While Americans warily eye gasoline prices marching towards $4 per gallon, it becomes more apparent each day how acute these effects are on manufacturers, airlines, small and large businesses, and average Americans.

Only 10 years ago, the average cost of a gallon of gasoline was just above a $1. It is clear that our country’s need for energy security and access is more crucial than ever.

The truth is America has abundant energy resources. We simply choose not to develop most of them. We cannot, and must not, ignore key energy resources available to us here at home.

Working with Congress, President Bush signed into law the Energy Independence and Security Act of 2007, which specifies a national mandatory fuel standard of 35 miles per gallon by 2020 for new vehicles. This will save billions of gallons of gasoline.

It also requires fuel producers to supply at least 36 billion gallons of renewable fuel in 2022.

These are good steps toward ensuring our future energy security. The year 2020 seems a long way away when many of our nation’s industries and citizens are struggling now.

A recently released study of oil and gas resources on federal lands and limitations on their development paints a dramatic picture in an era when energy access and security are so important.

The report, the third in a series of congressionally mandated scientific inventories, identified 31 billion barrels of oil and 231 trillion cubic feet of natural gas on these federal lands, mostly in the West.

However, the study estimates that of the 279 million acres of onshore federal mineral lands that contain these energy resources, 60 percent are off limits to development and 23 percent face restrictions on development, limiting the amount of oil and gas that can be produced and when.

In terms that every driver can appreciate, that means that of the estimated 598 billion gallons of gasoline and 214 billion gallons of diesel that could be produced from these oil resources, about 372 billion gallons of gasoline and 133 billion gallons of diesel currently can’t be tapped due to prohibitions and restrictions.

In addition, oil shale deposits in the U.S. represent potential reserves that may be twice as large as those of Saudi Arabia. Yet Congress has prohibited us from taking the steps necessary to make this vast resource available for development.

Some feel renewables are the answer. Renewables such as wind, solar, hydroelectric, biomass and geothermal will make up a growing part of our energy portfolio.

But renewables will not solve our supply problem. Projected to supply 12 percent of our energy by 2030, renewables face similar challenges as oil and gas: they affect the environment and people do not want production or transmission facilities in their backyards.

Environmental plans for U.S. energy production already are among the most restrictive anywhere in the world. Despite this, protests and legal challenges besiege energy development decisions, delaying or derailing production.

Meanwhile, we transfer trillions of U.S. dollars to buy oil from countries that do not have the same political and environmental standards we enjoy. It just doesn’t make good sense.

The picture is even more striking offshore, where 85 percent of the U.S. Outer Continental Shelf is off limits to development in the lower 48 states.

Yet most of the nation’s oil and gas is offshore – an estimated 86 billion barrels of oil and 420 trillion cubic feet of natural gas. That’s enough to fuel almost 40 million cars and heat 92 million homes for 15 years.

We produce less than half of the oil we consume and import the rest. Demand in China and India is expected to more than double by 2030, which will heighten competition for supplies. These trends all point to increasing difficulties in obtaining energy at a reasonable cost.

According to the Energy Information Administration’s latest estimates, even with new energy efficiency standards, U.S. oil consumption will rise 10 percent by 2030.

Better gas mileage will be offset by more cars. Total energy use will increase 19 percent.

Meeting near-term energy demand will require increased access to lands and resources for oil, gas and renewable energy, together with increases in conservation and energy efficiencies.

No single approach is enough. The health of our economy and our national security require a balance of these strategies.

While balancing access to our energy resources with other land uses is important, how many limits can we afford? With each fill-up, Americans are paying the price for these limits.

It’s time we look within our own borders for solutions, rather than rely on the shifting energy policies and politics of other countries.

C. Stephen Allred is assistant secretary of the interior for land and minerals management at the U.S. Department of the Interior.

The Port of Long Beach, Calif., and other West Coast ports working at capacity are unable to handle an influx of shipping to and from Asia. A proposed port on the Baja California coast will pick up the slack - and send the cargo through Tucson.

‘Tucson at a Crossroads” was the headline of a recent newspaper series about growth and development in the Tucson region.

However that headline may be even more appropriate to something else happening in our region. Over the next few years, we may find ourselves at an actual crossroads – one that puts us in the midst of a major international trade route.

We already see increased truck and train traffic passing through the region. However these increases pale in comparison to what may be on the horizon.

In April 2006, I accompanied a delegation to meet with Mexican trade officials in Baja California. The delegation included economic development officials from Tucson Regional Economioc Opportunities, the University of Arizona and the Metropolitan Tucson Convention & Visitors Bureau.

I learned a proposal is under way for the construction of a $4 billion megaseaport called Punta Colonet. This massive new facility, on a windswept bay on the Pacific Ocean about 150 miles south of San Diego, would be the first major port constructed in North America in decades.

According to a March 25 Los Angeles Times article, this new port is being planned to offset the growing demand for Asian goods and the congestion of the ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach.

Several bidders, including a Mexican conglomerate and Hong Kong and Dubai investors, are hoping to fund this development to provide an additional transportation corridor from Asia to U.S. markets.

The official construction bidding process will begin within the next few months with contracts to be announced by the end of the year. Construction is planned to start in early 2009 with completion projected for 2014.

Upon completion, initial port deliveries will approach 1 million containers per year with annual growth to 5 million containers within five years. It takes 10,000 trains to transport 1 million containers. With 5 million containers, we could see 50,000 more trains per year through Tucson.

One idea that was seriously discussed during my trip to Mexico was extending rail lines from the port that would then be connected to the United States through a series of new and existing rail lines running through Yuma, Red Rock and Tucson.

This route would handle all container rail transportation from the port into the United States from Mexico into Arizona. Once in the United States, Union Pacific could then transport these container trains across southern Arizona along existing rail lines, which parallel Interstates 8 and 10 to Picacho Peak.

Could the primary purpose of Union Pacific’s proposed Red Rock rail yard at Picacho Peak be to accommodate the sorting of these loaded containers onto trains for their final destinations within the United States?

Union Pacific is installing new parallel tracks throughout the region and is aggressively pushing a controversial six-mile-long classification yard to be located next to Picacho Peak State Park.

This classification yard is not for goods moving to and from Arizona; it is for sorting cargo passing through, destined for the rest of the country.

The rail companies have repeatedly blocked efforts for the public to have meaningful input into future trade route plans. Many stories have been written about the difficulties of Yuma and Red Rock property owners trying to get information from rail officials.

I am asking state officials to support state Rep. Jonathan Paton’s legislation requiring increased public input into rail expansion plans. However this alone is not nearly enough.

Discussions are taking place on the feasibility and desirability of a truck bypass route. However no such efforts or discussions are taking place on the impacts of rail traffic expansion.

The state and the region must embark on a serious effort to understand the impact of this increase in rail traffic and trade. We must establish a mechanism to take advantage of opportunities while minimizing the potentially serious impacts.

We truly may be at a crossroads – one that will define the future of the entire region.

Our city has long been a house divided by a rail line and an interstate highway. If our future is not to be defined by the ever-increasing widening of this divide, we must have greater local, state and federal participation in planning for the flow of international trade bisecting our community.

Otherwise, Tucson could find itself on the wrong side of the tracks – turned into a train and truck stop for the economic benefit of the rest of the country.

Ann Day is a Republican member of the Pima County Board of Supervisors and a former state legislator.

The state and the region must embark on a serious effort to understand the impact of this increase in rail traffic and trade. We must establish a mechanism to take advantage of opportunities while minimizing the potentially serious impacts.

Commuter traffic comprises only a very small part of the problem. Freight traffic has far more impact on the system, and it is the need to transport freight that is really driving this discussion.

A thank you needs to go to the editors of the Tucson Citizen for their Dec. 5 editorial on the I-10 bypass and the importance of looking into other options such as rail (“Going down a new path”).

Too much media coverage seems to imply that not only is the bypass inevitable, but also that ground is going to be broken sometime late next week.

Many, many issues will have to be considered before this thing can move forward, and the editors have pointed out just how complicated this seemingly modest proposal really is.

I attended two of the public meetings held by the Arizona Department of Transportation as part of the study process.

I came away with a number of doubts. I am concerned about the environmental impacts, that the bypass will merely become a corridor for sprawl, and skepticism that we would ever be able to secure funding for a multibillion dollar project.

There is also the very important question of whether this thing, given rising gas prices and declining supplies, will actually be useful by the time it gets built.

The editorial points out the importance of pursuing commuter rail along the corridor between Tucson and Phoenix, and Gov. Janet Napolitano deserves a lot of credit for taking this issue seriously enough to take action after decades of idle talk.

However, commuter traffic comprises only a very small part of the problem. Freight traffic has far more impact on the system, and it is the need to transport freight that is really driving this discussion.

The price of gas now stands at $3 per gallon. Current talk about the bypass revolves around 2030 as the construction date, by which time gas prices may well be $8 a gallon or even higher.

It may not be cost-effective to haul freight by truck by then, and planners and policymakers should focus on the need to expand freight rail as well as commuter rail to fully address our future needs.

The railroads, somewhat complacent in their decades- old antitrust exemption, have finally – after significant prodding from Congress – begun to address this issue of capacity and are expanding.

The state, through ADOT, is actively pursuing rail as a key component of Arizona’s transportation system.

We should continue to address our transportation problems with some imagination and not simply assume that every solution involves laying down more asphalt.

State Rep. Tom Prezelski of Tucson is the ranking Democrat on the House Transporta- tion Committee. E-mail: tprezels@azleg.com

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MORE GUEST OPINIONS
SPRING TRAINING: Even after White Sox leave, Tucson will remain in the game for a replacement

HILLARY: How she can split the Democratic Party

BIRD FLU: Hide the chickens indoors

LIVING GREEN: Lawmakers mandating ecologically responsible lifestyles

As a lawyer for Tucson cyclists who have been injured or assaulted by motorists, I have unfortunate experiences with the Tucson Police Department that make me question Tucson's commitment to our bicycling community.

The Tucson Citizen was right to champion Tucson’s efforts to create new bike lanes (July 31 editorial “Pedaling away: new bike lanes”), but the Citizen missed the mark on Tucson’s “bike-friendly” status.

Tucson currently has a “gold” designation from the League of American Bicyclists for its bicycle-friendly infrastructure, and it hopes to upgrade to “platinum,” a status so far achieved only by Davis, Calif.

But many local cyclists wonder if Tucson’s status is deserved.

As a lawyer for Tucson cyclists who have been injured or assaulted by motorists, I have unfortunate experiences with the Tucson Police Department that make me question Tucson’s commitment to our bicycling community.

For example, one client fell at an intersection while attempting to avoid a motorist who drove through a stop sign.

My client lay in the intersection injured while the driver called 911. But after making the call, the driver thought twice and fled the scene.

When my client got out of the hospital, she asked police to trace the call and cite the driver, but they would not do so, and the city will not reveal the caller’s identity to us without a subpoena.

Another client was struck while she was riding to work in a bike lane. A witness told police the driver turned abruptly into her without signaling or slowing.

She was struck by the car and flew over the hood, landing in the intersection, injured.

Despite the witness’s account, the driver was not cited. I have placed nine telephone calls over the course of three weeks to the officer to ask him about this decision, but he has not returned my calls.

In front of me now is a police report of a woman who was slapped by the passenger of a car that had driven up alongside her as she rode her bicycle on Campbell Avenue.

She got the license number at the next light, but police refused to track the driver down and cite him.

One final example: Another client was cycling with a friend when a passenger leaned out a truck window and threw a soft drink at him, striking him in the head. The pair caught up with the pickup at the light and were calling 911 when the driver charged them in his vehicle.

They were able to leap out of the way, but the truck ran over both bicycles and dragged them for several blocks.

A good Samaritan followed the truck, got the license number and retrieved the destroyed bicycles. Again the police refused to cite the driver!

Only after we filed a complaint and pressured police to cite this man did they act, but at his trial the police failed to show, and the city attorney settled the case without a trial.

The driver received no fine or jail time and only a few points off his license. This slap on the wrist angered many people in Tucson’s cycling community.

I cannot explain the police reluctance to protect bicyclists.

I do not understand why they will not track 911 calls by people who flee accident scenes while their victims lie bleeding.

I cannot explain why they hold harmless a driver who abruptly charges into and injures a cyclist in a bike lane or one who assaults cyclists with thrown objects.

But until something changes at the Tucson Police Department, Tucson will never deserve the cherished “platinum” status.

On the contrary, a downgrade is in order.

Erik Ryberg is a Tucson lawyer who represents bicyclists who have been injured or assaulted by motorists.

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MORE GUEST OPINIONS
MONSOONS: The mythical “wall of water”

BORDER: A Minuteman speaks out

ENERGY DRINKS: Those that contain alcohol come with risks

My wife hates bridges. Whenever possible, she’ll avoid driving over one. And when forced to do so, she turns up the car radio and fixes her eyes on the roadway ahead.

She thinks they’re unsafe, and the collapse of the bridge in Minneapolis, an apparent structural failure that buckled a large section of an eight-lane interstate that spanned the Mississippi River, has made her all the more certain of this.

At least 60 people were injured in this disaster and the death toll could exceed a third of that number once emergency workers finish pulling cars out of the river.

It wasn’t long after news of the collapse of the Interstate 35W bridge Wednesday rippled across the country that the federal Department of Homeland Security reassured Americans: “At this time, there’s no indication of a nexus to terrorism.”

By that, it meant the kind of terrorism that brought down New York City’s World Trade Center’s twin towers, not the terror that causes many people to worry more about structural failure than suicide bombers when they cross a bridge.

Of the nearly 600,000 bridges in this country, more than 25 percent of them were in a “deficient” condition in 2004, the Federal Highway Administration said. That’s hardly reassuring for an untold number of people in this country who – like my wife – suffer from gephyrophobia, a fear of crossing bridges.

And as the tragedy in Minneapolis and other recent bridge collapses prove, their fear is not completely irrational.

In 1987, a bridge over the Schoharie Creek in New York toppled. Ten people died in that disaster.

Four years later in Texas, eight people were killed when the vehicle they were riding in fell 85 feet in a channel when the Queen Isabella Causeway collapsed after being struck by a barge.

In 2002, 14 people were killed in Oklahoma when a portion of a bridge plunged into the Arkansas River.

In 2004, a family of three was wiped out in Colorado when a girder fell onto their car from a bridge above.

And just the day before the Minneapolis collapse, a steal beam fell from a California highway overpass that was under construction. It crushed the hood of a Federal Express truck and injured the driver.

While state and federal officials work to repair this nation’s bridges, they can’t keep up with the need.

In 2004, 26.7 percent of this country’s bridges were either structurally deficient or functionally obsolete, according to the Federal Highway Administration. In 1998, 29.6 percent of bridges were in those categories.

Now that’s scary stuff.

Unlike my wife, I don’t think about this every time I drive across a bridge, but maybe I should.

With over 1 in 4 of this nation’s bridges obsolete or seriously in need of repair, it might do us all well to focus on this problem. How many times a week do you ride across a bridge? How often do your children, spouse, or other loved ones go across a bridge?

Have you ever seen a sign on any bridge warning you that it is “structurally deficient” or “functionally obsolete”? And if not, how do you tell the troubled bridges from those in good condition? How do you know when one bridge is riskier than another?

No doubt this last question will linger in the minds of a lot of people who drive across a bridge in the coming days.

But with the exception of the gephyrophobics among us, most Americans will soon push such thoughts out of their head. “Life goes on” ought to be our national motto.

Despite what the polls say about what we think of our president and Congress, most of us believe that our government will keep us safe.

But safe from what? With millions of motorists on the roads each day – and roughly 1,500 of our bridges in need of repair – the roads we travel are a greater threat to us than the disciples of Osama bin Laden.

DeWayne Wickham is a Maryland-based columnist who wriites for USA TODAY. E-mail: DeWayneWickham@aol.com

Touted in the 1930s as a wonder of engineering, the traffic circle at Oracle and Drachman reaches the end of the road this week

The traffic circle at Oracle Road and Drachman Street will be converted into a traditional "T" intersection.

“Arizona is to have a ‘Miracle Mile’ – an almost perfect piece of roadway that will be fool proof! It will be the only safety-plus thoroughfare in the West, and as such will put the state in the spotlight of national highways.”

Were we ever that excited about a new road? So excited that the opening of a stretch of pavement merited a couple of multipage spreads in Arizona Highways magazine?

That was the case in 1937 and 1938, when an unidentified writer waxed eloquently about a couple of Tucson traffic circles – the first to be built west of the Mississippi and an innovation that “eliminates all the ordinary hazards of the highway.”

And now they are gone.

Today, road construction is nothing but a pain (e.g. I-10). But 70 years ago, it was a source of civic pride and a way for a growing city to establish its identity.

That was why a pair of traffic circles were built to welcome travelers entering Tucson from the north on the Casa Grande Highway, before there was an Interstate 10.

That road then was known as Miracle Mile – a name meant to evoke the magical possibilities of driving into Tucson. The north-south portion of the road has since been renamed Oracle, and the miracles have long vanished.

When the road opened in 1937, there were traffic circles built at two places where it turned: at what is now Oracle and Miracle Mile and at Oracle and Drachman Street.

The northern of the two circles was converted into a standard T-intersection in the 1970s. This week, the same is being done to the southern circle, which is being demolished.

Michael Graham, spokesman for the city Department of Transportation, said demolishing the circle will make more land available for development at the northeast corner.

The work also will improve pedestrian and motorist safety, Graham said.

It was safety that drove construction of the circles.

The June 1937 edition of Arizona Highways trumpeted the traffic circles in a two-page article with drawings.

A follow-up article in October 1938 had photos of the circles and the new “graceful entry into the city.”

Safety was the main reason for the circles and the then-unusual landscaped median on Miracle Mile.

“Head on collisions – the ever present hazard of modern motoring – have been eliminated,” the magazine proclaimed.

“Completion of the ‘Miracle Mile’ will mark the most advanced step in the state highway system since 1912″ when Arizona became a state, according to the magazine.

Ken Scoville, a retired teacher and local historian, tried in vain to persuade the City Council to save the Oracle-Drachman circle.

“Communities are always defined by transportation,” Scoville said. “Roads always shape a city.”

A notable feature of the circle was a large timber set on copper ore pedestals that announced to visitors that they were entering the “Home of the University of Arizona.” Graham said the timber was saved and will be relocated farther north in the Oracle Road median.

“It was a physical gateway defining the entrance to the city of Tucson,” Scoville said. “It was another element of when Tucson was a small town. This is another change that will make us look like everywhere else.”

Seventy years ago, Arizona Highways effused: “In the ‘Miracle Mile,’ the Arizona Highway Department, the construction company, and the City of Tucson have a monument to lives saved, to modern transportation, and the advance of a continually speeded up civilization in Arizona – the Last Frontier.”

The destruction of this 70-year-old “monument to lives saved” drew considerably less attention.

The city sent out a press release announcing, “When complete in five months, the current intersection will be reconfigured to a standard ‘T’ intersection with a traffic signal.”

One more traffic signal. How nice.

Mark Kimble appears at 6:30 p.m. and midnight Fridays on the Roundtable segment of “Arizona Illustrated” on KUAT-TV, Channel 6. He may be reached at mkimble@tucsoncitizen.com and 573-4662. Tucson Citizen Editorial Board blog: Check each day for our thoughts on the issues facing Tucson.

Is a bill of rights necessary to protect airline passengers?

SHAUNTI FELDHAHN: FROM THE RIGHT

Let airlines handle it as long as they can

No one wants to be trapped on a grounded airplane for almost 10 hours, and after JetBlue’s Valentine’s Day incident, it’s understandable that people would ask the government to legislate how passengers must be treated.

But unfortunately, history is littered with examples of well-intended legislation causing more problems than it solved.

Government should create boundaries within which a commercial market can freely operate, and extra measures may be necessary where market forces don’t work (such as in a monopoly).

But that’s not the case here. Because customers have a real choice in airlines, carriers have a competitive interest in preventing these problems – as proved by what actually happened.

Without any government intervention, a chagrined JetBlue immediately developed its own extensive customer bill of rights.

Mandating airlines to “release” passengers after a certain number of hours sounds sensible but could cause worse frustration.

Because I travel every week for business, I have been trapped on grounded planes several times for weather. Not long ago, I sat on a Dallas runway for three hours during a thunderstorm, waiting for the dozens of planes ahead of mine to take off during the clearings between thunderclouds.

As frustrating as the delay was, passengers would have been mutinous if an arbitrary time limit had forced us back to the terminal when we were finally nearing our turn!

In a telephone interview, David Castelveter of the Air Transport Association confirmed that the legislative reform currently being considered “could create inflexible standards and inconvenient travel for everyone.”

He said that sweeping reform isn’t even necessary, since “there are millions of departures each year and these situations are extremely rare.”

JetBlue already has demonstrated that airlines have an incentive to improve their customer service without having it imposed on them from the outside. As long as these incidents remain rare, we should let them handle it.

DIANE GLASS: FROM THE LEFT

No need for bill to spot obvious abuse

T here are necessary security delays and then there are unkind human tortures. The JetBlue flight that restrained passengers in a living space the size of a tuna can for 10 hours isn’t an example of stunning airport security. It’s an example of watching a pot that never boils. Or, in this case, waiting for the runway ice to melt.

The motivation to keep passengers on an airplane for hours is more about financial security than human safety. If you allow an airplane-load of people to disembark and stretch their legs, it costs time and money to get them back onboard, along with the added frustration of waiting for late boarders after their cafe-latte mad dash.

Then there’s the reality that if you let passengers off a plane, they may find other flights.

So what does an airline do? Obviously, absolutely nothing in the face of lost profits. That’s just not good enough. Airlines can’t wait until someone goes bonkers and then get out the stun gun.

The flight that prompted discussion about a passenger bill of rights was waiting for the ice to melt.

It is perfectly understandable and admirable that the plane didn’t take off during risky conditions. But it is just as risky to leave an airplane full of passengers in tight confines.

Only so many relaxation videos and Pilates exercises can abate the inevitable health issues of the underexercised American population before blood clots start forming.

Sure, airlines should be safe. They should be careful. They should X-ray my body until it quivers from radiation and sell those X-rays as pornographic fodder on eBay.

But 10 hours on a plane is pure craziness, unless someone is planning on stepping off a 10-hour flight to vacation in Japan.

We don’t need a bill of rights to identify an obvious abuse. I would suggest arresting airline executives for kidnapping and human torture.

We have lives. We are not monetary body counts shuffled in between hubs and escalators, fulfilling our fiduciary responsibility to pad airline profitability. We bleed, too. OK, maybe not as badly as Delta’s profit margins, but we do suffer.

Shaunti Feldhahn is a Christian author and speaker and married mother of two children. E-mail: scfeldhahn@yahoo.com. Diane Glass is a writer and freethinker with a B.A. and M.A. in comparative religion. E-mail: dglass@ajc.com. Both women have degrees from Harvard.

By Diane Glass, Shaunti Feldhahn

When I decided to tell civilization to shove it, and went to hunting up a piece of dirt where I could spend the rest of my life listening to the whistle of the red-tailed hawk and watching the play of light and shadow with the passage of the days and the seasons, I studied every map I could lay hands on to find a spot where my family and I would be left alone.

And I damn near made it. My wife bailed on me, my kids married or moved to the East Coast, I built my hideout where I was utterly alone for 13 years. Then half the commuters west of the Mississippi and east of L.A. showed up and bought land I thought would never hit the market.

If it weren’t a serious misdemeanor, I would like to shoot every last one of them stone dead.

City sorts and bedroom community dwellers clearly have no appreciation of how seriously antisocial country folk like us can be, and how hard we have labored, how many of the perquisites of communal living we coldbloodedly forfeit, to find solitude.

Don’t you get it? We don’t want you around.

After last week’s monologue, I anticipated a sabbatical from this extended stretch of self-pity, and then I read the Friday Tucson Citizen and saw how utterly hostile the ruling class has become toward the hermetic subculture.

The lead story on the front page told how state highway planners have decided to commence an official inquiry into bypassing Tucson with a four-lane divided highway around the north side of the Catalina Mountains and up the San Pedro River Valley, to hook up with I-10 again around Willcox.

Well ain’t that just dandy. All the wildlife and desert rats, the historic sites and endangered species – among which I include humanoids such as myself – that willingly gave up pizza from Domino’s, health care from anything outside of Johnson & Johnson, just about every advancement of human kind since Lee surrendered at Appomattox, can now look forward to having the quiet of the eventide, the stillness of sunrise, the scent of creosote after a rain and dew on sycamore leaves, shattered by the bark of Kenworth and the ceaseless howl of traffic.

Trust me on this one: Someone is going to die, bloody and ugly, for the cause of the traffic planner.

It won’t be me pulling the trigger. I make jest of tragedy, but I have this outlet for my anger and sense of outraged justice.

But consider the simmering soul of a man who has cast everything he ever owned or hoped to own on one last shot at surviving by himself, away from all the madness that sickens him in the city. You don’t have to be nuts to live out where your breathing is the only reminder of human habitation, but it does make it more comfortable.

An axiom of country life tells us that city folk tend to be neurotic; country cousins go psychotic. Why live life by half-measures?

So here’s our survivalist cousin, finally got the bunker weather-tight and his crops in the ground, and what the hell is that noise? D-Something Caterpillars blading virgin stands of saguaro to make way for the Paved Path of Progress.

Where’s my AK-47?

I had to laugh to read that S.L. Schorr is running his mouth as usual, as point man for the “feasibility and needs” study to be conducted by the Arizona Department of Transportation and then submitted to the ADOT board, of which Schorr is vice chairman, for its edification in selecting a consultant to make recommendations on the next step of the process . . . and so forth and so on, in the danse macabre that ultimately wrecks and wreaks and ruins the world we live in.

Si Schorr has been behind just about every bad idea that’s come down the pike hereabouts for the past half-century.

Down the pike. What could be more apropos?

The idea, according to ADOT, is to siphon off as much heavy truck traffic as passes through Tucson on its nonstop ride to the Florida coast, stopping only for diesel, deep-dish apple pie with soft-serve ice cream and teenage prostitutes. Where are they going to find enough of all this to meet the need, between Oracle Junction and Texas Canyon?

Answer me this one: Why are we already at the stage where consultants are being considered and high-priced staff opinions are being committed to maps and documents, and this is the first word the public hears of this wretched notion?

If I were the suspicious sort, I’d say the fix is in.

Truth be told, Jeff Smith is the suspicious sort. He may be reached at (520) 455-5667 or jeffyboy@wildblue.net.

Signs of chaos abound in the Old Pueblo.

The gem shows’ glitter has faded, rodeo dust settled, Match Play played out.

But spring training is going full swing, so there will still be conversations around town like the one I heard in Jerry Bob’s last week.

“Hermia, Stanley said it was just a straight shot up Kolb from our space at the Voyager.”

“Now, Leroy, don’t get all honked off. From what Myrtle’s map says, it’s no wonder we found ourselves over to the animal control place! Take a gander, here, see?”

Friendly, accommodating Tucsonan that I am, I was itching in my boots to go offer them some help. But I sat back with my short stack to enjoy the show a little longer.

“Let me see that magnifying glass. Well, I’ll be a monkey’s uncle! Lookee there. There’s a lot of Kolb Road down here; but wait, what happens to it here? How can these intersections have three names each? I see a little bitty ‘nother Kolb Road up and over there, but the canyon’s off this other way.”

I thought about the best way to give them a verbal cheat sheet on getting there from here in Tucson.

It’s not like it used to be, when the Lodge on the Desert actually was. When Rincon, Santa Rita, Catalina and Tucson high schools were the closest ones to their respective mountain ranges.

When the “boonie” parties were at the “end of Campbell” (now basically, the north parking lot of La Encantada) or at “Pontatoc” (now the south parking lot of Foothills High School).

“Why is it so hard to find Bert and Hazel’s street? It’s ‘Kimono’ something. How many of those could there be in a Western town?”

Yes, navigating the Old Pueblo is a little more challenging now.

Some routes are still relatively straightforward.

For example, traveling directly east to west on Valencia can get you from Diablo Sunrise Road to Angels Breath Drive or from Loveless Gardner Lane to Lonesome Drive.

But the journey from Chaos Canyon Lane to Via Tranquila, though pretty straight west to east, involves mostly one main road – Ironwood – except that it’s also Grant, Kolb, Tanque Verde and Wrightstown/ Harrison.

If your travel involves north/south routes (let’s say, from Horny Toad Place to Laughing Coyote Way or Songbird Lane to Ditty Lane), don’t forget that state Route 77 is also Oracle Road, Main, Granada and the Oro Valley community chest (a reputed speed trap).

Fearing I might make matters worse, I abandoned the thought of helping with their rumpled and befuddled map quest, and instead considered providing them with the official events list for the Old Pueblo Winter Visitor Auto Olympics, into which all October-April residents are automatically entered.

Oh, you don’t have the official list, either? Well, here you go:

● White line straddle-a-thon

● Flashing turn signal straightaway run

● Minimum miles-per-hour endurance challenge

● Steering wheel peekaboo target range

● Left-turn-avoidance obstacle course

● Shaded, pull-through parking spot dash

(Now before you snowbirds get your feathers all in a ruffle, I know we could do a whole ‘nother event list for desert-bred drivers trying to navigate in rain or snow!)

But as I was digging out my tip money, Leroy and Hermia were already shuffling past my table (“You OK, dear? I see that little hitch in your gitalong again . . . “).

So keeping my Chamber of Commerce-citizen-hostess role in mind, I simply smiled and said, “Welcome to Tucson. Enjoy your visit.”

Keep those pension dollars coming.

Native Tucsonan Robin (Calkins) Gwozdz is a registered nurse and “Mom” to many in addition to her own two children. E-mail: robinsmytucson@yahoo.com.

Nancy Schrader, a Tucson kindergarten teacher for 22 years, had a way of making her students feel valued.

It may have been her easy smile or her pleasant voice that helped the children and staff warm up to her initially.

But what ultimately made her an effective teacher – one who made her students come back to visit her long after they became adults – was the way she gave 110 percent to her job with Tucson Unified School District.

If students needed extra help, Nancy was there for them.

Supplies not adequate? She spent her own dollars to make sure they were.

If a colleague was having a problem, she would lend a non-critical ear.

This big beautiful grandmother, with her hair neatly packaged in a bun, was at the top of her profession.

Unfortunately, Nancy is no longer teaching. About four years ago, she and other experienced teachers were offered a buyout.

The rationale was that money could be saved by eliminating those teachers who were highest on the salary scale. The buyout rewarded those teachers with a cash bonus for leaving early.

The problems with that are obvious.

In return for monetary savings, our students lose their most experienced teachers. And younger, less experienced teachers lose their mentors.

What kind of price can we put on that?

What other profession “buys out” its best and brightest? Would we create pay incentives for our best doctors, lawyers and architects to retire?

But now there is hope. Gov. Janet Napolitano is changing the culture of this state with respect to education.

She knows that with a ranking of 49th in education, Arizona can’t compete effectively in the knowledge-based economy for highly skilled jobs.

The governor’s budget calls for increases in school funding for grades K-12.

It also includes a 10 percent increase to attract and retain highly qualified teachers.

Her budget would raise the ceiling on teacher salaries, giving incentives for the master teachers to stay and do what they do best.

If the governor’s vision becomes a reality, master teachers such as Nancy would be valued and allowed to mentor others.

In a profession where up to half of all teachers leave the profession within the first five years because, in part, of poor support, it’s key to keep mentors.

The National Center for Education Statistics says that partnering new teachers with mentors has been one of the best remedies in teacher retention.

We all need to get behind this budget and e-mail, call or write to our legislators to express our support.

The legislators need to know now, as the budget is developed, that we stand behind funding our future through high-quality education.

More than half of our school funding comes from the state, so we better pay attention to the state budget.

Let’s make sure the Nancy Schraders of the world are there for the next generation of Tucsonans. Because when we value our teachers, we provide the best for our students.

Saúl J. Ostroff is married, with four children, and is a counselor and teacher with Tucson Unified School District. E-mail: elsol711@cox.net.

About the author

In an 1865 New York Tribune editorial, Horace Greeley wrote the famous words “Go West, young man.” Well, plenty of people have taken his advice. The West is booming.

Arizona has added nearly 1 million people since 2000 to reach its current total of just more than 6 million. With a 3.6 percent growth rate, it is the fastest-growing state in the nation.

Not surprisingly, over the same six years, the number of registered vehicles in the state ballooned. Not only are there a lot more Arizonans in our midst, but also 5 million cars and SUVs cruising the highways.

Unfortunately, this influx of vehicles has brought long waits and traffic jams.

On average, drivers in Phoenix spend 49 hours a year stuck in traffic. The Texas Transportation Institute estimates congestion costs Phoenix commuters $1.3 billion a year in lost productivity.

Gov. Janet Napolitano refers to this as the “time tax.”

The Arizona Department of Transportation is attempting to keep up with this increased demand for space on Arizona’s highways. This year, it will spend upward of $3 billion to build and maintain roads. But even with this expenditure, ADOT is years behind in highway construction.

The conventional solution is increased public funding. But this isn’t our only option, and it certainly isn’t our best.

Texas, Indiana and even Canada are tapping the creative power of the free market to solve their highway woes.

In Texas, a private developer is investing $1.3 billion to complete the “Trans-Texas Corridor.” In return for financing, designing, building and maintaining the road, Cintra-Zachry will receive a 50-year contract to collect tolls.

To the benefit of taxpayers, once the road is finished, only those using it will have to pay for it, but the highway will remain state-owned.

In addition to relieving Texas of a $1.3 billion construction expense, Cintra-Zachry agreed to make an upfront payment of $25 million, which the state will use on other infrastructure projects. The company also agreed to split an increasing portion of toll revenues with the state over time.

In other words, the company is paying the state for the privilege of building its highway. Not a bad deal for Texas taxpayers.

In Indiana, for a lease price of $3.8 billion, the state recently turned over operations on a toll road to a private company for 75 years.

In addition to the lease, the company agreed to spend $400 million for road repairs. Indiana will use this new money to expand and improve roads all across the state.

Taking a cue from the private sector, Indiana took advantage of one asset to finance the construction of another. Pennsylvania and New Jersey are both looking to repeat Indiana’s success.

One criticism of private roads is that toll booths will create long lines and make traffic even worse. But this doesn’t need to be the case in Arizona.

In Canada, the privately managed 407 Express Toll Route near Toronto uses transponders to collect tolls, eliminating the need for old-fashioned stop-and-go toll booths.

Over the past five years, the company has invested more than $600 million to improve travel times and road safety.

Rather than raiding rainy day funds or going further into debt, the state should turn to the vast resources of the free market and allow private companies to finance road construction profitably, efficiently and safely.

The traffic crunch in Arizona is getting severe, and our growth shows no signs of letting up.

Now is the time to harness the power of the private sector to meet our transportation needs.

Noah Clarke is an economist with the Goldwater Institute, www.goldwaterinstitute.org.

I’m an American (or so I’ve been led to believe), and it has become increasingly difficult for me to ignore the commercialistic ethos of our nation presented in the form of the SUV.

Most profound and majestic of any patriotic symbol, these vehicles are a masterful unification of the lapidary and the soccer-mom instinct.

And while the SUV has popularity all but severely disproportionate to the number of people who actually require such a vehicle to support their livelihood, is widely criticized as possibly contributing to global warming (of course, maybe the glaciers just look as if they’re melting) and is financially cumbersome due to sporadic gasoline-prices, it has survived to seemingly dominate the realm of advertising.

The SUV generally inhabits its commercial time slot by driving heedlessly through the stunning wilderness and natural settings that supposedly constitute some part of our national heritage.

It is not enough that I have been lying on a couch devouring processed snacks, watching hours of midseason football. I must in the meantime be impressed upon by experiencing a vicarious, false patriotism – one that is a parade of waste and stubbornness.

It is easy to become lost in the symbols of one particular – and particularly hopeless – lifestyle.

However, the resources to evade a lifestyle of wastefulness and consumption based upon commercial and cultural ignorance exist in surprisingly prevalent forms.

That being said, it will at this point be necessary (if you are one of the ignorant individuals I am directing my condescension toward) to remember and visualize that bicycle you undoubtedly possess in some space or manner.

If, after removing this archaic utility-vehicle from storage and obscurity, you should choose to ride it, you may be encouraged by the physical and experiential benefits that are bequeathed to the normal cyclist.

Personally, I had no interest or use for bikes until I decided to join a bicycling team that represents my high school and the Bicycle Inter-Community Action & Salvage co-op.

At some point during our first serious practice, I realized that without expending any unsustainable resources – whether fuel or, as is sometimes the case, money – I was traveling across what seemed to be the entire Tucson Valley.

I was privileged with alternating visions of neighborhoods I didn’t know existed and natural areas I didn’t fully appreciate.

The perceptual capabilities of a cyclist as opposed to those of a motorist are comparable to those of someone watching high-definition TV versus someone watching a flickering, sepia screen.

Incidentally, this method of increasing awareness won’t lead to obesity. The bicycle is an almost perfect tool in the sense of its efficiency as a mode of transportation and its economic viability.

If you – as I once was – are apprehensive of covering yourself in spandex and moving your feet continually for stretches of more than 50 miles, begin your experiment casually.

Start with a ride around the neighborhood, observe what’s around you, and give the polar bears a break.

It’s a personal decision that may contribute to an economically and environmentally sustainable future.

Teen columnist Daniel Schaller is a junior at City High School. E-mail: ds_schaller@yahoo.com.

Drunken driving is one of America’s deadliest crimes.

During 2004, nearly 13,000 people were killed in highway crashes involving impaired drivers or motorcycle operators with an illegal blood alcohol concentrations, or BAC, of 0.08 percent or higher.

The picture for motorcyclists is particularly bleak. Forty-one percent of the 1,672 motorcycle operators who died in single-vehicle crashes in 2004 had BAC levels of 0.08 or higher.

That’s why the Governor’s Office of Highway Safety, along with law enforcement officials from throughout Arizona, will be out in force during the Labor Day holiday, joining in the national aggressive new crackdown called “Drunken Driving. Over the Limit. Under Arrest.”

Our message is simple. No matter what you drive – a passenger car, pickup, sport utility vehicle or motorcycle – if we catch you driving impaired, we will arrest you.

No exceptions. No excuses. Expect the max.

We will be out in force conducting sobriety checkpoints, saturation patrols and using undercover officers to get more drunken drivers off the road.

We want everyone to play it safe: Always designate a sober driver or find a different way home if they have been out drinking.

Driving with a BAC of 0.08 or higher is illegal in every state.

Although drunken driving fatalities across the nation slightly declined in 2003 and 2004, these fatalities are projected to increase in 2005.

And according to the FBI’s Uniform Crime Report, more than 1.4 million people were arrested for driving under the influence during 2004.

Much of the tragedy from drunken driving can be prevented with a few simple precautions before going out to celebrate.

● Whenever you plan to drink, designate a sober driver beforehand and give that person your keys.

● If you’re impaired, call a taxi, use mass transit or call a sober friend or family member to get you home safely. Remember to Pass the Keys.

● Promptly report to law enforcement any apparently drunken drivers you see.

● Wearing your safety belt when in a car, or a helmet and protective gear when on a motorcycle, is your best defense against an impaired driver.

● And remember: Friends Don’t Let Friends Drive Drunk. If you know someone who is about to drive while impaired, take his keys and help him arrange a safe ride.

Drunken driving is simply not worth the risk.

Not only do you risk killing yourself and others, but you also face significant trauma and financial costs in the event of a crash or arrest.

Violators often face jail time, the loss of their driver’s license, higher insurance rates, attorney fees, time away from work and dozens of other expenses.

Don’t take the chance. Drunken driving is a serious crime. Remember: Drunken Driving. Over the Limit. Under Arrest. Pass the Keys or Expect the Max.

Richard Fimbres is director of the Governor’s Office of Highway Safety.

Is Tucson safe for cyclists? You decide. I bike to and from work three hours a day, but I don’t ride on the road, especially when I’m near the University of Arizona.

New to Arizona, I was unaware that a law could be not only extant, but also enforced, to prohibit safe cycling on the left side of the road or on the sidewalk, when done cautiously and at reasonable speeds.

I will never ride on the right side of the road.

Too many drivers, like the one who hit me today, do not always look to the front.

By riding on the “right” side, cyclists place themselves in double jeopardy.

About 7:30 a.m. today, I was struck by a van and skidded into oncoming traffic but fortunately was not hit again.

The van driver immediately told me to take my bicycle to the sidewalk.

Before the driver had a chance to pull over, another man, dressed in medical garb, had me sit on a ledge by the sidewalk.

The driver then arrived, offering to call 911, and the other man advised me to call an ambulance.

The next minute, a firetruck drove by, and an ambulance followed. Someone apparently had already made the call.

Paramedics checked for spinal injuries and placed a neck-brace on me, and a police officer asked me for details.

Showing no concern for the grave danger I had just endured, he dwelt on the fact that I had been riding on the crosswalk when I was hit.

Once I had been situated in the hospital, the officer asked if I had any questions.

Still in shock, I said no.

I realized my only question was what kind of civil servant he was, as he handed me a citation.

Had I been riding where I “should have been,” I would be dead or near death.

I have never ridden on the right side of the road, nor do I plan to do so.

If a driver cannot see what is right in front of him, then I cast my life as a crapshoot every time I ride on the right.

I have had to bail on more than one occasion thanks to wide-load vehicles and other carefree road-cruisers.

A humorous side-note: I mentioned repeatedly to the paramedics, nurses and doctor that it would be a good idea to put some hydrogen peroxide on my scraped elbow.

Instead, after nearly three hours of waiting, I finally acquired some anti-bacterial wipes as I checked out of the hospital.

Then I called the driver and asked him to return me my bicycle, which he had kindly transported in his van.

I went back into the emergency room to call the Tucson Citizen, and am I glad I did!

Once off the phone, a gentleman approached me, saying he no longer cycles in Tucson because he, too, had been injured in an accident.

I hope more victims of this terrible cycling situation will speak up.
on

John Paul McGuire is a cyclist who wheels to work daily in Tucson, passing by the University of Arizona.

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Bicycling Safety
For more information on bicycle safety, see John Paul McGuire’s Web site at www.bikersafety.5u.com.

Even transportation plan critics like me must admit: It’s nice to see locals do something about traffic besides complain.

And it’s heartening to see a tax request get approved in Pima County – or by the 57.5 percent of the 25 percent who bothered to vote, anyway.

Like it or not, we now have a full-fledged regional plan that purports to improve our supposed traffic congestion.

(People who have lived in Denver or Miami aren’t wringing their hands over traffic here, but that’s another story.)

What remains to be seen is whether the supposed improvements really will allow us to vroom, vroom at the warp speed of Sheriff Clarence Dupnik.

Or will the ensuing decades of road work snarl things so atrociously as to slow all traffic, including cop cruisers, fire trucks and ambulances?

While we await the answer to that one, we’ll be wise to scrutinize how our new Regional Transportation Authority spends its new regionally endowed tax dollars.

That $2.1 billion is a pretty penny for southern Arizona.

And it’s a rare thing when Tucsonans and their neighbors in Oro Valley, Marana, Green Valley and Sahuarita all decide to further tax themselves.

Amid excruciatingly high property taxes and a healthy sales tax – even without the new half-cent come July 1 – area residents already pay plenty.

So it’s incumbent on officials in the RTA and all our local governments, including the county, to come clean continually.

Citizens are entitled to know exactly how these projects are playing out – and exactly how their money is being spent.

Competitive bids must be sought on every facet of work.

And every contract should include severe penalties for shoddy work and for missed deadlines.

That’s worked well in Denver, where the “T-REX” widening of I-25 typically progresses well ahead of schedule.

And these types of contract demands should work well here, too.

Reporters and plan critics such as John Kromko and Ken O’Day undoubtedly will be watching the RTA’s every move.

Despite serious concerns over certain elements, this plan does constitute our region’s first truly unified, cooperative effort on a major scale.

Voters – an increasingly rare breed hereabouts – have expressed their faith in the RTA and in the prospect of forging a regional solution to a regional problem.

If the RTA, county and all our little governments can pull this one off, there’s no telling where it might take us.

Regional cooperation on water, perhaps? On land use and zoning? Imagine the possibilities.

So the Regional Transportation Plan is not only a unique undertaking for us, but also an extremely important indicator of what lies ahead.

We’ll be watching. Don’t screw it up.

Billie Stanton may be reached at bstanton@tucsoncitizen.com or 573-4664.