Letters to the editor Oct. 27
Woodland roundabout
I live a few blocks from the proposed installation of a roundabout for the Woodland Park intersection. I traverse that intersection four or more times per day, almost every day of the year. My travels are at varied times during each day. A roundabout would be disastrous for motorists and pedestrians.
Yes, the intersection is strange. It is designed as is for a very good reason. The intersection sees a lot of traffic all year. The traffic from Woodland Park pulls up the steep hill heading west. Westbound traffic does not stop at the top of the hill for the intersection. The other three approaches have stop and yield signs. Roundabouts inevitably stop traffic to a standstill quite often.
Witness the Foy’s Lake fiasco which is being remedied by removal of an expensive, almost new roundabout. Stop only one westbound car at the roundabout in a snowstorm and you instantly create an entire hill of cars and trucks that cannot get moving again. This is a nightmare scenario.
Add to this the fact that the Department of Transportation is trying to “shoehorn” a roundabout which should require a diameter of about 150 feet into a very small easement area. They are calling it a “mini-roundabout.” If allowed this would be a “maxi-mistake.”
The intersection is proximate to the Conrad Mansion, a treasure that populates the area with many pedestrians walking the neighborhood while waiting for their tours. Roundabouts are the bane of pedestrians. This pinhole size roundabout would endanger them and many cyclists as well. The Department’s rationale is that there have been almost 40 “crashes” in 4 years. Let’s do the math. That’s less than one a month. I was one of them. My entry in that statistic was a girl on a cellphone who bumped me at the stop causing $150 damage. Crashes happen. This is not cause for turning a difficult intersection into a disaster at great cost.
The Department would be of far more use to the public by spending the money on filling potholes. It isn’t glamorous but would be more appreciated by we the public that have to live with the consequences of the department’s spending of our money. Attend the meeting Oct. 28, 4 to 6:30 p.m., downtown at Kalispell City Hall, 201 First Ave. E.
—Steve Williams, Kalispell
Hunter will take on affordable housing crisis
I endorse Ryan Hunter who is running for Kalispell City Council in Ward 3. Over the past few weeks I have had the opportunity to meet with Ryan and understand his passion for building a better Kalispell through renewable energy, city planning and affordable housing. I strongly support his efforts around affordable housing as it is very important to the continued growth and development of Kalispell and Flathead County. Businesses in the valley are growing and need to fill open job positions but the lack of affordable housing makes it hard to attract good talent. I am confident that if Mr. Hunter is elected he will take this issue very seriously, which not only impacts the working class and businesses but also the elderly being priced out and forced to live in their vehicles and young children moving here with their families for the American Dream. Ryan’s background with urban and regional planning is exactly what a growing city like Kalispell needs to plan for the future and housing is one of the biggest issues we face today. Consider opening your door to him and supporters who will be canvasing Ward 3 and learn why he is the best candidate for you and your community.
—Jamie Quinn, Kalispell
Surveying an evolving culture
It’s a grievous time to be retired, leaning back in a splintered Adirondack chair, surveying the evolving culture around us. A guy can manufacture a peptic ulcer fixating on the “progressive” obsession for political correctness — on every level — seeping through all channels of our lives.
Gun control. Climate change. Gender rediscovery. Body painting. Black, red, and brown-facing. Nothing mentioned about white face; too bland and sterile.
Yes, in the wrong hands, ammunition resting in its cozy box is an instrument of horrendous carnage. Ruthless disregard for the sanctity of life.
And now, so is the fate of pigment. In the wrong hands with a careless brush stroke, we can insult, defame, and appall vast swaths of racial groups. Leaving them damaged and devalued for life. Such as the justified shame endured by handsome and dashing young Trudeau of Canada.
I’m waiting for a knock on the door from a group representing a Walmart patron wishing to sue me from 1990, when I left a toilet seat up in the restroom.
Shall we board up all tattoo parlors? Nothing more insulting to a lovely model’s pose on a barrel chested biker whose biceps are sagging like bird poop on a telephone wire...and with it....the figure of the inked maiden he is sporting. Any gal so disfigured should be rewarded SOME form of damages. A greasy diet from roadside burger joints deserves to be punished.
And that’s the rub; an interconnected web of cause-effect that ripples through society, wearing out old folks’ hearts. Socially acceptable tradition must be broken.
I insist that the three people who attend my funeral all wear white. Death is dark enough. Play ice cream wagon music. As Twain always said, “Let us live such a life that at our death, even the undertaker cries.”
—Gary Vinson, Kalispell