SEEN AND HEARD: “Too Caliente: Won’t Be Open Today. Sorry” — El Cuate food truck, Aug. 8 ... “Hot!” a pedestrian said Aug. 10 when observed cupping water from the drinking fountain at Second and Oak and asked, “Water lukewarm?” ... Winery sandwich board sign held down using a 10-pound hand weight ... Law enforcement finding abandoned kayak paddles along a freeway jersey barrier ...
SCANNER TALK: On Aug. 9, a dispatcher asks a police officer, “Is there a legal crosswalk at Rand and Cascade that’s not marked?”
(Officer’s response unclear)
Dispatcher replies that a caller said, “Vehicles are not stopping and are yelling at her.”
The city will be revising the intersection and installing traffic signals, perhaps by 2020, but the design is not complete, so no official word on a crosswalk there.
However, the caller’s complaint points to the long- and often-noted lament that the only marked crosswalk on Cascade between Oak Street and the freeway is at 20th, meaning that a commercial district stretching about a mile contains a single official protection zone for pedestrians. Why this will have to wait another two years merits some explanation from the city and from the Oregon Department of Transportation.
SIGN of the Week: Parking “For Sale” cars on private property is legal, but only with the property owners’ permission (though not on public property) and property owners are within their rights to post signs such as this at Brookside and 12th.
(Basically, you can’t just slap a sign on your car and park next to some busy intersection.)
EMERGENCY ZONES II: It happened again; dispatchers and responders, in discussing a swamped kiter in need of assistance, referred to “The Event Site.”
That location and other waterfront locations are still called by name, when the emergency zone numbering system was installed years ago as a way of avoiding confusion. (See The Porch, Aug. 11.) The port and other partners went to the expense of numerically designating the zones. Why are we not saying, “In the water off Zone 3”?
(Post-script: The kiter was okay, rescued by a flotilla of kayakers and a jet ski rider; the sheriff office marine patrol was poised to respond, but did not need to. Happily, the latest in a long list of water sports folks helping each other out.)
‘FREE’ life: Imagine your own domestic vignette behind the combination of chair, vacuum cleaner and fan, put out for free (“take some, all, or nothing”) on a Heights street.
QUESTION OF THE WEEK: Why is it that at a certain establishment that is otherwise bicycle-oriented, the bike rack is by the front door is unusable thanks to a vehicle parking space?
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Take your seat on The Porch; feedback is welcome, along with contributions of those offbeat and under-noticed elements of life around here. You’ll know them when you see them; kneumannrea@hoodrivernews.com.
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