When you see people’s signs thanking essential workers, and also see they have not bothered to make it possible for those workers to safely and comfortably get to their bus stop.
When a City employee straight up says pedestrian access on a particular bridge is a priority, but days after the storm ended the snow is still present while the roadway itself practically sparkles. I don’t think “priority” means what you think it does, sir.
When every year the plowing efforts are so terrible that it feels plausible everyone moved out of Hartford and the population was completely replaced by folks who just came here from Georgia and Florida — you know, people who would have a legitimate excuse for pisspoor snow shoveling methods and being blindsided by a nor’easter that delivered exactly what had been predicted days in advance.
When you find yourself telling snow clearing crews to go back and shovel a curb cut because they’re obviously not going to do that on their own and you literally have to demonstrate for them, by climbing over a snow mound and nearly faceplanting in Farmington Avenue, why this is necessary.
When you see the same properties every single year being neglected: 371 Farmington Avenue, all of the bridges spanning I-84 (especially Laurel Street and Sigourney Street), that bridge over the Park River on Asylum Avenue, anything owned by the City of Hartford that is not in downtown.
When you know that the people doing the snow removal never walk anywhere because they would understand basics, like making those curb cuts (exits) and shoveling so people can access the pedestrian beg buttons. They would know that paths need to be wide enough to accommodate those using wheelchairs, and they would know that because if you walk everywhere, you see who else uses the sidewalks.
When a path through Pope Park is cleared, except that it does not connect to anything else except the parking lot, basically ignoring that the sidewalk is mainly used by people taking the Park Street bus but walking through the park to get home. In fact, the snow removed is pushed to block the bus shelter. Is it incompetence? Is it spite plowing? Do they imagine people are driving in, parking their cars, and taking a short stroll, turning around, and going back to their cars? What does it mean when there is Covid testing in this park that can’t be accessed by those on foot?
When you hear officials say how much they care about pedestrian safety, and you can pull up their exact quotes as you are trudging through knee-deep snow, feeling like you might try to video chat them right then and there so they can see that their rhetoric was nothing more than “thoughts and prayers.”
When you see that snow has been dumped such that it blocks crosswalks, and you just know that if a motorist drives into a pedestrian near here, the news will likely report how he was not in the crosswalk, but say nothing about why the person was physically unable to be in that crosswalk. We will hear the same for pedestrians who walk in the street because the sidewalks were not cleared. It’s negligence.
When a business has made no effort to clear its sidewalk, but the parking lot has been plowed to accommodate about ten times as many people as would even be legally allowed in the adjacent building right now with Covid restrictions.
When you are subjected to a litany of excuses, year-after-year, for why the plowing sucked. Sure, we have a pandemic this year, but what was the excuse last year? And the one before that? And the one before that?
We’re in New England. Act like it.
The photos in this post were all taken at least 24 hours after the storm ended. Some of these situations were resolved after four days. Others, like the icy steps from Capitol Avenue to the Sigourney Street bridge, have not yet been cleared.
Richard Nelson
Yes as you say, same story year after year. When I lived in Hartford I dreaded the winter because of the snowbanks, the sidewalks not shoveled and those stairs. So many times I felt that I was going to slip and fall all the way down. That was the way I went to work each day and came home at night. I fought and fought with the powers that be to get the curb cuts cleared, bus stops shoveled, snow removed from sidewalks in a manner that was more than a foot path each year but all it did was make me hate city officials, and negligent others more and I won’t even begin to state what I think about cars and those who use them. (liberals included) I will never forget when friend and comrade Claude Holcomb almost got hit downtown by a driver that insisted that she had every right to pull up in front of the Gold Building and that he shouldn’t be waiting in the street. I can still hear the chewing out that folks gave her and she got her behind out of there rather quickly. He was waiting for the 33 Bus to come home, in the street as access to the bus was blocked by a large snow bank and his transportation chair could not get through. When a complaint was made to the Public Works Department I was told, the streets are done by the city, the sidewalks by the building owner and the curb is sort of a no mans land. That is when I knew, but of course I knew before, that these folks were full of crap. Where I wait for the bus now in East Hartford the property owners on both side of the street not only do a great job with the sidewalk but clear out the bus stops. I think though that most folks don’t think about those of us who walk or take the bus. They just jump in their car and drive. Their religious charity doesn’t extend to us. (a whole other discussion when one considers the treatment of the least of these) All I can say is everyone keep fighting, maybe some day the powers that be will get it. After 40 yrs. of fighting them, well I will leave that up to readers imagination as I don’t want to be jail during the holidays. Be well and safe Kerri and Thank You.