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Whether our legislature is effective or not in dealing with transportation problems, the planning is coming.  You can help shape it.

The Transit Planning Board, which is made up of ARC, GDOT, GRTA, and MARTA representatives has a plan for transport throughout the region.  They are taking general public input!  You can make a difference by taking this survey.

As you take it, I urge you to think not in accounting terms, but in economic terms.  In other words, consider the opportunity costs of the choices you’re making.  Think about your answers as though you had to travel from one part of the metro region to another on a Friday at 4:15 P.M.

What are you unwilling to give up to have a better trip at that time.  What trade offs are you willing to make?

A tiny percentage of the Metro population will take the survey.  Ten minutes of your time will make a difference.

If you’re the Atlanta Falcons, your quarterbacks have not had a good season.  This week however, Joey Harrington won a game!

Not only did he win, but NPR carried it!  Harrington was this week’s celebrity contestant on ‘Wait Wait Don’t Tell Me‘.  In the game, he had to answer three questions about the Smurfs.  In Harrington-like fashion, he threw the first question away, but did successfully complete the last two.  Regretably, an Atlantan did not win the prize; that went to a woman in Saint Paul, Minnesota.

Harrington did reveal a little bit about the end of the Falcon’s season.  According to the quarterback, after his last game, Bobby Petrino came into the locker room and asked everyone to “Go home and think about what you can do for this team!”  Apparently, the best thing the coach could do was leave the organization.

Still, the Falcons and Harrington both really needed the win.  Even if they are the Smurfiest team in the NFL.

At roughly 9:15 P.M., January 1, 2008, it began to snow near Little Five Points. There wasn’t a lot of snow, and no accumulation, but it did snow. That in itself is a welcome site. The swirling snow against the neon lights of the shops were very pretty indeed.

What is even more remarkable is that upon reaching Sage Hill, where it was still snowing, there were not lines of nutballs trying to buy out all the milk and bread that Kroger had. People calmly stayed home, knowing that they’ll still be able to get to work tomorrow.

If the Legislature can show that much maturity, it might not be such a bad year after all. If the citizens get their voter registrations in before Saturday and then vote in the primaries, it might be even better.

Happy New Year all.

The opening of the new Hudson Grille at Brookhaven Station provides an opportunity to reflect on tavern culture here in Atlanta. We have an advantage over many cities in that we have mid price range up scale taverns that are based here. Just as Charlotte has a great diner culture, we have a great tavern culture. Most cities have great dive taverns and really high end bars, but few have great quality in the middle. Hudson Grille joins a great group that includes The 5 Seasons Brewery, Village Bakery and Restaurant, P’cheen, Atkins Park and others. All of these places serve quality beer and food that is a step above the dreaded Sysco and Monarch Bars.

The Hudson Grille takes the place of Jocks and Jills and GM Tony Shaw wants to recapture the J&J crowd “Plus”. That plus is a little bit better atmosphere and a real focus on the food. Like Garrison’s (the best value in steak in Atlanta, especially the Vinings location), the menu has some serious dishes on it. It also has bar food. To make his restaurant distinctive, Shaw knows that not only must serious dishes have to meet muster, but the basic bar food has to be better than expected. The burgers have to be worth it and wings have to be as good as Atkin’s Park.

Shaw is also taking another pretty big risk. He’s broadening the menu to add pizza. A broader menu will let him expand the crowd that comes in, however, serving pizza when you’re 50 feet from Mellow Mushroom is risky. Still, if he wants to capture both the Brookhaven parental crowd and the Oglethorpe University students, pizza is a risk that can pay. The trick will be to keep an eye on the quality. If some parts of the menu are not consistently prepared well, the reputation of the restaurant could suffer. With a diverse menu, that’s harder to do.

In doing a broader menu, he’s going the opposite way from institutions such as 5 Seasons and the Village Bakery and Restaurant. Both of those watering holes have made their mark by limiting their menu to a particular zeitgeist of food. The Village does delicious authentic German food. The 5 Seasons Brewery has done it by embracing a slow food philosophy and using only organic ingredients (and it’s Kobe beef you can afford!). They’ve also created an atmosphere that’s very community oriented. As a result both restaurants are beloved.

Shaw’s path to stalwartship in the community is riskier, however he also has the power of the Metrotainment group behind him. That gives him some marketing muscle, management help, access to first class desserts, and branding. It helps to be able to say “We’re the sports entertainment version of Cowtippers or Garrisons”; the message being “hey we’re just like these other places you love, but you can keep an eye on the game too!”

Visiting the Hudson Grille on opening night was a good experience and worth repeating. The interior is a bit upscale from Jocks and Jills but higher energy than Garrison’s. The service was on point and the food was good. The desserts were delicious. Key lime pie with a raspberry drizzle is always a good idea. The biggest complaint is that it’s a tad noisy, but they’ll learn to zone things. The check was $26 including one main course (shrimp), two desserts, and drinks.

Tests for the Hudson Grille and Shaw’s team will come pretty quickly. The community test will first come this weekend when the surrounding professional community comes to relax. He’ll be ready for them. Then two weeks from now, ‘the excellence in a broad situation’ test will continue when Oglethorpe students return.

Hopefully this place will succeed for a number of reasons. First, with Jocks and Jills on the defensive, Atlanta can use a good upscale sports bar. Second, Hudson Grille stays open late (until 2 AM) and is walking distance from a MARTA station so you can zip over after the game or concert is done). In an era where places have cut back their hours, it’s good to have a transit accessible watering hole where you can stay until the last train!

If there is one case that the Atlanta Police and Fulton County District Attorney’s Office has to handle it’s the case of the Cabbage Town Kidnappers.

If you’re not familiar with this, at 2:30 AM on July first, two attorneys from prominent legal organizations were kidnapped outside of a nightclub.  They were not freed until 15 hours later.  The names of suspects have not been released.

Nothing.  Absolutely nothing will shut off tourism and confirm white flight fears of downtown faster than kidnappings.  While it is horrible that this happened, and the kidnappers were just plain stupid to attack someone who worked with the Public Defenders Office, this is a chance at redemption for the police department.  Heaven knows they need it.

If the police get this case solved quickly and by the book, their reputation will be partially restored.  If they give the D.A. a case that is easy to prosecute that will help too.  The District Attorney then needs to make it very clear that kidnappers will swiftly receive the full impact of justice.

The Mayor, Convention and Visitors Bureau, and club owners then need to work together to make sure that this does not happen again.  That means more police at various clubs at all hours of the night.  It means that the police are going to have to work harder and smarter and may not be able to take as many side gigs.

So far, people have felt safe moving back into the city, but if another kidnapping happens, or if worse, one is successful, those condos will become very inexpensive very quickly and Real Estate Developers will egg on an already eager legislature to punish the city.

The Mayor specifically needs to get her hands dirty here.  She needs to find the money to hire more officers, pay them more, and make sure they’re not corrupt.  She then needs to publicly put pressure on Chief Pennington to make real changes and to cooperate with the Union.  She needs to get businesses to help with some support for officers and the families.  Then, we need the cop on every corner pledge.

Downtown, you need to always be able to see a police officer.  Chicago did this in the 1970s and it made a huge difference.  Literally, there was a cop on every block, all the time.  From Castleberry Hill to the Fox and from Centennial Park to the King Center, any should be able to simply say, “Excuse Me, Mr. Officer?” and get  immediate friendly help.

Do that and downtown booms.  Fail to do that, see one major crime happen, and the whole city will lose 20% of the its property tax value over night.

What does it say about a community when a Houston’s goes out of business?  Houston’s has been among the most successful restaurant chains in Atlanta history.  The restaurants made their name by being the best of the “glorified burger/fern bar” joints in the city.  Waits have been as long as two hours.  Now, the Ashford Dunwoody location has gone belly up.

According to several websites, a few elements precipitated the close.  First, websites noted that of all the Houston’s, the Ashford Dunwoody location had the worst customer service.  This apparently lead to the store being the worst financial performer of all the Houston’s in the metro area.  When J. Alexander’s (A Houston’s knock off) offered a substantial payout for the location, Houston’s accepted and closed.

It seems two trends have intersected to make this happen.  First is the national trend toward squeezing out the middle.  Houston is in a similar situation to department stores such as J.C. Penny’s, Montgomery Ward, and Sears.  These stores suffered from price competition from their downmarket rivals such as Target and Wal-Mart and lost upper end customers to Nordstrom and Bloomingdales.  The middle was squeezed out.  In the Perimeter area, the increase in property values has meant that staying competitive requires either high volume and profit items such as Chili’s or more upscale environments such as Garrison’s.  The middle gets squeezed.

The second element here is the quality of service deteriorated.  This seems to be one of the big subjects in Atlanta right now.  Quality waitrons are harder to find.  Bartenders don’t know their drinks, waitrons don’t know their food, and the shortage of qualified staff has lead restaurant managers to accept lower standards.   Restaurant such as Houston’s suffer disproportionately when the service drops because people are aware of their team concept and come with expectations.  Nothing hurts a restaurant with a good reputation more than poor service.

Still the neighborhood is suffering here.  Houston’s was the best of the fern bars.  If too many mid-list restaurants are removed the neighborhood has fewer reasonably options.  Further, it means that local, one of a kind restaurants have less chance of opening and surviving.  That hurts everyone.

If you live in Fulton or Dekalb County, get on your voting shoes, because there is an election Tuesday, March 20.  For most people, the vote is about re-authorizing a SPLOST for local schools.  If you don’t vote here, you can’t complain about your taxes.  Vote on this and you have a license to complain.  You can also make sure there is enough money to keep schools from crumbling.

If you live in Chamblee, however, you have more to vote for.  There is a City Council election.  Barry Finley and Dan Zanger face off.  Zanger has been on the Recreation Advisory Committee for the city.  Finley has been on the City’s ethics board.  Voting is 7 to 7 PM and will take you less than 10 minutes.  Just do it.

Marta has a new planning map! This, in and of itself is a good thing. It means the staff and the MARTA board are not giving up and just waiting for an ARC take over. It also shows some of the directions MARTA is considering and it lets people influence the process now, rather than when it’s too late. One can also discern which battles MARTA thinks it cannot win.

The most telling item is that MARTA is conceding that more road building is inevitable and that concrete, rather than rail, will represent a considerable part of the future. The prominence of Bus Rapid Transit solutions (henceforth BRT) makes this obvious. For ages, South Dekalb residents wanted their own rail line. MARTA accepted that there was demand for a line, but now has acknowledged that the likelihood of building new rail there is not worth pursuing. Rather, Memorial Drive seems to be the corridor in which BRT will get its testing ground.

There will be measures taken to ensure that the BRT will have some ability to get around traffic and that there are actual stations to ensure passenger safety. This project also has a time table attached to it, and according to the site cooperation from the Georgia Department of Transportation. If that’s more than just P.R., it is a stunning turn around indeed.

Dear Lois….

You hot sexy mama!!!!!!! You did it! You are the stuff. Will I give to WABE this year? You bet!

Why didn’t you tell us you were broadcasting in HD? Three different streams all the time! A feed for the news junkies? Yes! One for Classical Music to keep broadcast access to one of our greatest art forms? Yes. Plus the regular stream! These same streams are echoed on the Web.

All in HD Radio! Absolutely terrific! Thank you very much!

For those of you unfamiliar with HD radio, it’s a digital signal which new HD radio receivers can pick up and it sends out a digitally encoded signal. The standard allows for up to three formats in roughly each frequency range. WABE is using HD1 for it’s regular signal, HD2 for its classical music stream, and HD3 for the all news channel. Best of all, this is in the broadcast band! It’s free! All you need is a receiver.

Right now, for the most part, HD radios are a bit pricey, but more and more manufacturers are making them. However, Radio Shack has a model which if you purchase before Christmas 2006 is less than $150 with Rebate. It’s not the fanciest, but you’ll have 40 channels of radio in FM alone and no monthly fee to pay!

Now… if I could only get an HD radio card for my treo….

On Tuesday, all over the state, people had the opportunity to vote for Public Service Commission.  Of the over 3,500,000 eligible to vote, only 225,000 showed up.    It is amazing that even when an election DIRECTLY effects the pocketbook, we still don’t come out.

One volunteer who was working the polls yesterday cried because only 16 people hit his precinct all day.  16.  Some counties averaged as low as 11 voters per precinct.

In the metro area, Dekalb County did the best.  They turned out an average of 84 voters per precinct.  Frighentingly, Dekalb and Fulton turned out the same number of voters (Roughly 15,900 for each country), but Fulton has nearly twice the number of precincts and voters registered.  They averaged 47 voters per precinct.  Cobb did slightly better with 51 voters per precinct. and Clayton had 53 voters per precinct.  Remember that the polls were open for 12 hours yesterday.  That means in Fulton County there was less than one voter every 15 minutes.

The true patriots voted yesterday.  Regardless of party, regardless of the race,  We know there are only 225,000 dedicated Georgians and Americans.

Why list who won?  You don’t care… and that’s just sad.