There is a need for sidewalks in Asheville and east Asheville, but not now. Priorities of having our roads fixed and our water systems repaired/fixed should come before sidewalks for a specific community. Just look at our streets in Asheville: horrible in all locations.
The “goat trails” are overblown — take a lawnmower and a weed eater and do maintenance where needed. Look at the new sidewalks in east Asheville now, [with the] weeds as high as your legs. Look at Trinity Chapel Road and New Haw Creek Rd. — just absolutely deplorable and ugly. Look at the street drains in east Asheville – [they’re] all clogged up.
In closing, put priorities where they need to be: roads and water.
— Olaf Funderud, Sr.
Asheville
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Providing transportation and water distribution are basic responsibilities of a functional city government. You are right–we do need streets repaired & the water distribution system updated.
But for many people that do not or cannot drive; sidewalks are just as basic a need as roads. Indeed many factors are coming together to bring more people to consider walking, so we must continue to develop an infrastructure that supports those in Asheville that need a safer means to get around than in that sacred cow–the automobile. We must look beyond our own selfish needs and build a city we can all be proud of.
Many people take their cars and mobility for granted. If there’s a “goat path”, it means there’s enough frequent foot traffic that the ground has been pounded down to where nothing living can grow: a sure sign that a sidewalk is definately needed there. Stating it’s “overblown” is the same as proclaiming, “let them eat cake.”
That didn’t go over too well, either.