The Observation Deck

And FIY

Grow Lakewood Structural Balance Committee Meeting Wednesday, April 25, 2007 2007 page 1 of 8:

"Instead of reducing services, we concider how we can maintain or improve services, and save money, by working more effeienctly, and buying smarter."

Natural gas comes to mind...

This administration is seemingly lazy, lacking imagination, and short on the forethought it takes to solve problems and has no regard for what is important to Lakewood residents.

I mean really how hard is it to gut and cut?
How much thoughtfullness goes into slash and hack economics?
Real leaders find ways to solve problems "Instead of reducing services," and "concider how we can maintain or improve services, and save money, by working more effeienctly, and buying smarter."

Natural gas was what we needed to invest in...and still need to for that matter. Of course that takes a little thought and cant be achived by hack and slash economics

Hey!

The Holidays are here!

It's time for a new CAROL!

RING that BANJO!

Deck the Halls Parody

Deck the streets with plastic dumpsters,
Fa la la la la, la la la la!
Blue or green? What great big dumpsters!
Fa la la la la, la la la la!
Don we now our back elastics.
Fa la la la la, la la la la!
And with our snowshows, pull those plastics!
Fa la la la la, la la la la!

Up the hills and down the driveways!
Fa la la la la, la la la la!
Lakewoodites haul their rubber sleighs.
Fa la la la la, la la la la!
Like that reindeer, all red noses...
Fa la la la la, la la la la!
Will we think of this, on election day?
Fa la la la la, la la la la!

Rubber-stamping gutless councils?
Fa la la la la, la la la la!
Maybe this is not a done deal?
Fa la la la la, la la la la!
From the past, we will remember...
Fa la la la la, la la la la!
A running urinal from deep December!
Fa la la la la, la la la la!

Score thus far:
Running urinal thread from the LAST administration:
6509 views
Automated pick-up of garbage question, from THIS administration:
5218 views already, and climbing quickly by the day.

Wow,

Just couldn't help but notice that there are nearly 5900 views on this thread now.

That's getting pretty close to that other controversial thread's numbers..

Still some unanswered issues though, all jokes, discussion and statistics aside:

What will diabetics and others, needing medical or "sharps" container disposal, have to do with automated front yard disposal? Certainly not leave their sharps containers out front for the schoolkiddies to examine, I hope....

And certainly not put up "Diabetics live here" signs....right to privacy, you know.

And...even though the mayor has indicated that there will be accomodatations made for those unable to wheel those fully-loaded behemoths out to the street, what of the tree-lawn scavenger crowd, who will very quickly learn who is elderly or infirm by whose dumpsters are not sitting out front.

These homes will literally scream "Target me, target me, TARGET ME" for that next break-in...

Or should we assume that the city has solved Lakewood's theft problem by now?

Finally, a major point to consider: Federal laws were enacted to provide equality of service access for the handicapped and disabled.

Thank God.

That applies here too....

Hope the city keeps that in mind, if not, I would think that they will certainly be reminded.

Lakewood's for everyone, and that's federal law.

In light of the upcoming change in the residental trash pickup, I hope someone city's works department will take the opportunity to demonstrate how we will be expected to place the trash cans with the tree lawns buried under 3-4 feet of snow. Yes, I know this won't last a full winter, but it is reality for awhile. I'd especially like to see how the streets with narrow tree lawns cope with all this snow.

A few photos could be worth a few thousand words of feedback.

Not to forget either the unanswered posting made earlier by someone asking how these one-armed trucky-thingies were going to be able to service a one-way street like Lakewood Heights...

So many unanswered questions.

So many...

Just wondering how the sick and infirm shovel the length of their driveway and back footpath so that the cushmans can get to the backyard?

Don't worry Jim,

Under the new system, not only will the elderly and infirm (as well as the rest of us) have to clear those driveways and footpaths, but also apparently and likely: about 4 feet of the treelawns; in order to accomodate those dauntingly dinosaur-sized dumpsters.

Looking outside right now at my own mountainous snow-plow pushed-in treelawn, I wonder exactly where that extra snow will go?

Let's see... 4 foot x 4 foot, times say, roughly 2 foot high of snow = 32 square feet of snow.

Multiply, say, by 25,000 homes = That's eight hundred thousand more square feet of snow that we would need to move, in order to hypothetically accomodate Mayor FitzGerald's winter wonderland curbside trash program this week alone....

Of course, as a reminder, the elderly and infirm can also call the senior centers to inquire about assistance with snow removal services.

Hope they're ready for a little more work...

Gary Rice wrote:
Looking outside right now at my own mountainous snow-plow pushed-in treelawn, I wonder exactly where that extra snow will go?

Multiply, say, by 25,000 homes = That's eight hundred thousand more square feet of snow that we would need to move, in order to hypothetically accomodate Mayor FitzGerald's winter wonderland curbside trash program this week alone....

Gary,

Do what any other good citizen would do. Put it in the back of a pickup and take it to your councilman's front lawn. The Mayor has a nice sized yard, I'm sure we could make a good portion of that 800,000 ft^2 of snow fit.

We thought of doing this as a senior prank to Dr.Estrop, but then he told me he lived in a loft about six floors off the ground. (Couldn't confirm the validity of his statement.) Dr.Wagner was the other person on the list, but he's at school at 3:30 a.m. on some days and we needed our beauty sleep. Plus, if he can chop through five blocks of concrete (:shock:), a big mountain of snow is a jog in the park for the guy.

We were young, stupid, bored, and not that motivated.

All kidding aside, the day an older individual gets sick and gets hospitalized (or worse) when he's shoveling snow to clear a path for the Cushman, I'll bet that he will sue the city for liability, or if he's not around to sue, his family will. And I bet it will cost the city a lot more than they saved by switching to the Cushman trucks.

Cynical thing to say, I know.

[quote="Jim Sage"]Just wondering how the sick and infirm shovel the length of their driveway and back footpath so that the cushmans can get to the backyard?[/quote]

Shoveling the snow on your driveway and sidewalk is easy, because you can spend some extra time and take small bites.

Shoveling the tree lawn would be more difficult, because the snow thrown up by the plows is thicker and heavier.

Wrestling a 90 gallon demi dumpster to the curb would be much more difficult, since it is heavier and bulkier than s shovel of snow. Of course, you could always remove the contents, put the empty demi dumster on the tree lawn, then pick up the refuse, a bit at a time, and carry it to the tree lawn and put it in the demi dumpster. In fact, perhaps you could just leave the demi dumpster on the tree lawn permanently, and fill it as you amass trash. You wouldn't have to shovel the tree lawn either, as the demi dumpster would be there before the snow fell, and the only problem would be for the city to find the demi dumster under the plowed snow, and dig it out!

But its useless to discuss this matter now, as the decision to implement it was made quite a while ago. So we will have a couple of years to evaluate this plan, and decide if we want to keep a mayor and council who come up with such schemes.

Will Brown,

Thanks for the treatise on "dumpster in the snow"

Wow Jim,
You just inspired me!

A new SONG!
(to the Farmer in the Dell)

The dumpster in the snow,
The dumpster in the snow,
It sure makes that Gary go!
The dumpster in the snow!

The snow's on the tree lawn,
The snow's on the tree lawn,
Oh where will that dumpster go?
When the snow's on the treelawn...

How will that dumpster fill?
How will that dumpster fill?
With politicians' mighty plans,
The dumpster we will fill.

The banjo's getting back in tune again.

Note to the wise:

When Will Brown and I agree on something, a movement begins...

While I hate to bump this thread I do have a question. How are the cans allocated? Does each house get a can? I live in a double so do we get one can or two? While I recycle everything and rarely have a lot of trash I just can't imagine two households of 7 each getting all our trash into one can.

Despite even the weather issues with putting a can at the curb during snow storms, the cans themselves are HUGE. 96 gallon? Ginormous. Fully loaded, how many people of even good physical shape can wheel that down a long driveway without even a bit of a struggle.

Ridiculous.

Danielle Masters wrote:While I hate to bump this thread I do have a question. How are the cans allocated? Does each house get a can? I live in a double so do we get one can or two? While I recycle everything and rarely have a lot of trash I just can't imagine two households of 7 each getting all our trash into one can.

Danielle, I used to own a double and live in one half in another city/state. Each unit got their own can. Of course, those were considerably smaller than these, so I am wondering if a double would get only one can.