Portland: the city that works

So I guess if there can be a Clackistan populated by Clackistanis, we could call Portland "Absurdistan"...

What's union scale for the Supervisor in the blue shirt? I wonder if he is PERS Tier 1, or works for a contractor?

If you would only support the Zombie Hotel, they wouldn't have to send him out on make-work projects.

I have a legitimate question: has anyone asked these guys WHY they're doing this? I'd love to hear their answers, even if it's "Well, the boss told us to do it."

We'd love it if our reader who's tracking this would get a phone with a video cam in it, and do an interview.

Look Jack, I respect many of your opinions (even as a libertarian), but you guys are responsible for the stuff that goes on in Portland and Oregon. You vote these people in! You're so afraid of voting for a moderate Republican, or any sort of Republican, that you'd rather vote for these rapacious liberals who turn the city treasury into their personal piggy bank for social engineering. And Portland attracts these kinds of liberals, so any democrat you vote in over here will be on board with all the stuff you complain about every day.

Bottom line, you don't really deserve to complain about this stuff if you keep voting in the liberals who support it.

Hey Texas-

Click the first embeddened link in this post that links to one of my other emails where I indeed asked the crew the why question.

Jack-

I do have video capability on my phone and will see about recording some video next time they are at the same intersection. What is the over/under on when they will be back, 43 days?

Not sure if your blog will out me as picture guy, but I will indeed ask.

My two cents:

Don't bug the worker bees; it's not as if they make the rules or decisions. At TriMet personal involvement is discouraged. Shut up and do your job; don't ask questions...

The folks that continue to authorize these billion dollar projects with no accountibility - they are the ones who need to be put on the spot. Why are unelected officials allowed to play with our money in such a reckless manner; why does Meteo get virtually unchecked power; why does Portland get to obligate other cities/counties? Our form of governance is flawed; letting superpowers like Portland, TriMet and Metro make decisions for everyone without a vote and without proper representation.

Why not cement the %$&*ing bricks into place, and be done with it?! Am I missing something??

Cementing them would create more of a problem. Think of vehicles driving over the individual bricks with different weights, different forces,different angles. Not the same as asphalt or reinforced concrete. This was a poor design form the beginning.

Hey, Oliver, get off your high horse. I'd vote for a decent conservative candidate, but they've given up. Dave Lister, even Chuck Lewis would have been better than the birds we get to pick from now. Nobody with any sense wants the gigs.

I read a lot of "You deserve it" from the right, but I don't see anybody stepping up to help. Help me raise $1.2 million for a good government league and we'll sue our way to responsible leadership,

Look Jack, no offense at all. But you're probably the sort of guy who complains about these people all day long, then hold your nose and secretly vote for a progressive at the polls.

Or you bitterly complain about Kitzhaber, but refuse to endorse his opponent, who, let's face it, was a pretty decent guy and no radical tea partier. And so on and so forth.

Meanwhile over here in Lloyd Center, the MAX tracks are so FFF'd up they have to crawl for a block to avoid a derailment.

Would be a good photo op for Bow Tie- NOT!

I've seen these guys working on different intersections in downtwon. It is possible that this crew does this all year long and just does a circuit around the transit mall.

I agree with Oliver. Portland deserves their leaders. Just look at how Portland embraced, then double embraced, then tripled down on Sam Adams. And anybody who called out the clown during the recalls was a homophobe! And many (but way less than most of) Portland voters are right here reading and commenting. So some of what Oliver says strikes me as true.

But Jack is correct. Aside from Sho and Lister, not many Rs out there.

And regardless of party, this is so true: "Nobody with any sense wants the gigs."

Politics is an intelligence test. Anybody who goes after office has failed that test.

Z, thanks: I missed that the first time around. I've seen similar bad designs around here, too, and amazingly, they involved streetcars, too.

Are we sure they aren't rotating the bricks so they wear evening top and bottom ?
I mean that seems like a Absurdistan (Portland) sort of thing..

Futile as rebuilding the castles made of sand may seem, this still beats working on the Sustainability Center:

http://www.oregonlive.com/portland/index.ssf/2012/10/mayor_sam_adams_kills_oregon_s.html

It wasn't.

But you're probably the sort of guy who complains about these people all day long, then hold your nose and secretly vote for a progressive at the polls.

Ewww, what an insult. Bye, Oliver.

If they are massaging the bricks does that mean the work is part of the Stimulus Plan?

I mostly agree with Oliver's comment, but not the direct remark about Jack. Besides Lister and Sho, in the last mayor primary we had Fernandez and Brumm (forget the party labels) who in Portland's perspective could be called fiscal conservatives. Why didn't citizen's step forward and demand media pay attention and give them a fair shake?

How can I put this delicately? The mainstream media are a bunch of fat, lazy whores.

Those brick massaging escapades are Portlandia's version of Titanic deck chair shuffling.

Give me some details on a "good government league" and a bank - I'm in.

As for the bricks: there's a sand mix that sets up under rain with some cement-like qualities, but greater flexibility. Portland, of course, doesn't use that.

Portland the city that works to tax and spend more and more of your money.

Step 1: Refresh your memory about the definition of "sidewalk superintendent."

Step 2: Decide if that's a good use of your time.

I agree with you. You do indeed have better uses for your time.