The Washington times., 1925-07-08
With The
|Alibi Artists
Col. Bells Proposal En-
/. Enthusiastically O. KID
BY Times Writer
10th Street Proposition
BY DONALD McDOUGAL

30~ANA0AAA0
Hats off to Engineer Commits
sioner Bell He's started some
thing that won't stop until every
foot Of Washington tax-eating
highways is used for the benefit
OF the taxpayers, as 1t should be.
He shows where forty feet Of
precious space IL lost on Connecti-
cut avenue by the present layout,
and comes forward with plan to
make use Of it. That's business.
Under his plan twenty feet on
each side of the roadway. now go
ing to waste, will be paved and
turned over to the taxpayers for
parking space and slow vehicle
travel.
Connecticut avenue. with q
width Of 40 feet, has only so feet
available for street use. and one
third Of that IL taken up by car
tracks.
And the trees blossom out with
mo Parking" siEns, and the trAf.
fic court is congested with citizens
fined a dollar each for parking on.
the asphalt that their tax money
has already paid for several times
over, while forty feet Of good
Connecticut avenue isn't the
only thorohghfare that can be
made to yield parking space for
hundreds Of vehicles, with the use
OF q little head work. Tenth
six.foot sidewalk--twice as much
az its business requires.
That extra thirteen feet would
provide parking room for a. good
many cars, and relieve congestion
in traffic court.
Anyone who'll drive ] around
Washington for an hour or two
with his eyes open, can find
dozens Of places where good park
ing land IL left idle.
Then when he goes down to
traffic court and sees streams Of
people. like fans At the box Of.
flee, digging up q dollar each
for parking an hour or two over.
time, II he has more than six
red.blood corpuscles inN hts whole
system, he'll boil over; same az
the Alibi Man does occasionally.
The following paragraph by this
writer is from the washington
Times Of June 8:
IF Washington II willing to
apply the same energy to the
parking problem that other cities
have applied to the mere moving
Of traffic, there II room for sc
least 5000 al1-day parhers and
m equal number Of tWO-I1Our
parkers in our congested section
and it's immediate vicinity"
Commissioner Bells, discovery
OF room for two twenty-foot road
ways in Connecticut avenue, and
the fact that Washington aver
age street yields only q forty-foot
roadway in a Tlinety-foot width.
comes pretty near proving the
truth OF that statement.
Then what's the idea Of the
dollar fine?
With new drivers throughout
the country being licensed at the
rate Of something like two million
a year; with ears being turned
out Of the factories at the rate
OF 100000 per month; AMI with
Washington getting her full share
of both, it's easy to see that
the parking problem is only
blossoming now. We've got to
Get ready to care for the crop.
To narrow sidewalks where
they're wider than necessary; to
move them back where fifteen
and twenty4foot Government
owned front lawns are blooming
between them and the building
line-all this will cost money.
But SO does our present parking
scarcity.
Washington business men have
lost enough time during the last
five years, to say nothing of
fines. to pay for this work.
Washington has the best park
ing possibilities and the poorest
parking conditions of any city in
the nation.
Looks like Colonel Bell has
started something.