All we ask is for is a little common sense
Many tens of thousands of people couldn't leave New Orleans in advance of Hurricane Katrina because they didn't have cars. Now, the government threatens to cut their housing subsidies and we wonder why, after a couple of months, they can't get jobs to get on with their lives. Perhaps Texas isn't the best place to be poor and carless:
As many as 7,300 hurricane evacuees are now in the Austin area, and many live along the city's newest fringes in apartment complexes that, for the very reason of their remoteness, had vacancies before the evacuees came along.
[...]
The bus into town is a harsh walk more than two miles away, past car dealerships, along roads without sidewalks and under a highway.
"New Orleans felt more like the city where you could walk to the store and buy nachos or pickles," said Joyce Peters, an evacuee living with her husband, daughters and grandchildren.
At the Polo Club [apartment complex], she relies on one of the complex's employees to give her a lift to the Fiesta supermarket, more than a dozen miles each way, so she can pick up some dirty rice and beans.
Have you ever taken a walk along a six-lane suburban road with no sidewalk? It's not appealing in the least. The only thing that makes suburban life tolerable to the people who find it so is the fact that they can get from place to place with a fair amount of glass and steel between themselves and the ugly environs they've built.
Hat tip: Steve Gilliard.
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rj3 | 3:45 PM |
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I went to school in Austin. Outside of the downtown/campus area, it's not pedestrian friendly at all.
