This is depressing.
There was a brief discussion of the gate at the 5/16 Borough Council meeting, but the more critical meeting to discuss it was tonight (6/13), not with the entire Borough Council, but at a meeting of the Community Development Committee. There were two Edgewood residents there in favor of opening the gate (Rob Knapp and me) and six (plus 2 kids) who were opposed.
Those opposed mostly lived on or near Laurel St. They brought up several objections:
* when the gate was "open" in the past (e.g. a hole cut in the cyclone fence big enough to slip through) people going through it would dump trash in their yards,
* terrorized their kids,
* broke into cars,
* left shopping carts there,
* people from Wilkinsburg go through there,
* we prefer to be a cul-de-sac; we want to be walled off from Wilkinsburg and Swissvale (one person said),
* "those people" would make the playground on Laurel St less safe,
* when the gate was open/breached, we had 200 people per day going through, now that the gate is more impenetrable (must be scaled), that's down to 20 per day.
Rob and I spoke up in favor, recommending a trial period, mentioning the safety and car traffic benefits of kids not walking/driving on Braddock. Rob pointed out, quite rightly I believe, that the extreme scofflaws are the ones still hopping over the gate, so if the gate were opened, the traffic we'd gain would be much more law-abiding. I pointed out that I live five blocks from the gate and I've had my car broken into.
I suspect that the turnout tonight was not representative, but was the result of someone (perhaps even a committee member) drumming up resistance.
If we do nothing more, the committee will report back to the borough council at the 6/26 meeting that "the majority of borough residents are strongly opposed" to opening the gate to bicyclists & pedestrians, and this gate will remain closed, probably for years. It would be sad to see inertia, fear, and traces of xenophobia and racism prevail, but that's what's about to happen, it seems.
If you care about this connection, please WRITE A LETTER NOW, this minute, explaining why you favor a pedestrian & bicycle gate, how it would affect you, and why you think the positives outweigh the negatives. Address it to Pat Schaefer, Borough Council President, 2 Race St, Edgewood, PA, 15218. And/or cc me at ph@cs.cmu.edu and I'll forward it to her.