Friday, August 10, 2007
Dave Thune Is An Ass
Highway 280, a north-south secondary road, has been turned into a temporary freeway in order to handle the traffic that used to use the I35-W bridge in order to reach downtown Minneapolis.
The Minnesota Department of Transportation will be adding temporary lanes to Interstate 94 to handle increased traffic.
But seeking a legal detour on I35E - south of downtown St. Paul - and opening it for heavy trucks? Forget about it.
From Twin Cities.com:
A St. Paul City Council member vowed Friday to seek a legal detour for any plan to temporarily open a stretch of Interstate 35E south of downtown St. Paul to heavy trucks.
"We would absolutely be opposed to it, and we'd take it to court," said Dave Thune, a council member from Ward 2.
State officials said Friday that no decision has been made about a request by the Minnesota Trucking Association to temporarily remove restrictions forbidding commercial trucks from using the portion of I-35E in St. Paul. Truckers say opening the stretch would ease congestion created by the collapse of the I-35W bridge in Minneapolis.
Gov. Tim Pawlenty's office has asked the Minnesota Department of Transportation to look into it. "There are operational, citizen and legal issues," said Robert McFarlin, a MnDOT assistant to the commissioner.
In 1984, neighborhood groups agreed to accept construction of I-35E's last link after obtaining a guarantee in a federal court settlement that the stretch through a mostly residential St. Paul area between Interstate 94 and the Mississippi River would be closed to big trucks and have a posted speed limit no higher than 45 mph.
Thune said a temporary change would violate the court settlement and result in an outcry from neighbors.
Besides the legal hurdles, MnDOT spokesman Kevin Gutknecht noted other potential obstacles. He said I-35E's road surface may not be thick enough to support truck traffic and that some bridges over the freeway along the route are too low to allow truck traffic to pass.
The loss of the I-35W bridge means lengthy detours for many truckers, the trucking association argues. The state estimated last year that 4,840 trucks used the bridge daily, and the association estimated in 2000 that a bridge closure would cost trucking companies $119,000 per day. That figure may have doubled because of fuel cost spikes and other cost increases, said John Hausladen, president of the trucking association.
Thune is also a career politician, one of the longest serving members of the St. Paul City Council.
Thune is also the man who was cited for seven housing code violations last year:
St. Paul City Council Member Dave Thune has been cited for seven code violations at his Irvine Park home, found in the wake of the city's controversial effort to demolish a condemned North End house.
A correction notice for Thune's home at 26 Irvine Park was issued Monday and lists a number of conditions that Thune and his wife, Susan, must rectify by March 13. A variety of other window repair, painting, carpentry and masonry projects must be completed by July 1.
"Note: Please continue to make progress on rehab of structure," the letter to the council member says.
Thune was officially notified after city inspector Mike Cassidy visited his home Friday in response to pictures of the house posted on the Internet.
"All of this stuff is on our 'to-do list,' and we're working on it constantly," Thune said Tuesday after hearing of the notice.
Thune is a Happy and Oblivious Little Socialist who lobbies for raising taxes to spend, spend, spend, spend.
Thune is also the little LiberTard that I wrote about in January, 2006, noting that he uses...
... mooring rope as dental floss.
Can you guess that I really, really dislike Thune?
This man is such an ass...a pompous, egotistical ass.
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