Mayor Donna Deegan, Democrat – or 3D for short — wants Jacksonville to become the first city in the world without traffic fatalities.
OK. How?
One way to do that would be to ban the use of automobiles. People still would get killed on their bicycles and skateboards, however.
But presumably, that would be all right, because the real point here is to get people out of cars.
Liberals hate the automobile. It is the greatest instrument of individual freedom in history and individual freedom is an anathema to socialists.
People with a car can go where they want, when they want – without the permission of a politician.
Global warming guru Al Gore raged about the automobile, calling it the greatest threat to civilization instead of the greatest benefit.
One of the automobile’s crimes was to make possible another favorite bogeyman of The Left: suburbia. People were able to escape the crime and congestion of cities.
Politicians tax and regulate cars as much as they can. Decades ago, the idea was to speed cars on their way to their destination but today the brilliant idea is “traffic calming,” which means making traffic slower and more congested, not to mention more infuriating. Road rage is increasing.
Traffic calming, in fact, is one of 3D’s strategies.
Making cars less convenient, more expensive and more difficult to use will help force government subjects into mass transit — they hope.
In the socialist Utopia there are no cars, and thus no traffic fatalities because bus, train and plane accidents don’t count.
Traffic fatalities actually have fallen dramatically with safer cars and highways. Typically, government steps in to solve a problem when it already is on the way to being solved, and then makes it worse.
For example, poverty dropped steadily in the postwar economic boom, until LBJ’s Great Society came along and broke up millions of families, causing more poverty.
Elements of the Deegan plan include:
- Policy recommendations: Developing practical solutions, such as improved crosswalks, bike lanes and speed limits, to address safety concerns.
- Measurable performance targets: Setting clear goals to track progress and ensure accountability.
- Comprehensive crash analysis: Conducting in-depth studies to understand the causes of accidents and form targeted interventions.
Speed limits. Now there is an idea that screams innovation.
Yes, everyone would like to see even fewer traffic deaths, but politicians have no secret methods for accomplishing this – and certainly no “targeted interventions” that will eliminate them.
Not surprisingly, this plan coincided with a federal grant to formulate such plans.
City Council might want to use caution. As they found out with the Emerald Trail, “free money” from the federal government is no longer guaranteed since the Trump Administration began a return to fiscal sanity.
