The Daily Parker

The Chicago Tribune ran an exposé of suburban red-light cameras recently; today they're reporting that one suburb, Schaumburg, has removed its camera despite its success at generating revenue. So why would they remove a million-dollar-earning camera? Because it doesn't actually stop accidents, and it really annoys drivers:

When Schaumburg first signed on to the red-light camera business last year, officials could hardly wait to get started, which is why they chose Meacham and Woodfield Roads as the first of their 10 planned camera locations. That intersection wasn't chosen because it had a lot of accidents -- the spot isn't even in Schaumburg's top 10 -- but because all of the intersection's approaches are in the village's boundaries and are local roads. This let village officials deploy the cameras much faster, avoiding the state approval needed for cameras on state roads.

Almost immediately, that selection paid off, literally, as cameras there flashed as fast as a paparazzi pack, mostly nabbing drivers for making right turns on red without a complete stop. In just 2½ months, the cameras spit out about 10,000 tickets, each a $100 violation.

[But] Schaumburg officials stated Tuesday night that they terminated the RedSpeed contract because crash data, prepared by the Police Department in June, revealed that the intersection does not have a problem with running-red-light accidents nor did it have one in 2008 when the cameras were installed. That fact angers Brian Costin, president of the Schaumburg Freedom Coalition, a citizens group that campaigned against the cameras last September. "I think Mayor [Al] Larson and the board did not do their due diligence," he said.

Unfortunately, other suburbs haven't gotten the memo:

On Monday, River Forest's board voted to conditionally hire RedSpeed to install two traffic cameras along Harlem Avenue.

Sigh. Cameras may not be all bad, but when used to raise revenue rather than reduce accidents, they just piss people off.

Frango Mints, the historic Chicago mint-chocolate candy, have returned to Chicago:

South Side candymaker Cupid Candies has started producing the No. 1-selling Frango product — one-pound boxes of the mint chocolates — in the past several days for local Macy's department stores.

The start of production, to be announced today by Macy's and Cupid Candies executives, comes a year and a half after production was expected to start.

... The production is meaningful to Chicagoans outraged by the 1999 outsourcing of Frango production to Pennsylvania under then-Marshall Field's corporate parent Dayton Hudson, and then outraged again when Macy's CEO Terry Lundgren jettisoned the Marshall Field's brand and replaced it with Macy's in September 2006.

It's about time, too.

Incidentally, I discovered when I worked in Lisbon, Portugal for a few months in 2000-2001, that "frango" means chicken in Portuguese. People in Europe already think we Americans eat crappy food (can't think why); the "chicken mints" I brought caused some commotion in the Lisbon office until people got up the nerve to try them. Ah, international business.

Heaven knows some teams need it.

With baseball taking a three-day break for the All-Star Game (tomorrow night in St. Louis), we take a moment to reflect on how much worse things could be for the Cubs. They wound up exactly at .500, with 43 wins and 43 losses, tied with Houston and 3.5 games behind St. Louis (49-42).

The real story, though, has to be how the Washington Nationals haved lost 61 games so far, the second time in a row they've dropped 60 before the break, putting them on course to lose120 games by the end of the season in October. It won't be the worst season in history (the 1899 Cleveland Spiders went 20-134), but it would be the worst showing for the Nationals.

There's hope. Last year they pulled out more wins in the second half, ending with a 59-101 record.

The Cubs, though: looks like perfect mediocrity, once again.

Update: Mediocrity, certainly; but possibly also bankruptcy, according to reports.

Via Calculated Risk, apparently Wells Fargo is suing itself over a mortgage foreclosure, which Fox Business columnist Al Lewis fails to understand, and so, because it's Fox, decides to criticize:

You can't expect a bank that is dumb enough to sue itself to know why it is suing itself.

... In this particular case, Wells Fargo holds the first and second mortgages on a condominium, according to Sarasota, Fla., attorney Dan McKillop, who represents the condo owner.

As holder of the first, Wells Fargo is suing all other lien holders, including the holder of the second, which is itself.

Most of the column slams Wells Fargo for being stupid, for wasting paper, for abusing the legal process, etc., rather than trying to explain why the bank did this. Possibly, Lewis could read the third paragraph of his own column, in which he quotes a Wells Fargo spokesman explaining that "[d]ue to state foreclosure laws, lenders are obligated to name and notify subordinate lien holders." Guess how you're required to do that in most states' foreclosure laws? Through a court filing.

As one who possesses a (seldom-used and quite dusty) juris doctorate, I understand why this looks odd but is, in fact, appropriate under the law. The bank has this obligation so that other leinholders' rights are protected. Lewis, himself about as ignorant of the law as he is of journalism, asks "wouldn't it be easier for Wells Fargo to release one of the liens to itself?" I'm not sure what he means, because he doesn't seem to understand the fundamentals of real property law. As the bank's spokesman said, "The primary reason is to clear title and ownership interest in a property to prepare it for sale." (Emphasis mine.) It's not a contested suit; Wells Fargo will not be taking itself "to the Supreme Court," despite how much Lewis would enjoy that.

In the alternative I suppose Lewis could mean that Wells Fargo should simply walk away from the second lein, which would, in effect, put money in the pockets of all the other leinholders at its own expense. That would not only be stupid, it could generate a shareholder derivative suit.

The truly stupid person here is Lewis, who refuses to understand what his own sources are saying in his own column.

Since Lewis' main source seems to be the owner of the property under foreclosure, you can bet that if Wells Fargo had done something hinky with the second mortgage, Lewis would be all over that, too. That this is a complicated and somewhat nuanced legal situation doesn't seem to enter into his thinking; the Rights of the People (including—or, given this is Fox again, especially—those of millionaire property developers) Must Be Protected. The Outrage! The Outrage!

In sum: the bank really, really doesn't want to sue itself, a point several bank and legal sources make clear in the column to any person of average literacy. The bank has no choice, both as a matter of Florida law and as a matter of arithmetic. Yes, the bank probably shouldn't have agreed to an 80/20 mortgage during a real-estate boom on overly-optimistic condo project, and as pennance will now have to eat a good bit of both loans. But Lewis would rather waste column-inches getting mad rather than do what he as a journalist should do, which is to understand and explain a seemingly odd event.

Again, though, this is Fox. Understanding is not encouraged.

What a brilliant idea. Get 30 brewers together under some tents, charge a reasonable amount ($40) for admission, and provide everyone with a 60 mL tasting glass. Yum. (For the most part.)

Yesterday I went to AleFest 2009 in the shadow of Soldier Field, and in the aftermath of severe thunderstorms. (Note to self: bring dry socks next year.)

I must confess to a slow but perceptible change in the sensitivity of my palatte as the afternoon wore on, but I did come away with some new beers to buy when I can: Southampton IPA from, of all places, Long Island; Emmett's Victory Pale, from West Dundee, Ill.; and Granite City Duke of Wellington IPA, from St. Cloud, Minn.

There weren't as many people there as I would have expected, probably no more than 500 or so, but by 4pm every single one of them was in this line:

This is what happens when 500 people each have about two pints of ale simultaneously.

Excellently fun afternoon. And, given a small amount of discipline and a large amount of time, I did not overindulge. (In fact, more beer than you might guess wound up discreetly feeding grass and trees. Hey, not everyone likes every beer.

Whole Foods recently opened its new, enormous Chicago store at 1550 N. Kingsbury St., on an old brownfield lot. The old industrial infrastructure surrounding the site—including a still-active spur line railway running down the center of Kingsbury St.—still has some, ah, quirks from the days before tens of thousands of shoppers went there every week. The intersection of Weed, Kingsbury, and Sheffield, for example, goes off in five directions, not including the three parking entrances:

The store occupies the vacant patch in the lower-left quadrant of this image from Google Maps. The store parking lot has entrances near where Weed meets the river, and also near the "A" marking on this photo. North Ave., Clybourn St., and Halsted St., the largest streets in the area, are just beyond the top and right sides.

So a lot of traffic now goes past that intersection. Not just cars, either; with two major bus routes and a Red Line station right there, the store attracts lots of pedestrians. (Parker and I often go there, for example; it's about 3 km from home, so the round-trip makes for a good hour of walking.)

Until this week, the intersection only had two stop signs, one on the southbound Kingsbury corner, the other on the westbound Weed corner.

Tom Vanderbilt, author of Traffic, and Andres Duany, Elizabeth Plater-Zyberk, and Jeff Speck, the authors of Suburban Nation, would argue that this is probably less dangerous than it sounds. Everyone approaching the intersection instantly realizes that he has no idea where anyone is coming from or going to, no idea who's going to stop or go, and no idea where the guy with the dog will choose to cross. Consequently, he slows down and starts paying attention.

I am surprised that it took two months for the city to respond. Clearly we can't have people thinking for themselves at a dangerous intersection. So now the intersection has stop signs all around. My prediction: drivers will pay less attention, except to struggle with remembering who goes first when you all arrive at an intersection simultaneously,[1] with no effect at all on accident rates. As long as Parker and I can get across the street, we're fine.

[1] In Illinois, there is no rule. Probably you should observe the majority rule and wait for the person to your left to go before you.

Wow. You know you've jumped some serious GOP shark when even Peggy Noonan stomps on you:

Mrs. Palin has now stepped down, but she continues to poll high among some members of the Republican base, some of whom have taken to telling themselves Palin myths.

To wit: ... "The elites hate her." The elites made her. It was the elites of the party, the McCain campaign and the conservative media that picked her and pushed her. The base barely knew who she was. It was the elites, from party operatives to public intellectuals, who advanced her and attacked those who said she lacked heft. She is a complete elite confection. She might as well have been a bonbon.

"She makes the Republican Party look inclusive." She makes the party look stupid, a party of the easily manipulated.

"The media did her in." Her lack of any appropriate modesty did her in. Actually, it's arguable that membership in the self-esteem generation harmed her. For 30 years the self-esteem movement told the young they're perfect in every way. It's yielding something new in history: an entire generation with no proper sense of inadequacy.

After reading the column twice, I'm not sure I understand who Noonan is addressing. I think she's talking to members of her own party; I just can't tell, despite her conclusion:

It's not a time to be frivolous, or to feel the temptation of resentment, or the temptation of thinking next year will be more or less like last year, and the assumptions of our childhoods will more or less reign in our future. It won't be that way.

We are going to need the best.

A clue, perhaps, is the column's presence on the Wall Street Journal's op-ed page. Still, as one of the media elite she blames for Palin's ascendancy, perhaps Noonan is talking to herself?

Anyway, the GOP has needed "the best" for 49 years now, but has instead chosen a string of mediocrities and ideologues as party leaders (with a couple of exceptions, including Bob Dole). Not that we haven't presented our own mediocrities and ideologues, but ours tend toward gluttony and lust rather than wroth and envy, which results in much less death and destruction for the most part. Plus ours tend not to secretly hate the people they represent.

Still, it's an odd feeling to agree with Peggy Noonan. This bears more thought.

Yesterday's post "Subsidizing rural folk" generated more commentary than usual. All of it was through my Facebook profile (I cross-post the Daily Parker there), so I thought I should copy it over here.

Debbie K. of Highland Park, Ill., wrote: "In urban areas, cities maintain roads, or the Fed maintains freeways. There are more county roads to maintain in rural areas. A fact also conveniently left out of a similar story when in ran in the SF Chronicle about a week ago."

I responded: "But that's the point: the stimulus money is going disproportionately to highways, which are disproportionately rural. Urban areas have old bridges, canals, railroads, buses, and, yes, roads, many of which need repairs, and which provide significantly higher ROI. Even highways in urban areas make better investments. Of course I want the good people of Kittitas County, Wash., to have decent infrastructure, but more people drive on Lake Shore Drive (U.S. 41) every day than will drive on U.S. 2 through Wenatchee, Wash., in a month."

Debbie K. followed up: "My issue isn't necessarily whether county roads are more valuable than city roads, but that the fact, which is relevant to the issue, was left out of a news story. Kind of like how everyone seems to be leaving out the whole 'Manuel Zelaya's removal was required by the Honduran constitution' thing. I'm so incensed that I can't trust newspapers to deliver the entire story anymore."

Samantha D., writing from the U.K.: "David, I am inclined to agree with you, but our fuel is $5.60 a gallon (equivalent) and there's no more investment in public transport. It's so bad, in fact, that people are driving more than ever and the south-east of England is virtually gridlocked at some times of the day. I wish they would invest in it more, but instead they keep hiking up the fuel duty (on which we also pay sales tax, BTW) and spend the money giving themselves pay rises and gold-plated final salary pensions, which the rest of us don't get."

Nancy R., a professional journalist in Lexington, Ky.: "I think it's a bit more complicated than traffic volume. At least my take coming from a largely rural state that is subsidized heavily by the cities, specifically the one in which I live. But I always expect a city perspective on everything from the NYT. Case in point: story on laid-off moms that interviwed only weathy moms who shared how interesting it was to actually figure out where the playgrounds were and what their kids pediatricians looked like. The nannies had always taken their kids to those place in the past. Really representative of most people's experiences, I bet. The NYT always (almost gleefully) plays the rural stereotype, at last that's my experience as a Kentuckian."

John H. said: "David, do you like to eat? I thought so. Those rural roads you are complaining about are used by trucks to get the raw materials used in most of the food you eat to where you can buy it. If those roads aren't maintained well, then the trucks need more maintenance, which costs money, which is ultimately passed on to us. Also, the porkulus money is supposed to go to 'shovel ready' projects. If these other areas are like where I live, these projects have been on the books, ready for funding, for some time. Where I live there is a project to reroute a state highway that has been on the books to be done for 55 years, and it's being bypassed (pun intended) for other projects as far as the porkulus money is concerned. As for the $5 gas; my brother used to think that too, until he had to pay it, and saw the actual impact on the economy, then he changed his mind."

Finally, Yoshio K., Debbie's husband, summed it up neatly: "Roads? Where we're going, we don't need roads!"

Roland Burris won't run for Senate after all:

The decision, which is expected to be formally announced Friday, comes as a surprise to absolutely no one in local politics.

... Mr. Burris has raised almost nothing of the millions of dollars he would need for a serious campaign, and another well known African-American figure, Chicago Urban League President Cheryle Jackson, has formed an exploratory committee.

So, with Madigan and Burris both out, the 2010 election campaign should be a hoot. I can't wait.

The New York Times has a must-read article today about disproportionately small shares of transportation stimulus money going to places that produce disproportionately large shares of GDP. More simply: we in cities are subsidizing rural roads:

According to an analysis by The New York Times of 5,274 transportation projects approved so far — the most complete look yet at how states plan to spend their stimulus money — the 100 largest metropolitan areas are getting less than half the money from the biggest pot of transportation stimulus money. In many cases, they have lost a tug of war with state lawmakers that urban advocates say could hurt the nation’s economic engines.

...[T]he projects also offered vivid evidence that metropolitan areas are losing the struggle for stimulus money. Seattle found itself shut out when lawmakers in the State of Washington divided the first pot of stimulus money. Missouri has directed nearly half its money to 89 small counties which, together, make up only a quarter of the state’s population.

...Obama administration officials, who have called for ending sprawl and making sure that federal transportation spending is cost-effective, say they are looking at how states are spending the money from the stimulus law...

For example, New York, which produces almost 9% of U.S. GDP, is getting 2.9% of the money; Chicago, at 3.7% of GDP, gets 2.6% of the money. Contrast those figures with Kittitas County, Washington (population: 39,000), which is getting $836 per capita to resurface roads.

We don't need more roads. We need repaired bridges. We need trains and buses. Frankly, I also think we need $5 per gallon gas, which I think would lead directly to heavier investment in public transit, but that's a rant for another time.