Outline of comments to City Planning Department

1. By Wayne Brockbank
2. Introduction
   1. Honored to speak
   2. Wayne Brockbank
      1. Professor of Business Administration at the new named Ross Business School at the University of Michigan
3. Fatal flaw
   1. Fatal flaw in companies occurs when….
      1. IBM - mainframe
      2. Enron – ethics and board governance
      3. K-Mart – inventory management and price infrastructure
   2. Causes
      1. Get their sunk costs high: they pour good money after bad.
      2. Arrogance; can’t admit they made a mistake
   3. 3 Important of recognizing flaws before it is too late.
4. Primacy of The Safety of our Children
   1. If this cannot be addressed and be guaranteed then the planned site has a fatal flaw the school should be moved elsewhere.
   2. To date the school district has been totally in adequate in addressing the concerns of the parents and other individuals who live in and know the area. Again. Who live in and know the area. – including especially the traffic dangers.
5. Situation
   1. Heavy traffic in generally along a two lane road – one lane going each direction
   2. Six major locations of concern
      1. From Miller to M-14
         1. Going north converges two lanes in to one. A mess for anyone who has driven it during commuting hours
         2. Going south, the left hand turn onto Foss is an accident waiting to happen
      2. Under M-14
         1. Two highway entrances and egresses
            1. Many accidents
            2. People cutting across with stopping
            3. No commitment to date of which I am aware to put in to stop lights
         2. One lane that cannot be expanded into two lanes
      3. M- 14 to Craig and Blueberry
         1. Blind hill, straight street (encourages speed), blind entrances
         2. During freezing rain or snow, it becomes impassible
         3. Cars in the ditch as they turn east onto Blueberry
      4. Blueberry to Huron River Drive
         1. Blind hill, sharp drop, sharp turn, from Laurentide to Huron River Drive
         2. Traffic coming in from three directions (Whippoorwill, Newport and cross traffic exiting off of Huron River Drive from both directions.
         3. During Freezing rain or snow, it becomes impassible
      5. Foster Bridge
         1. Narrow
      6. Huron River Drive
         1. Fast, Narrow
         2. Bicyclists and runners
   3. Two lane road, fast, with sudden drops, blind curves and blind entrances.
      1. Solution – make it a four lane road.
         1. Would destroy the nature of the neighborhood but would save the lives
      2. Problem - Cannot be made into a four lane road unless the M-14 over passes are reconstructed.
      3. Solution – to make Maple not fully but adequately safe would require two lights at the freeway entrance, a light at Blueberry.
6. School Board Response to date:
   1. Personal experience.
      1. Memo of May 10^th to George Fornero and Jackie Ziemba
         1. No answer
         2. Ask for feedback and no response. Does not raise the trust level
   2. Lack attention and deferral of arguments
      1. October 14, 2004 memo to neighbors
         1. pages 3 – 4
         2. By their own admission their studies are inadequate and based on opinions rather than data
   3. School board member cited Semcog data from the AA News that there had only been two fatalities in six years. This did not sound right. So a neighbor went to Washtenaw Country Sheriff’s Department and found that two fatalities occurred in 2001 alone.
7. Neighborhood reality – Has the school board and the commissioner driven Maple both North and South
   1. During snow
   2. During Freezing rain
   3. After a Pioneer or UM football game
   4. We have and Maple is a dangerous Road
   5. My personal experience – Brynna, Wes. Both of my children have been in live threatening accidents. I have been hit by a car while running on Huron River Drive and forced off the road while biking up Maple
   6. Who knows better about the safety of this road? The school board or the people who live here and use these roads every day. To dismiss there input and conclusion is the heighth of arrogance
8. Conclusion
   1. This location for a high school has a fatal flaw. It is the safety of our children and of the neighbors
   2. The Ann Arbor City Planning Department Mission Statement
      1. The Ann Arbor City Planning Department provides expertise and information to advise and guide public and private community decision makers in achieving the best possible development, redevelopment, improvements and preservation for the benefit of the people who live in, with n, and visit the City.
      2. A key word here is the “benefit of the people”. It is part of the responsibility of the City Planning Department to protect the neighborhood and our children from the fatal flaw of having a high school in this location.
      3. This is an unsafe location.
      4. If the school Board and the Superintendent of School continue to over look these fatal safety flaw, I simply ask, ‘How many people will have to die or be badly injured before, they admit that they made a mistake?” But by then it will be too late.
      5. As part of the important mission of the City Planning Commission, I ask that you halt the fatal flaw.