Stuck in Traffic

Had an early morning dog grooming appointment. 8 am to be exact. Set off for a 3 mile trip. Encountered backed up traffic. That turned into a nightmare. Traffic backed up for miles. As far as the eye could see. This on suburban country roads. Traffic lights working. Cars not moving. Then large semis were spotted on lightweight rural lanes. Something was not right!

Inch by inch we moved toward the unknown. As miles ticked off and minutes evaporated, it became apparent that a serious auto accident had occurred in our region that caused closure of several streets. In rush hour any shut down creates a massive tie up. And this one was a beaut.

Sure enough. A sheriff’s squad blocked a major artery. Southbound traffic was allowed out of the impacted area. North bound had to turn onto a narrow lane either east or west. Traffic already on the lanes could only creep along or escape south at the only major intersection.  All other north south and east west routes were closed.

So we sat. Inch by inch we moved forward to a deeper calamity of stalled traffic. We knew not the extent of all this. After 35 minutes of this cell phones alerted us to the cause: a regional accident blocking a major intersection of major arterial roads. The secondary and tertiary routes were jammed to a stand still. Because the infrastructure of these secondary roadways lead to very few escape routes designed to carry heavy traffic, we all came to a standstill.

This county is one of the wealthiest in the nation. It is home to 1 million people living in well educated homes with fancy incomes. But policy by most governments in the county is not to build any road or traffic plan that would attract more population.

The result: gridlock on a massive scale for all of us who already live here, some of us for 40 or 60 years. This problem has grown steadily worse without improvement of any kind. All solutions are 25 to 30 years behind a reasonable schedule. Relief is always 10 years behind the problem.

Yet conservative voters protecting their own life styles and greedily elevating their own sense of self, elect into office people who do not solve problems. They just monitor those problems and figure out ways to avoid doing anything positive with them.

I’ve watched this approach to public policy for 42 years. I’ve attempted to do something about it. All efforts have fallen on deaf ears. All workable solutions are nixed because of greed or fear of change. The result? The County of DuPage Illinois was not ready to cope with massive unemployment of the latest recession, the loss of billions of dollars in property values, the jump in need for social services or a clear headed plan to move smoothly into the new century.

The county cut its own budget to curry favor with voters. They scotched economic development plans and new highways. They continued to short change social services and reduce staff of social workers, the very people needed to help citizens in need cope with the recession, loss of homes, loss of work, loss of health…you name it and you’ll find a program shut down or paralyzed for lack of resources.

The county talks a good game but delivers little. Oh they blame the problems on the state and federal governments. Yet they alone sit at the intersection of the needs and delivery of the solutions. They chose to ignore all of these opportunities to make a difference in favor of letting someone else do the hard work on somebody else’s dollar.

For Shame. For Shame. The very people claiming the wisdom of smaller government at federal and state levels find out they need help from them to do the local job they failed to prepare for.

Government is not the problem. The attitude of governance avoidance is the problem.

When do you suppose voters will learn this lesson?  Ever?  I’ve watched this develop for 42 years. I’ve talked about it. I’ve written about it. I’ve helped create groups and programs and a newspaper to enhance the conversation about these matters. Still little gets done.

When will America step up and do what is required. This begins in towns and villages and counties and states. It is not all the responsibility of the federal government. But it is the responsibility of all of us.

After all, we are America, aren’t we?

March 14, 2013