THE GRIDLOCKED, AIR POLLUTED, OVERCROWDED, WATER RATIONING FUTURE OF DENVER
By Frosty Wooldridge
Re: “Future of Denver” Denver Post, Plunkett/Harsanyi 5/17/09
In their “Ten ways to transform Denver transportation”, DP journalists Chuck Plunkett and David Harsanyi offered a plethora of solutions for our growing gridlock traffic nightmare. Unfortunately, none of their answers take into account that current projections show Denver growing by two million people. At the same time, the State of Colorado expects another added four to five million people. (Source: Fogel/Martin March 2006 “US Population Projections)
No amount of solutions can solve the core problem: hyper-population growth. Worse, all their solutions predicate greater problems because they tacitly accept unending population growth as their working paradigm. That will prove a flawed and outdated concept in a short few years.
First of all, continued growth equates to a cancer cell. It can and will kill the host. Therefore, continued growth advocated by Governor Bill Ritter, Mayor Hickenlooper and most companies in Colorado fail to understand their own dilemma. Such growth guarantees water shortages, degraded quality of life in Colorado, energy crises, crowding, gridlock and worse. We face a horrendous crisis!
What is that crisis? It may be described as a Faustian Bargain or selling their souls for immediate financial gratification to suffer long term consequences certain to arrive. And, ironically, the further they travel into the consequences, the more they are forced into Hobson’s Choice: by waiting too long to enact ‘real’ or ‘workable solutions’, they force a citizens to pick two doors for their final choice. If they pick door # 1, the walk through and walk over a cliff. If they pick door # 2, they walk into a swamp of quicksand.
Harsanyi said, “Expect more traffic, not less.” That statement makes about as much sense as a cancer patient saying, “Okay, I might as well as expect more cancer, not less, but I hope to get better.”
A rational statement by Bill Vidal, Denver’s Department of Public Works, said, “You can’t just pay or pave your way out of this.”
No horsefeathers, Sherlock!
Then, Harsanyi states that our infrastructure and bridges aren’t in such bad straits, “All those reports about structurally deficient bridges are a lot of bunk.” Tell that to the 1,500 bridges that have collapsed since 1970 in the USA with the people on them that died…latest case in Minneapolis on I-35 that killed a dozen folks like you and me.” Good reporting Harsanyi. You show wise use of words.
The article talks about “Congestion pricing”; “Rolling work times”; “Free hired drivers”; “Better bike lanes”; “Micro rentals”; “Democracy now” and several others.
But the one harsh reality both journalists failed to consider, and the one that would solve all our gridlocked traffic problems for certain, yes, for certain: we must stabilize Colorado population. That simple! That smart!
Therefore, the Denver Post can live in the past and think in the past and invent solutions certain to fail—or they can pull themselves out of the 20th century and Titanic-like thinking by proposing a “Colorado Sustainable Population Policy.”
I invite the Denver Post to move quickly into the 21st century and hire top writers and thinkers that will deal with reality, write with an eye toward the future and not the past, and promote rational solutions that work.
Yippee ki yea! The future stands ready to accept us or unseat us from our ‘hubris’ and arrogance.
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