Hey, dumbass! Get those steel beams off the street and put 'em where they belong -- on the sidewalk.

It's okay. Handicapped users can use the sidewalk on the other side ...

... which doesn't exist.

Looks like we're all out on the street, literally and figuratively.

Why does the Board of Public Works and Safety routinely approve things like this? Until municipal government learns what is meant by concepts like walkability and handicapped access, and enforces this understanding not only as it pertains to others, but to municipal government itself, the situation isn't going to improve.

#OurDelightfulDemocrats

ADA, anyone? Parking is not permitted on sidewalks. This IS a sidewalk, right?

I have no beef with the business at the corner of 15th and Spring, and I suspect it hasn't dawned on anyone working there to consider a potential access issue on the sidewalk out front owing to employee parking habits.

Primarily, this is because the city of New Albany has neglected maintaining the sidewalk. We can afford a $9 million water park, but not a gallon of paint.

As with the (until recently) ignored crosswalks on nearby Elm Street, it's another instance of simple striping. At least once since we moved into our current residence in 2003, the city painted yellow stripes on the tarmac to show the sidewalk's configuration in the absence of a road verge.

Emulating local Democratic Party grandees, it has been allowed to fade into nothingness.

Here are three recent views looking west, with the photos taken on different days.

I fully understand that New Albany's Board of Public Works has a full slate of ongoing befuddlement as to who's going to tune the street piano, which just isn't an option, because art shouldn't stray past the boundaries of velvet Elvis and dogs playing poker.

But I believe the intent of the Americans with Disabilities Act is to make the boundaries of the sidewalk clear and accessible. Perhaps the chairman can add this one to his burgeoning agenda.

Another malfunctioning metaphor for downtown quasi-walkability.

In terms of walkability, the intersection of Spring and 15th is decidedly below standard.

Some of the crossing lights work, and others don't. Several of the crossing request buttons are rotten to the touch, and obviously unworkable.

What's more, it's been this way for a long time.

Ironically, the stop light at this same intersection marks the beginning of the only periodically (coin flip?) enforced drag strip on Spring Street, from 15th to 7th.

Maybe some day the Board of Works will take note. We neighborhood residents can dream.

Does the CSX railroad "own" the 15th Street right of way?

Near the end of last evening's City Council meeting, during non-agenda public speaking time, CM Larry Kochert unexpectedly divulged that legal research conducted by Sewer Board attorney Greg Fifer indicates that the city of New Albany, not CSX, actually owns the right-of-way for the rail line.

Even the self-appointed citizen's advocate at the podium was taken aback at this revelation.

Moments before, CM Kevin Zurschmiede had uttered a seemingly hard-line challenge to the railroad to repair the 15th Street corridor or, in effect, get out of town. Given the traditional status of the nation's rail companies, this seemed foolhardy ... until CM Kochert spilled the legalistic beans.

Now, the obvious question is: True or false? Suddenly, NAC's proposal to nationalize the corridor seems almost capable of being achieved.

There'll be more on the Thursday meeting later this weekend. Cheers.