First I Look at the Purse.

I don't care if you got yourself a wrap
all I want is your pretty green cash
Bought me a suit, bought me a car
Want me to look like a Hollywood star
Money, (Money!) I want money (Money!)
Baby, ain't no "why", baby (Money!)
I need money!
First I look at the purse!
First I look at the purse!
First I look at the purse!
First I look at the purse!

Changes to Slate Run Road project total $676k, by Daniel Suddeath (Hanson's Old White Male Digest)

Slate Run Road work continues as the New Albany Redevelopment Commission has taken some steps to rectify problems discovered with soil conditions.

NEW ALBANY — They were informed earlier this month that addressing issues with the Slate Run Road improvement project would cost more money, and on Tuesday, members of the New Albany Redevelopment Commission found out the cost.

A change order for $676,140 was unanimously OK’d by the commission after a brief discussion on why the cost for the project is increasing. The costs include some expenses beyond the steps that will have to be taken to adjust for the soil conditions that have led to delays in finishing the road project.

Redevelopment Director Josh Staten told the commission during the virtual meeting that the change order for the project contractor, Temple & Temple, includes additional drainage work and mediation of soil conditions that city officials said were discovered after paving work had already began ...

... Staten said Tuesday he isn’t sure when the project will be completed, but believes construction can be finished “pretty soon” with the additional steps that have been taken.

“This is about finishing the road and getting the best finished project we can get for that neighborhood,” he said.

City Engineer Larry Summers was asked if the additional remediation has helped since being approved earlier this month.

The contractor has continued to make progress over the past two weeks, and that paving should commence this week on the northern end of the project near Charlestown Road, he said.

“We have done what we can to make sure that we provide a good product for the citizens in the end,” Summers said.

Commission member Adam Dickey said about half of the change order costs appeared to be tied to drainage improvements that were added to the project.

“I think it’s important that we move forward with this and get this wrapped up,” he said.

Diane pissed off the mighty Oz, and five years later ...

... Slate Run Road still awaits attention.

Is there any better example than Slate Run Road as proof that multi-modal transportation design such as that espoused by Jeff Speck can exist outside the city's core?

But it takes political will ... and a remote sense of fairness, because it's clear that Team Gahan's non-action on Slate Run is a result of vindictive political considerations.

These need to stop, and the means to do so is right around the corner.

August 21, 2010: New Albany seeking input on Slate Run construction, by Daniel Suddeath (News and Tribune)

...“What we want to do is upgrade the facility to make it accessible and safe for pedestrians,” (Carl) Malysz said. “There’s a couple of different design approaches and that’s what we want to talk with the neighborhood about.”

Duggins tells Redevelopment that in spite of CM Benedetti, Slate Run Road will get election year sidewalks.

Congratulations, residents of Slate Run Road.

It's an election year, and coincidentally, the verdant and burbling TIF springs have miraculously replenished coffers just in time to promise those of you living between Charlestown Road and Slate Run Elementary that your kids will have sidewalks soon.

As for the rest of you, most of whom voted at one time or another for Diane Benedetti or Randy Smith, your compliance with the city's new Fundamentally Better Voter program will be checked closely to determine whether you are worthy of further implementation -- and Adam's writing the software as we speak.

Just look for Mickey Mouse logo on your ballot, and select accordingly.

River Ridge may gain Toyota instead of New Albany, by Daniel Suddeath (N and T)

SLATE RUN PROJECT TO PROCEED

During the overview of the city’s seven TIF districts, Duggins said the first phase of sidewalk and street improvements for Slate Run Road will likely commence this year.

The entire project — which would include the addition of sidewalks along Slate Run Road — is estimated to cost $3.6 million. It has been included in projects to be funded through the Charlestown Road TIF district, but work has been delayed for the past four years.

Funding has been an issue, as there are more than $12.8 million in projects under construction or that have been proposed that are to be paid out of the Charlestown Road TIF district.

The district had a cash balance at the end of 2014 of just more than $5 million, and is expected to garner an additional $1.6 million in TIF proceeds this year.

Instead of tackling the entire project at once, Duggins said improvements will be implemented in phases. The first phase — which would cost about $1.9 million — would see sidewalks added and upgrades made on and along Slate Run Road from near the Charlestown Road intersection to just past Slate Run Elementary School.

“We’re finishing engineering design on that,” Duggins said.

The city is thinking about doing road shit. Really. It says so, over there behind that wall.

There was an article by Daniel Suddeath in the local chain newspaper about council members quizzing administration officials 'bout infrastructure projects: "New Albany City Council questions administration about projects." Tunnel under the paywall to read it, or peruse this nifty paraphrasing.

The miracle is that City Hall sent anyone to the council meeting when there existed a chance they might have to reveal top secret plans. But David Duggins, who serves as the city's Economic Development and Redevelopment Director Everywhere Except Downtown was there on Thursday.

Duggins said that anything you've heard about the Slate Run Road, Mount Tabor Road and Captain Frank Road projects is true, unless it isn't. All are being contemplated, unless they aren't. The mayor will consider modifications, unless he won't. The usual suspects from Pool "A" will design these projects and build them, unless other usual suspects from Pool "B" are chosen instead. To reveal more would mean having to kill us all, and the street department can't manage such a clean-up.

Councilman John Gonder then made a forceful presentation on the topic of sidewalks in the context of safety, and mentioned that since the city is in a position to massively fund no-brainer quality of life issues like aquatic complexes, there obviously is money for basic walkability elsewhere. Duggins answered that the city had contacted the usual engineering suspects and would begin formulating a secret sidewalk plan for Captain Frank Road.

Finally, council person Diane Benedetti asked Duggins about the long discussed and always delayed Slate Run Road project. Resisting the impulse to provide Benedetti with the most obvious reasons ...

If you don't vote with the mayor, you can't have any road work.

How can you have any road work if you don't vote with the mayor?

... or suggesting that she move to Silver Hills where the streets are paved with Caesar's Gold, Duggins remained composed and replied that of course, it is being considered just as top secretly as all the others.

In other news, the Arts Council will permanently loan a Barney Bright sculpture to Bicentennial Park, where everyone hopes it won't be vandalized during the annual Harvest Homecoming Swill Walk.

Is it beer thirty yet?

Uncertain Slate Run improvements merely a symptom of the street grid malaise.

I walked home from work today, east on Spring Street against traffic.

Three times I came to an intersection with a vehicle traveling southbound. Not one time out of the three did the driver so much look right (west) before rolling forward -- twice slowly, once without stopping at the stop sign.

How may times must this point be made?

One way streets are a tremendous impediment to walker safety.

And yet by almost all reputable indices, walking is what we need to encourage in order to make good on the downtown revitalization we've achieved to date. Everyone involved with city government claims to grasp this ... and we can do nothing save reach for the low-hanging fruit on Main Street (read: state money).

Meanwhile, just a bit further from downtown, but still inside the beltway, we're playing political games with the Slate Run corridor. Read the comments below, and ask yourself this question: Apart from our cars, how the hell are we going to get to $19 million worth of new parks?

One more: Wouldn't it be better if we could use or legs or our bicycles to get to these facilities?

And to conclude: But if the city's street grid was navigable by residents on foot or riding, and not in their cars, wouldn't it make the whole city a recreational facility?

The state of Slate Run Road; Residents vocal about project, but status of Slate Run improvements uncertain, by Daniel Suddeath (News and Tribune)

A SAFETY ISSUE

Around this time each year, hundreds of children begin their classes at Slate Run Elementary School.

Kate Caufield and her husband hoped their children would be able to walk to Slate Run Elementary when they moved to a street near the school.

But after realizing sidewalks are scarce along Slate Run Road, they quickly changed their plans.

“I can hear the kids playing on the playground at recess from my house, but I have no way to get [my children] there except to drive them,” Caufield said.

Webb raised her children in her house off Slate Run Road, and they also attended Slate Run Elementary.

“Of course I could never let them walk to school,” she said.

An avid jogger, Caufield finds herself driving to adjoining neighborhoods in order to find sidewalks where she can safely run.

“You’re kind of at the mercy of people letting you run through their yards” on Slate Run Road, she said.

Amerson’s wife also regularly walks for exercise, and like Caufield, she drives to another neighborhood where there are sidewalks to use.

Caufield has run in the street a few times, and said some motorists on Slate Run Road expressed their displeasure with having a pedestrian in the street.

“It’s frustrating and it’s dangerous,” she said.

Pedestrians and cyclists have little safe haven along Slate Run without using private properties or diving into a ditch when a car speeds by, residents said.

However, the safety concerns aren’t just limited to pedestrian use. Webb said she regularly sees vehicles speeding up and down the road, as she estimated some of the cars, trucks and motorcycles were traveling 50 to 60 mph, well above the 30 mph speed limit.

Whether it’s more stop signs, speed bumps or even a roundabout, Benedetti said more traffic-calming measures need to be added on the road.

The administration has projects planned to improve Main Street, Mount Tabor Road and another segment of Grant Line Road.

Amerson conceded he doesn’t know the traffic count for Slate Run Road, and can’t insist that a project for the street would be more important than upgrading other thoroughfares in the city.

But he added that Slate Run is a busy road that needs attention, and he credited Benedetti for raising the issue before the redevelopment commission last month.

“I would just hope the Slate Run Road project would not go to the back of the agenda,” Amerson said.

Development is as Development does: maybe they can swim to school.

A quick review of recent history:

First, we agreed to pay $9 million in a sweetheart, unbid architect/developer deal for an aquatic center of the sort that, per easily found comparables, other communities are regularly building for millions less.

Then, we agreed to pay another $9 million or so for a probably mostly we think maybe indoor recreation site before anyone had ever actually seen concrete plans for it. What is to actually be built is still not clear.

Now, we're suggesting that an already planned and much needed transportation project may have to be delayed or cancelled in order to pay for the probably mostly we think maybe site.

One would think that someone in Duggins' position would have a perfectly rational explanation as to why building what, according to potential descriptions so far, will essentially be a second indoor volleyball facility in New Albany is more important than providing basic, functional infrastructure to multiple neighborhoods. But he doesn't have one, because there's not one.

I'm not sure how true it is as it's just one official's opinion, but it was recently suggested to me that, owing to Duggins' influence on the mayor, publicly challenging this type of wayward thinking would be "bloody". If that's the case, then perhaps a significant bloodletting is precisely what we need, as an environment in which the competition of ideas is discouraged is pretty much the opposite of what can rightfully be called development. That much I know is true. A director of development and his boss should know it, too.

New Albany councilwoman, residents question status of Slate Run Road project, by Daniel Suddeath (N &T) 

Funding set aside for a $4 million upgrade to Slate Run Road in New Albany could go toward other projects, making unclear the future of the road improvements.

The Charlestown Road TIF district was to fund the effort, but with other projects coming online that will use the same TIF dollars, city officials are taking a second look at their priorities -- upsetting some residents.

Don't stop with sidewalks; Slate Run's redevelopment should include room for bicycles.

JB and BWS already have noted this point in the comments section of the newspaper's web site, so permit me to reiterate: Any such redevelopment plan that does not include bicycle lanes is ridiculous, and a source indicates that at least one member of council already has scoffed at bicycles as part of this plan.

At the meeting yesterday, CM Diane Benedetti expressed the view that Slate Run Road is too busy for bike lanes.

To the contrary, Slate Run is the ideal place to initiate a bicycling connector between the vicinity of IUS and downtown -- unless, of course, we just nationalize the railroad track running along Grant Line and use it as a rail-to-trail.

I bike Slate Run regularly, and as it currently stands, autos treat the road as a high-speed thru-way. Traffic calming would be a wonderful idea there, and a wee bit of sharing, with both pedestrians and cyclists, stands to make them better drivers as they trundle off to pay tolls on Kerry Stemler's and Michael Dalby's bridges.

New Albany seeking input on Slate Run construction; Addition of sidewalks goal of project, by Daniel Suddeath (Tribune)

A multi-million dollar project, with a main goal of upgrading pedestrian traffic flow along Slate Run Road,will be the topic of a public meeting.

New Albany Redevelopment Commission members will join administration officials from 6 to 8 p.m. Aug. 31 at the Slate Run Elementary School gymnasium for the open hearing.