Introducing:
The 53rd and 45th Street Bike Boulevards
Countdown Clock
City Council: Be Warned
The policy makers at Emeryville City Hall have a way of forgetting about programs they don’t much care for and insofar as these programs are mandated by the General Plan and have a prescribed implementation timeline therein, the Tattler has always been there to gently remind them. However, even our rigorous oversight has not been enough to coerce the decision makers to implement the Bike Plan, the part of the General Plan that City Hall historically has had the biggest aversion to.
Owing to this intolerable situation, the Tattler now introduces the 53rd and 45th Street Bike Boulevards Countdown Clock. The clock will be located at the bottom of the front page of the Tattler (phone users will have to load the web version to see it). It will remain until the City places the traffic calming measures on these two streets the Bike Plan mandates. Alternatively, the City Council could amend the Bike Plan to remove the traffic calming requirements for these two streets and then the Clock would be taken down.
Every Two Years
The 53rd and 45th Street Bike Boulevards Countdown Clock is set to run out to zero on September 14th, 2019 at 5:00 pm, the latest possible time the City has to implement the next required level of traffic calming measures placed on the two streets. The clock began on September 14th, 2017 after the required official traffic count was completed when the City became aware that there is too much vehicle traffic on the two streets. The City conducts the traffic counts on every Bike Boulevard every two years as the Plan stipulates and if an “overage” of traffic is found, the City is required to emplace traffic calming measures, after which a new countdown begins.
It is hoped the City Council will look to the Tattler 53rd and 45th Street Bike Boulevard Countdown Clock in place of their staff who has been negligent in reminding them of their duties regarding the Bike Plan. Since the staff has opined that temporary traffic calming measures need to be emplaced for at least six months before a new traffic count can be considered reliable, the Council is reminded the clock only records the actual time when the measures need to be on the roadways and it doesn’t take into account any internal scheduling policies.
The City needs to do its due diligence and make sure the clock doesn’t run out without the next traffic calming measures in place on 53rd and 45th Streets. Additionally, the Clock will not be reset except insofar as duly prescribed Bike Plan traffic calming measures are implemented. And warning to the elected officials: the Clock will help serve as the people’s accounting device at election time.
The City needs to do its due diligence and make sure the clock doesn’t run out without the next traffic calming measures in place on 53rd and 45th Streets. Additionally, the Clock will not be reset except insofar as duly prescribed Bike Plan traffic calming measures are implemented. And warning to the elected officials: the Clock will help serve as the people’s accounting device at election time.
It’s great to see the Tattler insisting that the City Council take its bike plan seriously. The clock is a fine reminder that time is running out, as is our patience,
ReplyDeleteYes, given the terrible legacy City Hall has earned by ignoring the Bike Plan, the countdown clock graphic adds a (proper) sense of urgency to the situation. Let's hope this shakes things up at 1313 Park Ave.
DeleteTo the Editor-
ReplyDeleteI have recently been making critical comments at your competing news site the E’Ville Eye, calling out the Editor there for the poor job he is doing and noting that site is the conservative news site for Emeryville. His readers are rushing in to defend him and offering up criticism of the Emeryville Tattler in defense. I didn’t even mention the Tattler but it’s a subject they are very agitated about, explaining to me it’s the Tattler that’s conservative and the E’Ville Eye being the progressive site. Using Trump logic, the Editor and his readers told me Emeryville’s minimum wage is conservative and it’s progressive to be against it and that’s why they’re against it.
I expect the Editor’s die-hard supporters to rally to his defense but the reason I started commenting in the first place was to see if comments critical but respectfully made would be censored by the Editor. I report to you my comments have not only been censored, I have now been banned from even being able to go to his site at all.
At first the Editor threatened to reveal my IP address for everyone to see despite his guarantee of anonymity for his commentors. Then he started pulling down my comments if he could get to them before his readers could see them. If he wasn’t near his computer and my comment was up for more than an hour or so, he would leave it, probably because he doesn’t want his readers to know he is censoring comments. These are comments that don’t violate his own rules but are (respectfully) critical of his editorship and what I see as his conservative agenda. He taunted me as not being a resident of Emeryville (I do work here). Finally now he has completely removed me with no explanation to me or his readers. His readers are probably thinking I’m not responding now because their side won and the Tattler lover was driven out. I expect conservative peace and calm to once again reign at the E’Ville Eye.
The Editor of the E’Ville Eye has violated the first rule of journalism as I expected he would when I began my experiment. I’ve been quietly reading both news site over the last year or so and it’s clear the E’Ville Eye is the conservative site even though he denies it. However the censoring of community members that disagree with him makes what he’s doing not journalism. The Tattler lets in very critical comments both against your editorial stance and against you personally. That is commendable and it shows you are not afraid of your community.
As a disclaimer: In my comments to the E’Ville Eye I noted that although both sites are disruptive and that’s usually helpful, the Tattler is too left for my likening, far left wing I called it. Still I am closer to your editorial stance than the other site and I cannot condone his anti-journalistic practices. For all his talk about community, he excludes the left of center part of it.
I told the Editor of the E'Ville Eye I would notify the Tattler of this.
Thank you for what you do.
This is quite a submittal...I thank you for it. I would like to post this as a full blown story under the 'Letter to the Tattler' aegis. Would you be willing to use your real name to facilitate moving this up to full on letter status? This information is extremely valuable and worth bringing to the whole community's attention but I can't post this without your identity being public. Please email me at sophbeau@yahoo.com so we can discuss facilitating your very compelling letter.
DeleteTo the Editor-
DeleteI should also point out that the editor of The E’Ville Eye listed some very slanderous things about you personally including that you were removed from Nextdoor.com for abusive comments and implied you opened new accounts under your daughters and then wife’s names so you could keep posting links to your stories. He also said you came to his child’s daycare and confronted his family. If these things are true, I’d prefer to remain anonymous as I would not want to invite this unstable behavior into my personal life.
DeleteSlander, yes, the Editor of that blog is very fond of slandering those he feels he is in competition with. RE Nextdoor: The moderators of that local iteration of that website are pro-business and not fond of Emeryville’s minimum wage. The Tattler is not something they can countenance.
Mr Arias attacking my wife and daughter are beyond the pale but Nextdoor corporate allows autonomous human beings to join. They require valid California drivers licenses to prove their autonomy. Except at Nextdoor Emeryville. There, left wingers and their autonomous spouses are not allowed to join. My wife, having proved she is a real person with the information they requested was kicked out of Nextdoor Emeryville at Rob’s behest. He doesn't want members of the community that have a progressive vision for the town like my wife, the ability to post on Nextdoor Emeryville. You should inquire yourself: what is required to open an account there….see what they say and report back to me. BTW; the posting of links to the Tattler is allowed, just like Rob posting links to his advertising site is allowed. Or so they say…in reality, the Tattler is too progressive for Nextdoor Emeryville. The E’Ville Eye with it's pro-business viewpoint is more their cup of tea.
Mr Arias is close friends with the moderator at Nextdoor Emeryville and that’s how he has overturned Nextdoor corporate policy. It’s a private business so laws are probably not being broken. It IS unethical though. Like Rob’s blog, it’s not open to real comments from real community members, just fellow travelers.
But this revelation helps highlight the fact that Rob Arias besides being a liar, cannot countenance critics of the business he’s built at his advertising site. Remember, it’s his livelihood. If you don’t want to invite unstable behavior into your personal life I’d recommend you not let him be made aware of your identity, now that you have criticized him. If you criticize him on his site, you'll be kicked out.
Lastly, to his allegations of me attacking his wife and child, I’ll say to you what I’ve said to him: Why hasn’t he called to police on me because of the many crimes he says I’ve committed? Why haven’t I been arrested much less convicted? The Emeryville police can’t see the crimes I’ve committed. Only Rob Arias can see them.
However, the latest is a serious charge and we should get to the bottom of it. Just like the Lockness Monster: that’s a serious charge…is it real? How about the Apollo Moon landings; real or fake….we need to get to the bottom of it. On a different note, I’ve noticed Rob doesn’t wear an Emeryville logo lapel pin. What’s up with that? He says he loves Emeryville. Where’s Rob’s lapel pin? Inquiring minds want to know.