Fairy Tales

Permanent?

Bless Their Hearts

Seems like city hall has joined the special olympics of city services having replace the broken light on the parkway. With a bright white LED creature that doesn't even look like the others. Maybe they'll say it is for safety but what about the one right next to it that works only intermittently? Isn't that unsafe at least some of the time. 

All you can say it "bless their hearts."

Do You STILL Believe?

Before the fateful referendum, Fran (of Fran and Dan fame) had a conversation with a member of The Other Dunwoody who felt things were moving a bit too fast. Fran ended that conversation by saying "don't you just believe we'll be better off as a City?"

And now here we are. Sure, we got a new parkway. But we also got a rapid slide into a lower level of service, particularly with regards to code enforcement and police presence. It is worth noting that a call to 911 will come up empty on the code enforcement front because that isn't what cops are for. They're shuckin' and jivin' in a lip sync contest.

So Fran, what have you wrought?

The Penzoil Sign (at the right) is STILL Illegal

Moving the sign onto the grass may have opened up the sidewalk but it remains out of compliance with city ordinances. After all, THIS is what we were promised.

Last Work By Norman Rockwell

So, yeah, moving the offending sign allows these folk their promised right of passage. But we are obviously still not paying folks at the City Taj Mahal enough to get the job done. JiffyLube may well have pastured the Penzoil sign but they also offer us this.

That's right. TWO illegal signs. You just have to wonder who is getting a lube job. Oh, and does Fran STILL believe?

Cleaning The Parkway

Looks like another third rate delivery from our former City Manager What's-his-name. Irrigation is probably a good idea for Parkway landscaping. For the asphalt? Not so much.

Or maybe drip irrigation would have been a better idea that improperly installed something else. 

Twisted Twee

It was nice to get the new Christmas trees

Left tied you get a Twisted Twee

Six Foot Over

If you develop or even renovate property on Dunwoody Parkway the law laid down at City Hall says you must install 12 foot wide sidewalks. You will note this happened in front of faux Georgian office building when it was rehabbed. Since this code carries the weight of law you might expect this dictate to be enforced evenhandedly. You might be forgetting the first principle of legislation--laws are for the wee people not for those writing them. After all it was the City that put in the current non-compliant sidewalks. Yes there was the property ownership/rights issue, but this is simply City blackmail--you want to develop? then you have to build our sidewalks.

And why demand 12 foot sidewalks (and install 6 foot) in the first place? There was a reason for the twelve footers, wasn't there? Not one with sufficient political clout to spawn a grant industry (think bicycles) but it had to be more than some architect's renderings ripped right off the Mad Men set. You know, A-Lines pushing baby buggies and suited gentlemen tipping a fedora as they pass, all in pencil and pastel. Is that what crafts our laws?

Or is it a code at all? The second principle, in the vernacular, is that all rules are meant to be broken. Now that we have our first major re-development on the Parkway the first thing they are likely to get is a pass on the 12 foot requirement. What about those Olde Farts and their walkers trying to 'Shroom On In? How will they pass? Or when their grandkids visit and want to walk with their strollers to the hardware store to pick up some Duct Tape? What if they have twins? These are real problems. At least as real as catering to all the bike commuters in Dunwoody. It must not look good in pastels.

When City waivers are there for the asking it makes you wonder what other codes and ordinances spilling out of City Hall fail to rise above a mere suggestion. 

Million Dollar View

There is a second, more viable, proposal for McCondos for Old Farts in the dilapidating low rise office park on the Parkway. Prices are likely to start in the mid-700's but with added upgrades and an elevator a $1M price tag is not out of reach.

Depending on the unit an owner is a short lift ride away from a window sporting a view something like this.

That's right. One million dollars to look at the arse-end of a decaying US Post Office. The salt in this wound is that the USPS attempted to close this office consolidating operations at the delivery facility on Shallowford near 285 an industrial area where such views are more in context. Folks who claim to be more Dunwoody than you would have none of it, claiming that where they are from, so long ago, the center of any city was anchored by the post office. The USPS caved to pressure closing the Shallowford facility moving those operations to daVille. As a result the Dunwoody Green Market (yes, there once was a farmer's market in Dunwoody) lost use of the USPS side parking lot and you get to pay a fortune to enjoy the sights and sounds of the USPS in all its glory.

New Christmas Trees

The Parkway deforestation brought to us by what's-his-name has been fixed by a Ramblin' Wreck.

Stumpy

If you remember way back when...when the buzz in daVille was all about a park with pavement and a parkway without (or at least with less) then you may also remember the wringing of hands over the loss of trees. Collateral damage due to the annihilation of the median where they were growing. We were told this cost was easily justified as a small sacrifice to build bike lanes for Torpy's One Percent*. We were also told that trees are the ultimate renewable resource. Funny how that's not being said to slash and burn farmers in the rain forests of South America.

But back to renewables. As it turns out these trees are quite renewable. A full six have been renewed down to mere stumps

with another ten standing brown and dead awaiting the arborist's axe. This represents a significant DOA rate, perhaps as high as thirty to forty percent. With that kind of failure we will be renewing these resources for some time before we see any shade on those sidewalks.

The City's stump generation program suggests that Smart City Staff did not obtain these renewables with any reasonable guarantee. You know, like what most folks get when they buy from a reputable nursery. Maybe they were too focused on getting pavement and sidewalk contracts to the right folks to realize if you don't get a warrantee you are likely to get selections most in need of one. Seems like the closest they ever got to anything having to do with trees was sipping Champagne with execs from Treetop.

But that was Staff operating under the direction and supervision of an unlamented former City Manager. Now we have a bloke smart enough to get into Georgia Tech and with the work ethic needed to cross the stage and pick up his diploma so there is a good chance we'll have some renewables renewed before next summer.





*Bill Torpy's At Large is behind the AJC's Pay Wall.

Road Apples

Smart folks would have installed the conduit BEFORE pouring the sidewalks but the plans laid down under our former city manager's reign seems to have inexplicably reversed the order. Hopefully these intellectual road apples and the brain farts that accompany them will be fewer and further apart going forward.

From The Benches

What Are YOU Looking At?

Fascinating Scenery

If a Lube Job Isn't Enough

Definite Improvement By Smell Alone

Turn Your Back On Illegal Immigration

Is Dunwoody Business Friendly?

Much of the interesting discussion in last week's City Council meeting inadvertently asked (and perhaps answered) this question.

The first was about mandating long neck garbage cans at drive-thru lanes in fast food joints and if you watch the video you're just waiting for someone on Council to jump up and shout:

"Live from City Hall---IT'S MONDAY NIGHT!"

Sadly this did not happen. They were serious.

Now those amongst us who are Southern by the Grace of God must be patient with those not so blessed but by all that is holy sometimes folks living in a world chilled by freon really stress the limits. We'll just have to ask them to imagine--not that there is no heaven...that really is easy if you try---but to imagine their drive thru experience. That's a bit more like hell.

Like the others it starts at the squawk box that makes the ESL student's voice even more unintelligible and as the queue moves slowly towards the window where you pay and you pray (that you got what you thought you ordered) you find an interestingly placed garbage can. Now the do-gooders say this is here because there are soooo many people, mostly in huge SUVs, that have run out of trash space in the back seat so they need to unload between order and fresh eats so they have room for the new garbage. Don't know what part of Dunwoody these folks live in but you can smell it before you see it. So then in their imaginary world you would gather up all the garbage (keep in mind you don't have the sense to have a litter bag in that overblown truck) and toss yesterday's junk food wrappers into the garbage can at today's junk food emporium. Because you're a junk food junkie. Anyway, that's how they see it.

But here's where the southland rises up. You know what an outdoor garbage can like this really is way down here in the land of cotton? It is a haven and breeding ground for all manner of vermin. But not just no-see-ums, flies and rats. No sir. We're blessed with a special creature. One that just loves to feast on what little Coke might remain in the cup thrown out this morning. We're talking about Yellow Jackets. Territorial. Fierce. Angry. Aggressive. Downright mean spirited. And when they launch out of that garbage can--and it isn't just any can because the City is gonna mandate it be a long-neck can with its bat-cave-like maw right beside your open window--they are coming after you and yours like Obama's drones going after a Pakistani wedding party. There will be blood.

What makes this trash can ordinance a business issue (as well as even funnier) isn't just that the City intends to foist the cost on businesses. It is because one justification was "it would be easier and better for the business instead of having to pick up trash in the drive thru." Really? You'd think a for-profit operation would have figured out which is better, cheaper and more efficient without a whole lotta outside help.

And this whole Yellow Jacket Microclimate Ordinance was just the warm-up act. It. Gets. Better. Because the on-deck issue focussed on "for profit"--something the City most certainly is NOT.

This issue was about the increasingly contentious "Arts Festival" which as we've pointed out in the past is stretching the definition of "Art" when we include booths for banks, kitchen remodeling and auto repair. However this is particularly on point when some of these booths are manned by for-profit organizations that are not even located in Dunwoody. But that wasn't really Council's concern. There was some concern about the negative impact to local business--this all but shuts down some village businesses for whom Mother's day is otherwise a big event--but the real concern was around the fact that the festival is organized and operated by a for-profit entity.

Some took issue with the perception that the City was "picking winners" amongst for-profits but there seemed to be little (some, but little) concern that this winner is itinerant and their financial victory comes at a cost to our neighborhood businesses. Of course the low-impact alternative presented earlier by TOD is impossible this year because the City has chosen to run a barrel racing contest on the Parkway while the Arts Festival is in full swing.

What was very interesting was the intense focus on the fact that the organizers are for-profit as if somehow that matters a bunch. Those who've not had much exposure inside a non-profit may believe everyone there is drunk on altruism and works for a dime on a dollar because they're doing good works they really, really believe in. Perhaps true for some folks on the front line, but by and large non-profits are driven by the same growth ambitions as any other organization money flows thru--business, government, you name it. You do remember the scandal of the United Way execs who were flying around in their G-4s and smokin' big cigars don't you? Rest assured, if this organization were non-profit the folks working there would be getting as much if not more money, they'd pay less taxes but we'd get to see their filings (after 3 years).

The profit/non-profit obsession seems deflective. Fact is the City is putting on a party and in new-city fashion we have privatized the operation by contracting it out to a party-organizer. Now before folks get their knickers in a knot, that's not quite precise as the party-organizers applied for permission to close the street and the City's involvement is only to approve and provide necessary security. Makes it a little less clear exactly who they work for now doesn't it?

And don't ask why security at Vermack/Womack isn't just as "necessary" Or why the City is more than willing to foot the bill for security at Food Truck Thursdays. And don't ask how Food Truck Thursdays can be such a raging success but relocating the Arts Festival to the very same location would be such an obvious disaster that it isn't even worth trying this one time. And certainly don't ask "if they were really trying to screw things up what would they do differently?"

Why?

Because we have a representative government and Council have already asked similar questions on your behalf. The City Manager and Staff were specifically asked to investigate moving the Arts Festival but haven't gotten around to finding an answer. Either that or this investigation is the only thing more delayed than the CAD-to-CAD interface. Or perhaps the City Manager and Staff don't believe something as silly as "Arts In The Parks" could ever work so they just don't want to waste their time.

The fact of the matter is that this train wreck is pretty much out of the Mayor and Council's control as the approval of these permits is an administrative matter not a policy matter. If the City Manager and his Staff want an Arts Festival and the third party organizer (no matter who they really work for) want it on Chamblee Dunwoody then that's what we'll have and that's where we'll have it.

Arts Festival Success

By almost any measure this year's Arts Festival was better than years past, particularly in the improved ratio of Arts Booths to Banks and Basement Waterproofing Booths. For the time being we will classify "Bullet Bugs" as art.

In fact it was so well attended that it choked on its own success--at times it was virtually impossible to move from booth to booth as you were forced to body surf with the ambling crowd. Along with the auto traffic issues around closure of the main thoroughfare in the village (red) it is increasingly a mystery why the Arts Festival is NOT held on Dunwoody Village Parkway (green).

The Parkway affords adequate linear space and being two lanes with a median more than addresses the lateral space issues caused by the location on Chamblee Dunwoody and the Parkway be used without closing access to any of the Parkway businesses. The Parkway also provides convenient overflow space in adjacent parking lots as well as the carny food booths. By leaving Chamblee Dunwoody open the significant impact on high street businesses is eliminated yet they still see a significant increase in footfalls due to pedestrian traffic to and from the festival.

Surely someone at Smart City Hall has a really good explanation for not using what they tout as the crown jewel of the village to showcase the Arts Festival.