spoke to me at length about the collective burden he and his colleagues must bear because of a bad reputation, one that makes it much harder for him to perform HIS job as well as he could, because of the public's lack of confidence.


He said that this perception by the public really undermines morale, especially for the handful of employees who are consistently hard-working, even as city management pretends that it's not a real problem.

The reality is self-evident: there are lots of incompetent city employees who should be fired.


I described for him in detail the situation that had existed on Golden Isles Drive for many months, as the city and their contractors seemed to do just about everything in their power to get the normally placid residents of this street to come out of their apts. with pitch forks and enough rope for a hanging party.

Honestly, as I was thinking of how to take this photo to best illustrate the problem, there was no end to the reasonable complaints I heard from residents walking to stores or walking their dogs, who walked up to me rather quizzically, inquiring why I was taking this photo of the pipes.

After I explained what led me there, there was no end to their complaints!

Starting with the city's lack of timely communication with the neighbors regarding project time lines, then moving onto the issue of the large pipes just being left on curbs for weeks at a time,
and most pointedly, the city NOT requiring the crews to consistently sweep up construction debris and gravel that accumulated everywhere, esp. near storm drains.

The folks I spoke to also made a point of saying that, where they were from, similar sorts of road projects would've been handled much differently -and much more professionally.

They insisted that someone from the construction crew would be made responsible for ensuring that the area was swept clean as as reasonably as possible before quitting each day.

If that wasn't done, residents knew the name and the phone number of whom to call to see to it that the appropriate changes were made.

As much as I and my immediate neighbors in Arlington County often complained about the overly-bureaucratic way things were done there, to the point that it often seemed like a Soviet Republic, the county would never have tolerated the unprofessional and slipshod things I've witnessed on Golden Isles for months and months and...

How do you have DOZENS of barricades with lights that don't work at night???

Fix them!!!

And don't even get me started on the dozens and dozens of barricades on HBB at night that didn't have working lights on them the whole summer when the street lights from 12th Street east to Three Islands didn't work.

After the RK strip mall on the north side of HBB turned their parking lot lights out at 2 a.m. or so, HBB became a black hole from the Walgreen's to the Burger King on Three Islands.

I saw it for myself!

And did I mention the many pallets of bricks that were placed next to medians in the left hand turning lanes -with no orange cones or barricades with working lights?

Who was responsible for "coordinating" that whole effort and why were they never made an example of?

In Arlington County, someone would've been fired for thinking they could get away with that sort of contempt for public safety for so long.

And where exactly were the Police and Fire Chiefs hiding when all of this was going on right in front of them?

Am I supposed to believe that they never drove down HBB at night during this time period?

I didn't have this photo -above- with me at the time I spoke to that city employee I spoke of, obviously, but post it here just to give you some idea of the sloppiness and lack of concern for public safety that's regularly exhibited by HB city employees and the contractors they hire.

In this case, DPW, which as I learned from some newspaper reporters once I moved back into the area, was City Manager Mike Good's old bailiwick.

In the photo, notice the complete absence of ANY warning signs or orange cones alongside the south side of these pipes, closest to you as you view it.

Just so you know, that barricade farther up the street -shocker- lacked operating lights at night.

But that wasn't an aberration, only part of the larger pattern of a serious lack of attention to detail and safety, since at one point, every time I walked by the intersection of HBB & Golden Isles, I counted the number of operating barricade lights on the south side of the intersection.

I'd usually only count 4-7 working barricade lights among the more than 2-3 dozen on that entire street. The entire street!

You'd think that proper illumination would be an important consideration at night for a population that's not the youngest in the world.

Stored directly in front of The Golden Lakes Apts. complex's Fire Zone.

You know, where no parking is permitted, hence the yellow line?

You can't tell here, but the pipes are just a few feet away from the entrance to the complex's parking lot.

So close that you can picture the accidents in your head without much effort.

But in HB, the safety rules that apply to the rest of the world just don't apply!

(As it happens, this photo from March was snapped just a few minutes after watching then-HB City Commission candidate Julie Hamlin -and a pal- campaigning for votes among people in line at the nearby branch of the U.S. Post Office, which I discussed in greater depth in a March post.)

This whole area was just a disaster area, with lack of proper signage being the least of it.