Traffic Committee to Waste Money on Engineering Consultant
Last Thursday night the Supervisors were hoodwinked into wasting more of your money on yet another consultant. The chairman of the traffic committee reported that Lee County has determined that the new Red Sox stadium would have no detrimental impact on the adjacent roadway network.
Read The Entire Traffic Study
Read the Traffic Conclusion
Seeing an opportunity to spend money, the traffic chair decided that wasn't good enough and we will be spending money on an engineer to "look at the county study".
Folks, mark my words, your Supervisors lead around the collar by a useless traffic committee are going to spend money on an issue that will change nothing. For the traffic committee and the Supervisors to cry foul now is disingenuous when they've been ignoring the process. Every person in this community has known for at least a year that the Red Sox stadium was going up. The traffic chair and the board now claim they weren't exactly sure where the stadium was going and they are surprised it's so close to Gateway. Hey people, do a little homework will ya? So the ignorance of the committee and the board means we need to spend more money.
It's what I've been saying all along about this board. They are strictly reactionary. There is nobody proactive. There have been many meetings between the builder, the landowner, the Red Sox and the County to get this project to a June 1st start date. And now our piddly diddly CDD wants to get involved.
I'll bet you a doughnut not a single member of the board or the traffic committee attended any of those meetings when they could have made a stink about the traffic. These people had a year to ask for town hall meetings of their own to make a stink. As a matter of fact I was the only one to hold town hall meetings, 2 of them, over the past year, and I don't have any juice in this community. And remember the majority of Gateway residents who attended my town hall meetings said they were in favor of the stadium being built next door. Some said the sooner the better.
The facts are these: Like it or not the Red Sox are building a new stadium next to Gateway. There is nothing - NOTHING - the CDD can do about it. We are talking about 15 games a year. So what if there's a little traffic congestion on 15 nights. So what if some of these cars use Gateway Boulevard to exit (as long as they drive the speed limit). Maybe they will stop at the Boulevard Deli, maybe they will stop at 7-11, maybe they will see a business they shop at or an open house sign. It's not like we have to repair the roads from extra wear-and-tear. And so what if they decide to have a minor league baseball team.
I had to laugh when they all started talking about how the traffic with the games would add to the problems of parent pick-up at the schools. All of a sudden the parent pick-up issues are a concern to you all? You've done nothing to address this since the schools opened. How about this. If you spent time working on a solution for parent pick-up for the last 3 years, instead of just ignoring it, those cars wouldn't be in the way when the Red Sox traffic lets out. Your a traffic committee. Parent pick-up is a traffic problem. You've done nothing to fix that. Now it's an issue you care about because you are concerned about 15 days worth of traffic.
The traffic committee chairman gave the board a ludicrous example of the pain we are about to endure with the new stadium. She told a story about leaving the Minnesota Twins stadium and how it took 20 minutes to get from point A to point B. OH NO...20 MINUTES!! How did you survive in 20 minutes of traffic? This is the same person who thinks we need a traffic light at Griffin and Gateway Boulevard. 20 minutes is not a significant traffic impact. It's an inconvenience to people with no patience.
Try exiting a parking garage after a 4th of July Fireworks display in West Palm Beach. Try getting out of the parking lot of Yankee Stadium after any game of the year. Try driving in Los Angelas at 5PM on any freeway on any day of the year. That's significant. People adjust. Lives go on. That stadium and the planned retail will be nothing but positive for Gateway.
And, by the way, why in the hell do we have an engineering firm on staff, that we pay a salary every month, if they cannot "look at" the County report. If they do not specialize in traffic why do we have them on staff if this is one of our issues. Why do we have an Operations Manager and a District Manager and neither of them can "look at" the study. Why not call the County and ask for a meeting with the engineer that produced the study? Why not ask a resident to "look at" the study. We have plenty of engineers that live in Gateway. How about asking them to give back a little "by looking" at the report. I'm sure they'd be happy to help. Need names???
It's just another total waste of our money with no benefit for what's being spent. It's a way to justify existence. Nothing more.
P.S. I have made a request to Lee Count Commissioner Ray Judah for another Town Hall meeting here in Gateway to discuss the traffic report with the company that did the study. Once it is set, I will let all the residents know.
