Thanks for posting this John!Continue readingMr. Bowers’ visit and his comments are almost comical, particularly his quote that “the government is stimulating for renewables to give them a running chance but, when you remove them, the question is can they run on their own two feet?”
A good question! Fact is that neither coal nor nuclear would be able to “run on their two own feet” if it wasn’t for the large subsidies both have received for decades. Now these are nicely hidden subsidies so that the average consumer thinks he is getting a bargain, without realizing that it is us, the consumers, who have actually paid for this “inexpensive rate”.
At the same time truly renewable and clean energies
Tag Archives: Safety
Georgia Power forges ahead with expensive nukes
Today in the VDT David Rodock wrote, Georgia Power discusses nuclear, solar, energy costs
Georgia Power president and CEO Paul Bowers visited Valdosta late last week to talk nuclear energy, solar and what the company has been doing to cut energy costs for their customers.Yet another dignitary visits without telling the public first.
Anyway, much of the story is about how cost-effective and safe Continue reading
Hazard mitigation public hearing 6PM today
SO I called Ashley Tye, who said: Continue readingHazard Mitigation Public Hearing (10/17/2011)
PUBLIC HEARING ON
HAZARD MITIGATION
MONDAY, OCTOBER 17, 2011
6:00 P.M.
ADMINISTRATION BUILDING
327 N. ASHLEY STREET
COMMISSION CHAMBERS – 2ND FLOOR
For more information please contact EMA Director, Ashley Tye, at 671-2790.
Do we want a Gladiator School prison in Lowndes County?
The same reporter, Rebecca Boone, wrote again for AP Sunday, almost a year later, CCA-run prison remains Idaho’s most violent lockup
BOISE, Idaho (AP) — In the last four years, Idaho’s largest privately run prison has faced federal lawsuits, widespread public scrutiny, increased state oversight, changes in upper management and even an ongoing FBI investigation.What improvement there has been is because multiple inmates filed lawsuits.Yet the Corrections Corp. of America-run Idaho Correctional Center remains the most violent lockup in Idaho.
Records obtained by The Associated Press show that while the assault rate improved somewhat in the four-year period examined, ICC inmates are still more than twice as likely to be assaulted as those at other Idaho prisons.
Between September 2007 and September 2008, both ICC and the state-run Idaho State Correctional Institution were medium-security prisons with roughly 1,500 inmates each. But during that 12-month span, ICC had 132 inmate-on-inmate assaults, compared to just 42 at ISCI. In 2008, ICC had more assaults than all other Idaho prisons combined.
By 2010, both prisons had grown with 2,080 inmates at ICC and 1,688 inmates at ISCI. Records collected by the AP showed that there were 118 inmate-on-inmate assaults at ICC compared to 38 at ISCI. And again last year, ICC had more assaults than all the other prisons combined.
Even so, Idaho renewed and even increased its contract with CCA. With one small improvement: Continue reading
$12M to widen US 41 N is more than $7.5M for a bus system
One short stretch of road vs. a three-line bus system to connect Wiregrass Tech, Five Points, Downtown, Moody, East Side, South Side, West Side, and the Mall.
Road and bridge proponents usually mutter that a bus system won’t pay back for years, if ever. And that’s right: bus systems usually operate at a loss because local governments subsidize them for the social and economic benefits they bring, such as these:
This project will provide mobility options for all travelers; improve access to employment; and help mitigate congestion and maximize the use of existing infrastructure by promoting high-occupancy travel.Employment, safety, and less sprawl, all from a bus system.
What road and bridge proponents don’t ever mention is: Continue reading
T-SPLOST public meetings coming up in a few weeks
Monday, September 19, 2011; 10:00 a.m. – 12:00 p.m.; at the Valdosta City Hall Annex; 300 North Lee Street, Valdosta, Georgia; presentation will begin at 10:30 a.m.There’s a meeting in Fitzgerald later that same day, and an earlier meeting in Waycross on Wednesdday, September 7th.
If you’re interested in saying something about the 50% increase in the Old US 41 North widening project or about some of the other projects still on the constrained list, this would be the place to do it. You can also send in written comments. Here’s contact information.
-jsq
Planning Commission meets tonight
The Planning Commission’s remit is not just rezoning cases. According to the City of Valdosta’s writeup:
The mission of the Greater Lowndes Planning Commission (GLPC) is to look beyond short-term solutions in planning for the future of the Greater Lowndes community; to improve the public health, safety, convenience and welfare; and to provide for the social, economic and physical development of communities on a sound and orderly basis, within a governmental framework and economic environment which fosters constructive growth and efficient administration.
The Planning Commission meets at the old Lowndes County Commission offices: Continue reading
Atlanta’s T-SPLOST
Ariel Hart wrote for the AJC 15 August 2011, Regional transportation list approved
If the projects are built, in just over a decade passengers could be riding trains from Atlanta to Cobb County or to Emory University, or traveling new, swifter ramps through the Ga. 400/I-285 interchange, or finding countless arterial roads wider and less clogged, from Henry County to Cherokee County and all points in between.New swifter ramps! Countless arterial roads less clogged! Well, except by pedestrians trying to scurry through the faster traffic.
Why, in the second decade of the 21st century, do we continue with a failed traffic model from the middle of the 20th century? Seems to me traffic safety should be pertinent and should include pedestrians. and instead of more unsafe roads making life unpleasant and unsafe for communities, we could go for roads that serve communities.
-jsq
Retrofitting suburbia —Ellen Dunham-Jones
Georgia Tech Professor Ellen Dunham-Jones spole January 2010 at TEDxAtlanta, Retrofitting suburbia
In the last 50 years, we’ve been building the suburbs with a lot of unintended consequences. And I’m going to talk about some of those consequences and just present a whole bunch of really interesting projects that I think give us tremendous reasons to be really optimistic that the big design and development project of the next 50 years is going to be retrofitting suburbia. So whether it’s redeveloping dying malls or re-inhabiting dead big-box stores or reconstructing wetlands out of parking lots, I think the fact is, the growing number of empty and under-performing, especially, retail sites throughout suburbia gives us actually a tremendous opportunity to take our least-sustainable landscapes right now and convert them into more sustainable places. And in the process, what that allows us to do is to redirect a lot more of our growth back into existing communities that could use a boost, and have the infrastructure in place, instead of continuing to tear down trees and to tear up the green space out at the edges.Here’s the video: Continue reading
Do we need more of the same unsafe roads?
More from Professor Ellen Dunham-Jones of Georgia Tech:
Even Buford Highway, she says, could be transformed with medians, trees and buildings set closer to the road. Changes that are known to slow traffic. But outside of the ivory tower, change does not come easily. Or quickly.And what Lowndes County has sent in for T-SPLOST funding includes:Last year Georgia spent more than two billion dollars on transportation, but only a tiny fraction, less than 1 percent, went specifically to pedestrian safety.
- $10 million to widen New Bethel Road from 2 lanes to 5 lanes to Lanier County
- $8 million to widen old US 41 North
- $3 million to widen Val Del Road
- $3 million for sprawl on Cat Creek Road.
-jsq