The Capital's Earl Kelly, who gets paid to attend and write about such things, unlike your loyal blog publisher (and therefore we'll suggest that you good reader go here http://www.capitalonline.com/cgi-bin/read/2007/10_24-25/TOP) did a good job of interpreting what happened at last night's well attended public forum on growth and sprawl in Annapolis.
Kelly interviewed audience member Elvia Thompson, who lives outside the city, in Oyster Harbor. Thompson said,"There is one thing that hasn't been said; Annapolis is surrounded by Anne Arundel County."
The article concluded with her saying,"To my mind, Parole is the new Roslyn," pointing to one of the most overdeveloped and congested areas of Northern Virginia. Ms. Thompson said the high-rise condos being developed at Parole will only encourage other developers to construct even taller buildings on surrounding tracts that are now occupied by shopping centers.
"The camel has put his nose under the tent," she said. "This (symposium) is an Annapolis conversation - where is the Anne Arundel County part?"
RIGHT ON!!! Ms. Thompson, with whom CP is acquainted, got it exactly right.
Referring to another recent article in The Capital, http://www.hometownannapolis.com/cgi-bin/read/2007/10_22-20/TOP, this one being a lead story about potential for rail development in our area, County Executive Leopold and Mayor Moyer trade barbs, each one blaming the other for not talking to each other. CP has heard from the Mayor's people that she has tried, and he has heard from the Executive's people that he has tried. People, please! Will one of you take the high road and invite the other to meet? For gosh sakes, do it at the city/county line at the intersection of Route 2 and West St if you must, but please do it!
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2 Comments:
Yes. Take the high road.
What I thought, CP, is that Earl Kelly missed Morrish's biggest point of all - creative, invested, and thoughtful solutions don't come from the exploitation of zoning laws (sticks), they come from inventive goal-setting (carrots)!!!
And, although Ms. Thompson is right about the county vs. city discussion that must happen - Annapolitans can't just wait and blame until the next 1901 shows up!
Take that for what its worth.
Troy Thanks--as always for your comments. Well, yeah, I am not out to "get" Earl or anybody at The Capital, although he seems to take more than a passing interest in whatever I am writing and loves to yank my chain. The folks I attended with and have talked to since were all a bit confused, one way or another about Morrish and not too excited about Sartori's ho-hum rehash of "more people are coming..." What really gets me is this implicit assumption or implicit acceptance of the statement, "More people are coming."
Yeah--who says? Is growth inevitable? Could a combination of social and market forces stop residences from being built? After all, if you build it, they will come. But what if we do not build it?
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