There have been claims of a study done with the community, but we allege the data was made up. Here’s how that conclusion was reached:
- From the start, the City claims to have data collected by a consulting firm that established the communities desire for a host of features
- Repeted requests to see the data have never produced the data
- No one we have talked to actually claim to have seen the data
- The initial report from the City claimed that the plan features were based on what the community wanted but never actually referenced the study (e.g., 10% of respondents wanted median)
- For 6 years now, after repeated requests, including a promise by council member Bufkin to produce the data, no data has ever been produced
- Multiple requests and attempts to set up a time to go see the data in person have gone unanswered and/or avoided
- Although the initial report claimed the community wanted these many features the report never referred to any percent, proportion, average, or number of people that wanted anything
- The report now justifies the project with “a committee saw opportunities” Who the committee was or how they saw opportunities is unknown.
Initial Public Meeting
- The initial public meeting at city hall held in January 2017 was in a packed room and hallway full of people in opposition to the proposal
- The chair brought up only trivial issues until the time ran out and then called the meeting to a close
- Promises were made to put concerns on the next agenda but if it happened it was not advertised to the community
- No record of this meeting is in the project timeline – but we ave witnesses.
Second Public Meeting
A second meeting was held that presented the issue of 2 or 3 lanes. Obviously, this meeting took place after the plan had been devised and can not be claimed to have been used as input for the initial plan. In addition, the City only presented information about how the additional lane would receive traffic congestion. It do not include an 18.5 foot median or extra bike lanes. Using this public meeting as evidence that the public wants this project in ints present form is a gross representation of the data
Pin Pad Data
Data presented in the report that were collected from pin pads is by far the most farcical of all. The data is used extensively in the report to justify the many features of the project. The pin pad data has two fatal flaws:
- First. The sample of respondents is not representative of the community. If we were take the pin pads to the churches on Sunday and asked people to respond to the same questions we could expect as completely different result. A biased sample summarily invalidates the results.
- Second. The results are self-incriminating. 100% of the respondents wanted bike lanes. The only way to get that kind of clean result is to make it up. Whether you push the pin pad y buttons yourself or accidentally ask a set of people that wants a certain outcome – the data is made up just the same.
Information about the public not wanting the project has been suppressed.
Results from the public meeting was cherry picked and misrepresented.
Pin pad data are obviously biased.