On Traffic Cameras
To the Editor,
I am sorry I missed last week’s edition where I understand you expressed the view that speed-detecting cameras are ill advised. If we want to address the traffic problem I can’t imagine why we would turn our back on this tool. Let me relate a recent experience.
I had the pleasure of driving around New Zealand and Australia for a month last year. When you pick up your rental car you are clearly warned that cameras are in wide use and you will be ticketed; everywhere! City and country.
As I left Melbourne heading west (think leaving Boston on the Mass Pike) I was struck by a strange observation. Everyone was going the speed limit. No one was passing on the wrong side, no tailgating or excessive lane changing. There was an unfamiliar civility about the entire driving experience.
Compare that to home where for 25 years I have been walking my dogs on Commonwealth Ave. It has become a drag strip. High speeds, constantly seeing red lights ignored. And don’t get me started on the new scourge: that of the wrong way, unlit, sidewalk driving food delivery motorbikes.
By the way, I’ve never seen a traffic stop of a passenger vehicle on Comm Ave by the BPD.
So to those charged with making our world safer, let’s use cameras to address the speeding and red light infractions. Let’s use traffic calming devices seen elsewhere such as city street style speed bumps.
Oh and by the way, Australia, with a road system profile similar to ours, has 40% of the per capita driving deaths we have.
Michael Gallup
Is this an April fool’s joke
To the Editor,
Your article, “City holds virtual meeting on West End Branch Library redevelopment plans” in which you reported the possibility of the West End Branch Library being replaced with “unstaffed book lockers” felt like an early April fool’s joke. However, the article posits that the possibility is in fact real. Recently, a library patron described the library as “a wonderful place where opportunities, ideas, and people come together.” How can an unstaffed book locker possibly serve that greater purpose?
Patrons rely on the West End Branch Library for more than just books: the library offers resources for families, tutoring, classes, and a space for the entire community. It is a place where someone can check out a laptop who otherwise might not have access to technology. A place where a child who is not yet of school age, can experience a book read aloud among peers.
Furthermore, why has there been no input from patrons of the West End Library regarding turning the library into a locker? Patrons only learned about the virtual meeting after it had already taken place.
It appears the decision was made without taking into account what a significant loss to the West End being without the library for a long-term duration of two years would have on the community.
For a project touting itself as being “inclusive” it feels extremely exclusive. Exclusive of opportunities. Exclusive of ideas. Exclusive of the community of the West End.
Please sign the petition: https://chng.it/WDqSygq6J9 to find an alternate space for the West End Branch Library during construction.M. Wormwood