Of beauty and streetcar wires

Infrastructure, mostly it is wallpaper and no one even notices it. That said people have been commenting on how ugly the streetcar overhead wire is downtown, namely our ridiculous county auditor.

Dusty
What is beauty though? How do you rate beauty? For that you need comparison, anything can look good until its looked at it side by side with another lesser or greater example. So how to compare? That required a trip out to Delhi to discover what magnificent electric wires look like.
And here it is, the first picture is what the auditor sees at the end of his driveway every day.
The next picture is the "ugly" streetcar wire downtown. I'm not going to get into a debate about which looks better because to me, if the whole streetcar argument has devolved into what the overhead wire looks like the argument is over.
infrastructure

infrastructure

In a way I can almost understand the people who rail against the streetcar. Their world is based on the consumption of goods. The mcmasions, the fancy cars. Because to them, how do you judge someone if not by the size of the plasma TV in their rec room or how new/expensive their is their latest car.
People who consume services are a complete mystery to them. People who consume coffee shops, breweries, local restaurants and in less than a year the streetcar. These consumers of services only care about what you've done, what’s your latest project, or idea. They couldn’t care less about how many mortgages you have supporting your American Dream
I always wondered how do we bridge that communication gap? Maybe we can't. Maybe we're asking and expecting way too much of people.
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3 ugly streetcar wires

3 comments:

  1. I was worried 'bout that wire and the supports, etc. but it turned out fairly innocuous while delivering the latest best tech streetcar in North America. Now I'd like to see discussion of a gondola skypod system connecting this streetcar to all our neighborhoods, museums, universities, etc.
    SEE: http://www.cnn.com/2013/09/13/business/skypods-gondolas-urban-transport/

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  2. Excellent post, Mr. Schwartz. Apples with apples and all that jazz.

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