Middletown v. Hamilton

Support Midd.- a couple of observations-

Please don't call the highway off I-75 to Hamilton the Michael A. Fox Highway. That's what it was called originally, but our former esteemed State Senator, Scotty ( I only write legislation to protect insurance companies so that I can get a nice VP job in Columbus in the insurance industry) Nein, got mad and introduced legislation to have it renamed- Veterans Highway. A little internal squabble within the Repub Party years ago. Scotty would be very displeased to hear the Fox name mentioned.

The boulevard system that we have has made it so much easier to get from one area of town to the other. It was a slow go to get around to different areas before they were installed in the 60's-70's (?) Thank former city engineer (manager?) Bill Klosterman for those boulevards. That and widening Grand Avenue from two lanes to four was probably the last good thing to have happened here involving the roads. Both were done under competent leadership this town use to have.


Don't know as yet about the train stop in Middletown, do we? Notice the enthusiasm from the city leaders has gone quiet lately about this. Perhaps it's a dead issue now-don't know.

The school comparisons- Hamilton performing at the Effective/Continuous Improvement level without asking nor receiving more money. Midd. still "not getting it done" while asking for more money to continue to "not get it done". Hmmmm... maybe that's why their levies often fail- ya think? On the subject of new schools being built- Hamilton has probably maintained their student population while Middletown's student enrollment is declining, yet, Midd. has just built larger elementaries to house less students-?????? Won't get any more operating nor building money from us until they can justify the larger schools and improve the performance. More money is not the answer. Hamilton is proving that.

Midd. 1500 Sec. 8 vouchers ...... Hamilton 1000 and a larger town to boot! Figure that one out. Thanks, once again, city council, for helping to ruin a once respectable town!

Hamilton allows the possibility of hispanics to move into older, decaying parts of town. Middletown gets some fed money and knocks it all down to create "greenspace" for later development, which will only come when they decide to get decent paying jobs in town to attract the people to buy homes here. Eventually, these city leaders will wake up to find that the fed money tap has run out and they will be forced to generate city revenue the correct way through jobs/taxes.

I would imagine that Hamilton has as many businesses leaving as Middletown does. Another similarity. Wonder if Hamilton is a more "business friendly" town than Middletown. From what we read from the business folks here on this site, I would imagine almost any place is more friendly than Midd. Thanks Marty K!!!!!   

1 in 29 on a voucher ?!!! Gees !!

 

Middeltown = Welfare Capitol of The State (Not only for residents but for city government as well)

Nelson you are exactly right.  To much time and money has been spent trying to just maintain the ivory tower downtown at the expense of the City's infrastructure, it's business community, it's business amenities, it's school system, the city's ability to draw jobs that pay a living wage, the housing stock, etc., by relying on Federal funds from welfare programs.  This has played a major hand in destroying Middletown. 

SupportMiddletown wrote: [   The boulevard system itself is not the problem, just the capacity. None of the boulevards have a demand greater than 4 lanes can accomodate, but many are six lanes. University south of 122 is eight lanes, and it is probably the least utilized of any of them.   Middletown needs to begin to think about road dieting and reducing all the boulevards to four lanes, except for the recent widening of 122 around the interchange. Not only will this reduce lane miles to maintain, repave, and clear snow, but it makes streets more friendly for pedestrians to cross. The city could also vacate the right of way for the outer two lanes, increasing lot sizes and taxable property.   I was saddened to see so much of the curbs reconstructed with the recent repaving of Breiel and no lanes removed.   If nothing else, they might provide a good opportunity for bike lanes.

Bike Lanes...that says it all.  You are so out of touch.

How much would the Vacating of the Lanes cost? Probably more than the repaving of the existing Lanes would.That would give us another 20 Years to know what we need to do.

 We don't need more "scheming", that is that got us into this mess. We need less intellectualism and more Old Fashion responsibility.

VietVet wrote: Support Midd.- reducing the amount of lanes on the boulevards due to the reduction in traffic (due to the people leaving town and the population evaporating before our eyes) may be one way of thinking. However, when these boulevards were built, there was a need to move more traffic around the city in a more efficient manner. In those days, there was traffic galore out on our roads. Two ways to look at this. Your way of reducing the roadway miles to accomodate a dwindling population as our town dies a slow death, or keeping the roadways as is and building the city to attract new residents that will justify our boulevard capacity. We can accept the direction of a fading town's populace or we can attempt to increase those boulevard traffic numbers through increases in residency. More in-depth than the original topic......