Carl Zehr Square renovations

[danbrotherston]

When they rebuilt the IHT, they put in attractive wooden benches. It wasn't long before they were vandalized by spray painters. Removing the paint also removed the finish, ruining the look of the benches. They had to replace them with easier to repaint black metal ones.

I think most of the benches are still wooden ones, no? The ones that sometimes have "bike holders".

I once saw a near-naked man sanding all of the paint off of the bridge at IHT/Henry Sturm Greenway, which I assume is there to help prevent corrosion.

And just north of there by the train tracks, I'm pretty sure someone cut down one of the light posts on the trail. I heard sawing noises, and a woman leaving from there was on the phone (presumably with the police) asking to have someone sent out. I decided to walk a different direction, but the light post was knocked over and cleanly cut next time I went through.

This is a weird thing to do, and frankly, I wonder if it wasn't one of the property owners. They opposed the lighting pretty strongly, claiming that a light 50 meters behind their home would "ruin their lives". I wouldn't be surprised if one of them chose to take some direct action.

And...lemme say, absolutely we can't have nice things anymore. But it isn't just tweakers and taggers who ruin things for us. NIMBYs and drivers too are killing our city and making it impossible for us to have nice things. But as respectable members of society, nobody is really willing to say that out loud.