The Many Perils of Walking

My Friday afternoon has been terrific. Perhaps I'm easily amused, but I just went to a gallery and a pub, and this diversion from drudgery made my day. In fact, on my way to these places, I almost didn't care about the horrible shape of sidewalks on the near northwest side of town.

Although my simple contentment might have blocked feelings of fury, however, perplexion set in beside a parking deck on Marietta Street. I had to actually leap from an upthrust section of pavement, to avoid tripping and hypothetically splitting my skull. This particular square of sidewalk was actually an entire foot above the adjoining section. I silently thanked God that I wasn't in a wheelchair.

Sidewalks such as this, perhaps echoing an imaginary earthquake, are myriad throughout the city. But what is being done? According to the Atlanta BeltLine, money from the city of Atlanta and some Tax Allocation Districts (TADs, for short) will fund "pedestrian connections" around the project, which is dandy; also, to my knowledge, some of the projects on the regional transportation tax list include new sidewalks. Still, much more of the city than what is mentioned is in dire need of new or wider sidewalks. Have you tried to take a stroll on Cheshire Bridge Road lately? It looks like a bombing range.

It seems incredulous to me that anybody would not want to fund better sidewalks, in a major city so often visited as Atlanta. In fact, there are indeed opponents to sidewalk funding. Their rationale is that projects like improved sidwalks and the BeltLine, as mentioned in the following article, provide no relief to traffic congestion and are therefore not worth the money. Never mind that they improve quality of life for urban residents, say these haters; they don't get long-distance drivers home any faster. The Georgia Department of Transportation has, until recently, explicitly stated that sidewalks are automobile recovery zones.

What ought you to do if you have to deal with a beat-up sidewalk? Complain to the adjacent property owner. Yes, believe it or not, it's their responsibility to pay for sidewalk repair.

For those who want to know what I did today: I wandered into the Atlanta Contemporary Art Center and paid a discounted $3 student price (regular admission is $5) to look at two exhibitions, one of which was delightfully raunchy and bizarre. The hours and address are listed here, and the gallery can be reached by MARTA bus routes 1 (from Five Points) and 26 (from North Avenue or Bankhead).

Afterwards, I rode the 1 to Der Biergarten, which serves something like sixteen German beers on draft. I ate, drank and was merry. The goulash (or maybe it was the beer) made me happy as a clam.