Red Light Cameras Part 3: Brutal Honesty, Please

In parts 1 and 2 you should have gotten a crystal clear understanding that safety and red light cameras, RLC, are not connected. Communities are removing them as others are putting them in. The ones that are pulling them out are doing so because the facts and evidence don’t support the claim that RLC make people safer.

It’s always about the money

Another Piece To The Stormwater Puzzle

I was up in Madison WI this week on business. I think the City Motto is “The USSR may have fallen but Madison marches on”. They’ve been on the west edge of where WI has been getting hammered by stormwater this spring, and the lakes are just about over their banks.

Being the state capital may help, but they seem to be a leg up on stormwater solutions too, and it has definitely helped.

Red Light Cameras Part 2: Not So Safe

The insurance industry, and the Red Light Camera (RLC) suppliers them selves lobby hard and long to get RLC put up wherever they can. The Insurance Institute for Highway Safety, a front 100% funded by insurance companies, puts out reports that purport to show how RLC increase safety at intersections.

It ain’t about safety. RLC actually contribute to more accidents and more injuries.

Red Light Cameras Part 1: Smile

This is a spy red light camera. It takes pictures of cars that run red lights. Take a good look, and start taking a look around.

Illinois’ state lawmakers voted in 2006 to allow the devices, and the move toward red-light cameras has been gaining momentum ever since.

At the June 17th council meeting, commissioners asked for preliminary information from staff about red light cameras. Commissioners cautioned that this was just a first look, just asking for information from staff, as if anticipating resident backlash.

Indeed.

Heritage Fest Tully Ticker

You know he’d tell you if he was here.

Martin Tully Says:
June 20, 2008 at 12:28 am e

Yes I would and yes I am. And don’t forget about the benefit concert for the Blodgett House on the evening June 26th. “Let’s put the heritage back into Heritage Festival.”

Gee, would you ever guess that I am also the Chair of the Community Events Commission?

PCPCP

Another piece to the stormwater puzzle.

Read the comprehensive cold weather report on Portland Cement Pervious Concrete Performance. If you don’t want to wade through 70+ pages, short form: works great. Around here, it doesn’t eliminate the need for detention/retention, but it would significantly reduce runoff we continue building into our village now-despite knowing how much fixing the problem costs us later.

Thousands now; millions later. Pick one.

Traffic Calming: The Power of the Whiteboard

Tonight council approved sweeping simplifications to the traffic calming ordinances and to the processes residents must go through to get village help in their neighborhoods; help to combat drivers that drive too fast down residential streets.

Unlike the recent updating of ordinances, definitions, and language undertaken singly by the Planning Department, Acting Village Manager Dave Fieldman and Assistant Village Manager Mike Baker, along with Interim Public Works Director Robin Weaver and her department, the Planning Department, Police Department, Village Attorney Enza Petrarca, and others, all huddled around a whiteboard and hashed it out.

County Press Release: ‘Seperation’ Moves Forward Updated with Village Press Release, Spellchecked!

DuPage County Board Chairman Bob Schillerstrom showed a bit of why it is good to be king, and how he can help the cities and villages of the county. It was King Bob that called the meeting before the ICC meeting to hash it out with local pols, IDOT Secretary Milt Sees, DG key players, and pulled everything together for Sec. Sees to make the final commitment.

Having done all the legwork diligently for so many years, and being a project ready to go didn’t hurt, but it serves as a reminder of the power wielded by a county board chair.

John H. Pearce, 1927-2008

From the Chicago Tribune:

John H. Pearce, a Naperville resident since 1965, died June 9, 2008 at Edward Hospital. Born Aug. 21, 1927 in Terre Haute, IN. He is survived by his wife, Elvina; a brother, Frank G. Pearce of El Macero, CA; and eight nieces and nephews. He was preceded in death by his parents, Fred and Irene Pearce; a brother, Milton Pearce; and two sisters, Genevieve McWilliams and Dorothy Shea. A memorial visitation celebrating John’s life will be held on Friday, June 13, 5 until 9 p.m. at the Friedrich-Jones Funeral Home, 44 S. Mill, Naperville. In lieu of flowers, memorials in John’s honor may be made to the Interlochen Center for the Arts, 4000 Highway M-137, Interlochen, MI 49643. For info, 630-355-0213.

IDOT To DG: Belmont Underpass IS A GO!!

Council Commissioner Geoff Neustadt just called me.

“Plan B” worked!

In a meeting earlier today, members of the ICC, METRA, IDOT, county and DG, along with elected local downstate officials (don’t know who yet) sat down and IDOT hashed it out fast and sweet. They have almost all the cash, they want the project turning dirt ASAP, they are in. The balance, maybe $200,000 will be coughed up a bit here and there by other parties.

Update: IDOT ponies up the full funding. $8.3 million was what the parties figured as the actual gap.

After 10 years of effort, finally the work can begin.

Night Of The Living Consultants

In case anyone was wondering what the answer to The $95,400 Question No One Asked is, the answer appears to be: $282,100.

First Look At New Buses

Make or break time gets a stop or two nearer…

Belmont Underpass Plan B

Last night Mayor Sandack announced the Belmont Underpass Plan B, where he and AVM Fieldman and VA Petrarca will try and assemble area elected officials from the IL house and senate (Dillard Pihos, Bellock, maybe others), county officials (Schillerstrom and staff, and maybe our county board members from 2&3), as well as officials and staff from IDOT to try and hash out the extra $8.5 million needed to start construction on the Belmont Underpass.

We have some things working for us.

IReadItInDG vol 8

“You, Meat, are a small minded, vanilla village idiot.”, says IReadItInDG vol 8, featuring puppet-on-puppet insults, and puppet-on-daughter-of-puppet bashing. And I’m not quite right about some things. I am thinking they picked on the wrong puppet taking shots at Meat and his daughter…

Latest Green Roof Tests In Seattle

Green roofs limit storm water run-off. If DG is to make a difference in how much stormwater we have that runs off, we will need to address things like this. From The Changing World of Stormwater Technology, by Dan Rafter, this report of a comparative testing of green roofs to determine the optimum design.

The Planner’s Progress

“Pounding it out”, is an old football phrase that means little by little, bit by bit getting somewhere. No big flash or sizzle, just nose to the grindstone three yards and a cloud of dust stuff. It seems Tom Dabareiner, Director of Community Development has harnessed some talented staff and is making some significant improvements due to their process of pounding it out and, as a direct result, our village is benefiting.

GE Citizen Power Stays The Day At Ackerman Woods

A friend asked me why I bother writing about this; it is not even near DG. No arguement about proximity, but here is a group of people who got mad, got organized, and got a plan.

The Belmont Underpass Odyssey Continues

Looks like 2008 has slipped away as the year the Belmont Underpass gets done started. Despite an intense and coordinated effort by Mayor Sandack and council, hired lobbyists, and staff this year, the Illinois legislature finished up its regular session without passing Illinois Works, an increasingly controversial capital projects bill that would solve many old and festering problems, let us finally get our BU…and create new problems for the state on the process.