The Tell-Tale Fart: This peachy "apartments at Steinert's" project may seem to be free-market capitalism, but the deal's a lot more tangled than it first appeared.

I'd gently argue Steinert's was the building suited to be described as iconic in a way mere "used to be there" vacant lots cannot ever be, but this would be picking nits. It is noteworthy that in a distinctly post-election way, as soon as the campaign was over and the mayor safely re-enthroned, suddenly he has "elected" to refrain from interjecting his dull mug into every announcement.

The reality speaks differently.

Our Shopping Cart Napoleon already had this Steinert's fix quite firmly into place. Before linking to the local chain newspaper's story, let's have a look at the interconnected participants.

Here's Vitor Bueno.

TSI Construction was the contractor for the sewer overflow project by St. Mary's Cemetery at Charlestown Road and Silver Street, during which equipment and materials were being stored in ... a big vacant lot where Steinert's once stood.

TSI was purchased in 2016 by an "investment firm" -- 3 Crown Capital, the leadership of which all formerly worked for Neace Ventures.

The former Steinert's site is owned by a Neace offshoot (son).

And NB Develop, which will build apartments on the Steinert's site, stands for Neace Bueno.

Oh, and the Neace/Bueno has a connection with a newly elected at-large councilman.

Extol Magazine now operating under Neace Ventures.

(November, 2016)

John Neace was the first person to support our dream of starting Extol by becoming our initial investor. He and Vitor Bueno both jumped on ship as minority owners in this venture that was started by Sales Director/Managing Partner Jason Applegate and his wife Angie Fenton, Extol's editor in chief. We are so grateful for this opportunity to grow and further our mission.

Yes, and by the way ...

John Neace is Jeff Gahan's 5th-largest career campaign finance donor.

There was quite a lot left unsaid in the newspaper account, wasn't there?

Development coming to former Steinert's site in New Albany, by John Boyle (Bill Hanson's Jeffersonville First)

NEW ALBANY — An iconic New Albany property could soon see new life.

Steinert's Grill and Pub, located near the intersection of Silver Street and Charlestown Road, was a local landmark and watering hole for decades, with the building having been there since 1877. All of that history was lost over a decade ago, when the structure was destroyed in a 2008 fire.

In the years since, the property at 2239 Charlestown Road has sat vacant, with nothing but the Steinert's sign standing as a remnant among the empty asphalt. Now, developers have plans to fill the void with a $3.5 million, three-story apartment building.

Vitor Bueno said NB Develop set its eyes on the property in part due to its well-known former occupant.

"Steinert's has been a place that a lot of people have come through and have a lot of family memories at," he said. "I think that's a nice part of the site. With it being on top of a hill in a three-story building, people can have a nice view of New Albany."

Plans call for 24 units, half of which will have two bedrooms and two bathrooms and the other half having one bedroom and one bathroom. Units will range in size from 754 square feet to 1,131 square feet ...

ON THE AVENUES: The 2019 remix, "You want some fries with your redevelopment?"

This column originally was published on July 10, 2014. Until only recently the prospects for creative redevelopment at Colonial Manor seemed permanently belly-up, but now residents living nearby have rallied to the idea of participating in the Redevelopment Commission's closed-door, fix-is-in process. Predictably this has raised the hackles of the spider-web-encrusted monastics seated there, but anything to mobilize the grassroots is good, whether or not Irving Joshua agrees (and rest assured, he doesn't). 

Hint: "Corridor study." Mayor Jeff Gahan is on record as dismissive of the idea, which is the single best reason to pursue it. 

---

ON THE AVENUES: You want some fries with your redevelopment?

“Fast food is popular because it's convenient, it's cheap, and it tastes good. But the real cost of eating fast food never appears on the menu.”
-- Eric Schlosser, author of Fast Food Nation

Once upon a time someone asked me where I live.

I said, “Well, have you heard the old adage about the clinical definition of insanity?”

“Sure,” he replied. “The definition of insanity is repeating the same mistakes over and over again and expecting different results.”

“Exactly. So, to answer your question, I live in the place where the definition of insanity is precisely the same wording as the mission statement for our city’s economic and redevelopment commissions.”

“I don’t understand at all. Can you repeat that?”

“But of course. Our elected officials repeat it twice a month.”

---

A boy can dream of subversion, revolution and the unexplored, virginal territory lying just outside the box, but in reality, there wasn’t a snowball’s chance in Tahiti that the moribund stretch of Charlestown Road by the McDonald’s and Colonial Manor would ever be “redeveloped” in any substantially different way today than it first was developed in the early 1970s.

After all, these latest cookie-cutter chain components are interchangeable. Once a Wendy’s and KFC; now a Hardee’s and Domino’s Pizza. Once an impossibly ugly suburban-style strip center with a Kroger, now just as unattractive and sparsely occupied by a Cash Saver grocery (it’s a member of One Southern Indiana, dog), this latter occupancy hailed by England Doug and Maalox the Conqueror as one of the supreme achievements of Hizzoner’s somnolent third mayoral term.

It is left to Irving Joshua, who surely has more unmonitored power than any non-elected official in town, and consequently wields the redevelopment commission as a veritable rolled-up newspaper of outmoded notions, to step forward and connect the dots with another usual platitude, fortuitously captured by the newspaper at a meeting scheduled during the afternoon, when most working people can’t attend:

Joshua, president of the redevelopment commission, said (Hardee’s and Domino’s) are “improving the likelihood we can keep the grocery store there.”

That’s a deeply depressing measure of how far the bar has descended here in Truck Through City, where pallet-nailing is considered a high-tech job, and Chick-fil-A is the preferred place for 50th anniversary dinners, just so long as they’re procured via the handy automotive window.

At the same time, it shows just how crazily out of touch I’ve become with respect to what passes for modernity these days – thankfully, gratefully and happily so.

I try to imagine what it must be like to hear of a new burger joint coming to the neighborhood -- to immediately fall to my knees, and to break into tears of joy, fulfillment and release: “I never, ever thought I’d live to see the day when we’d have a Zaxby’s down the street. I just might eat there every single night.”

Whatever. Let’s hope you have Obamacare when your heart explodes.

---

Consequently, it is with an overwhelmingly vast chasm of a psychological disconnectedness that I attempt to fathom the desperation and bleakness of lives spent contemplating the advent of a new fast-food sandwich, as seen on television, all the better for the Archer Daniels Midland Triple Fatburger to be greeted by social media with millions of “likes,” retweets and varied regurgitations of “hosanna.”

How on earth these people can root for extractive, exploitative corporations is beyond me. Maybe I’m getting old. Then again, maybe uneducated self-delusion is the new national pastime.

And yet … the recurring problem amid my rampant cynicism is that yes, I actually can see both sides of it – and I’m fully implicated in one of them.

In my own chosen world, there are regular explosions of pulse-quickening geekery, exclusionary narcissism and pure avarice when it comes to the impending release of a rare, highly-rated beer, and to be perfectly fair, I’m forced to concede that as the peculiarly American stains of materialism and consumerism go, the differences between Taco Bell envy and Westvleteren hoarding are of degree only. They’re both representative of materialism and consumerism run amok.

It makes me want to refrain from both food and drink, and retreat to the confines of my library to select real, tactile books, and begin to reacquaint myself with the world of ideas.

That’s because I’m nothing if not stubborn. Ideas matter, and yet at present, this country is a dismally stupid place. It also is mercilessly tacky. Perpetual tsunamis of crass materialism and consumerist greed define the American experience, and what’s worse, we’re not content to populate our own continent as 24-7 shopping zombies, pausing occasionally to thank Jesus for the blessed privilege of possessing our baubles.

No, we must infect the remainder of the planet, too. The evangelistic impulse is the same, whether capitalistic or religious. To me, David Novak’s rah-rah cheer for the shareholders of Yum Brands plays a bit too much like “Heil, Hitler” – and as a non-book-reading, insultingly wealthy white man, his cadence is even less symmetrical when translated into Mandarin, Brazilian Portuguese or Klingon.

We can’t even have useful innovations like universal health care, for fear that dollars invested in human happiness might detract from expenditures on the very same food rendering us in need of hospitalization in the first place, not to mention whatever is left to purchase vital plastic trinkets from overseas manufacturers.

There it is, in a nutshell, and something to ponder while you’re sinking your cavity-ridden teeth into some Papa John’s:

We celebrate rope-a-dope notions like the "American Dream," aiming to marginalize an excluded majority, while perpetually bedazzling constituents with hopes of a consumer paradise here on Earth, buttressed by religious and patriotic superstition, even as the overall playing field is kept firmly tilted toward wealth where it already reposes.

Come to think of it, that’s the Republican Party's platform.

To paraphrase the late Warren Zevon, America … New Albany … your shit’s fucked up.

---

Recent columns:

June 27: ON THE AVENUES: Mourning (and alcohol) in America, circa 1984.

June 18: ON THE AVENUES: Let's lift our voices for another verse of "Talking Seventh Inning Blues."

May 28: ON THE AVENUES: Challenges are forever, but downtown New Albany's food and drink purveyors keep on keeping on.

May 21: ON THE AVENUES: "Pints&union, where the classic beer hits keep right on pouring."

Colonial Manor redevelopment visioning to be the subject of a public meeting on Wednesday at 5:30 p.m.

One must remember at all times that whatever it is, Jeff Gahan was for it before anyone else -- unless it's bad, then he was against it from the very start. Dear Leader does not make mistakes, and genuinely believes he's been error-free since 2012.

Which doesn't explain the Bud Light Mang-O-Rita in his hand.

As the emperor's acolytes fit him for some brand new clothes, we turn to the Colonial Manor center on Charlestown Road. Redevelopment is having a public meeting, and we can only hope that the advent of Josh Staten as director implies an actual willingness to listen at such events. I'm optimistic. Staten studied at the University of Louisville with John Gilderbloom, and that's strong medicine.

Folks in the neighborhood have a Facebook page called Colonial Manor Redevelopment Visioning.

The purpose of this citizen-organized, grassroots, non-partisan Facebook Group is to envision possibilities and positive ideas for the potential redevelopment of the Colonial Manor center area on Charlestown Road in New Albany. It is designed to collect ideas, primarily from those living in or doing business within a one-mile radius of Colonial Manor, in advance of a city redevelopment public hearing set for Wednesday, March 20, 5:30 p.m.-7:30 p.m. This public hearing is at Fairmont Elementary School and you are cordially invited and encouraged to attend and express your thoughts and ideas then, too.

It's interesting how all this came about. Grassroots activists attended more than one public meeting to petition for action, and were told by the administration that it already was so shocked and appalled by the recent demise of Arby's that the imminent awarding of no-bid contracts to outside consulting firms for top-down revitalization plans was a lead-pipe certainty. Piggy banks have ears, and at Gahan's vault they're twitching in anticipation. 

Well, I always told you the higher-ups were eating lunch at Arby's -- and of course, the problems in the Colonial Manor area long predate the dismantlement of a single unfortunate artery-clogging fast-food grease trap, but I suppose we must begin somewhere.

As such, see you Wednesday. I'll be there early, hoping this time will be different, and preparing to drink heavily if it isn't ... and either way, #FireGahan2019

"Zoning rules could save retail corridors."

Charlestown Road between Klerner and Silver?

Zoning rules could save retail corridors, by John Conti (Pittsburgh Trib)

 ... Most of these corridors were built up in the wave of suburban expansion in the 1950s. There's been little in the way of zoning rules to guide their development, and they've always been characterized by visual disorder.

Buildings are set back irregularly, sometimes close to the street, sometimes not. Sometimes at angles, sometimes not. It's possible to find a quaint church adjacent to a used-car lot; a one-story, mid-'50s, drive-in bank next to a brick yard. Often, you can still see a lonely remaining house, misguidedly built close to what was once a quiet country road, now turned into an insurance agency and flanked by something like an Arby's on one side and a McDonald's on the other.

Landscaping is infrequent, sidewalks nonexistent, pedestrians totally unwelcome. Crossing these streets on foot is perilous. The car traffic moves fast, except at rush hour, when it sometimes doesn't move at all ...

Props to Lightning Food Mart's half-century in business.

This article is a good illustration of the qualities that independently-owned local small businesses exhibit when surviving over the long haul. They adapt to changing markets, find undervalued niches, and provide great service. Obviously, Lightning has been doing these things right.

Lightning strikes twice in New Albany, by Daniel Suddeath (News and Tribune)

When Tammy and Bob Wolford decided to move Lightning Food Mart across Charlestown Road from the spot it had been located since 1962, they knew it would be a gamble.

But risk and reward are concepts convenience stores are built upon. Ranked as the top selling lottery store in Southern Indiana, Lightning Food Mart’s reputation for facilitating winners stretches from Floyds Knobs to Louisville.

At the risk of picking nits, one sentence is unsettling to me.

“One of the things I take the most pride in is we’re one of the only American-owned convenience stores left,” Wolford said.

Of course, I'm an advocate of "American-owned," so there is no disagreement there. However, why say "American-owned," when "independently-owned and operated" conveys the same meaning, without a reference to American, which in this context implies code language for "not owned by foreigners"?

It's just that words, language and ideas genuinely matter, but let's not stray too far from the central point: Independent local businesses are the economic backbone. Instead of subsidizing big-ticket, plaque-ready projects, shouldn't we be tending to our fundamental infrastructure as the best way to help independent local businesses compete on a level playing field?

What they're saying: At-large council candidates Roseberry and Bell.

As the weeks go past in route to May's primary election, I'll try to provide periodic unedited candidate statements of approximate substance, as lifted from social media and news reports, and as opposed to familiar gems (although they certainly have their place) like "I enjoyed talking with the bunco club last night" or "donate to my campaign first, and maybe I'll have something of merit to say later."

That's because it is my aim to determine whether our declared candidates have anything to say at all, and I'll quote all candidates, whether or not they're in a contested race. Just promising change and new ideas without divulging them won't cut the mustard, aspirants.

Today in the at-large council contest, we find Democrats Hannegan Beardsley Roseberry and Brad Bell. It is Roseberry's first run for office, and Bell's second (he ran for an at-large council seat in 2011).

At her Facebook campaign page, Roseberry contributes this valuable observation about Saturday's Speck street study meeting.

At this morning's meeting about the Speck street study, there were questions about the funding and cost of implementing two-way streets. The city officials did not give any response to that question, but this article from last month states that, "...the city has $1.6 million in Kentuckiana Regional Planning & Development Agency (KIPDA) funding to get started." This was a quote from Mayor Gahan. The meeting should have shared this information. We need greater transparency from our city leaders, and city officials who aren't afraid to speak their minds and stand up for its citizens.

It would help to know that, wouldn't it?

Also at Facebook, Bell offers economic development strategy, echoing a topic previously discussed at NAC: Impure thoughts about suburbia" and New Albanian corridors.

What to do with Colonial Manor??

When Kroger moved from Colonial Manor Shopping Center, many many years ago, that section of Charlestown Road has struggled to find it's place in the community. Even though many different stores have tried to fill holes over the years, Colonial Manor now sits nearly vacant again. Two (2) unsuccessful grocery stores have tried to hold down the anchor spot, but have both lasted less than 2 years. Dollar General moved down the road to a much bigger location, and other stores have simply disappeared.

While some area's of New Albany have seen major growth and expansion, some areas have continued the downward spiral. This section of Charlestown Road needs major help. With that being the sole agenda, I propose turning Colonial Manor Shopping Center into a family friendly fun zone. We should seek out an anchor such as GattiLand, Chuck-E-Cheese or a Puzzles Fun Dome type of location so families can have an indoor fun center for all season's right here in New Albany. The outlying stores in Colonial Manor can also be family driven, in order to be a family destination site.

Not only that, but Bell thinks he can do it without tax abatements. Be sure to follow the link and read the entire piece.

See this post for more information on the at-large council race:

NA council: The at-large scrum of nine contestants for three jobs.

Basically, sharrows suck, so naturally New Albany plans more of them, so we can be "bike friendly" on the cheap.

Back in May, we sneered at another of John Rosenbarger's signature megalomanical muddles.

Rosenbarger giveth and He taketh away; thus shall autos be glorified at the Beechwood intersection with Charlestown Road.

 ... Useless bicycle lanes originally marked just a few years ago, which start and end nowhere, and that never were calibrated to guide a cyclist through an auto-centric intersection, now will be rendered even less useful than garden-variety useless ... with the compounded uselessness occurring just a few blocks from Monon Street, where there'll be a brand new park not connected in any way, shape or form to any non-automotive form of transport.

The intersection reboot is complete, and last night I noticed that it includes a new, dramatic step to resolve the bicycle friendliness issue mentioned above. Previously nonsensical and disconnected bicycle lanes now are routed through the automotive cluster muck by means of a sharrows symbol painted on the street.

Like a nightmare, it all came back to me: The city official in August, whom I quite like as a human being, but have never even once seen riding a bicycle, assuring me that New Albany's way forward to status as a red hot, bike friendly town was to have sharrows everywhere instead of more costly measures to actually achieve something.

At their very best, sharrows are a component, as the excerpt below makes clear.

However, in the absence of other (better) street use reform measures, the sharrows notion is little more than propagandistic palaver. Main Street's freshly minted conceptual catastrophe is a fine example. On a street already sufficiently wide to incorporate bicycle paths amid narrowed traffic lanes, we've opted instead for a median and wider traffic lanes, which will speed traffic rather than calm it (speed limit reductions notwithstanding), thus rendering sharrows both useless and potentially dangerous to bicycling novices who don't yet share a general contempt for sharrows as a municipal cop-out.

So what do we intend to do with our opportunity? Talk crap, paint symbols on the asphalt, then move on to build a dog park.

That's the New Albany way, and it's dead wrong -- at some point, probably literally.

Want to Increase Cycling? Sharrows Won’t Cut It, by Angie Schmitt (Streetsblog)

Shared-lane stencils for bikes, a.k.a. “sharrows,” definitely have their place in a balanced and healthy street system. But these friendly reminders to drivers to share the road have their limits as a tool to boost safety and create more inviting streets for biking.

A study by the LA County Bicycle Coalition [PDF] showed that sharrows do little or nothing to encourage new people to take up cycling, the way bike lanes and cycle tracks do.

That’s why communities should not rely on sharrows when more effective interventions are called for. Unfortunately, Sam Ollinger at Bike San Diego says her city has fallen into this trap:

In the last year, San Diegans have seen the increasing number of shared-lane markings, also called “sharrows.” Sharrows are appearing everywhere: Adams Avenue, Park Boulevard, Broadway, El Cajon Boulevard, Grand Avenue, Voltaire Street, Chatsworth Boulevard, Hotel Circle South, Pacific Highway and more. However, these sharrows are being used as a cheap band-aid instead of implementing real change on our roadways that would increase the number of people riding their bicycle for transportation or recreation.

For starters, San Diego’s Bicycle Master Plan recommends sharrows on roadways that are too narrow for bike lanes. Sharrows are recommended on roads that have a minimum width of 14 feet. Bike lanes are recommended on roads that have a minimum of 15-17 feet. El Cajon Boulevard, for example, has three travel lanes in each direction – it has more than enough room for a bike lane.

So how can the City of San Diego increase the percentage of people who ride a bicycle? A recent report [pdf] from the Mineta Transportation Institute, an institute that was established by Congress to research “multimodal surface transportation policy and management issues,” concluded that in order to attract a wide segment of the population, a bicycle network’s “most fundamental attribute should be low-stress connectivity, that is, providing routes between people’s origins and destinations that do not require cyclists to use links that exceed their tolerance for traffic stress, and that do not involve an undue level of detour.”

The new location of Keg Liquors in New Albany will be 4304 Charlestown Road.

It's old news by now, but as a follow-up, here's the official "new location" news from Todd Antz.

We've made it through the paper work stage of moving our liquor permit for our New Albany location, and now its on to the manual labor of moving a store, and building it all over again. We're also happy to announce the address of our new location, 4304 Charlestown Road, in New Albany. Our hopes are to be open by the end of October, or the beginning of November. Here are a few pictures to show you the construction of the new location. We thank everyone for their patience during this transition.

ON THE AVENUES: You want some fries with your redevelopment?

ON THE AVENUES: You want some fries with your redevelopment?

A weekly web column by Roger A. Baylor.

“Fast food is popular because it's convenient, it's cheap, and it tastes good. But the real cost of eating fast food never appears on the menu.”
-- Eric Schlosser, author of Fast Food Nation

Someone once asked me where I live.

I said, “Well, have you heard the old adage about the definition of insanity?”

“Sure,” he replied. “The definition of insanity is repeating the same mistakes over and over again and expecting different results.”

“Exactly. So, to answer your question, I live in the place where the definition of insanity is precisely the same wording as the mission statement for our city’s economic development department.”

“I don’t understand at all. Can you repeat that?”

“But of course.”

---

A boy can dream of subversion, revolution and the unexplored, virginal territory lying just outside the box, but in reality, there wasn’t a snowball’s chance in Tahiti that the moribund stretch of Charlestown Road by the McDonald’s and Colonial Manor would ever be “redeveloped” in any substantially different way today than it first was developed in the early 1970s.

After all, these latest cookie-cutter chain components are interchangeable. Once a Wendy’s and KFC; now a Hardee’s and Domino’s Pizza. Once an impossible ugly suburban-style strip center with a Kroger, now just as unattractive and sparsely occupied by a Cash Saver grocery (it’s a member of One Southern Indiana, dog), this latter occupancy hailed by England Doug and Maalox the Conqueror as one of the supreme achievements of Hizzoner’s somnolent third mayoral term.

It is left to Irving Joshua, who surely has more unmonitored power than any non-elected official in town, and consequently wields the redevelopment commission as a veritable rolled-up newspaper of outmoded notions, to step forward and connect the dots with another usual platitude, fortuitously captured by the newspaper at a meeting scheduled during the afternoon, when most working people can’t attend:

Joshua, president of the redevelopment commission, said (Hardee’s and Domino’s) are “improving the likelihood we can keep the grocery store there.”

That’s a deeply depressing but accurate measure of how far the bar has descended here in Truck Through City, where pallet-nailing is considered a high-tech job, and Chick-fil-A is the preferred place for 50th anniversary dinners, just so long as they’re procured via the handy automotive window.

At the same time, it shows just how crazily out of touch I’ve become with respect to what passes for modernity these days – thankfully, gratefully and happily so.

I try to imagine what it must be like to hear of a new burger joint coming to the neighborhood -- to immediately fall to my knees, and to break into tears of joy, fulfillment and release: “I never, ever thought I’d live to see the day when we’d have a Zaxby’s down the street. I just might eat there every single night.”

Whatever. Let’s hope you have Obamacare when your heart explodes.

---

Consequently, it is with an overwhelmingly vast chasm of a psychological disconnectedness that I attempt to fathom the desperation and bleakness of lives spent contemplating the advent of a new fast-food sandwich, as seen on television, all the better for the Archer Daniels Midland Triple Fatburger to be greeted by social media with millions of “likes,” retweets and varied regurgitations of “hosanna.”

How on earth these people can root for extractive, exploitative corporations is beyond me. Maybe I’m getting old. Then again, maybe uneducated self-delusion is the new national pastime.

And yet … the recurring problem amid my rampant cynicism is that yes, I actually can see both sides of it – and I’m fully implicated in one of them.

In my own chosen world, there are regular explosions of pulse-quickening geekery, exclusionary narcissism and pure avarice when it comes to the impending release of a rare, highly-rated beer, and to be perfectly fair, I’m forced to concede that as the peculiarly American stains of materialism and consumerism go, the differences between Taco Bell envy and Westvleteren hoarding are of degree only. They’re both representative of materialism and consumerism run amok.

It makes me want to refrain from both food and drink, and retreat to the confines of my library to select real, tactile books, and begin to reacquaint myself with the world of ideas.

That’s because I’m nothing if not stubborn. Ideas matter, and yet at present, this country is a dismally stupid place. It also is mercilessly tacky. Perpetual tsunamis of crass materialism and consumerist greed define the American experience, and what’s worse, we’re not content to populate our own continent as 24-7 shopping zombies, pausing occasionally to thank Jesus for the blessed privilege of possessing our baubles.

No, we must infect the remainder of the planet, too. The evangelistic impulse is the same, whether capitalistic or religious. To me, David Novak’s rah-rah cheer for the shareholders of Yum Brands plays a bit too much like “Heil, Hitler” – and as a non-book-reading, insultingly wealthy white man, his cadence is even less symmetrical when translated into Mandarin, Brazilian Portuguese or Klingon.

We can’t even have useful innovations like universal health care, for fear that dollars invested in human happiness might detract from expenditures on the very same food rendering us in need of hospitalization in the first place, not to mention whatever is left to purchase vital plastic trinkets from overseas manufacturers.

There it is, in a nutshell, and something to ponder while you’re sinking your cavity-ridden teeth into some Papa John’s:

We celebrate rope-a-dope notions like the "American Dream," aiming to marginalize an excluded majority, while perpetually bedazzling constituents with hopes of a consumer paradise here on Earth, buttressed by religious and patriotic superstition, even as the overall playing field is kept firmly tilted toward wealth where it already reposes.

Come to think of it, that’s the Republican Party's platform.

To paraphrase the late Warren Zevon, America … New Albany … your shit’s fucked up.

Rosenbarger giveth and He taketh away; thus shall autos be glorified at the Beechwood intersection with Charlestown Road.

Earlier this morning, we urged someone to tell John Rosenbarger that "Modern bike lanes call for modern reference guides."

Now, let's see how the Rasputin of Redevelopment applies such advice in daily practice. We begin with this newspaper story:

Busy New Albany intersection will soon be upgraded, by Chris Morris (The Moultrie Observer)

One of New Albany’s busiest intersections will soon receive a much needed upgrade, and most of the work will be paid for by the federal government.

The Indiana Department of Transportation met with New Albany city officials, engineering consultants, utility company representatives and contractors this week to coordinate implementation of a $214,792 Beechwood Avenue-Charlestown Road intersection improvement project. The work will include adding a left-hand turning lane on Charlestown Road to Beechwood and a new LED crosswalk and stop light.

Let's take a look at the aerial view.

If you look closely in the bottom left quadrant, you'll see bike lanes on both side of Charlestown Road between the Beechwood intersection. These lanes were triumphantly installed during the most recent England administration, after which the King drank a few bottles of wine. They extend roughly three blocks southwesterly, to terminate quite abruptly at Vincennes Street.

Now, look at this photo, top right-hand quadrant.

The bike lanes stopping short of the intersection on the southwest side do not begin anew until Lincoln Avenue on the northeast side; they run a few hundred yards further to the Silver Street intersection, where they end yet again.

Clearly, while there are two pedestrian crosswalks built into the current Beechwood intersection, there are no delineated bike lanes drawn through it.

Recalling that John Rosenbarger regularly has hailed this situation as proof of his urban design prowess, read on as Chris Morris gives us the LOL punch line.

The city did not have to buy right-of-way to expand the intersection. Rosenbarger said the bike lanes through the intersection will be absorbed for the road expansion.

But as the photos show, there are no bike lanes through the intersection. Three miniature/a> bike lanes have dangled unconnected along Charlestown Road since being installed. In short, more (utter) bullshit, from the city's premier bullshit artist, who'll now point to the elimination of the non-existent as further evidence of his indispensable ability, even as he variously blames politicians, newspaper reporters, drivers, bicyclists, walkers, stupid commoners and the abominable snowmen for the nonsense -- just not that guy in the mirror.

Let's recap.

Useless bicycle lanes originally marked just a few years ago, which start and end nowhere, and that never were calibrated to guide a cyclist through an auto-centric intersection, now will be rendered even less useful than garden-variety useless ... with the compounded uselessness occurring just a few blocks from Monon Street, where there'll be a brand new park not connected in any way, shape or form to any non-automotive form of transport.

And, lest we forget, we're paying Jeff Speck $75,000 to explain just how useless this uselessness really is. Is it any wonder that few of us believe Speck's advice will be heeded?

It makes you wonder: Which Democratic central committee grandee lobbied for the automotive intersection to be made even more auto-centric?

Answer: Probably all of them.

The non-walkable North Y ... and why you should be disputin' Rasputin.

In general terms, New Albany's "North Y" is where Charlestown Road, Grant Line Road, 8th Street and the railroad tracks converge. Sidewalks of fairly recent vintage line Charlestown Road as it approaches the Y, facing almost due south.

That's where the sidewalks end. Looking north on Grant Line Road and the rail crossing, there is no refuge for walkers. It's a few hundred yards before sidewalks resume at the intersection with Vincennes Street.

The same goes for 8th Street southbound, under the railroad bridge. Needless to say, without sidewalks, the many walkers spotted thereabouts tend to be strolling on the pavement.

A complete (and sadly typical) absence of speed enforcement means that typically, traffic moves quickly. What's more, northbound traffic on 8th is not required to stop, while southbound traffic on both Grant Line and Charlestown Road must stop -- and on widely scattered occasions, actually does. Otherwise, the intersection is a scrum of rolling stops and confusion on the part of drivers.

On the downtown side of the Y, sidewalks don't begin again until the alley north of Jackson. It's a long way between the alley and Vincennes.

---

In New Albany, 8th Street leads from a downtown junction with Spring to the Y, and in turn, to Grant Line Road and IU Southeast, perhaps six miles away. In any remotely walkable and bikeable city, this would be a natural route for close examination. Not here, because in this benumbed place, ideas are for being kept captive by those presumably in the business of minting them.

One time a few years back I tried to engage John "The Rasputin of Redevelopment" Rosenbarger on this topic, only to inadvertently sentence myself to his rambling chronology about the merits of using the railroad pictured above to run a trolley from IU Southeast to Main Street, via 15th Street, which he estimated might be achieved for a mere $70 million dollars, assuming the track itself could be confiscated.

I repeat this story only to illustrate the futility of attempting to introduce any ideas to Rosenbarger differing from those he's already pre-conceived and nurtured through a 30-year career of purely selective, arbitrary interpretation. Again and again, I've made honest efforts to engage him on two-way streets -- and I've yet to receive either a straight, unambiguous position, or an expression of his usual repetitive bias which is free of condescension.

And so, I've had it. You should, too. Yes, Rosenbarger knows a lot. But in my mind, he isn't necessarily using what he knows to the benefit of the city. Rather, it's mostly to the benefit of his own quixotic plan-centricity -- and as molasses-cum-glacially slow as humanly possible. I suppose that's how you kill an underachieving bureaucratic career's worth of service time, and as such, good for him.

But not so good for the rest of us.

Chinatown on Charlestown Road, and a "rewind" to "On the very nature of nay-saying."

In all sincerity, it's good that Earth Friends is relocating to Louisville, and the Exchange already is up and running at its new downtown New Albany location.

But the departures leave two vacancies in the commercial area just inside the beltway on Grant Line Road, near the original location of my own beer and food business. Granted, these could be filled soon, and the overall situation is by no means bad in my Northside neighborhood.

It also could be better, and there doesn't seem to be any firm public plan on the part of local, various economic "development" entities or business owners themselves to improve prospects therein, although getting the Grant Line Road construction project finished certainly helps. To me, the ultimate goal remains connecting IUS with Community Park, and maintaining a locally-owned economy as much as possible in between.

Arguably, matters are far less hopeful on Charlestown Road, roughly between Slate Run Road and Silver Street. There are quite a few commercial vacancies there, especially amid the zombie fast food row by McDonald’s. The ideal solution would be to raze all of it and replant trees, but American capitalism probably precludes such a reason-based course.

A long time ago – 2005, to be exact – when downtown was as yet moribund and revitalization meant anywhere else except here, we returned from a trip to Chicago and it struck me that metro Louisville needed an Asian community like the Windy City’s thriving Chinatown. I looked at the empty buildings downtown and thought, hmm, this looks like a fine place for it; if we can’t do it, I bet the Chinese could. China has the investment capital and the work ethic. Just let ‘em have the buildings, and get out of the way.

Perhaps now that the doughnut hole has moved to Charlestown Road, so has the ideal location of our Chinatown, with Indonesian where the Wendy’s used to be, and Filipino at the old KFC. Colonial Manor could function as NA’s Iroquois, with a grocery as good as ValuMarket. I’m not sure where this leaves Sonic, but we'll figure it out.

Here’s the article I wrote seven years ago. The pink spitwad blogyard has yielded to decaying tabletop linoleum, and while much has been accomplished, much more needs to be done. We might need a Russian oligarch for this.

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Rog's rant: On the very nature of nay-saying (June 21, 2005)

We spent the weekend in Chicago, and as is the case every time I return home from a trip, it takes a few days to adjust to the state of mind.

The culture shock stands to be a bit greater this time.

Our hotel in Chicago, chosen because it was the cheapest in close proximity to downtown, was located in the heart of Chinatown, one hundred yards from the subway stop and several thousand miles away from just another place to stay.

By this I mean that Chicago’s Chinatown is just that – touristy to an expected degree, but filled to the brim with, well, people from China (and some from Vietnam, Malaysia and other Asian locales). Sometimes none of the voices to be heard are speaking English. It’s easy to catch yourself thinking that you’re somewhere else, not Illinois.

Stand at the right spot, and the aromas of cooking fill the street, emanating from ubiquitous restaurants with dining rooms often tucked away on upper floors, eateries relieving tourists like us of our cash while pulling extra duty as community centers.

Early Sunday morning we entered a bakery and were shooed into the almost hidden rear section, where the satellite television was entirely in Chinese. The staff spoke English, but the customers in the crowded room paid little heed to it. I checked off breakfast choices, including dim sum and doughy pastries, on a card and handed it to the waitress, who returned with tea and hot sauce.

What were the men talking about? I’ll never know what the men smoking by the no smoking sign were talking about, but their conversation was animated and filled with laughter.

------

We returned home today, and after checking e-mail, I perused the local blogs and other usual daily sites, thinking all the while that while it’s a clear case of apples and oranges to compare the range of options and attractions in an immense metropolitan area like Chicago to those in and around Louisville, at the same time, why must we perpetually insist that superstition and backwardness are our best friends?

I’m not speaking here about Scribner Place, Cannon Acres, the City Council, the Mayor, or any of the specific local political topics that have been discussed at NA Confidential since its inception last year.

Rather, with the memory of Chicago’s vibrant neighborhoods and can-do spirit fresh in my mind, I’m referring to the recurring phenomenon hereabouts that currently enjoys its most prominent, and saddest, manifestation in apoplectic opposition to progress in the city of New Albany, an opposition that unfortunately doesn’t confine itself to screaming that present circumstances stand in the way of progress, but that taken together, all past mistakes by any and all politicians and community leaders indicate that we simply can’t do anything right, and should never, ever try.

I am utterly sickened by this cancerous attitude.

Why, if not stemming from unadulterated envy, is it that people who lack the ability to understand insist that their incomprehension is sufficient reason to deny others the opportunity to learn?

Why, if not from simple self-loathing, is it that people take pride in their ignorance, rather than take the steps necessary to gain knowledge?

Why, if not from our own timidity and a respect for fair play that goes far beyond that accorded us in return, should people like these be allowed to use their own lack of imagination and creativity as veto power over varieties of progress that will benefit the remainder of the community?

Of course, these shrieking cyber-punks are not the truly downtrodden, genuinely poverty-stricken, disenfranchised "little people" they so fancifully imagine themselves to be, and since no one else will say it, I will: These "Concern Taxpayers" and "New Albany Residents" don't care one jot for those in this town who really do have it badly.

It's all about tearing down ideas and people that they wrongly perceive to be "above them," not lifting up those they're comfortably sure are below, and even though this is nonsensical at best and repugnant at worst, it's the way it is.

In defense of people like these, it was recently stated elsewhere that they:

“Are not stupid, ignorant, recessive thinking globs of people. (They) are people who happen to have a different opinion, or aren't quite convinced that this (progress) is a good idea.”

Fine.

Readers, if you haven't already done so, go to the pink spitwad blogyard and feel the hatred oozing between the angry words. Consider the anonymity that cloaks it. Remember that its readers support all-American concepts like censorship. Now, ask yourself: What is it that would make these people happy beyond the confines of their own four walls, and the knowledge that not one cent of their taxes went to fund a better community?

It isn't pretty, is it?

In fact, it's often vicious, and goes far beyond reasoned debate and benign disagreement.

Stupid? Ignorant? Recessive (sp – regressive, Laura)?

Their words. Not mine. And if the shoes fit ... then wear them to exit New Albany, like our best and brightest young people continually do, because always standing between them and the remaking of a city in the future tense are the nay-saying Brambleberries, prepared for no sacrifice or gainful efforts of their own beyond that necessary to brutally kneecap progress in any form and preserve their own fiefdoms of futility.

Or, as I've done, you can stay right here and join me in fighting the Luddites every step of the way. To those who have no plan of their own, and want to make sure that progressivism is not allowed to have one, either, because they hate the future just as much as they hate the capable and talented, I've got this to say: you cannot win. You cannot stop the globe from spinning, or the pages of the calendar from turning.

We'd prefer their cooperation in making this city a better place to live, but we're quite prepared to do it without them.

Heh heh. I feel much better now.

Non-recusals, Wendy's, 2009, The Gary, a roadway and lessons never learned.

Readers with long memories (they are to be pitied, in a way) will recall it starting back in spring of 2009, when The Gary (McCartin) wanted to turn a green space into non-permeable asphalt by moving the Wendy's from a regrettably expanding old-school suburban doughnut hole to a spanking new exurban location on Charlestown Road by the rockin' Interstate, where the Hummers and private autos roam.

The plan snaked its way through the scores and snores of various bureaucratic channels and came to rest in city council packets, where it devolved into an epic, multi-meeting struggle between the adjacent neighborhood and The Gary's Krafty John.

Live blogging 4: Council votes on The Gary's Wendy's fetish.

Jaws drop as Messer, Coffey execute simultaneous 180-degree flip-flops, killing Wendy's ... for now?

Okay, I'll say it: Messer and Coffey unite to promote cynicism in Wendy's flip-flop.

Ah, the humanity ... or lack thereof.

There was a first council reading, and then a second and third, both occurring with the council short one member; afterwards, the then-council attorney Stan Robison dramatically reversed the finality of those 4-4 ties, and so fourth and fifth readings were scheduled and recorded. After the Messer/Coffey flip-flops finally came to rest, The Gary had been ingloriously defeated, and he stormed away in a pique, muttering about never doing anything for this ungrateful community, ever again -- a promise we piously hope he's keeping.

Except that he had the last Wendy's laugh: A few months later, all was moot when McCartin found a convenient zoning-supported spot nearby to make the community even fatter then before from heart-healthy burger grease.

All of this came back to me today when I noticed in the newspaper that the final resting place of Wendy's on Charlestown Road had so altered the traffic dynamic that the Board of Public Works and Safety had been compelled to consider changes to the roadway.

New signal in design for Charlestown Road; Light would be adjacent to new Wendy’s (Suddeath; OSIN)


New Albany City Council President Diane McCartin-Benedetti said Sam’s ownership needed to be alerted of the plan, though the board of works would still have to approve the actual installation of the signal.

That'd be the CeeSaw-coup-mandated council president Benedetti, also a council delegate to Redevelopment, now graciously helping to broker a traffic solution, and the knowledge of this reminded me of something else about that legendary 2009 council clash, as framed by the inimitable Bob Dusch during public comments about the Wendy's move.

Live blogging: City council meeting of March 19, 2009.


Bob Dusch - (It's an) "end run" to develop commercially. Explains that zoning laws exist to protect property owners. Waste of neighborhood and council time. "We will have been sold out for a hamburger joint ... Wendy's isn't even owned locally." Mrs. Benedetti is now singled out. She ran as Diane MCCARTIN Benedetti. How can she vote on bro's project? (Even the) Tribune pointed out the seeming conflict of interest ... "appearance is important."

Benedetti responds: Yes I ran on that basis. I have no capital gain. Voted him down before. I did my research (she gets very hysterical) ... wants to make "solutions not problems." Doesn't have an e-mail address because "I don't want people e-mailing me ... I want them calling me." Now says that brother and the others have actually spoken with Bob. She now gestures to the crowd like Steve Price always does. Now she denigrates downtown New Albany as comparison. She cherishes the exurb. BIG BIG time grandstanding. BIG BIG time grandstanding. No capital gain, no conflict of interest.

New Albany stories typically don't have morals, because for there to be a moral, it is necessary for there to be a lasting lesson. So, I'll stop here.

Concrete into sod along Charlestown Road?

The Tribune's Daniel Suddeath leaves Erik far behind and explains that just like the radioactive mutant creature in the sci-fi movie, our doughnut hole has shifted from downtown to the old, original suburbs, farther out -- and someday may be headed for the (gasp - no!) exurb itself.

Once thriving area of Charlestown Road in New Albany now defined by vacancies

Some alert readers posting comments at the story page seem to be suggesting that aging concrete sprawl acreage should be converted into parkland. That's good progressive Green thinking, indeed.

Is such non-gasoline-driven subversion actually legal here?

Someone better ask the Slumlord Benevolent Society first.