City must stand firmly against plaza
The 9-12-07 headline reads “MDOT
offers bridge plaza impact study,” but as evaluated by City Manager Karl
Tomion “vital details are missing.”
He and the rest of us need to know the primary justification for puting
an expansive hole in the heart of slender Port Huron.
Mr. Tomion’s opinion, not altered by the current report, is that this
project is not about solving traffic problems, but is the requirement of the
Bureau of Customs and Border Protection—a subdivision of the Department
of Homeland Security.
In my reading of the report I see
also no narrative on why we must build a new bridge plaza to be more secure.
But on MDOT’s website, under the heading “Why this project is
needed” the first of six stated reasons is: “Enhance border security.”
This reason also appears once in the report’s executive summary
section, but with no rationale developed.
The question of traffic backups is
addressed in the report, in that they are postulated to cost the U.S. and Canada
$3.9 billion between 2010 and 2030, if nothing is done.
Doing the math, the approximate one half share of this for the U.S., over
those 20 years, would be $100 million per year.
Certainly a significant sum.
But traffic delays could be diminished by Canadian trash truck
reductions.
And the $433 million total plaza renovation funds could be spent,
instead, for focused technical improvements on the present plaza, hiring more
inspectors, and offering expanded 24/7 Nexus [now open only 32 hrs/wk, <20%
of the time] for passengers , and FAST for trucks, automated ID programs.
These possibilities receive no comparative cost benefit analysis in the
report.
The “no build’ alternative needs a complete and fair assessment.
There is a new design wrinkle in the
report, that I’d not seen comment on before.
A line of “outbound inspection” stalls will be constructed before our
U.S. toll booths, in each of the three “build” plans.
These are not explained, except in a short notation that sometimes
vehicles can’t be adequately halted before they get onto the bridge structure.
They would certainly mean a new delay for traffic leaving the U.S.
towards Canada.
Their purpose would probably be, in the Homeland security scenario, to
keep a truck bomb off the bridge.
Can the Department of Homeland
Security and MDOT better protect us with an almost half a billion dollar bridge
plaza boondoggle?
The likely, though unstated, security parameters are:
protection of the bridge structures themselves, and denying entry to
terrorists and contraband.
On the first count, these are bridges, and in addition to parking
a Ryder truck type bomb on them, or in an underpass, a boat underneath with a
small missile, or a plane loaded with explosive could all do crippling damage.
[Remember the plane that flew under the bridge a couple years ago--never to be
found or identified?]
And these threats all can come from the Canadian side as well, not mitigated at
all by our extensive Bridge plaza re-build.
Bridges are nearly impossible to protect from a determined adversary.
Completely dedicated hatred is likely to succeed.
True security is found in defusing the hatred, not in thoroughly
bomb-hardening your homeland.
On
the second count, if terrorists had a bomb to deliver to Michigan (and why
choose underemployed Michigan?) they’d surely avoid border checks altogether,
with a power boat trip offloading at any beach from Algonac to Alpena.
The central question I’ve posed to
MDOT / Homeland Security in an unanswered letter to them is this:
Has any terror related incident of any kind been impeded or
uncovered resulting from the U.S. Customs process at the Blue Water Bridge, pre
or post 911?
None has been publicized.
That could mean that in the name of national security
our personal way of life and commerce in this region is being offered up
for the benefit of a new U.S. industry based on unreasoned fear—Homeland
Security Inc.
We need to go back to
Mike Connell’s March 2, 2007 Times Herald article, in which he quotes
David Bradley, an Ontario trucking official, about the at least 10 new U.S.
security measures aimed at thwarting smugglers, terrorist, and illegal
immigrants, “Its like taking a cannon to a fruit fly.”
Fear
is now manufactured as a business for the profit of a few, at the expense of the
many.
For all the personal inconveniences, for all the discouragement of cross
border commerce, for all the impediments to real productive international
industry, are we even one bit safer?
The money pressure of unspent federal funds still can steamroll the
Bridge Plaza project through the center of our community, with no questions
asked and no answers given, and little likelihood, again, of local construction
companies receiving any but token economic benefit.
Hopefully,
the Times Herald, and the Bridge Plaza Business & Community Coalition, and
the citizens of Port Huron will keep the political pressure on, and demand the
light of day for ongoing decisions made at the behest of the federal agency that
couldn’t protect, and isn’t able to re-build New Orleans.
In the 9-15-07 Times Herald, an article lists the Homeland Security
Department as an accounting “mess”, and potentially one of the two most
wasteful agencies in our federal government.
A suit in federal court that asks the question, in detail, “why do we
need this new bridge plaza?” is still a good idea.
Its
time to stand fast for the common sense “no build” [with innovative
technical and personnel based traffic solutions] approach to our Blue Water
Bridge.
The symbol of America has been the soaring eagle that travels far, and
sees with keen vision.
Lets not have that replaced by the ostrich, head in sand (looking for
Middle East oil), corralled in by concrete barriers, elaborate security checks,
and razor-wire border fences in its own backyard.
Yours
truly,
Michael
McCarthy PA-C
Blue
Water Pax Christi
2714
Stone St. Port Huron, MI 48060
810
982 2870
mccpax@comcast.net