My neighbors and I have been accused of being opposed to RUPCO's project because we live nearby. I have cited a lack of safety as the main reason for my opposition to the proposal as it stands, and the sole reason for this blog.
I want to explain why this is not, and in fact IS the opposite of a NIMBY argument.
When somebody lives near a hazard, they are acutely aware of that hazard, and they become especially vigilant when close to that hazard. This vigilance becomes second nature.
Here is an example: When I was a child, there was carpeting in my bedroom, and right at the threshold to the room, there were one or two tacks sticking up from the floor. I NEVER stepped on them. Neither did anybody else in my family. It never occurred to us to fix this hazard because we all were trained, in some subconscious way, to step over that threshold. My parents should have fixed this hazard, but they didn't. All of my friends cried out in pain when they entered my room, but my response was, in line with my parents' practice, simply to tell them to be careful. This example shows us that people who live with and near hazards simply get used to them and avoid their dangers.
What this simple example shows us is that people UNfamiliar with the hazards of a particularly tricky intersection are going to be the ones who get hurt. The other people who will get hurt are the locals, those among us who deny that there is any real danger at the intersection of Route 212 and Playhouse Lane in Woodstock, New York.
When I drive through this intersection, the very fact that RUPCO might BE in my backyard is the reason I am going to be just fine.
And you? When you give your friends and loved ones driving directions, and they are busy making the left onto 212 from 375, busy reading the billboard as they do so, and busy admiring the playhouse, do you think they will have any awareness at all of the cars backing out of Playhouse Plaza?
Monday, January 25, 2010
Saturday, January 23, 2010
31- The Power of Observation
I have been asked by what standard I am qualified to make an assessment of a traffic study for RUPCO. There are many answers, but I want to tell you how I discovered it. I want to show you how simple it is, broken down, step by step.
When I first learned about RUPCO's plans, and all the cars that were going to come through the intersection of Playhouse Plaza and Route 212, it seemed to me that surely somebody would have already taken the project traffic numbers and done a simulation of car travel, meaning, send cars through the intersection according to the study numbers, to physically show how there would be too much traffic.
I was quite surprised to learn that project opponents had spent full days counting cars, but not actually SHOWING anybody, themselves included, what 400 extra cars, per day, LOOKS like, in that intersection.
So, my first idea was to round up some neighbors, pick an hour of the day that RUPCO's consultant, Creighton Manning, told us there would be a lot of traffic, and make that traffic happen, with real cars.
I figured out how to produce around 30 trips through the intersection using only 5 cars, by asking them to drive through the intersection in various directions at various points during the hour.
I videotaped the hour, and my conclusion was that the additional cars, on their own, were not the problem. This hour was between 5 and 6 PM, when Lori's restaurant business is winding down, and before dinner at Violette restaurant, also right at the intersection, picks up.
I take research very seriously, and I do not want to make any uninformed decisions. At that point, however, I believed that the cars resulting from RUPCO's presence, would not, as my one hour experiment had revealed, pose a traffic volume problem at the intersection, or anywhere else.
After that, some neighbors told me that when they take their kids to school, there is a lot more traffic, and lots of business at Lori's restaurant. Furthermore, the "rush" at the intersection is not defined by the rush hour of 9-5 commuters, but rather by the business at Playhouse Plaza. Some of the stores there do not open until well past 9 AM.
That is when I decided to videotape a morning hour. First I chose the morning of Yom Kippur. Oops. School was closed, and all Jews observing any holidays were probably fasting that day. Then I chose the first day of the Woodstock Film Festival. Oops again. There was SO much traffic in the parking lot, the study was just not fair, in the other direction. Finally, I chose a regular Tuesday in October, from 8:42 to 9:42 AM. There was no reason for this morning other than that my mother was visiting and was nice enough to offer to keep me company in the car during the hour.
The result of that hour's videotape was nothing less than stunning. I counted all the cars, and at first, I didn't even count the cars going into and out of the parking lot. But the longer I watched, the less sense it made for the parking lot traffic to be excluded, since THAT traffic was clearly causing all of the danger and confusion and delays in the intersection.
At that point, I went to look at the Draft Environmental Impact Statement, because my sketched notes did not show any car counts into or out of the parking lot, and I wanted to verify that the parking lot had been omitted from the study. I have to mention, here, that I expected this omission since I already knew that there were other omissions in the study.
I live on Evergreen Lane, and Creighton Manning left my entire street off its map. Yes, that's right. According to Creighton Manning, there will be NO additional traffic on my street, so why bother even to draw in the street. Even though Evergreen Lane is parallel to Playhouse Lane and Plochmann Lane, and could be used to travel from Plochmann and 212 to the entrance to the RUPCO project. Right now, there is no reason for any car to drive up my street, unless it is coming TO my street, or to the five houses beyond the end of my street. The effect that this project will have on through-traffic on my street will be the difference between occasional traffic to those five houses, and occasional traffice to 58 houses (five plus 53 new ones.) That means that although traffic now is next to nothing, it will increase by ten times. That is significant.
However, I was told by somebody at the Planning Board office that my street was irrelevant to the project traffic study. What is interesting about that is that I receive letters from the Planning board, notices of meetings and so forth, addressed to me as a "contiguous neighbor" of the proposed project. I had already been disgusted with my street's omission from the traffic movement study, so it was not difficult for me to believe that Creighton Manning had also excluded the very important car movement into and out of the Playhouse Plaza parking lot.
As you can now see, anybody with a questioning mind and patience could have discovered Creighton Manning's omissions. I did, as a combination of having my home and street excluded, and the study's negation of my direct observations.
I am also an experienced policy analyst, which means that it has been my JOB to question and question and challenge and discover things that are missing from what look like the work of competent, professional "experts," but are in fact much much less than perfect. And, I know from history that terrible omissions in "comprehensive" studies have cost cities and nations millions and billions of dollars, and many lives. And I know that one individual citizen, who focuses, and thinks, and asks, and asks some more, and tests, and documents, and reasons, can add valuable information to a debate.
Never let anybody tell you that things are too complicated for you to understand, or that something that feels wrong to you is going to be for your own good if you just leave it alone and trust the authorities. Trust your gut, do your homework, see for yourself, and share your experience. We will ALL be better off for it.
When I first learned about RUPCO's plans, and all the cars that were going to come through the intersection of Playhouse Plaza and Route 212, it seemed to me that surely somebody would have already taken the project traffic numbers and done a simulation of car travel, meaning, send cars through the intersection according to the study numbers, to physically show how there would be too much traffic.
I was quite surprised to learn that project opponents had spent full days counting cars, but not actually SHOWING anybody, themselves included, what 400 extra cars, per day, LOOKS like, in that intersection.
So, my first idea was to round up some neighbors, pick an hour of the day that RUPCO's consultant, Creighton Manning, told us there would be a lot of traffic, and make that traffic happen, with real cars.
I figured out how to produce around 30 trips through the intersection using only 5 cars, by asking them to drive through the intersection in various directions at various points during the hour.
I videotaped the hour, and my conclusion was that the additional cars, on their own, were not the problem. This hour was between 5 and 6 PM, when Lori's restaurant business is winding down, and before dinner at Violette restaurant, also right at the intersection, picks up.
I take research very seriously, and I do not want to make any uninformed decisions. At that point, however, I believed that the cars resulting from RUPCO's presence, would not, as my one hour experiment had revealed, pose a traffic volume problem at the intersection, or anywhere else.
After that, some neighbors told me that when they take their kids to school, there is a lot more traffic, and lots of business at Lori's restaurant. Furthermore, the "rush" at the intersection is not defined by the rush hour of 9-5 commuters, but rather by the business at Playhouse Plaza. Some of the stores there do not open until well past 9 AM.
That is when I decided to videotape a morning hour. First I chose the morning of Yom Kippur. Oops. School was closed, and all Jews observing any holidays were probably fasting that day. Then I chose the first day of the Woodstock Film Festival. Oops again. There was SO much traffic in the parking lot, the study was just not fair, in the other direction. Finally, I chose a regular Tuesday in October, from 8:42 to 9:42 AM. There was no reason for this morning other than that my mother was visiting and was nice enough to offer to keep me company in the car during the hour.
The result of that hour's videotape was nothing less than stunning. I counted all the cars, and at first, I didn't even count the cars going into and out of the parking lot. But the longer I watched, the less sense it made for the parking lot traffic to be excluded, since THAT traffic was clearly causing all of the danger and confusion and delays in the intersection.
At that point, I went to look at the Draft Environmental Impact Statement, because my sketched notes did not show any car counts into or out of the parking lot, and I wanted to verify that the parking lot had been omitted from the study. I have to mention, here, that I expected this omission since I already knew that there were other omissions in the study.
I live on Evergreen Lane, and Creighton Manning left my entire street off its map. Yes, that's right. According to Creighton Manning, there will be NO additional traffic on my street, so why bother even to draw in the street. Even though Evergreen Lane is parallel to Playhouse Lane and Plochmann Lane, and could be used to travel from Plochmann and 212 to the entrance to the RUPCO project. Right now, there is no reason for any car to drive up my street, unless it is coming TO my street, or to the five houses beyond the end of my street. The effect that this project will have on through-traffic on my street will be the difference between occasional traffic to those five houses, and occasional traffice to 58 houses (five plus 53 new ones.) That means that although traffic now is next to nothing, it will increase by ten times. That is significant.
However, I was told by somebody at the Planning Board office that my street was irrelevant to the project traffic study. What is interesting about that is that I receive letters from the Planning board, notices of meetings and so forth, addressed to me as a "contiguous neighbor" of the proposed project. I had already been disgusted with my street's omission from the traffic movement study, so it was not difficult for me to believe that Creighton Manning had also excluded the very important car movement into and out of the Playhouse Plaza parking lot.
As you can now see, anybody with a questioning mind and patience could have discovered Creighton Manning's omissions. I did, as a combination of having my home and street excluded, and the study's negation of my direct observations.
I am also an experienced policy analyst, which means that it has been my JOB to question and question and challenge and discover things that are missing from what look like the work of competent, professional "experts," but are in fact much much less than perfect. And, I know from history that terrible omissions in "comprehensive" studies have cost cities and nations millions and billions of dollars, and many lives. And I know that one individual citizen, who focuses, and thinks, and asks, and asks some more, and tests, and documents, and reasons, can add valuable information to a debate.
Never let anybody tell you that things are too complicated for you to understand, or that something that feels wrong to you is going to be for your own good if you just leave it alone and trust the authorities. Trust your gut, do your homework, see for yourself, and share your experience. We will ALL be better off for it.
30- Perennial Playhouse Plaza Parking Problems Previously Puzzled Planners
Hello. Tonight I want to discuss an issue that was brought up on local access TV a couple of days ago. Michael Veitch and David Menzies, in reviewing the RUPCO-related articles and letters in the Woodstock Times, got around to discussing the time the doctor at Playhouse Plaza rented his office.
Whether Menzies was on the planning board then, or at another time, I don't know, but they pointed out that the doctor was supposed to have provided a sort of valet parking arrangement for his patients, since parking at Playhouse Plaza was already tight. That was the planning board's decision, or solution. Something like that.
Menzies and Veitch's discussion reminded me of this, since I first learned about that chapter in Playhouse Plaza Parking history from the doctor himself. About three months ago, I was out photographing cars parked on the north side of Route 212. The doctor started to complain about the cars, and I told him that I agree with him, and then we got to talking about his lease and the valet parking arrangement by which he was supposed to have abided.
What all this says is that the planning board is well aware of the surfeit of cars at the Playhouse Plaza parking lot. Having already considered the problem of one single merchant, there, bringing about a very inconvenient and complicated parking solution, how can they explain their blindness to Creighton Manning's omission of all the cars in this parking lot, in the RUPCO traffic study?
Seems to me the planning board simply didn't think, much.
Whether Menzies was on the planning board then, or at another time, I don't know, but they pointed out that the doctor was supposed to have provided a sort of valet parking arrangement for his patients, since parking at Playhouse Plaza was already tight. That was the planning board's decision, or solution. Something like that.
Menzies and Veitch's discussion reminded me of this, since I first learned about that chapter in Playhouse Plaza Parking history from the doctor himself. About three months ago, I was out photographing cars parked on the north side of Route 212. The doctor started to complain about the cars, and I told him that I agree with him, and then we got to talking about his lease and the valet parking arrangement by which he was supposed to have abided.
What all this says is that the planning board is well aware of the surfeit of cars at the Playhouse Plaza parking lot. Having already considered the problem of one single merchant, there, bringing about a very inconvenient and complicated parking solution, how can they explain their blindness to Creighton Manning's omission of all the cars in this parking lot, in the RUPCO traffic study?
Seems to me the planning board simply didn't think, much.
Thursday, January 21, 2010
29- How Many Accidents Make this Project UNaffordable?
This morning, January 21, at 8:52 AM, I was called by my neighbor, who was walking her 8 year old daughter to Woodstock Elementary School. She told me that there was something going on at Route 212 and Playhouse Lane, and that it involved two fire engines and an ambulance. I ran out the door with dog and camera, and before telling you what I learned about what happened, I feel that this series of photographs will say more than I ever could. 
I interviewed one participant in the accident, and she described to me what happened. I have sketched her account in a handy diagram, below.
According to this woman, who was extremely flustered and did not wish to identify herself by name, she was driving east on route 212 when a car, parked in Playhouse Plaza parking lot, backed out. The car in front of this woman stopped so that the car could back out, and this woman also stopped, suddenly, in order to avoid driving into the car in front of her. The car behind her, which makes a third car on Route 212, failed to stop and drove into this woman's car. The photo of the crushed front end is a photo of the fourth car in the sequence.
In this diagram, car 1 (blue) backed out of the parking lot, backing out west in order to drive east, car 2 (pink) stopped to give blue car 1 room. Car 3 (yellow) was driven by the participant who spoke to me. She stopped Car 3 so that it would not hit Car 2. Car 4 (green) did not stop in time, and ploughed into Car 3. The photo of the white car with the crushed front end is Car 4.
Now, this is the intersection through which virtually all of the traffic to the RUPCO housing will drive. It is my opinion that the town of Woodstock cannot afford to accommodate much more traffic in this spot than it already does.
Creighton Manning Engineering, in research for Ulster County, in 2003, presented guidelines that make is clear that parking lots should not be placed in intersections, and if that can't be changed, that traffic in the relevant area should be limited. LIMITED is the opposite of introducing 400+ more car trips per day, every day, forever.
It is my opinion that the negative press Woodstock will receive for ANY accident at this intersection, after RUPCO has broken ground, is something the town cannot afford.
It is my opinion that the town of Woodstock will not be able to afford its casualty and liability insurance premium increases, once its insurance carrier, NYMIR, gets wind of this trend of reckless development.
But who am I to make an assessment of this situation? Just a person who is paying attention. Look at these photos, and this diagram, and look at what RUPCO wants to do, and has done in terms of measuring the safety of this intersection, and make your own assessment.
Sunday, January 17, 2010
28- Nobody Showed Up at Guy Kempe's Urging
On Monday, January 11th, Guy Kempe, RUPCO's director of community development, announced on RUPCO's facebook page, the Woodstock Planning Board's public hearing on the RUPCO proposed site plan:
Here is the web page:
http://www.facebook.com/pages/Rural-Ulster-Preservation-Company/110906738064?ref=nf
Here is the specific post:
Rural Ulster Preservation Company PUBLIC HEARING WILL BE RE-OPENED Thursday 1/14/10 5PM on the site plan/special use permit for Woodstock Commons. Now is the time to speak up in support of Woodstock Commons, affordable housing for seniors, artists and working families. Let's expand housing choice in Woodstock!
January 11 at 7:27am
On the morning of Jan. 14, he updated his notice, since the location of the public hearing had been changed the day before:
Rural Ulster Preservation Company THE PUBLIC HEARING WILL BE RE-OPENED Thursday 1/14/10 5PM on the site plan/special use permit for Woodstock Commons. NOTICE- LOCATION CHANGE: THE MEETING WILL NOW BE HELD AT THE WOODSTOCK COMMUNITY CENTER, ROCK CITY ROAD, WOODSTOCK
Thu at 7:19am
There were 26 speakers at the public hearing.
23 spoke against the project.
3 spoke in favor of the project.
Were any of those three people "fans" of RUPCO on facebook? I know for a fact that one of them does not own or use a computer. Two are regulars at public hearings on many topics, and the other one, who had also spoken before, stated that he wanted to apply for housing at Woodstock Commons. I would bet my own money that these three people would have shown up and spoken with or without Guy Kempe's urging. I don't think I am going out on a limb to state that Guy Kempe's effort to bring people to the public hearing was entirely ineffective. Could it be that aside from these three expected pro- speakers, there isn't anybody around actually in favor of this housing project? Way to "develop" the community, Guy.
Here is the web page:
http://www.facebook.com/pages/Rural-Ulster-Preservation-Company/110906738064?ref=nf
Here is the specific post:
Rural Ulster Preservation Company PUBLIC HEARING WILL BE RE-OPENED Thursday 1/14/10 5PM on the site plan/special use permit for Woodstock Commons. Now is the time to speak up in support of Woodstock Commons, affordable housing for seniors, artists and working families. Let's expand housing choice in Woodstock!
January 11 at 7:27am
On the morning of Jan. 14, he updated his notice, since the location of the public hearing had been changed the day before:
Rural Ulster Preservation Company THE PUBLIC HEARING WILL BE RE-OPENED Thursday 1/14/10 5PM on the site plan/special use permit for Woodstock Commons. NOTICE- LOCATION CHANGE: THE MEETING WILL NOW BE HELD AT THE WOODSTOCK COMMUNITY CENTER, ROCK CITY ROAD, WOODSTOCK
Thu at 7:19am
There were 26 speakers at the public hearing.
23 spoke against the project.
3 spoke in favor of the project.
Were any of those three people "fans" of RUPCO on facebook? I know for a fact that one of them does not own or use a computer. Two are regulars at public hearings on many topics, and the other one, who had also spoken before, stated that he wanted to apply for housing at Woodstock Commons. I would bet my own money that these three people would have shown up and spoken with or without Guy Kempe's urging. I don't think I am going out on a limb to state that Guy Kempe's effort to bring people to the public hearing was entirely ineffective. Could it be that aside from these three expected pro- speakers, there isn't anybody around actually in favor of this housing project? Way to "develop" the community, Guy.
Friday, January 15, 2010
27- RUPCO's Guy Kempe A'salts Me
Guy Kempe, RUPCO's director of community development, told the Woodstock Times this week that he would take "anything that Robin has put her name to with a little grain of salt." Then he asks: "according what standard is she qualified to make an assessment?" (an assessment of Creighton Manning's traffic study.)
For such a glaring and basic error of omission by supposedly qualified traffic engineers, there are so many standards by which I could be called qualified to make an assessment. Let us look at some of them! And to make it more fun, I think I'll make all the standards by which I am qualified to make an assessment different colors. What fun is a personal blog without a little color...
The short answer is that I took the study, and compared it to the actual intersection, by putting on my boots and going down there, and I found that the study misrepresented reality. So, I guess the standard by which I am qualified to make an assessment is that I know the difference between fact and fiction. I know the difference between a schematic that represents reality, and reality itself.
I know how to use my eyes.
I know how to take hundreds of pages of data, and isolate the incongruities.
I know how to follow the scent of such incongruities to discover what might have motivated them.
In any public policy movement, such as this RUPCO project, there are stakeholders. There are costs and benefits. Every interested party wants to highlight some facts and downplay others. That's fine, and that's the way the process works. But when one party actually misrepresents reality, which Creighton Manning did, and which Guy Kempe has tried to defend, we have a very big problem.
Guy Kempe has stated that I have an outcome in mind, for this project. I think it is safe to assume that he means that I do not want the project built. But I remind him and everybody else, that I DO have an outcome in mind, which is the purpose of this blog, and that is to keep the town safe, whatever that means for the project. That means that the standard by which I judge the facts is safety, and that I maintain that safety CAN be defined, and measured, and MUST be present in any plan that breaks ground in this town.
Onward, though, to defend my honor and qualifications.
This RUPCO project is not simple. It involves all kinds of disciplines. All kinds of interests have to negotiate with one another. It is as important to know the motivations of each participant as it is to look at the facts they present, since it is extremely naive and dangerous to assume that ANY information, quantitative or otherwise, can be presented free of bias. I have experience working in public policy, on large projects with many stakeholders.
I have worked on public policy efforts much larger and more complicated than this one. I have worked for the national governments on four continents, for the US Department of Energy Policy Office, the EPA, and the United Nations. At the United Nations, I managed a program that sought to reduce pollution from transportation sources in cities, using private investment AND city resources. This meant that I had to understand how and why it is difficult to limit car use, to build a subway system, to make a dedicated bus lane, to limit driving or parking. All of these policies have technical and political and economic consequences. Reading documents with all of these things in mind simultaneously is key to not being fooled by some engineering study that purports to be "simply" a traffic study, and I know how to do that. That's why I found the discrepancy in the Creighton Manning study.
No, Guy Kempe, I have not spent my career measuring rural intersections and counting cars, but when that is what is called for, I know how to do that. When you stand at this intersection and look, you feel that this is a hazardous intersection. The Woodstock Times article makes that clear. It's not just my opinion. But what I am qualified to do, as a policy analyst with a brain trained to pinpoint key metrics, is that I can search until I find the documents that DEFINE safety, and compare the metrics to the project plans. And so that is what I did. I learned how to define safety. And I defined it. And I compared it to RUPCO's plans. And I discovered that in fact RUPCO has ignored key elements of safety in its plan.
There are no secrets here. Anybody can do what I did in this blog. Most people are overwhelmed by the amount of information there is, however, and they don't think they can. The beautiful thing about research and analysis is that you learn as you go. Even if you are unqualified when you set out to get to the bottom of something, if you stick to what is logical and true, to what is legal and able to be proved and confirmed along the way, then by the end, you have learned, and that is why you ARE qualified, by the time you have your answer. So pour a whole shaker of salt on my findings. Go back to square one and do all the research again. That's fine with me. I will defend what I have learned and written, because it is sound.
I am not the one who "can't account for" omissions, and who needs some abstract standard by which to measure the logic of somebody else's statement. That's Guy Kempe. He is the director of community development for RUPCO, and he is not going to misdirect THIS community.
26 - Woodstock Times Take Notice
Thank you, Woodstock Times, for investigating and writing about this blog. George Pattison did a thorough job of investigating and interviewing a number of officials. The article is available online here:
http://www.ulsterpublishing.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=article&articleID=505249
Here are some highlights: RUPCO community development director, Guy Kempe, actually SAID that our favorite intersection is an "existing hazard," a "longstanding traffic concern," but that it was beyond the study's purview. (He refers to the Creighton Manning study that included car movement at that intersection, but that omitted all of the cars moving into and out of the parking lot at the intersection.)
Seems to me that if car movements IN that intersection are within the study's purview, then the cars moving into and out of a parking lot directly INTO that intersection are also within the study's purview. This is so especially since a couple of hundred feet down 212, the same study DID count the cars moving into and out of the parking lot at the intersection of Routes 212 and 375.
And another thing: RUPCO's project will generate extra traffic in this intersection. No, this is not part of the site plan, but it IS considered an environmental effect of the project. If the project can be analyzed for water runoff and light pollution outside of the site map, why can't it be held accountable for traffic runoff, which is, face it, worse than runoff, it is planned access to and from the site on the order of 400+ cars per day.
When asked why these cars in the Playhouse Plaza parking lot were omitted from the Creighton Manning study, here is what Mr. Kempe had to say:
http://www.ulsterpublishing.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=article&articleID=505249
Here are some highlights: RUPCO community development director, Guy Kempe, actually SAID that our favorite intersection is an "existing hazard," a "longstanding traffic concern," but that it was beyond the study's purview. (He refers to the Creighton Manning study that included car movement at that intersection, but that omitted all of the cars moving into and out of the parking lot at the intersection.)
Seems to me that if car movements IN that intersection are within the study's purview, then the cars moving into and out of a parking lot directly INTO that intersection are also within the study's purview. This is so especially since a couple of hundred feet down 212, the same study DID count the cars moving into and out of the parking lot at the intersection of Routes 212 and 375.
And another thing: RUPCO's project will generate extra traffic in this intersection. No, this is not part of the site plan, but it IS considered an environmental effect of the project. If the project can be analyzed for water runoff and light pollution outside of the site map, why can't it be held accountable for traffic runoff, which is, face it, worse than runoff, it is planned access to and from the site on the order of 400+ cars per day.
When asked why these cars in the Playhouse Plaza parking lot were omitted from the Creighton Manning study, here is what Mr. Kempe had to say:
"I can't account for that," he said, citing a lack of data on accidents as the
probable reason for the lot's exclusion from the study."
Now, let's look at Mr. Kempe's statement. In a study of car movement through an intersection, the point of which is to COUNT the number of cars moving through and making turns, why is accident data relevant? Is accident data on 212 relevant to how many cars travel on Route 212? No, of course not. Mr. Kempe's statement makes no sense.
Mr. Kempe further argues that other agencies and consultants do not have a problem with the Creighton Manning study. I will explain why this is:
An agency who reviews a study that OMITS information, such as the existence of a parking lot at an intersection, CANNOT be expected to find fault with the study, since the problem is one of omission. If I tell you something is not there, and you do not actually go to the place I describe, why would you even question my findings?
The methodology used by Creighton Manning is OK, but the map describing the reality of the intersection OMITS the parking lot, and all the cars moving into and out of it. Any other agencies checking up on this study cannot be faulted for not going to the corner and verifying whether or not the roads in the study represent reality.
The error of omission is so basic. Anybody could have pointed to it, and it is simply indefensible. Mr. Kempe asks by what standard am I qualified to make an assessment of this study. I will answer that in the next post.
Wednesday, January 13, 2010
25- Surprise! Change of Venue for Public Hearing
I have been speaking to a reporter from the Woodstock Times for a couple of days. He is working on a story about RUPCO and our favorite intersection that should be in print in tomorrow's paper. Around 5 PM today he informed me that somebody from the town offices let him know that the Jan. 14 public hearing will be held at the community center, not at the town offices, as previously advertised. So, MY notice came 24 hours in advance. I called up the leader of the opposition group, SAGE, and she said that nobody told her. The town, or the planning board, or whoever called this shot clearly does not have the courtesy to inform the LEADER of the official opposition group that the venue has changed. I characterize that as worse than discourtesy. I would call it malice. The venue has been changed on the official town calendar on the website, but who consults such a thing when it has been clearly stated that the hearing would be at the town offices? Maybe an obsessive compulsive person, but not a normal person. The right thing to do would have been for the town to have alerted some interested parties, in addition to the newspaper. Let's see if the town posts a sign at the town offices prior to 5 PM tomorrow to tell people to go over to the community center instead. (Hint to the town: post a sign! It's the decent thing to do!)
See you tomorrow at 5 PM at the community center!
See you tomorrow at 5 PM at the community center!
Wednesday, January 6, 2010
24- Public Hearing Notice
You are cordially invited:
January 14
5-7 PM
at the Woodstock Town Offices (45 Comeau Drive)
(Jan. 13 update: now, it's scheduled to be at the community center... see post #25 for details)
This is when and where the next public hearing on RUPCO's proposed project will happen. I received a letter notifying me of this public hearing because I am a "contiguous neighbor" of the proposed development.
Personally, I think everybody in town, or at least everybody living in the hamlet of Woodstock should receive notice of this public hearing, since it will mean an increase of the hamlet's population by something like 12%. That's a huge impact on life in town, in vehicle traffic, and in other ways as well. The addition of actual people AT the site seems to be ignored in this very narrow targeting of potential participants.
the planning board will also accept comments in writing up to the date of the public hearing. I don't know where to send emails, but I assume you can send letters to the planning board at 45 comeau drive, woodstock, ny 12498. Fax number is 845-679-8743.
In addition, if you would like to review the project plans, they are available on Monday and Thursday, 9-5, at the Planning Board Office, which is the smaller building behind the garage at the town offices, at 45 Comeau Drive. I believe there is also a copy of the latest set of plans in the town clerk's office, and that copy would be available in a little more of a user friendly window, but I won't swear to any of that. (As usual, please correct any inaccuracies in the comment area.)
What is interesting about this public hearing is that we will not be allowed to speak about the corner of Playhouse Lane and Route 212 because, although the project will send hundreds of cars per day through that intersection, it is not technically PART of the "site plan." It is, get this, part of the "environment" that the project will affect.
It's good to consider all sides of an issue, so if you would like more information from citizens who are interested in the potential negative effects of this project (because, face it, all of the positive effects, real and imagined, are going to be trumpeted by RUPCO,) there will be an organizational meeting this Sunday, Jan. 10, in the evening. To find out where this meeting is, and what time, please email me at this address by early afternoon Sunday:
sendrobinemailnow[atsign]yahoo.com
Please do not use this email address at any other time, since I usually just delete most messages without opening them.
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