Thirty two new jobs (projected), a million dollars in direct subsidies and millions more in transportation funding later, we’ve managed to move two businesses from one Minnesota community to another. And we call that “creating” jobs and businesses.
Rome (AD 56): They make a desert and call it peace.
America (AD 2014): They relocate a business and call it growth.
Have we fallen so far that telling ourselves lies is the best we can do?
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When we mix high speed cars with stopping and turning traffic, it is only a matter of time until people get killed. It is statistically inevitable because we are all normal people living normal lives. When things get bad on one spot – when a random sample of accidents becomes the inevitable statistical aberration in one place or another, the mistaken signal within the noise – professional engineers will propose some turn lanes or a lane widening or a greater clear zone. They will never propose the two things that would matter: designing non-highways in such a way that people drive more slowly and removing dangerous accesses from those highways where we want people to drive fast.
Read MoreLast weekend we had a really important Strong Towns retreat. Not only did we finalize the agenda for the National Gathering – which is going to redefine all your expectations of what a conference should be – but we made some important progress on how Strong Towns, the organization, is evolving and adapting to grow this critical movement. I left excited and energized; we have some real visionaries working with this organization, as members and volunteers, and being with them is invigorating. Now we all switch to baby watch as our former board president – Faith Cable Kumon – and her husband, our Executive Director Jim Kumon, are expecting any day. August is going to be a great month.
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