I hate to start writing about November’s Trinity referendum this early, because I have to think that people are going to be suffering from "Trinity fatigue" before long anyway, what with the charges and counter-charges that are going to be flying around. But after reading today’s front-page News article that for about the 100th time re-states the fact that people who voted in 1998 knew or should have known that a tollroad was part of the project, I just feel compelled to say something.
I voted in 1998, and I voted for a huge Trinity parks project that I understood was to have a road meandering nearby providing access to the park. I voted for the lakes, parks and those types of amenities; I accepted the fact that a road would be part of the deal, but not the defining part. And then, for the past nine years, I’ve pretty much forgotten about the whole thing because nothing (to the naked eye, at least) was happening with it anyway.
So when the project resurfaced (on my radar, at least) last year as a gigantic tollroad that just happened to cut through the park and also, as I understand it, eliminates about one-quarter of the park land to allow for the road, I re-thought my original vote. I don’t like the way the tollroad is being planned, and I don’t think it’s what I voted for then or what I want to have built now.
So to me, the whole argument about whether voters in 1998 were misled or not is pretty much irrelevant. This is 2007, and as a voter, I feel like it’s my right and maybe even obligation to revisit the whole gigantic project. Thanks to Angela Hunt and her cohorts, I’m going to get that chance in November.
And as things stand now, I don’t like the tollroad as it is being planned, and I don’t like the fact that so much of what is already starting to look like a pretty pathetic park is being eliminated in favor of a tollroad that doesn’t allow access to the park anyway. So I’m going to vote against the current tollroad alignment, unless someone changes my mind.
Saying that I already voted for it once so I can’t vote against it now, even though it appears to me that I have that right, isn’t persuasive enough; can’t you guys in favor of the tollroad come up with something better than that?
