Category Archives: Scott Walker

Hoan-ie Bridge is falling down, falling down, falling down

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What are Summerfest officials supposed to do now that Graef-USA has announced that festival patrons may be injured by falling pieces of the Hoan Bridge? Will there be signs posted? Will the ground immediately under the bridge be blocked off?

If pieces of the bridge fall and hurt someone, who will be liable? Summerfest? The state? Wait — wouldn’t the state be immune from such lawsuits? The patron, under the theory that he or she should have known about the unsafe bridge? Did the Wisconsin Department of Transportation give Summerfest a head’s up that it was going to deliver a major blow to the festival’s attractiveness? Maybe extreme risk enthusiasts will be lured by the possibility that they might be crushed while walking to the Taj Mahal concert! If nothing falls from the Hoan and no one is hurt during Summerfest, can the festival get some compensation for the damage WisDOT has done to it? Was Summerfest mentioned so folks get scared and don’t stop to ask questions about the project? Aren’t patrons of ethnic festivals at risk, too?

And what about that horizontal cracking on the new Marquette Interchange retaining wall? Hmm?

Other questions — did Graef-USA have to bid for this particular “Summerfest patrons might diiiieeee!” work, or was it a no-bid job, like its work for then-County Executive Scott Walker on the O’Donnell Park fiasco?

And most importantly, why, if our existing infrastructure is in need of multi-, multi- multi- multi-millioin dollar repair work, is Gov. Walker pushing ahead with unaffordable, unneeded, multi-billion dollar highway expansion projects? Doesn’t this guy know anything about fiscal responsibility?

No, really, highways are all we need

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Just depend on gas-powered vehicles — any alternatives are just silly. Just ask road builders, some real estate agents and Scott Walker.

Don’t think about the latest from the Energy Information Administration:

Gas prices are expected to increase

Regular-grade gasoline retail prices, which averaged $2.76 per gallon last summer, are projected to average $3.86 per gallon during the 2011 driving season. The monthly average gasoline price is expected to peak at about $3.91 per gallon by mid-summer. Diesel fuel prices, which averaged $2.98 per gallon last summer, are projected to average $4.09 per gallon this summer. Weekly and daily national average prices can differ significantly from monthly and seasonal averages, and there are also significant differences across regions, with monthly average prices in some areas exceeding the national average price by 25 cents per gallon or more.

 

More reasons to oppose the Zoo Interchange plan

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From comments filed with the Wisconsin Department of Transportation by the ACLU, Black Health Coalition and Midwest Environmental Advocates:

Federal law states that federal funding recipients may not, “directly or through contractual or other arrangements, utilizecriteria or methods of administration which have the effect of subjecting persons to discriminationbecause of their race, color, or national origin, or have the effect of defeating or substantially impairing accomplishment of the objectives of the program with respect to individuals of a particular race, color, or national origin.
That the state is planning to increase highway spending while cutting transit in the Milwaukee-Waukesha region is unquestionably a method of administering its transportation programs that has a significant racially discriminatory effect.
Build bigger freeways in a time of increasingly scarce oil while simultaneously decreasing funding for local roads and transit. It’s Scott Walker’s Wisconsin!

But if I break the law, the state won’t pay for my lawyers

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Walker’s Wienies thumb their noses at a judge’s ruling delaying implementation of the budget repair bill so they can strip away worker bargaining rights and impose wage cuts right NOW.

Wow, does everybody get to do this or is it a special privilege reserved for political hacks who mistake small-margin electoral victories for divine right? 

Of course, everybody can’t foist the legal bills onto taxpayers, as Walker is doing (and to think a lot of those taxpayers are the very public employees he is so eager to harm!).

Mr. “Frugal Government” Walker is running up those bills just as fast as he can.

Gad, what a hypocrite.

Before charging forward with Walker’s highway binge…

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…consider this from Reuters:

Congressional Republicans looking to hold down federal spending are considering a transportation budget blueprint that would, at a minimum, be less than half the size of the plan advanced by the White House.

In fact, the base-line figure of under $240 billion would fall below what Congress approved in similar legislation five years ago for road, bridge and transit upgrades, according to sources with knowledge of the six-year plan.

The bill for budgeting transportation priorities in the states is just beginning to take shape within the House of Representatives Transportation and Infrastructure Committee.

And if the feds don’t come through, just how will Gov. Walker get the money for his wildly over-ambitious homage to his road builder masters?