Jeff Melcher
David Tuthill
                             

09/04/06  Labor Day Worries and Hopes.

The past couple of months have given us a series of shockers regarding the ins and outs of the funding for the Calatrava String Thing Bridges.  If you are pro-String Things, you haven't liked the news.  If you oppose the String Things, you can hardly be happy with what you are learning about the untrustworthiness of people we have put in positions of trust.  Even a cynic doesn't want their worst nightmares to be true.

9/06, as Emily Ramshaw has kindly pointed out, I have been mistaken as to who first broke the story on the budgetary shortfall related to the Trinity String Thing Bridges.  Not only did she break the story in March in a Dallas Morning News story,

Bridge may shatter budget; Some say soaring costs put Calatrava's 3rd Trinity span in peril Friday, March 31, 2006 By EMILY RAMSHAW / The Dallas Morning News

she had a follow up in June.  So, DallasArena.com stands corrected.

Trinity bridge bids far exceed budget; Dallas: City refuses to go over, will ask Calatrava for scaled-back design Thursday, June 8, 2006By EMILY RAMSHAW / The Dallas Morning News

In June, Jim Schutze covered the String Thing shortfall from a different slant.  Not only are the Calatrava String Things way over budget, but Schutze identifies several areas where the money could be better spent -- on things we really need -- not aesthetics.

First Things Last  by Jim Schutze, published June 15, 2006)

This is all about priorities. Isn't it?    Last week when bids were announced for the first "signature" bridge over the Trinity River, the reaction at City Hall was understandably distraught. City leaders had hoped to erect three suspension bridges over the Trinity designed by famous Spanish architect Santiago Calatrava. But the lowest bid for the first one was twice the amount the city had been able to raise.    The Woodall Rodgers Bridge came in at a low bid of $113 million. By scraping together bond money, state and federal funds and private donations, the city had been able to come up with $57 million. But arts mavens and bridge boosters vowed last week that the bridges must be built. ... The Dallas Observer has reported in the past that the two existing freeway bridges over the Trinity that the Calatrava boosters want to tear down and replace are not considered in need of replacement by state or federal highway authorities ("Dear Congress," November 4, 2004). ... The full cost of the Calatrava project, including all three bridges, would be four times the amount needed, according to the needs list, to repair and replace every broken sewer in the city ($103.6 million).    It would be more than one and a half times the amount needed to resurface every street that needs it in Dallas ($237 million) or to repair all of the 998 outdated alleys in the city ($239 million). ... the mere difference in the bid is two and a half times the amount the city will spend this year to hire more cops and bring down response times ($23 million), this being the city with the highest crime rate of any major city in America. ...

In July, Ch. 11's Sarah Dodd reported we don't have the money to do the first bridge (the least important), much less all three.

Jul 10, 2006 8:33 pm US/Central Dallas Calatrava Suspension Bridge Over Budget  - Sarah Dodd Reporting

In August, The Dallas Managed News, wrote another story on the monetary shortcomings, but with a more optimistic spin that the money's coming.  You will learn later just where the ODB intended to go to steal the money.

New bids sought on Calatrava bridge; Dallas officials hope designers can help contractors lower costs Monday, August 14, 2006 By EMILY RAMSHAW and TONY HARTZEL / The Dallas Morning News

At Councilman Salazar's 8/28/06 Budget Townhall meeting held in the Bachman Rec Center, one citizen said he wanted our taxes raised not lowered so we could "fix" things.  No one else there joined in his position.  He and I have had a continuing debate over taxes.  Like a lot of liberals, he remains confident that government can fix things with the right politicians in power, but the right politicians always seem to do the same wrong things as the wrong politicians did before them -- then they become the wrong politicians, and so on and so on.  There is so much waste in government, city to federal.

Another citizen at that townhall meeting criticized the $500,000 budget for funding two pay stations where people in West Dallas and South Dallas (MLK Center) can pay their bills.  That's a half million dollars which could be spent to much better purpose.  Another lady said she like the pay stations because the stores charged her a dollar for the same service.  We have to spend half a million dollars, so she can save a dollar? 

Then, there's Shakedown Chaney's Ego Park where he still is scheming to get his fat head included.  So much waste when there is so much real need.

Eye Candy; It's overpriced, it's gaudy and we have to put it on a credit card. Yep, that Calatrava bridge says Dallas all over. By Jim Schutze  Article Published Aug 31, 2006

... I have been bitching about the bridge project for five years. My complaints have been based on cost, which is boring; sometimes on hydrology, which is even more boring; and once in a while on criteria having to do with "congestion mitigation," which sounds nasal and vaguely unpleasant. ...  The total cost the city admits to is $409 million for new bridges. The first one is sort of a bridge to nowhere. The other two replace bridges that don't need to be replaced. We would be doing it strictly for the aesthetics. And right now the city only has half the money it will take to build the first bridge.    In 1998 we voters of the city of Dallas passed a $246 million bond issue for the entire Trinity River project, which we were told was about lakes and parks. These bridges weren't even in the picture. How in the world did they ever become so important? Whose idea is this, anyway? ... The moment is coming when you and I, the lot of us, either will have to find a way to pay for the first Calatrava "signature" bridge over the river in downtown Dallas or maybe just give up on this whole Golden Gate-for-Dallas idea. ...  "That's what beauty is about," Dr. Gail Thomas told me. ... "The classical Greeks knew that, and Michelangelo knew this when he carved the David." ... OK, I'm thinking we don't need Michelangelo's David to get us to West Dallas. But no, no, that's not the way to think, either. Donald Gatzke, dean of the School of Architecture at the University of Texas at Arlington since 2004, told me that a new bridge is exactly the thing we should make beautiful.    "A Calatrava bridge is a very romantic notion--to do something that is grand and that appeals to the spirit rather than just the pocketbook," Gatzke said. ... My point is that Calatrava bridges are not cheap. The city has budgeted a total of $57 million to pay for the first one, which will link the dead end of the Woodall Rodgers Expressway downtown with a very bleak district of disused warehouses and small factories in West Dallas and, I should mention, Ray's Sporting Goods, ...    This, by the way, is supposed to be only the first and actually the most modest of three Calatrava suspension bridges across the river downtown. When the city put it out for bids earlier this year, the lowest bid to build it was $113 million, almost twice the amount the city had in the bank for it.   Bill Hale, Dallas district engineer for the Texas Department of Transportation, told me that a "normal bridge" could be built to Ray's Sporting Goods for $40 million. ... he said, "everything above that $40 million was the responsibility of the city of Dallas."    The difference between this bridge and a "normal" bridge is that this one has been designed by Santiago Calatrava, the famous Spanish architect whose bridges have made him a global superstar. Using a system called "cable-stayed" construction, ... That's also why all the bids were so high. Plain vanilla freeway bridges are basically huge sections of extruded concrete slapped down on top of giant sawhorses. ... Every Calatrava bridge, on the other hand, is a unique creation--the kind of very complicated, worrisome challenge that keeps contractors awake at night and can cause the public works equivalent of erectile dysfunction. ... Veletta Lill, a former member of the Dallas City Council and ardent champion of the Calatrava project, told me, "I read a quote in The New York Times once about Calatrava. ... It basically said, 'In the world of bridge-building there is Santiago Calatrava, and then there is everyone else.'" ... I assume the piece Lill quoted was a 1998 story in which Times architecture critic Herbert Muschamp wrote: "When it comes to bridge designers practicing in the world today, there's the Spanish architect and engineer Santiago Calatrava and there's everyone else." ... "It's important because from the day the construction is completed, it will be a defining icon for Dallas."   "There is something that connects us to our bridges," she said. ... "Sometimes when you look at them," Lill told me, "you can even hear the symphony in your head." ...  the icon quiz must be part of a certain party line on why we need Calatrava bridges, because I got it again from Ed Oakley, chairman of the city council's Trinity River Committee:  "Let me ask you a question," Oakley said. "What do you think is synonymous with Dallas? If you think of Dallas, if you look at a picture of Dallas, what icons do you see as you look at downtown?" ... "The ball on the Hyatt is one of those things that's synonymous with Dallas," he said helpfully, "and you see it in the skyline." ...  "Is there an intrinsic value to the ball and a restaurant up there," Oakley asked, "or could they have saved a bunch of money and built a restaurant that wasn't nearly as impactful?" ... I don't think impactful is even a word. But Oakley's point was that the Calatrava bridges will be even more impactful.    "Is it worth building a TxDOT bridge, or do we spend private money and public money to create public art that people and children and grandchildren will look back at?" ... I'm glad he brought up the money. The question of how we're going to pay for the first bridge, let alone the other two even bigger ones,...  That's what I like about money. It's just money. You don't have to be that smart. All you have to do is count.  ... my chat with Mayor Laura Miller not long ago: She said, "I think the first two bridges will get built. And I think it just really adds a big bunch of eye candy that I like. ...  "If we weren't doing the lakes and we weren't doing the wetlands, the trails and the islands, then the bridges are stupid because then we've just got pretty bridges over a ditch with power lines along it."    Yeah, but we're not doing most of that other stuff. ... we were told we were going to do all of those things when we voted for the $246 million Trinity River bond issue in 1998. ... since then most of those things have been gutted because of the enormous growth in the amount of money to be spent on the bridges and on a freeway that wasn't even in the bond package we voted for. ...  TrinityRiverCorridor.org under "implementation costs." "Stormwater wetlands," it says. "None." ... "Headwaters wetlands. None. Boardwalks for nature observation. Not included. Natural lake amenities. None. Whitewater rafting course. None. Park access roads. None. Active recreation terraces (two). None. Amphitheatre. None..." ... All the stuff I voted for: None. ... I didn't vote for the bridges. Or the freeway. Neither did you. Nobody did. We voted for the sailboats on the lake. NONE!    The list is staggering--things we voted for that now are not paid for, because the money has been shifted to the road and bridge items that we did not vote for.    In 2001, the city argued in court that it was not bound by any of its promises in advertisements or by official city pamphlets describing the river project. The city said it was bound only by the very broad language that appeared on the ballot itself in the bond election, which basically allowed it to shift the money in any way it wished. The city won that case.    The reality now is that the first Calatrava bridge is going to get paid for one way or the other, unless somebody comes along and forces a new election to de-authorize the entire Trinity River project. About a month ago I saw something that showed me just how far local officials will go to get it paid for--a dicey chapter that was not reported in the pages of the city's daily newspaper.    This is a nasty little detail way down deep in the bowels of regional government, in the dark inner reaches of technocratic politics where public eyes almost never intrude. By the way, that's why technocrats love regional government. They're the only ones who even know where the meetings are held, let alone when. ... a little birdie called and told me to take a look at the agenda for a body called the "Regional Transportation Council" of the North Central Texas Council of Governments for its July 13 meeting at the Six Flags La Quinta Inn & Suites in Arlington. ... The city of Dallas had been saying it could actually pony up more than the $57 million for the first Calatrava bridge--more like $65 million, although it was unclear where the extra $8 million was coming from. But even if they had 65 big ones, that still left $48 million Dallas would have to find in order to take the lowest construction bid of $113 million.    Well, there it was on the agenda of the Regional Congress of Whatever: "Action: Approve $48 million of additional Category 2 funds from the City of Dallas I.H. 30 Canyon/Mixmaster project to Woodall Rodgers Extension."    Translation: Gob onto $48 million in road money that was slated to help fix the worst traffic mess in North Texas, the so-called Mixmaster where Interstate 30 and Interstate 35 collide in downtown Dallas, and stick the money instead on the bridge to Ray's Sporting Goods. ... motorist/taxpayers have been told for decades that the single most important transportation project in our city is fixing that Third World bump-'em-cars carnival-ride-in-hell joke of a freeway intersection downtown. So now somebody's ready to quietly filch $48 million out of it to pay for an icon? ... First I had to find out exactly what the Regional Transportation Council was and how it could do a thing like that. Bill Hale, the regional state highway director, explained to me that the RTC is a regional body with the power under state and federal law to divvy up highway money between projects, even when the roads in question belong to the state. ... But it did not happen. Lo and behold, the $48 million grab for the Calatrava Bridge seems to have been pulled from the RTC agenda at the last moment before the big July 13 La Quinta conclave, a little after I began making the first of what I mistakenly thought were discreet inquiries about it.    Dallas City Manager Mary Suhm, who has vowed publicly that the first Calatrava bridge is going to get built no matter what, confirmed to me that she knew about the proposal and decided against it: "There was a suggestion made that we might be able to work something through that, but it didn't turn out to be a good idea." ... "It's a bad idea because I don't want to pay that much for a bridge. It's just really not the way I want to do business." ...  Michael Morris, director of the transportation staff at the North Central Texas Council of Governments. He confirmed that he was the one who had put the item on the agenda and then pulled it. But Morris told me repeatedly it had never been his intention to take the full $48 million out of the Mixmaster project. ...  I never got to the bottom of exactly how and why the $48 million got onto the agenda, who told him to put it there, or how and why it got taken off. But everybody I talked to agreed it would have been in the power of the RTC to hoist $48 million out of the Mixmaster and put it on the bridge.    It was suggested to me in very general terms that the item got pulled because somebody figured out at the last moment such a move could have uncomfortable political repercussions. ... "I'm not sure what the vote would have been, because I-30 and I-35 probably have more transportation significance than Woodall Rodgers going across the Trinity River right there," Hale said. ... The really interesting question is how on earth these bridges could have become this important. What is the will? Where does it come from? Who is it who thinks these bridges are more important than the park in the river bottom that the people of Dallas voted for when we passed the bond money eight years ago?    Gail Thomas ... "So I started realizing that one way to get people's attention was through those bridges. That's when I supported rethinking and revisiting the whole notion of the Calatrava bridges." ... In doing a little background for this article, I came across a wonderful book published in 1984 called The Colossus of Roads, written by Karal Ann Marling, now a professor of art history at the University of Minnesota. In the book Marling explains how Americans have used various totems and iconic structures to define their space from the early days of the nation, ...  Marling explains that the territorial marking that people hoped to accomplish with these icons incited jealousy in other locations. ... Marling talks about how the greatest manmade landmarks of North America have always entailed a certain reality-bending trickery, ... "Public na?et?does not explain a positive relish for being duped," she writes. "Indeed, if a fraud bolstered local or national pride, its success was virtually assured."    Could this be closer to the true nature of our desire to build fanciful suspension bridges across our measly little river? Would these bridges be our own very fancy, very sophisticated joke on nature, our hoax? ...  Calatrava bridges are everywhere. They're all over the world by now, especially in Europe and in the United States.    Calatrava's bridges are very distinctive. But they are distinctively Calatrava. Everything about a Calatrava bridge says Calatrava. Nothing says Dallas. If anything, Calatrava is an example of the school of architecture called "brandscaping," more commonly associated with commercial and especially retail architecture. ...  I know that the people pushing for this first bridge and the even bigger ones to follow have the very best interests of the city in their hearts and minds. They believe that the most luxurious brand of bridge is the kind of iconic statement Dallas needs to make in order to feel good about itself. ... When everybody wants in, it's time to get out. Contemporary art is not much different--especially when you've got a guy like Calatrava who's cranking out so much product. ... In an article in The New Republic last January, "Santiago Calatrava's Moment for the Birds," Goldhagen expressed great respect for Calatrava's early work but said he's turning out junk now. Goldhagen homes in on the icon thing. ... Goldhagen works Calatrava over pretty brutally for the way he ignores materials, terrain and the environment itself. Wait until she gets a look at his San Francisco Bay bridges in downtown Dallas, Texas. ... What if the people who have pushed this project so far, including Mayor Miller and Gail Thomas and Veletta Lill, no matter how good their intentions, are not, in fact, the people who know what's cool? ...  Even if the Calatrava bridges are impressive, are they cool enough to make you want to live near them? ... council member Angela Hunt, ... "You know why people are going to move downtown and why they're going to gravitate toward the Trinity?" she asked. "Not because of the toll road and not because of any grand bridges, but because of lakes and parks and trails." ... I remind you of that $48 million. That almost happened. It will happen again. City Manager Mary Suhm has put the Woodall Rodgers bridge out for bid again. They'll whittle it down a bit, fake it up so parts of it can be charged to other projects, ...    The only way Dallas could turn the Trinity River project around and change it back into what we voted for in '98 is by holding a new election to de-authorize the project and start over from scratch. ...

Eye Candy by Schutze may be the most important thing he has done or will do in a long time.  Had he not asked the right questions about the plans to divert $48 million from the Mix Master project to the String Thing Bridge to Ray's, it would have happened.  Most of us, if not all of us, would have never known about it or how it happened.  All we would be told is that the funds aren't there to fix the Mix Master, so we will have to live with it as it is, which is probably what will be the future anyway.

Selling Us All Down the River from UnFair Park By Jim Schutze August 31, 2006

Mayor Laura Miller, speaking from Hobby Airport on her way back to Dallas, was on KRLD-AM (1080) just a bit ago talking about the Calatrava bridge. KRLD must be getting calls on my story in this week?s paper. They were asking Miller things like, ?Why do we even need this thing?? And, ?Isn?t a normal requirement for a bridge that it have water under it??    The mayor said two things that really sent up red flags for me. First she said that a Calatrava suspension bridge, which costs three times what a regular concrete bridge costs, will last ?three times longer,? so it winds up being a good buy.    As far as I have ever been able to determine, this is flat-out not true. People have tried to float this argument for the bridge in the past?never quite this flamboyantly?and it doesn?t work. No one has any numbers to prove or even support this contention.    If it were true, you?d have to think the state would be putting up Calatrava suspension bridges all over Texas. There is also the fact that the lifespan of a normal concrete bridge happens to be about the same period of time you can predict traffic patterns. You actually don?t want to be married to a certain size bridge for 120 years, because you don?t know yet if we?re going to be taken over by Martians and flying around on anti-gravity dog bowls by then.    She said another thing that was quite interesting. She said these bridges are now to be considered flood protection devices, because they don?t have concrete piers that would impede the flow of water. Pay attention to that one.    I have suspected for years that we?re being lied to about the whole need for the bridges in the first place. After we voted for a park in the river bottom in 1998, the powers behind the scenes stuck an entire freeway project into the river bottom that we did not vote for.    Building a freeway in the river channel is terrible flood policy. It chokes the river and makes flooding much worse. To offset it, the city has proposed digging the river down deeper.    But doing that creates a kind of water-cannon dynamic, forcing more water through a deeper, narrower channel, greatly increasing water velocities. I have always suspected that the Corps of Engineers warned the city it was going to blow out all the existing freeway bridges with that deep channel.    Hence: suspension bridges. But they can?t admit the real reason they need the bridges, because then the huge cost of new bridges has to be added to the cost of the freeway, which is already deeply in the red. By that I mean the freeway already costs way more than the value it can deliver in moving traffic. Put the cost of all new bridges on top of what it already costs, and you get a set of numbers that practically scream: DO NOT BUILD THIS FREEWAY. IT?S STUPID. IT?S NOT NEEDED. IT COSTS WAY TOO MUCH MONEY FOR THE BANG.    In her remarks about the importance of not having bridge piers, Miller may be lifting the corner of the tent a bit on that issue and inadvertently giving us a peek at the truth.    The worst thing about the Trinity River Project, as promoted by Laura Miller? It will create the very circumstances that flooded New Orleans last year?bad levees, bad flood control, bad public policy. Her legacy and the legacy of the Trinity River land hucksters pushing this thing will be disaster and tragedy, and I hope somebody remembers to mention it on their tombstones. ?Jim Schutze

This is exactly why I have the doldrums and druthers on Labor Day. 

It's raining, which I'm glad about, even if I would druther be at the Dallas Zoo to see the new Penguin Exhibit. 

I have the doldrums and druthers because events of late (all relating to the Trinity Bondoogle) make it abundantly clear to even the biggest Pollyanna that people who we have placed in positions of power (or people they have placed in positions of power) are not mindful of their fiduciary responsibility to us, Joe & Jane Taxpayer.  Once we put them in a position of power, they become puppets of the elite.

My Dad was always respectful of Our Downtown Betters (the ODB) because he thought those people had to be smarter and better than us to acquire all that money and power.  He may have been right about the ODB of his day, but we have the sons and grandsons (or daughters and granddaughters) holding the power today.  Birthright does not equate to intelligence or superiority, but you can't explain that to the ODB or their suckups.

I'm always amazed how often a smart guy like Jim Schutze will quote Gail Thomas.  If you have ever heard the woman speak and are still mesmerized by her or even take her seriously, then you were not paying attention to what she had to say.  That in itself is excusable because part of your brain will shut down in self-defense after about 3 minutes of her nonsense.  She is a walking example of the Emperor With No Clothes.  There's nothing there in anything Thomas says, but everyone listening is afraid to say it aloud for fear someone will think he or she's too dumb to understand the nonsense they are hearing from the much vaulted Dr. Gail Thomas.

Even worse, Schutze quotes Princess Velveeta Lill who is the most overrated source of information in this city, one of the original Housewife Extraordinares.  You know those pompous housewives on the city council, who never had a real job, but would weekly expand the level of hot air in this town by large measure.  When all the other community people in this city were asking the council to adopt the Plan Commission's version of the Comprehensive Plan rather than the apartment-heavy version recommended by staff, the Princess of Preservation (as she alone designated herself) spoke for the staff version.  During her time at the mike, she mentioned the months and days and hours it has been since she served on the council.  She was clarifying that it had been more than a year since she left and was not breaking the conflict of interest rules, but it wasn't necessary to say since she was not getting paid to speak on either side of the issue -- or was she?

So, I'm in the doldrums about my city when a Chicagoan like Princess Velveeta is considered an expert on what Dallas needs or is.  As I've said many times, I'm sick of people coming here from other places and trying to turn my city into THE PLACE THEY CHOSE TO LEAVE!

As Jim Schutze says, "Everything about a Calatrava bridge says Calatrava. Nothing says Dallas. " 

You look at that picture of Calatrava's dream imposed over our city, and it does nothing but diminish Dallas.  It makes the city look flat and vacant.  It draws the eye away from Downtown.  I have not seen one drawing showing it with the Downtown skyline in the picture.  All the pictures have it looking West toward Fort Worth or Irving.  How does it draw people to Downtown Dallas, when it in fact pulls the eye to West Dallas?

I didn't intend for this to be an all-Jim Schutze commentary, but he has done us all a major service.  He has exposed the ruthlessness of those who intend to get at least one Calatrava String Thing by hook or crook.  He has also shown a lot of cowards in this city that nothing bad will happen to you for speaking the truth.  If anything, more people respect Jim Schutze today than ever. 

It really is a source of pain for me that my friend, Laura Miller, will not let go of this String Thing albatross.  Her support for these over-priced, ugly bridges to nowhere has hurt her reputation.  Had she run for mayor in 2007, the String Thing Bridges would have been a huge negative among her North Dallas base.  I still think she would have won the election, but it would have been a squeaker without the mandate she would need with a new council.  However, with a new council, she might have had some reasonable people to work with, not like Brain-Dead Thornton-Reese, Shakedown Chaney, Sandra Dee Griffith or Weeping William Blaydes.

Speaking of Sandra Dee Griffith, an e-mail exchange between him and some jock sniffer was shared in an e-mail newsletter:

Gary Griffith is just a flat out liar.  "Patrick" is talking about demolishing the Cotton Bowl, rather than refurbishing it.  Sandra Dee Griffith knows -- or should know -- that the Fair Park site failed because (1) Jones wanted too much money and (2) the Starplex contract made the land acquisition cost-prohibitive.  The Starplex contract was another bad deal worked out under Mayor Annette Strauss for the benefit of her husband and his associates.  It binds the city, but Starplex is not paying the city back the revenue promised.  Jerry Jones was never going to build his stadium in Fair Park, regardless of what Dallas offered him.

So, yes, I'm in the doldrums about the future of this city, and I would druther feel more optimistic.  To leave on a happy note, I've made a list of good things that can happen between now an the May, 2007 council elections.

1.    A mayoral candidate will separate himself from the pack and call for de-authorization of the Trinity Bond Project, or at least a referendum on our support or lack thereof for the Calatrava String Thing Bridges.  I'm not optimistic that any of the announced or rumored candidates have the cajones to do that, but hope springs eternal.

2.    Since neither Flip Flop Oakley, Weeping Bill Blaydes or Sandra Dee Griffith can run for mayor and council simultaneously, and since none of them are likely to be elected mayor, they will be gone from City Hall.

3.    Because anyone will be better than Shakedown Leo Chaney, Brain-Dead Thornton-Reese or Convicted Wife-Ditcher Don Hill, we will have better representation from the Southern Sector.

See, you can always find something to lift your spirits.

sb