The San Francisco Citizen

So you’re doing a good deed in the Mission District of San Francisco, and then when you come back to your very-well-made, made-in-China ride, you see that somebody has taped a handbill to your bike. Then you see it says:

“HELICOPTERS COULD SOON BE FLYING OVER OR NEAR YOUR HOME AT ALL HOURS OF BOTH DAY AND NIGHT!”

And then you think, wow, somebody has finally bought off all those NOT IN MY BACK YARD Nimby people who were standing in the way of Progress, and San Francisco will no longer have the only Level One Trauma Center in the country to lack a helipad or access to a heliport.

Click to expand

But then you read on and see that the handbill is from the Nimby’s themselves. Disappointed. They think a helipad is a bad idea for them.

Read on to see the fruits of the labors of the Stop the Helipad people:

“A head-on collision on the Golden Gate Bridge in Maythrew the evening commute into chaos and drew immediate cries for new safety measures. Lost in the flurry of traffic reports and debate about possible barriers, however, was the aftermath of the crash for the most seriously hurt victim. Dr. Grace M. Dammann had to be transported by helicopter about 25 miles to John Muir Hospital in Walnut Creek because San Francisco General Hospital lacks a helipad for its acclaimed Level 1 Trauma Center.”

Mmmm. According to an American College of Surgeons Consultation Survey of San Francisco General Hospital’s Trauma Program:

“The lack of a helipad and helicopter service is a major deficiency in providing optimal trauma care for San Francisco General Hospital and San Francisco. It is difficult to understand why a city the size of San Francisco does not have any medical air transport. The congested roads and bridges with the surrounding water make helicopter service an essential medical support service.”

Will the YES HELIPAD people win this one?

Eventually…

Oh oh, there’s a new “neighborhood call to action” in San Francisco.

“Sometimes it’s possible for really significant changes to slip past normal public planning channels almost unnoticed.”

Now this man certainly doesn’t look too happy about a LightSpeed utility box installed in his nabe, but San Francisco’s new boxes should be shorter than this. People, teh Sunset district with a few more metal boxes here and there is still going to be the Sunset, avec all its pluses and minuses. This LightSpeed program won’t be a “significant change” to anything. You NIMBYs are getting out of hand.  

Look what DPT has to go through with DPW to make deadly Masonic Avenue a little safer a with a single (one) controller cabinet. The notice pictured below was posted on umptyump telephone poles recently.

Click to expand. (Sorry NIMBYs, time has expired for any call to arms on this one.)

Countdown signals now! And LightSpeed, meh, whatever, doesn’t matter.