We are not shortcuts. We're even more than two ways.

All one has to do is actually look at the streets in question to easily determine that they were designed from the beginning for mutlimodal use. They didn't end up that wide by accident and we're lucky they and the practical sensibility they represent are still there. Every time we diminish one of those modes, though, either directly like transit removal or indirectly by making non-motorized use too dangerous, our capacity as a community - the ability of the city to function as a platform for working, learning, recreating, giving and receiving care of all kinds - is diminished right along with it. That we have ended up, after two hundred years of public and private investment, in a position of begging for such basic consideration serves as testament to just how badly we have neglected not only our heritage but the ways of shared opportunity and decency that created this place. When city leaders do finally hear that begging, when it registers as something more than a spreadsheet, it will be their consciences making the case, not us.