By David Horst sandhill7@gmail.com
From time to time, a columnist needs to purge his notebook and produce a mishmash of this and that from bits too little to be a column but too much to be ignored.
Complete streets
I attended the annual meeting of the trail advocacy group Fox Cities Greenways and
heard a presentation by Jack Zabrowski of the La Crosse County Health Department,
who coordinates the county's "complete streets" efforts.
It is a term I had not heard before. The concept is to commit to designing streets not just for automobile traffic, but for all of the functions they serve — safe routes for bicycles, pedestrians and school children. That means more than adding bicycle lanes, Zabrowski said.
It may involve building in such features as bump-out crosswalks as in downtown Appleton, raised crosswalks that serve as low-grade speed bumps, curb cut ramps at intersections, shared bicycle and parking lanes and bike-only lanes. In rural areas, it may be as simple as paved shoulders and 14-foot-wide traffic lanes.
Area communities have done a good job of insisting on recreation trails as part of major highway projects. This is the next step.
Sunday, February 19, 2012
Sunday, January 15, 2012
Wolf River eagles ready for their closeup
By David Horst sandhill7@gmail.com
New London -- Last winter, productivity slumped in offices across the country during feeding time at an eagle nest in Decorah, Iowa, where three eaglets became webcam stars.
Since this nest-eye view went online in February 2010, the site has recorded more than 212 million views from more than 20 million unique viewers.
This season, a new show comes to a URL near you featuring a nest in the backyard of a Shiocton-area family. The people behind it are hoping for even a small share of Decorah's visibility.
I went along the Saturday before Christmas when Pat Fisher, who runs the New London bird rehabilitation center The Feather, led a small, mechanized crew of volunteers to wire up an 80-foot-tall white pine for the season premier.
The installation came courtesy of Gary Bunnell, known to area fishermen and hunters for his underwater fish cams and deer cams at WolfRiverCam.com. He got an assist from a bucket truck and crew provided by Great Lakes Line Builders in Greenville, a division of M.J. Electric Inc. The conservation group Shadows on the Wolf helped pay for the camera.
"It's a three-way deal," Bunnell said. "We're able to educate and entertain, and help Pat and help Shadows on the Wolf."
New London -- Last winter, productivity slumped in offices across the country during feeding time at an eagle nest in Decorah, Iowa, where three eaglets became webcam stars.
Since this nest-eye view went online in February 2010, the site has recorded more than 212 million views from more than 20 million unique viewers.
I went along the Saturday before Christmas when Pat Fisher, who runs the New London bird rehabilitation center The Feather, led a small, mechanized crew of volunteers to wire up an 80-foot-tall white pine for the season premier.
The installation came courtesy of Gary Bunnell, known to area fishermen and hunters for his underwater fish cams and deer cams at WolfRiverCam.com. He got an assist from a bucket truck and crew provided by Great Lakes Line Builders in Greenville, a division of M.J. Electric Inc. The conservation group Shadows on the Wolf helped pay for the camera.
"It's a three-way deal," Bunnell said. "We're able to educate and entertain, and help Pat and help Shadows on the Wolf."
Saturday, January 14, 2012
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