Street roots
14
July 8, 2011
One bad accident puts healthy streets in a whole new light
BY ROB SADOWSKY
C O N T R IB U T IN G C O L U M N IS T
I
Healthy Streetbeat is a
monthly column fo r
Street Roots written by
the Bicycle
Transportation
Alliance (BTA). Our
contributors are Rob
Sadowsky, executive
director, and Margaux
Mennesson,
communications
director.
broke my collarbone and three ribs two
months ago. I needed to make significant
adjustments to my regular commute to
work as a daily
bicyclist Walking
and taking transit
is something I
generally enjoy. I
like the extra time
Bicycle
it may take to
Transportation
arrive at my
Alliance
destination, for I
see new sights,
hear new sounds,
and experience life from a different viewpoint.
But I also carry stuff: a lunch, a book to read,
my notebook, a water bottle and often a .
sweater. I couldn’t carry stuff on my body
with a broken collarbone — no backpack, no
messenger bag. So, I loaded up my stuff into
a rolling backpack I had at home and began a
new street experience.
Streets are complicated places designed for
many different users crisscrossing their way.
When our sfreets áre designed well, we move
fluidly with no worries of obstacles. When our
streets are overfilled, the flow slows down or
stops, or in common vernacular, it “locks.”
Our streets do not end at the curb — they
extend through the sidewalk experience, and
when you do that they get even more
complicated. We’U dance our way through the
sidewalk experience in different ways than we
I learned to adapt, to grow accustomed to
might if we were driving a car. We rarely
the new environment, my new dance along
think of our sidewalk traffic locking up like
the street. I also learned to accept the
our automobile congested streets do, but they
indirect route, for shortcuts were filled with
present challenges and roadblocks, just the
even more obstacles. Yes, I adapted. But, I
same.
never enjoyed it the way I usually enjoy
- Rolling with a bág gave me a new
walking.
appreciation for the frustrations that people
I’m lucky, though. I’m able to return to
using strollers or wheelchairs feel every
bicycling, carrying my stuff on my bike. I’m
moment of their walking life. I know every
able to change my dance. Not everyone can
com er in my neighborhood that lacks a curb
do th a t I believe it is the responsibility of
cut (the little ramp to get you up the curb). I
' society to design streets that make our
learned to hope that the next bus or MAX
streets a wonderful dance rather than one
train coming would be one of the newer,
with obstacles. I also know that it is possible.
more accessible models, rather than the old
I’ve experienced streets where the curb cuts
ones with two big steps up. For each tíme I
are directly perpendicular to the direction
had to lift my bag, I felt acute pain. There
traveling rather than at the corner. I’ve
were numerous times wheri I would depart a
traveled on TriMet busses that are more
bus at a grassy location, sometimes wet and
accommodating for people with limited
muddy, with no sidewalk present, forcing me
mobility. What would it take for TriMet to
to carry my bag several feet until I was once
replace every bus and MAX train with the
again on firm reliable concrete.
new accessible model? The recent bond
Rolling with a bag also placed me in a
different location on the sidewalk, particularly initiative that failed would have helped
when it came to intersections. Curb cuts are
enormously.
most often at the corner sharing space with
We have streets in our grid that are still
locked to pedestrians. We have whole blocks
two directions. One corner curb cut is
cheaper than two in eachdirection, but it also
that lack sidewalks entirely. This is a call to
means that one has to roam put a bit into the
action! Let all ofapur regional governments,
street to cross. I was always left with a feeling neighborhood associations, planners and
of vulnerability as I got near to traffic, to
engineers collaborate to build complete
busses and trains. Had I been visually
streets, streets that are healthy for all users.
impaired, unable to see the type of
I also call on you, readers, to get actively
intersection I was about to enter, that dance
involved in the healthy streets movement.
out into the street would be even more
One day, you might need healthy streets just
frustrating — and dangerous.
like I did.
Ultimately, we’re on the same side, even when we’re not
Z*™\ n Aug. 23, 2009,1 wrote about what
I lw a s then known as the Resource
V.X Access Center (RAC) and how a few
Leo Rhodes is a street
activist and homeless
advocate. H e is also a
vendor'with Street Roots
an d a regular conributer to
the newspaper.
of my homeless brothers and I bought a
lottery ticket We were hoping to win and
buy a huge storage
place to change it into
’f ’f f jE
a shelter for all. Of
course, it did not work
out.
I went to the
Leo Rhodes
groundbreaking
ceremony for the RAC
building. I askéd City
Commissioner Nick Fish if I could take a
picture with him. He said yes, and suggested
we both hold the same shovel. The picture
was taken. I then asked for another picture.
The picture I wanted was of me,
Commissioner Fish, and the empty shovels
(there must have been eight of them). The
photographers looked at me like I was crazy
and most of them refused to take it. A few
took the picture and I asked them to send it
to me. I don’t remember seeing any of the
pictures of me, Fish, and the empty shovels.
The reason I wanted that picture, was
because I knew my homeless brothers were
with us then. I could see them next to the
shovels. Some of them teasing each other
about how to hold it. They always did that;
accused each other of holding the shovel
and not working.
Time went by and I asked, Commissioner
Fish for an interview. The time and place
were set, but then my back went out. The
interview was going to be part of a
documentary, but it didn’t happen.
Around this time, Commissioner Fish
asked me if I would write a poem for the
opening ceremonies for the center. I said
yes. I had plenty of time to write a poem. I
asked for information on the building to
inspire me. It didn’t come until late. I got all
of the information, sat it on a table at Whole
Foods in Hollywood, started reading it and
looking at the picture. I even read my
column. I sat there soaking it all in.
Nothing. Nothing stuck o u t My mind was
blank. 1 went through it again. Still nothing.
I still had some time left, and I put it on the
back burner.
I started working on my projects,
meetings, columns, talking to the public,
and poems. In between these, I would try to ,
work on the poem for the opening
ceremony. Still nothing. Every time I saw
Commissioner Fish he would ask about the
poem. Td tell him I’m working on i t
I wrote several poems one titled
“Thinking Outside the Box” and “Being
Human?” Being a frustrated homeless
advocate and homeless person, these words
just fell out.
I was helping on a project with my
brothers and sisters from Nicklesville in '
Seattle, WA, It was a direct action/protest. I
went up to Seattle and when I came back I
had a message, “Need to have the poem.” It
was two weeks before the ceremonies. Man,
where did the time go?
I figured “Being Human?” was a perfect
fit I sent a copy to Commissioner Fish’s
office. They liked it.
So it was all set on June 2 . 1 would read
my poem “Being Human?” on the morning
of the opening ceremonies. I started
videotaping everything. The podium where
we were going to speak, the empty chairs,
the people coming. I put my stuff in the
front row. I went mingling with my video
camera. I came back and sat in the front
row waiting for the ceremonies to begin.
Commissioner Fish came around and we got
to talking. I told him just like I told Israel
Bayer, whom I was there with from Street
Roots, “I feel weird, like I am going to get
arrested.” Both of them assured me that I
wasn’t Commissioner Fish quipped, “Not
now anyway.” We all started laughing.
A couple of months before the opening
ceremonies, they changed the Resource
Access Center (RAC) to the “Bud Clark
Commons.” I met Bud Clark, he’s a real nice
man. I believe this was his cause years
befbrfc.
After the speeches were done. They
invited us to take a tour of the Bud Clark
Commons. From the entrance way they had
some good stuff. They had a bike repair
center, dog kennels, benches, smokirjg area.
Inside they had a big conference rooni, mail
room, pretty good commons area, computer
room, laundry room, showers, lockers, and
it said library but I didn’t see a kitchen.
Upstairs were the rooms; I didn’t make it up
there.
I know some of my friends would have
been disappointed; it was not what we had
envisioned. I’d have to reason with them
and say, “Hey, it’s better than nothing”
Just before I got up to read my poem I
did something I hadn’t done in years, and
that was say a little prayer. I guess this is
what my best friend Joanne Marinex calls
closure.
Days after the ceremony I couldn’t shake
the thought of being arrested; that feeling I
had. I couldn’t get it out of my mind. Then it
occurred to me, since 20011 have been
fighting for shelters, for tent cities, and for
homeless people to have a safe, secure
place. Talking to decision makers, hearing -
them saying “no” to the shelters and tent
cities. Their reasoning was that they were
going to put everybody intd housing. We
would reply, “That’s great, but that’s a long
term goal. What are you going to do in the
meantime?” This conversation goes on and
on.
Then it’s time for direct action, starting a
tent city or camping outside in a huge
group. This is how Dignity Village started in
2000 and it’s still running today. The people
that started dignity village had to go through
the torment of being harassed by the cops
and rent a cops, telling them they couldn’t
pitch their tents and or sleep in certain
areas.
Doing such action ends in arrest or threat
of arrest. Getting back to my original
thought of being arrested.
Why is it that when homeless people and
grassroots organizations try to start a tent
city or shelter there is the threat of being
arrested? But with a multi-million dollar
project like the Bud Clark Commons there
was no threat. I mean, we’re both fighting
for the same thing: to get the less fortunate
in a safe secure place, off the streets.
But one route is a lot rougher than the
other.