Chasing the Blues

Downtown Baton Rouge Rediscovered

Back from a quick weekend trip to Louisiana, once again heading from Atlanta to Montgomery and Mobile to Slidell, Hammond and Baton Rouge. We stayed in downtown Baton Rouge at the Hilton, the renovated Capitol House and Heidleberg.

What a pleasant surprise to find a vibrant scene in downtown Baton Rouge, which used to be abandoned at night. Now a number of bars, restaurants and live music sites keep the streets full with fun-lovers until the early morning hours.

Walking around the old streets near the Mississippi, I rediscovered how much of my past life unfolded in downtown Baton Rouge. I worked in several jobs there as a young man, and even lived close to downtown before leaving for Georgia 30 years ago.

Coming home, we again traveled through lower Alabama to northern Georgia. As has become our custom, we stopped at the Pizza Hut in Evergreen for its buffet. It's hardly elegant dining, as we enjoyed at a couple of spots in downtown Baton Rouge, but the salad and pizza bars are tasty, and the workers are always friendly and quite competent. And, a convenience store is right next door, where we fill up with gas for the ride home to Atlanta.

Crawfish, and Flood, Season in Louisiana

We crossed the Mississippi on the trip to pick up the crawfish. Looking down from the Mississippi River Bridge from Baton Rouge to West Baton Rouge, I saw that the water line had reached near the top of the bank.

"If they hadn't opened the Morganza spillway, LSU and downtown Baton Rouge would have flooded," said my sister, in the driver's seat.

Big ships still plowed down the heart of the river, leaving a wake of white turbulence behind. The day was hot and dry; a juxtaposition of drought and high water. My sister turned to the ramp headed to West Baton Rouge, and we were headed through Brusly, divided into Back Brusly and Front Brusly, as my brother-in-law reminded me from the back seat.

I was visiting from Atlanta, interested tyo see this road, La. 1, that I used to travel frequently when my late father had a camp in Bayou Pigeon in Iberville Parish. We would not be going that far today, but would stop in Bayou Sorrell on the other side of Plaquemine to get two sacks of living, writhing crawfish for boiling that afternoon.

As we road, my sister and brother in law commented upon how much the area had grown; and sure enough, what I remember as sugar cane fields now were covered with strip shopping centers, condos, apartments and subdivisions. Appaently, the recession had not hit the area that badly, although Louisiana's state budget was in serious arrears.

Just outside of Plaquemine, my sister pointed out a commercial crawfish pond, and I turned to see a long, rectangular body of dark, still water. A squad of white herons stood on sentinel duty, statoned about 20 feet from each other in rows. They looked real, but in retrospect might have been fake birds to scare off whatever predator a crawfish pond might need protection from.

Headed into Plaquemine, the trip began to feel familiar. I saw the old rusted railroad bridge at the Plaquemine city limits and the lovely collection of ante-bellum homes. The names of the politicians on the eternal political signs were also familiar, dynasties of one or two families that had been running the parish when I left 30 years ago were still running things. Plaquemine had an exhausted, run down atmosphere, as if the 20th century and now the 21st had not quite settled in deeply. To my amusement, I noticed a sign for an Islamic temple beside a low-slung house of yellow stucco.

"I'm surprised Osama Bin Laden wasn't found in southern Louisiana," my sister said.

We turned off on the road that led to the Atchafalya Spillway and the road where my father had his camp. Again, homes, quite nice ones, lined the road where once sugar cane fieids lay. We turned off on a street where mobile homes and trailers alternated with nice houses. I recalled the strength of Louisiana's off-the-books economy. Although the state lags far behind most economic indicators, it's really quite prosperous, with many industries conducted outside of the bounds of govermental accounting.

We turned into a nice house with a big boat in front and picked up the crawfish. I looked at them in their sacks, packed in tightly with their familiar, distinctiive brown-gray color. We threw them in the back, and my brother in law covered them in newspaper to keep them from dying in the brutal sunrays beaming through the back window.

We headed back toward Baton Rouge, traveling beside the stressed levees along the Mississippi. I'd last traveled this road as a young man, and here I was back again at 60, taking part in a unique Louisiana ritual. We crossed the bridge, Huey Long's state capital rising into the bluish-white sky to our left, Tiger Stadium and LSU to our right. Folks had been flooded in the Morganza Spillway, but Baton Rouge was dry, by God, dry and resplendent beneath the hot Louisiana sun.

Delta's Not Ready When You Are

Back in Atlanta after a rough ride on America's once-great air transportation system. To avoid the gory details, we arrived at New York's LaGuardia Airport in early afternoon on a warm, sunny, humid Memorial Day and ended up not leaving until midnight when our flight at last took off for Atlanta. Delta Air Lines kept delaying flights and herding us like cattle from one gate to another, all because of a band of thunderstorms along the East Coast.

According to news reports, the airlines are forced to cancel a flight after a three-hour delay, because of congressional action following the horror story of people being forced to sit on a fetid plane for hours and hours. We were going to fly to Savannah on a small Delta Connection flight from LaGuardia, but sat not even reaching the runway for two hours. The flight was canceled after two hours, not three. A sweet, strongly professional and conscientious flight attendant did her best to make the situation better. We would have all endured another hour on the plane to make the flight, but it was canceled. That's the rules, we were told. Two hours, not threee. No one wants to sit on a plane for 40 hours. Now, though, it's gone too much the other way. But, as one or two folks kept repeating, I'd rather be alive and sitting in the airless airport rather than dying in a crash caused by a thunderstorm microburst.

So, with our flight to Savannah canceled, we decided to try to fly home to Atlanta instead, which we did, some seven hours later. Nothing like seven hours in charmless LaGuardia with a bunch of frazzled, frenzied passengers. After a while, the absurdity and sense of shared misery take over, and people grow resigned then friendly, and then tribal. It's sort of like the seven stages of death, from anger and regret to acceptance.

As we sat in the airport, conspiracy theories flew around; people kept calling their destination cities to have relatives or friends report that the weather was great there. No rain. No thunder. No lightning. The conspiracy theorists from our Savannah flight pointed out that the Savannah pilot had menioned something about lacking the proper paperwork, and that seemed to set us back further in the airplane queque watiing to take off, leading to our two-hour delay and the cancelation.

Later, other folks seeking connections seemed to be of the idea that the airline was intentionally causing the delays, covering up, what? They couldn't exactly say, seeking to blame the visible target of the airline for a  complex situation caused by federal laws, weather patterns, and God knows what. The favorite airline mantra is "it's the responsibility of ground control."

What became clear is that the airlines no longer will put stranded passengers up in hotels as they did years ago. Now, you're pretty much on your on. The airline makes the impression of giving information, repeating the same tape over and over. I think we heard at least a hundred times a  robotic voice intone "Flight 2457 to Atlanta is delayed. The flight is delayed due to weather in Atlanta. Estimated time of departure 11:03 p.m." That estimate was just an hour off, as it turned out.

Stranded passengers kept saying "The weather's great in Madison!" "The weather's fine in Charleston." "It's blue skies in Raleigh-Durham." "Everything's balmy in Portland, Maine!" Later, the overly jocular pilot on our flight to Atlanta explained that it wasn't necessarily the weather in New York, also fine throughout the day, and in destination cities, but the bands of thunderstorms in between.

As we sat, the news blared from CNN TV monitors: the oil spill still spewing in the gulf, BP still trying to come up with solutions, Obama also bitten by the weather when his Memorial Day speech was cut short, the Israelis in trouble for something to do with a ship. The Israelis blew up a ship. What ship? Who's? Much remained murky as Delta kept switching our gates and raising the possbility of further delays.

At last, Delta got it together, and the flight originally scheduled for 7 p.m., then 9 p.m., then 11:03, took off at midnight, avoiding further delays when a flight attendant stopped a pirate catering truckdriver from attempting to open the door and setting off some devastating alarm. (I'm not making this up).

After a further uneventful flight, in which we were able to fall into a fitfull sleep, we at last "made our descent into Atlanta." With MARTA closed, Hartsfield-Jackson Airport dark and lifeless except for the cleaning crew, we staggered to find a cab. A nice African driver took us home on the blissfully quiet interstate. "The airport used to be open 24 hours," he said to us. "Now it closes early."   

Back in the City That Never Sleeps

As I write, I'm sitting in a room high above First Avenue and East 72nd Street in New York City. A cool breeze blows through the window, and at early morning, the traffic's roar remains steady, as it has throughout the night.

Yes, the city that never sleeps. We arrived on a packed Delta Air Lines 757 from Atlanta's Hartsfield-Jackson, already hearing New York accents. A bunch of young kids were onboard, with blue T-Shirts that said "Carnegie Hall" and "the Singing Children of Mobile."  Before takeoff, a sweet looking woman with a ponytail counted the kids once, and not coming up with the right number, did a recount, this time finding all present and accounted for. She sat down, and a stewardess, or whatever they are called these days, shared her relief that no kids had been lost or left behind. At last, the plane took off for the relatively short flight to New York and the thrilling descent over New Jersey, across Manhattan and into Queens.

When we landed, the kids from Mobile retrieved their bags from the overhead bins, and we all waited. As we stood there with our own bags, we chatted with a young soldier who resembled Kobe Bryant. He was proud that Boeing was opening a plant in his hometown of Charleston, S.C., to build huge super airliners. We'd been discussing the 757, airplanes being one of those subjects that men have just enough knowledge of to keep small talk going.

Finally, we walked out of the plane into the charmless LaGuardia Airport -- Frank Sinatra no longer seranades arrivees with "New York, New York," but my mind supplied the sound track -- and to the taxi stand, for a friendly taxi driver who said he was from Guinea. Quickly over Robert Moses' Triborough Bridge, now called the Robert F. Kennedy Bridge, to FDR Drive along the East River, and we were at the apartment we have come to many times over the years. This time, we would poignantly miss the presence of our brother-in-law Woody, who passed away in February. Getting out of the cab, a lady said "Welcome to New York," and I rediscovered as I have over the years how friendly New Yorkers are.

After getting settled, we embarked upon lunch and a walk to Central Park to meet our niece and her young son. We played with the toddler for a while at an old-fashioned playground full of New York children, and then they had to leave for Penn Station and a train trip out to the beach on Long Island. My own son and girlfriend had come over from Brooklyn. We walked back to 72nd Street, somehow ending up on Central Park West, and the trek beneath a charming tunnel that showed how much care about beauty people once had when building things.

My son stopped to pick a rose for his love, and I helped him cut the stem with my car keys, getting stuck by the thorns, and we ran to catch up. Back at the apartment, a nice festive dinner commenced, with another young couple in a celebratory mode. As they talked about their careers, I felt the weight of the old verse from St. Paul, "Life as we have known it is passing away."

A bit of Christopher Hitchens' memoir, "Hitch 22," a bit of the New York Post and the Times, and a bit of watching the Celtics blitz the Magic. Then down came the Murphy bed, and we fell into sleep, as the traffic roared from down below throughout the night. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Tiger Woods Remains Arrogant

Why does it appear that Tiger Woods still doesn't get it? Like the king of the universe, which many apparently still consider him, he summons reporters to make his big announcement. No questions please --the "reporters" are to serve as Tiger's functionaries. Why do the reporters and their employers participate? If he's not going to answer questions, let Tiger buy TV time or make an announcment on Facebook. ...Tom Watson spoke the truth when he said that Woods, although he's won a slew of major tournaments, is not a true champion because he lacks the sportsmanship that is the essential nature of the game.

...Atlanta, once the darling of the federal government, now can't even get funds to build a streetcar line down Peachtree. The idea appears a bit lame anyway, although tourists and bored conventioneers, if any could be found, would likely have used the line for excursions from downtown to Midtown and Buckhead. Most residents would probably cling to their cars. A streetcar would be subject to the same traffic tieups and delays as an automobile. Traveling the streetcar in towns like New Orleans and San Francisco is fun, but is often slow and cumbersome.

...Carl Hiassen, the fine Miami Herald columnist and comic crime novelist, recently ripped federal funding for a high-speed rail line from Tampa to Orlando to Miami. The noted anti-development writer pointed out that the rail line would undoubtedly lose money, requiring exorbitant subsidies from cash-strapped Florida. A family would find it cheaper to rent a car to make the journey rather than take the train, Hiassen said, although he didn't cite any sources for this questionable assertion. Plus, this assumes that gasoline will continue to remain plentiful and cheap.

Why does the rest of the world, including China, Europe and Japan, forge ahead with high-speed rail, while the development of rail looks impractical to folks like Hiassen? He put his finger on a key reason: the United States continues to think about high-speed rail and other infrastructure advances on a state-by-state basis rather than regionally or nationally.

Florida received the money for high speed rail, while Georgia was refused money, but North Carolina was ticketed for some. So North Carolina will develop a rail system, and so will Florida, but they will not connect, because Georgia will be a missing link. Regional projects built with money shared by all three states would lead to a comprehensive system that folks might find more practical and inexpensive than using cars, or planes. Imagine going from Miami to Orlando to Tampa to Atlanta to Charlotte in perhaps a day's time. Flying might appear more attractive to some, but rail would look practical to many, especially if cheaper than flights.  

A Wintry Visit to Central Park

Returning from an unexpected fast trip to New York City, I'm caught in that time distortion upon return. Atlanta feels slower, sedate, uncongested and pastoral.

While New Yorkers brag about how quickly things move there, and how quick-thinking and reacting they are, it can seem like the most inefficient of cities. With all of its visual, verbal and aesthetic excitment, the steady change that constantly transforms it, it's also a place frozen in time. Central Park, the Met, the Fifth Avenue Library, the Village: in the 40 years I've visited New York City, much of it never changes. Each generation of young people, immigrants and workers has a similarity of activity, gestures, habits, speech.

Walking down a street with sidewalks lined by dirty, crusted snow, with a body-knifing wind blowing from the East River, I sensed a sadness beneath the city's motion, I feeling that its great days were waning. Or perhaps it was just that it was mid-February, and we had come because of a death in the family.

On a cold afternoon, I walked from our hotel on east 92nd Street to Central Park. I'd read a piece on Augustus St. Gaudens' Grand Army Plaza statue of Gen. William Tecumseh Sherman, and wanted to take a close look at it; although I'm sure I'd seen it before. So I trekked over to Fifth Avenue and began walking toward the Plaza Hotel (no longer a hotel), passing the row of great museums -- The Met,the Guggenhneim, The Frick -- on the grand avenue. No matter how many times I've gone to Central Park over the years, I'm always astonished that the city made a decision to devote so much land to leisure and beauty.

Snow, lovely in the park, still covers its hills, swales and sidwalks. The sun had broke nout, , and folks are out walking, running, skating and biking. Young mothers push babies in strollers, and young honeys stroll arm in arm. A few bratty adolescent boys throw snowballs and insults at each other.

At last, I come to St. Gaudens' mounted Sherman and winged Victory, towering in gold over the bright white day. Getting close to the statue, I'm intrigued that the great sculptor rendered the horse's male genitalia with detailed accuracy. The statue, dedicated in 1906, presents Sherman as a symbol of rising American power. Sadly, as a sign of the city and nation's possibly declining power, the gold on the statue is badly flaking off and needs re-gilding.

I'd seen St. Gaudens' monument in Boston to Col. Shaw and his Negro regiment, the subject of Robert Lowell's "For the Union Dead" (answering Allen Tate's "For the Confederate Dead"). The Shaw work, while heroic, is much less triumphant, its sense of mourning predominant. The Sherman work proclaims unequivocally the nation's industrial, military, financial, judicial and aesthetic might.

Swiss Experts Give Atlanta, Southeast Mass-Transit Vision

Switzerland is more concerned with developing mass transit, particularly rail transit, in metro Atlanta than the Georgia General Assembly has been.

A heavyweight lineup of Swiss officials came to Georgia Tech this week to lead a forum on developing sustainable transportation in Atlanta, the state of Georgia, and the Atlantic-Piedmont region. The Swiss officials pointed to the incredibly efficient and extensive Swiss rail system, part of a unified transportation network that includes a variety of buses, trams and streetcars, ships on the country's beautiful lakes, and yes, cars. The Swiss contingent, led by ambassador to the United States Urs Ziswiler, made a passionate case for the city, state and region developing an integrated system, including rail, to reduce congestion and traffic gridlock.

The Swiss motives for hosting the event were a bit puzzling. As the event progressed, it became clear that the Swiss, with their deep rail expertise and highly developed manufacturing sector, stand to beneifit economically from the development of rail in Atlanta and the United States. And, as was briefly brought out, the Swiss hope to reduce global carbon emissions, since their country, with its glacial Alps, faces devastating effects from climate change.

The forum also included panels of city, state and region officials, who presented the dismal, if familiar, situation in Atlanta:  too many cars, too few roads and mass transit options, funding shortages, pollution, and hours wasted fuming in traffic. Experts like Ga. Tech professor Mike Meyers, former GRTA head Catherine Ross, and ARC's Tom Weyandt painted a picture of city looking at economic and social disaster because of its overreliance on automobiles. With some of the lowest fuel taxes in the country, imposed about 50 years ago, Georgia has done little to discourage automobile use and the growth of suburbs farther and farther from the inner city. The recession, caused by the collapse of the housing industry, has severely curtailed the Atlanta metro area's sprawl frenzy. Advocates of smart growth and a sustainable future hope that situation continues.

Nationally, experts like The New York Times' Tom Friedman call for a carbon tax, to reduce dependence on automobiles and the need for foreign oil. It was pointed out at the meeting that when the price of gas jumps, autombile travel is reduced, and more people use mass transit. Under Friedman's plan, the carbon tax would be revenue-neutral, with citizens receiving money back for energy efficient homes and transporation modes.

The Swiss officials pointed to their country's overwhelming popular support for their state-of-the art transportation system, paid for with heavy taxes on gasoline and on trucks carrying freight through the country, among other sources. In comparison, Georgia distressingly has lacked the political will for even the most rudimentary solutions to transporation problems.

That's changing, State Sen. Jeff Mullis, head of the Senate Transporation Committee, said in one of the Georgia Tech sessions. He pointed to Gov. Sonny Perdue offering a state transportation plan that would fund improvements through bonds paid for with general funds. Perdue also is supporting elections in 12 state districts in which voters in each area will have the chance to approve a special 1-cent sales tax for transportation. Mullis, from Chickamauga in North Georgia, expressed support for rail transporation, saying his constitutents would love the option for taking the train into Atlanta, so as to avoid that notorious traffic congestion.

Another panelist, Jim Durrett of the Buckhead Community Improvement District, wondered how those people would get around once they arrived in Atlanta by train. A possible answer to this concern is that a heavily used rail terminal in downtown Atlanta would provide  the demand for improved local transportation and the likely development of businesses like increased cab companies. Just look at the heavy number of taxis in New York City.

Local panelists repeated a number of concepts that have been around for years: as Tom Weyandt of the ARC said, Atlanta doesn't lack for ideas, but the commitment to carry them out. Former Athens Mayor Doc Eldridge said his dream would be a rail line down the middle of Ga. 316 and I-85. He revisited the idea of the "Brain Train," a rail link from Atlanta to Athens that would tie the University of Georgia to Georgia Tech, Emory, Georgia State and CDC. A brief discussion rose about the possibility of using exisiting rail lines for the "brain train," whether the railroad companies would allow use of passenger trains on their freight lines. (While Atlanta is underdeveloped in passenger rail, the city and Georgia actually do have a heavy amount of rail freight traffic, one area in which the state rivals Switzerland.) Also mentioned were the federal funds secured for rail between Atlanta and Lovejoy, another project long on the drawing board, but not yet realized.

One of the most forceful and dynamic speakers was former Charlotte, N.C. Mayor Pat McCrory, a Republican who led the hometown of Wachovia and Bank of America to develop its 12-mile rail system. Sadly, Atlanta led the way 30 years ago or more in developing the MARTA rail system, but now Charlotte and other cities are forging ahead of Atlanta in their support of rail. Meanwhile, as was repeatedly mentioned, MARTA faces severe funding shortages. Another frequently repeated point came out yet again: MARTA is the only major transit system in the United States that receives no state funding. Mullis shook his head over the disruption that would result in Atlanta if MARTA is ever forced to stop service for even one day.

McCrory's major message was the need for regional cooperation to develop high-speed rail and other transporation improvements in the Atlantic-Piedmont region from Atlanta to Charlotte. He pointed out that the growth of the region's cities are making it one huge metropolitan area, from Atlanta to Spartanburg and Greenville, S.C., and on to Durham, Raleigh and Charlotte. "The growth can be planned or not planned," he warned. In the next 20 years, the region is expected to be among the most economically vital in the world, but its promise will be hampered by unplanned growth, he said.

The Swiss leaders gave the most compelling presentations, illustrated with colorful Power-Point presentations and films showing sleek trains speeding through gorgeous Alpine vistas.

Gregor Saladin of the Swiss Federal Department of Transportation complimented MARTA, mentioning that he'd found his trip from Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport to downtown Atlanta efficient and inexpensive. But Atlanta came off poorly when he compared the Zurich airport with Hartsfield-Jackson. In Zurich, he said, passengers can get off the plane and find a multitude of connections to European and Swiss rail lines, light rail, and other options. 

Saladin, along two other Swiss officials, glowed with pride over the economic vitality of their country. He pointed out that Switzerland recently gained the No. 1 spot in the Global Competitiveness Index, knocking the United States to No. 2.

He ticked off a dizzying array of statistics that showed Switzerland the most rail-friendly place on earth. In 2007, the Swiss led the world in train use, with each person traveling an average of 1,307 miles by rail during the year, beating out Japan. Meanwhile, each person in the United States traveled an average 87 miles by train. He didn't say it, but undoubtedly, that U.S. number is skewed by folks using trains in rail-heavy corridors of the Northeast and West Coast. In many American cities, the stat would be 0 miles of train travel a year.

Still, with all of the rail options, two-thirds of the trips in Switzerland are still made by car. When asked why this is so, Saladin pointed to the country's geography. A bit smaller than Georgia, Switzerland has two-thirds of its terrority taken up by the Alps. He said that "rail can't go everywhere," and that mountain trips are often made by car. Also, people still find it convenient to make small trips from suburb to suburb by car.

But Switzerland, although it does have its own urban congestion and pollution, is nowhere near as auto-dependent as the U.S. Ziswiler pointed out that in Zurich, 58% of the people have no car. Salidan said that in the United States, there is one car for each person, but in Switzerland, it's one car for every two people. He also gave a brief explanation of his participation in Switzerland's shared mobility program, a cooperative effort in which people share auto availability. When needed, Salidan can reserve the use of a car, choosing one of the necessary size for what he needs.

The most thrilling presentation came from Dr. Renzo Simoni, CEO of  AlpTransit Gotthard LTD, the company charged with digging a massive tunnel through a section of the Alps. Simoni presented an amazing story of engineering ingenuity and audacity in completing the 35-mile long tunnel, which will be the world's largest upon completion. The tunnel, being bored and blasted on the same level as the country's cities, is below the highest point of the mountain above it by 2,500 meters, 8,500 feet.

The rock dug out is being recycled into concrete for the construction of the tubes that will seal the tunnel. Other debris is being used to build islands that evolve into wildlife sanctuaries  in the country's lakes. This recycling of the mountain materials starkly contrasts with the U.S. coal companies' mountain removal projects in states like Kentucky, where the debris is dumped into mountain rivers, leaving horrible pollution from hazardous materials. Also, unlike the coal companies here, AlpTransit restores to a near natural condition areas where it bores shafts into the mountain. The shafts are used as entry and exit points for those constructing the tunnel.

A main reason for the tunnel, which will be used solely for rail passenger and freight travel, is to significantly reduce the number of heavy trucks coming through Switzerland. The truck traffic, spurred by the advent of the container system in world ports, grew heavily during the 1970s, increasing air pollution and damage to the Alps. Curtailing the truck traffic was a major factor in the Swiss people's approval of the tunnel project. A key element in funding the tunnel is taxes on the trucks, whose operators must pay a fee for every foot they travel in the country.

Simoni expects the tunnel, including the smaller Centuri tunnel, to be operational by 2019. The company has access to a fund of a maximum $13.2 billion for the work. When the tunnel's finished, the trip from Zurich to Milan will be cut from four hours, 10 minutes, to two hours, 40 minutes.

Another Swiss speaker, Michaela Stoeckli, general manager of the Swiss Rail Industry Association, energetically espoused the benefits of the country's rail industry. One exciting job: driving a train through the Alps. Seeking to recruit adventurous Tech students, she mentioned high-paying engineering and consulting jobs: Switzerland has one of the highest standards of living in the world.

Stoeckli gave an impressive list of companies that have risen from the country's rail focus. The country prides itself on performance: the trains arrive and leave on time, and one company does nothing but make timetables to keep the system moving. She said that the company also keeps France's trains on time.

Other companies: Mobotime, which manufactures rail station clocks used all over the world; Stadler, which makes rolling stock, i.e. rail cars; Hess, which manufactures buses. Another Swiss company leads the world in the manufacture of high-tech diesel filters. Stoeckli said that with the country's expertise, it's not afraid of growing competition in these areas from the Chinese.

On the first day of the event, the AJC reported one bit of news that offered perhaps a strong step locally toward the kind of transportation diversity espoused by the Swiss. The Georgia Department of Transporation, told the DOT board that it intends to officially suggest a proposed mass transit terminal in downtown Atlanta to private developers. According to the AJC's April Hart, the DOT hopes to ask for interested companies' qualifications by March.

The public-private project would connect to MARTA, and may (we hope that changes  to will) have space for light rail, commuter rail, commuter business and inner-city rail like Amtrak. It may also have the ability to handle high-speed rail in the future.

Such a multimodal is an essential addition to Atlanta's transporation infrastructure. With the help of the Swiss, the trains could even arrive and depart on time.

 

 

A Song of Praise as the Old Year Wanes

I take it that many are saying good riddance to 2009 and "the aughts" decade.

While the year and decade brought professional, economic and personal challenges, I've decided to focus on the good parts of the last 10 years. One of the highlights of 2009 for me was reading Mary Karr's "Lit," an acount of the poet and memoirist's recovery from alcoholism and her spiritual awakening through Catholicism. I was struck by her conception of prayer as expressing gratitude for life's blessings. In that spirit, I look back, and look ahead to the future.

During 2009, my wonderful wife and I made great trips to San Francisco, Brooklyn and Savannah. A highlight of the San Francisco trip for me was seeing the great Legion of Honor art collection, then finding my way to the pathways along the cliffs overlooking the Pacific Ocean. The farthest point West in the United States: full of historical, geographical, artistic and literary sigificance.  We also loved the Fillmore street neighborhood near our hotel in Japantown, and walking through the city's hilly and glorious streets. How wonderful to see historic spots where longtime heroes walked: City Lights Bookstore, the Hungry I, Fillmore East. The city of Herb Caen still lives. We loved seeing our daughter, Sara, happily living in the beautiful city by the bay and working for the federal public defender's office.

Brooklyn, where we traveled to celebrate the wedding of our friends Tim and Pui, was another memorable experience discovering a great city. Walking through Brooklyn's neighborhoods, enjoying its restuarants, bookstores and art galleries, ambling through Prospect Park, all made us aware that Brooklyn is a world-class city in its own right.

Savannah was also marvelous, with his layers of history and culture and serendipitous downtown experiences.

During the year, I increased my participation on Facebook. While I had sympathy with my son's groaning over we baby boomers taking over what had begun as a defining institution for his generation, I valued reconnecting with old friends and keeping up with their lives and interests. I also enjoyed writing this blog, Chasing the Blues, and my other one, Southern Bookman. My former AJC colleagues' many blogs and Web ventures impressed and enthralled me with their creativity, wit and entrepreneurship.

I'm glad to live in a neighborhood with so many useful and enjoyable businesses, from restaurants to grocery stores to bookstores, to gas stations. A special note of thanks to the friendly staff at the PPC health club and to my fellow exercise sufferers, for their warmth and encouragement. Atlanta sometimes appears to be falling behind other cities it once led, but when I drive down Peachtree or see the Buckhead skyline standing proudly against the bright blue horizon, I feel proud of my adopted city.

I'll also remember the decade as the one in which our children grew into wonderful, productive and caring adults. Each of them has special gifts to contribute to the world.

In closing, I mourn those lost, in that horrible morning of Sept. 11, in Iraq and Afghanistan and throughout the world. Colleagues who passed away, or who I no longer see everyday as I did for years, remain bright in my memory. Farewell to those great writers and artists like John Updike, Frank McCourt, Paul Newman and Marlon Brando.

A new decade dawns, full of new challenges and the possibility of great accomplishments. For those in pain, I offer the old chestnut that sometimes we are making the most progress when we appear stuck in the depths. As the most interesting man in the world would say, stay thirsty, my friends. 

Taking a Walk, or Two or Three

I love walking on trips and will long savor wandering in London, Brooklyn, San Francisco, Manhattan and Savannah. At home, I enjoy hiking down neighborhood streets. With my wife in Vegas to see Bette Midler and old college chums, I took several nice solitary walks this weekend.

On Friday night, I sauntered over to the Blue Heron Nature Center for an art exhibit. When I discovered that the back gate to the Blue Heron was closed, I went around past the pond to Roswell Road, happy to discover a well-lit sidewalk there instead of the overgrown, dark path I expected. Headed down the driveway and over the bridge, I was dismayed to see the parking lot full of cars, especially since the Blue Heron is the home of the Audubon Society. There was something disconcerting about the conflict between the Blue Heron and Audubon's mission and the car-filled lot. Atlanta is not a walking city, and people have to go most everywhere by auto, even when they are celebrating the enviornment. Only one other neighborhood person was at the reception; I suppose everyone was at a meeting to discuss the building of new sidewalks on Wieuca Road for the new Sarah Smith school annex.

The next afternoon, Saturday, I walked along the sidewalks on the other side of Wieuca from my home to Borders Bookstore. Although Wieuca is a busy urban road, where drivers whiz by despite the 25-MPH speed limit signs, it's one of my favorite walks. I've walked it countless times in the more than 20 years we've lived in the neighorhood. Actually, the 25-mph speed limit is moot, since someone won a lawsuit or received a judgment that the speed limit was too low for a road like Wieuca.

As usual, I found the walk loaded with sensory delights. Folks were busy with their blowers cleaning up leaves. A young guy planted a flowerbed. At the Wieuca Road Baptist Church, I heard the whoosh, whoosh, whoosh of a paint gun, and looked up to see a man dangling from a rope, halfway up the steeple, repainting its whiteness. Between the church and a now completed high-rise office building, with dark gray-black glass reflecting clouds, I noticed a green field with soccer goals and wondered what league used it. Probably one at Wieuca Road Baptist.

At the busy intersection of Wieuca and Peachtree Road, I pushed the traffic-light button and waited for the walking man to light up, signaling that I could cross. In Borders, a camera crew blocked the newsstand section, where rows of chairs had been set up, surrounded by bright floodlights, monitors, booms, etc. A sign said that Mike Huckabee would be signing copies of his book at 4 p.m., and two hours before, the Huck fans were already lining up. As Republicans go, I like the genial Huckabee, who actually showed a bit of wit during the campaign for president, a pretty rare occurrence these days. I thought about going home and coming back with my guitar to see if he wanted to jam with his bass, although it occurred to me he probably wouldn't be bringing his bass along to the signing. I supposed the camera crew was there to film Huckabee for C-Span's book TV. Anyway, I tripped along the wires to find a Piano magazine I'd wanted to buy and beat a hasty exit before too many more Hucksters showed up.

Headed back home, I remembered the damsel in distress I'd helped on Wieuca on a similar Saturday afteroon a few years back. The poor woman from Alabama had gotten lost in Buckhead and was discombobulated about finding her way back to Muscle Shoals, Montgomery, Huntsville, Birmingham, or wherever she was from. I calmed her down and told her how to get on Ga. 400 to downtown Atlanta and I-20 headed West. Recalling her speeding off in her Mercedes convertible, or perhaps I'd made that up, I also remembered the young Japanese woman I'd helped one day when the MARTA train broke down on a cold February day. She said that such a thing would not happen in Tokyo. I told her that was undoubtedly correct, and helped her across the station to another train, which took us south. At her stop, she walked away with a smile and a wave, as if we were caught in a movie. 

At the site of the Sarah Smith annex, I heard the whir and echoes of construction. Seeing big sewer pipes by the driveway, I was wondering whether they were in a hurry to complete the school before the January opening. I was also amazed at the size of the buidling: It looked big enough for a high school, although only three grades, 3 through 5, will be there. The building definitely looked state of the art. My children had begun going to the school more than 20 years before, when it was still raggedy.

On Sunday, right at noon, I walked the other way, across Roswell Road to Interlochen to Chastain Park. Seeing golfers at the North Fulton Course, around which the Chastain trail runs, I remembered my golfing days. I'd spent many an hour along those same fairways, sand traps and greens. At the baseball fields, gym and football fields, I remembered the many hours we'd spent there when my children were in leagues. Now the sunlit immaculately green fields were filled with a new generation of families. I kept passing young moms and dads, pushing kids in strollers or three-wheeled running trams. Now, my children had grown up in a blurred rush of Sunday afternoons, soccer and football games, Christmas plays and Thanksgiving projects.

Back on Roswell Road, I waited for the traffic to die down and crossed the road. Kids in their 20s sat on the patio at Ribs Etc., watching NFL games, and I thought of going over to ask if anyone had heard a Saints score. But for some reason, I didn't, and kept walking  home. 

 

From Brooklyn to Savannah, in Surreal Time

After a trip to Brooklyn and Savannah, I'm back at the keyboard, committing a blog again. Returning to Atlanta in a driving rainstorm, after a three-hour plane journey from Savannah, I awake in a new season. Images of Brooklyn and Savannah return, as if I'd dreamed not really lived my time in both history and literary-haunted places, where the past, present and future co-existNow, back in Atlanta, where the present and the future mainly consume the past.

We traveled to Brooklyn to celebrate the recent marriage of an old friend. After years of exploring Manhattan, we walked around Brooklyn, its innerconnected neighborhoods, its wonderful parks. Then we flew to Savannah, which we'd rarely visited, despite living in Georgia for nearly 30 years. Savannah's lovely tree-lined squares reminded me of Bloomsbury; Broughton Street the old Southern business districts of the 1950s. East River; Savannah River; the sunsets over the water; the faces passing by as we walked -- one contiuous stream.

Back to see the Hurricanes pummel the Jackets, to catch a missed episode of "Madmen," in which the caterpillar motif of the Tony Soprano dream returned to the Betty Draper giving birth dream. The show drifts seriously off-course. How happy to wake up to discover just a a few leaves upon the swimming pool. A few invoices stoke the freelancer's hope that yes, eventually, I might get paid. Out of all of the images, a few will remain - the smile of the shy waitress at the Blue Goose cafe; crossing the Gowanus Canal into Park Slope (an oddly transcendental moment); spaghetti with Tim, Pui, Anne-Marie and Tammy from Hong Kong and Susannah from Melbourne; sitting on a stoop in Brooklyn; drinking muscadine wine (don't ask); holding a baby boy in Central Park; reading about William Manchester and Jackie Kennedy at the SCAD library; Julian Story's painting at the Telfair Museum, "the Black Prince at Crecy." 

As always, enduring truth of St. Paul's observation: "the world as we have know it is passing away."