[at-l] Foot Bridge

[Renee (Frolicking Dino)]

    Sloetoe wrote

    "A solution looking for a problem" by an organization looking for
    justification of mission.

    When "ATC" changed from "Conference" to "Conservancy", it was the stamping out of the last vestige of the ATC being the creature of the maintaining clubs (and their members), and becoming the ruler-of-all-short-of-the-NPS, and suborning the maintaining clubs (and their members*) to footnotes and after-thoughts for the future......

    .....that change being away from trail activities, and towards an NGO bureaucracy. The "ATC" name change just seals the decades-long deal.

    And so we have a $600,000 bridge, proposed by the organization that at one time was able to secure funding in even the tightest of budgets, because of the bi-partisan observation that the dollars were well and wisely spent. 

    With the trail corridor secured, I would propose the ATC be phased out, or curtailed back to a biennial *conference* 

An excellent suggestion IMO.  The sort of mismanagement detailed below 
coupled with the changes detailed above is why I stopped contributing to 
the ATC and started contributing to some local clubs, the American 
Hiking Society and the Cumberland Trail Association instead.  I just 
can't support such poor management of the AT in good faith.

She-Dino
>
> Felix Wrote: 
> *I can't imagine that stretch of AT/road is dangerous enough to merit a
> $600,000 bridge.* Or, really, even a change. The *road's shoulder is
> plenty wide enough and there are  plenty of places with visibility long
> enough to make safe crossings*. If the ATC wants to throw $600,000 at a
> *dangerous situation*, they should look at the *Palisades parkway*.
> Chainsaw Wrote:
> I and many of the local trail maintaining club agree.  BTW -- there is also *a 
> local road underpass nearby that could also be used at a much lower cost.*
>
> IMHO, *this bridge was the ego trip of a former ATC Regional Office honcho*. 
> Once he got the land for it condemned and taken away for the project, the ATC 
> became "committed" to the project -- no matter how dumb.  IMHO another form of 
> "commitment" would have been more appropriate.
>   
Martha and Jim wrote:

>> Is anyone from that area?  Would the bridge be used by AT hikers only, or
>> would it be used by other folks in the area to get from Pt. A to Pt. B?  ....
> Chainsaw wrote:
>
> ..... some of those buildings were condemned under eminent domain by the NPS for the ATC and have been unoccupied for years.


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