I’ll be talking 2012 tonight at 8:30pm (CST) with Collateral Damage host DJ Wilson on KDHX 88.1 FM. Not in St. Louis, listen online here.
As you celebrate tonight please be safe and be considerate of others. Thank you for reading in 2012 and I hope you’ll stick around in 2013.
— Steve Patterson
I’ve long been a fan of seat belt use so the effort of Missouri state Senator Joseph Keavany to try again to raise fines caught my attention:
Now, almost three years later, Missouri still ranks pretty low among states for seat belt compliance, at 79 percent; hundreds of people involved in traffic accidents still die because they don’t buckle up; and Missouri’s fine for not wearing a seat belt is $10.
“The fine for littering in Missouri is $79.50,” Keaveny, D-St. Louis, told the Ride Guy last week.
Senate Bill 62 is the latest version. Keaveny prefiled it for the upcoming session and hopes to get this measure out of committee. (stltoday.com)
You can find SB62 here, and all the 2013 prefiled Senate bills here.
This is the topic for the poll this week, vote in the right sidebar and share your thoughts in the comments below.
— Steve Patterson
Five years ago today Copia Restaurant & Wine Garden was severely damaged after an early morning fire, .
The fire was arson. On May 5, 2009 the arsonist was sentenced:
Gilbert Summers, a former employee of Copia Urban Winery and Market, was sentenced today to five years in federal prison for the 2007 fire that caused $2.7 million in damages to the Washington Avenue eatery. (RFT)
Copia reopened in June 2010.
— Steve Patterson
Starting to see some positive action on the vacant storefront I first posted about in September (Storefront Still Vacant A Decade Later, Tax Dollars Wasted?) and again in October (Hotel Has Used State-Owned Retail Storefront Rent-Free For A Decade).
Looks like the space is being readied to lease to a retail tenant, after a decade of rent-free use as storage. Maybe it won’t get leased right away or it’ll get leased and the first tenant will fail, but we have to try.
Putting up paper over storefront windows for a decade in a city that needs more sidewalk activity is just destructive. To do it in a state-owned building built by an agency whose mission it is to foster development is baffling.
— Steve Patterson
When you are dating someone who tells you he has never been to the top of the Arch, you make plans to take him to the top. Easy enough, except when you are disabled. Saarinen’s Gateway Arch was conceived long before the American’s with Disabilities Act of 1990 was signed into law by George H.W. Bush, back in a time when many physically disabled people were institutionalized.
The National Park Service website alerts visitors to the fact the Arch isn’t wheelchair accessible. Yet much of the design of the Arch does permit wheelchair use, although the slopes exceed those allowed by the ADA. Other areas have steps but railings are pretty good. It’d be impossible to make the full Arch experience ADA-compliant.
Thanks to Jefferson National Expansion Memorial Superintendent Tom Bradley and his staff for answering my questions beforehand. Depending on someone’s ability to navigate steps and walk on a curved floor they can reach the top.
— Steve Patterson