Quickies: Downtown traffic jam?
Short Quickie today:
* That plan to lease the parking lot off of Riverboat Road to Central High School for student parking could have a slight problem. Grand Forks Council President Hal Gershman wondered if all those cars turning left from DeMers Avenue onto Riverboat Road might not cause a big traffic jam downtown. Council member Art Bakken thought the solution might be to have traffic patrol directing traffic.
Patrol or no patrol, more cars has to mean slower traffic. I'm glad I don't have to commute across the river during the morning hours. That's gonna suck.
* Lack of rain around Grand Forks is getting to be a drag, but, on the bright side, there aren't too many mosquitoes and mosquito control is costing $100,000 less than the $640,000 budgeted. Abundant rains last year meant the city had to spend nearly $700,000.
Mosquito control supervisor Todd Hanson said to tell you guys that, if you're older than 50, you still have to be careful about mosquito bites. Culex mosquitoes, the ones that carry the West Nile Virus, aren't easily deterred by dry weather so they'll still be coming out in August and September.
Update 3:44 p.m., 7/25/06: Oops, it rained. There goes the 100 grand.
* That plan to lease the parking lot off of Riverboat Road to Central High School for student parking could have a slight problem. Grand Forks Council President Hal Gershman wondered if all those cars turning left from DeMers Avenue onto Riverboat Road might not cause a big traffic jam downtown. Council member Art Bakken thought the solution might be to have traffic patrol directing traffic.
Patrol or no patrol, more cars has to mean slower traffic. I'm glad I don't have to commute across the river during the morning hours. That's gonna suck.
* Lack of rain around Grand Forks is getting to be a drag, but, on the bright side, there aren't too many mosquitoes and mosquito control is costing $100,000 less than the $640,000 budgeted. Abundant rains last year meant the city had to spend nearly $700,000.
Mosquito control supervisor Todd Hanson said to tell you guys that, if you're older than 50, you still have to be careful about mosquito bites. Culex mosquitoes, the ones that carry the West Nile Virus, aren't easily deterred by dry weather so they'll still be coming out in August and September.
Update 3:44 p.m., 7/25/06: Oops, it rained. There goes the 100 grand.
posted by Tu-Uyen at 10:21 PM
7 Comments:
Do I get your math correct, in that "dry, horrible conditions for mosquitos to fester" is $540,000 to handle, while "wet, optimal conditions" is $700,000? Wow, that 1/2 million is quite the baseline they've got going. You would think that the control costs for a mosquito count of "out of control" would be a lot higher than those for a count of "negligable."
Do I get some of my $2.50 a month back if they don't spend it all killing mosquitos that aren't there?
Dale: There are fixed costs and this isn't a money making operation, as far as I know. I should've linked to my article, which explains that the biggest cost is the larvicide, which is the stuff they put in water to kill mosquito larvae. And they still need to use a lot of larvicide to get rid of the Culex mosquitoes that carry the West Nile Virus.
Anonymous: Sorry, no. The money goes back into the fund for equipment replacement. That fund got raided last year because of the wetter than normal summer.
And they still need to use a lot of larvicide to get rid of the Culex mosquitoes that carry the West Nile Virus.
Well, correct my ignorance, but mosquitos, culex or otherwise, hang out in stagnant water, ie: not the river (although I suppose that as the river goes down, puddles emerge, but I digress,) and spraying the river seems a little idiotic anyway.
Thus, no rain, no stagnant water, aside from dopes that leave their birdbaths filled for months at a time. So, what bodies of water are they spraying?
Normally, you're spraying larvacide like a maniac, because there is water in the ditches, puddles, ravines, etc. Any low lying areas. This year, the drought means that, while those areas may have dormant mosquitos, spraying them isn't going to do diddley.
I didn't ask them to be specific but they said they have 100s of sites they have to check. I'm guessing that there are lots of ponds and ditches that do have water still.
Oops, it rained. There goes the 100 grand.
Heheh. Exactly :-)
Two words: English Coulee
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