Filed under: Uncategorized
I was bitching about this ridiculous expense when I heard it was costing taxpayers to the tune of 100 thousand dollars. Today I learn that changing the name of the Triboro Bridge to the RFK Bridge has an official price tag of 4 MILLION dollars! One hundred plus signs that direct people toward the thoroughfare must all be replaced I’m told. Now I’m just a malcontent and not a sign maker but I feel certain that some abridged (pun intended, feverishly hunted for and gleefully found at the cost of great time to the author) compromise can be reached in answer to these archaic and over abundant road indicators. Here’s a few suggestions.
1.)Get rid of some of these damn things. 139 signs!? Is it really necessary in this age of GPS, MapQuest and general eyeball competency. It’s a giant, crowded bridge that can be seen with the naked eye if you’re anywhere near it and most of the users of said bridge use it so frequently that they could find it with a face full of pepper spray. Just follow the 24 hour flow of traffic
2.)Get some workers out on the existing signs with box cutters and follow this simple procedure. Slice away the ‘T’ in Triboro, then do the same to the ‘i’ the ‘o’s and the curvy part of the ‘b’ ,then a couple of strategic sharpie marker marks and voila, you got The r F k Bridge. Problem solved.
3.) Leave them the way they are!
I’m a pretty fair illustration of the common New Yorker and I agree that Robert Kennedy was great. The same way that gas siphoning and glory holes and the uppercut are great. They all enriched American life and continue to do so with their resonance. But when their image or symbolism is used to stroke a few of us while financially hurting a lot of us it is fuuuuuuuuuucked up!
What is really happening? Do the surviving Kennedy’s have some leverage against Paterson or Bloomberg? Photos maybe? The mayor’s real i.d. that reveals him as being 5’5″ and not 5’10″? Maybe the local politicians are just not reading enough blogs. I keep hearing Albany and Manhattan’s mantra of “We’ll all have to kick in and sacrifice, times are tough.”
Obviously the mayor and the governor have different ideas than I do when it comes to what ‘tough times’ really are.
Here are my criteria for tough times in NY; a daily threat of overzealous, unregulated traffic cops with itchy ticket writing fingers. Possible fare hikes and East River toll implementation. Skyrocketing rent. Plummeting economy. And I’m a white male! Notice how driving over the same boring ol’ Triboro Bridge with it’s same dull name is NOT one of my criteria.
What is their idea of tough times and sacrifice? Being snubbed by a Kennedy at a wine mixer? Having to take the short limo due to touriot* clogged streets? (Despite the claims I have never…never,never,never seen Bloomberg on the train. This town’s not that big.)
While traversing the r F k today I saw no less than 2 enormous, movie ad style billboards featuring the man in question and a paraphrase of one of his famous quotes; “Dream of things that never were, and ask why not.” I guess the budget planners thought that this extra cajoling was needed in order to influence travelers to not turn their backs in horror and flee from the newly titled crossing. Thankfully these signs were paid for by the RFK Center and not by me and you but the quote made me think. I tried grasping for an applicable metaphor for the entire issue that I could involve the quote in. I found none. I just think that Robert Kennedy probably would not have cared about such a trumpeted namesake, he had bigger fish to fry. And at least for this contemporary generation, the deceased’s good name may have negative associations due to this irresponsible expenditure.
By this point, like you, I’m getting bored so I’ll leave it like this. The bridge name change is an unjustifiable expense loaded on the backs of struggling New Yorkers. It’s a tough town to make it in, just look at all the songs made about it(see glossary below), but we want to be here. So much so that we take punishment and make sacrifices. I only want those concessions to be repaid in a practical form.
*Touriot: It’s a word I just made up by combining Tourist and, wait for it… Riot! Its good right?
Songs.1. New York by Sinatra. Is that the name of that song? 2. Shattered by the Rolling Stones 3. NYC by Interpol 4. Rock you like a hurricane by the Scorpions 5. Rap songs by rappers… and many more!
4 Comments so far
Leave a comment
It’s only fitting that I pop your comment cherry, as you once popped mine, all those blogs ago.
I’m impressed. You are worthy competition in the news blogosphere, and it’s really CUTE how you pretend to be a “typical New Yorker”. Yeah, the kind who has been here for 3 years, speaks with a southern drawl, and doesn’t know that the song is called “New York, New York”.
But I digress. You make a good point. Another option would be for the Kennedy’s to foot the bill, or how about our dear Mayor? Maybe he could dip into his emergency fund. A commenter on the Times City Room blog suggested that instead of renaming the bridge, we should rename the yet to be erected Freedom Tower the Robert F. Kennedy Trade Center.
Comment by Breukellen December 10, 2008 @ 2:43 amYou adorable little fiscal conservative, you. I just want to pinch your furry cheek and babble nonsensically to you about how cute you are. I get the gas siphoning remark, but I’d so like to know what financial damages you’ve suffered in the past at the hands of glory holes and uppercuts. Either of those should make for a rollicking yarn. Lastly, I need to chastise you for resorting to gimmicky punctuation, unnecessary capitalization, and lengthy misspellings for added emphasis. If your words can’t stand without cheap crutches, banish them to die in the wilderness like a deformed Spartan baby.
Comment by Dave December 10, 2008 @ 4:00 amOh, and Interpol blows.
Comment by Dave December 10, 2008 @ 4:01 amDave, what your calling ‘gimmicky punctuation’ is nothing more than plain old fashion poor grammatical comprehension with a dash of linguistic ignorance. And I wasn’t lambasting glory holes or the uppercut, I was genuinely singing their praises. Just wait till you’re on the receiving end of both at once and you’ll be a convert.
Comment by grangergreenbaum December 10, 2008 @ 2:02 pm