The Stevens Avenue Traffic Calming Project
"..... is a sanctioned manipulation of the facts by officials
to sway public opinion in their favor while utilizing the public's
money to do so."
(From: An Analysis of Leadership,
Politics, and Ethics
in the Stevens Avenue Traffic Calming
Project, 1998"
The Muskie Institute for Public Policy, 1998
The short explanation: some friends of the City Council wanted to traffic-calm a major arterial in Portland. Some say it was for safety, some say for cleaner air, some for less through traffic; others, for an increase in real estate prices. Who's right? Some people know, but they're not saying.....
To get that calming funded the federal and state government had to be defrauded: lied to. This was done by downgrading the street from a major arterial to a minor one, then creating documentation that didn't represent the truth of the situation. The public was lied to. The state and feds were lied to, City employees had to be coerced.
Nobody bothered to check the details all the way up the line, or they didn't care, so it got approved. Calming was applied. Hundreds of thousands of dollars were spent. Accidents went up. Injuries went up. Pollution went up. Supporters cheered. The general public suffered. Pols got re-elected. Lies continued.
This is a very complex section of this whole site. Four years in the making, it's the sordid little history of the Stevens Avenue Traffic Calming Project (SAP).
I highly recommend reading the glossary to get some sense of the different acronyms, agencies, and regulations involved with this subject, before going further.
For a summary of this whole section, see here.
The various subjects below will be presented in detail.
Myth: Speeding was rampant on Stevens Avenue.
Speeding was causing accidents on the street.
Speeding was
causing pedestrian accidents.
Speeding traffic was endangering school children
Reality: Cars going too slowly or stopping were causing accidents : letter
No car accidents had been caused by “speeding”.
No pedestrian
accidents had been caused by “speeding”.
School
children were at no greater risk than at any other time or school zone.
Project
designer Thomas Gorrill stated project was not suitable for the road.
Stated desired project results (project studies):
Decreased accidents.
Decreased
pedestrian accidents.
Increased
pedestrian usage of street.
Increased
bicycle usage of street.
Increased air
quality.
Actual Results
of project (as per City, MDOT, FHWA) :
Accidents increased 40% (with 2,500 fewer cars on road).
Pedestrian usage dropped 8%.
Bicycle
usage dropped 8%.
Air
pollution increased 46% to 17 extra tons per year (city figures),
or
400%
to
125 extra tons per year (Federal figures).
Drastically increased
emergency response times at far ends of service area.
Methodology for fraud :
Call
project “air quality” project for
federal funding
project.
Create "problems" (accidents / speeding) even though not occurring.
Use
vague terms ( i.e.: "improvements") to imply success, even when not.
“Buy” a
consultant (re:
Charles Harlow)
Create misleading proposal for federal funds.
Quote
erroneous air quality data for project support.
Ignore national engineering standards.
Ignore
project’s own design engineer’s recommendations.
Ignore legal statements to Federal government when project goes bad.
Create,
change, or ignore applicable laws if they are in the way of project.
Coerce
public employees ( DPW, police,
fire, rescue ) to comply with alleged
project success, or be fired.
Falsely maintain project as success even when not.
Next to: History
Installation
Air Quality
Pedestrian Accidents
Vehicle Accidents
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