Back from "vacation"
Yes, I know it's been months since my last post. And I have but two excuses: 1) Sloth; and 2) Inattention.
Would that I could say that I've been busy with other matters -- and, to a certain extent, I have: overseas travel (in connection with my and the former Joan Giger Walker's 60th birthdays); personal business (rebuilding a house damaged in the hurricanes of 2004); and quasi-public business (Times/Review Summer Tennis Tournament, Southold Citizens for Safe Roads, East End Student Film Project) -- but the truth is I stopped writing mostly because I had a sense no one was reading this blog, which was something of a letdown after years of regular reader reaction to my Suffolk Times column. But now I've come to the (belated) conclusion that I need to maintain this blog for myself and no one else. And that's because I still like to write, even if there's no one else out there to read what I have to say. So please sit back and don't read this.
The most excitement I've had in a long time came at (can you guess?) Cross Sound Ferry's Orient Point terminal last week. My nephew, Nelson Walker III, and I were there in connection with a documentary film Southold Citizens for Safe Roads is making on the ferry traffic issue. Nelson is the filmmaker (with previous projects screened on The Sundance Channel and a current project pending for inclusion in this winter's Sundance Film Festival) and I was serving as his driver, caterer (in other words, I sprung for lunch) and key grip, whatever that is.
Let us set the scene: Nelson was standing atop a big mound of dirt/sand/stone that CSF has piled up on the edge of the bay beach, just east of the ferry docks. He was filming the east parking lot and the so-called "Trust Property," where CSF seeks to locate an additional 451 parking spaces. I was waiting in my pickup truck. We'd been there less than five minutes when another pickup pulled up, and a fellow wearing an Orient Fire Department baseball cap identified himself as an employee of the ferry company and asked us what we were doing. Long story short: he didn't like what we were doing and asked us to leave, which we immediately did. (I personally have a little trouble with his invocation of Homeland Security concerns with our photographing a parking lot and an empty field -- having seen, just that morning, en route on the ferry from New London to Orient, literally dozens of tourists photographing the John H -- but we did not argue.) We departed immediately for Orient Point itself, where we shot some scenic footage of ferries passing one another in the waters off the Orient Point lighthouse.
Upon our return to the terminus of Route 25, however, we were intercepted by two Southold Police Department patrol cars. After asking to see my driver's license, one of the officers informed me that I was henceforth banned from going on Cross Sound Ferry property. Why, I asked. Because of my "past problems" with the ferry company, he replied. What problems, I asked. I don't recall that he gave a satisfactory answer, but my suspicion is that my past public criticism of the ferry company and the traffic its ferries generate was at the root of the problem. I did not complain at the time -- probably because he was carrying a 9mm handgun -- that he did not appear to be mediating a difference of opinion between a ferry company employee and the aforementioned film crew, but instead appeared to be representing only the ferry company's point of view. But I did tell him I would need to see the order in writing because I had never caused a scene or presented any sort of a threat on a CSF boat or at one of its terminals. Besides, isn't this the same company that invokes interstate commerce every time Southold Town government wants to impose any sort of controls (read: zoning) on its operations? In other words, is CSF a public carrier or not? And can they ban a passenger simply because they don't like what he has to say? I wouldn't mind getting answers to those questions in a court of law.
So far, that cop's so-called order hasn't been tested, mostly because I have not returned to the CSF terminal since discussing the matter with Police Chief Ty Cochran. I told him we have no intention of returning to film the terminal or ferries -- mostly because we already have the footage we need, but also because CSF asked us to cease and desist.
Stay tuned for updates. Joan and I no doubt will need to use the ferry again one of these days, and it will be interesting to see if they've got my name in their reservations computer as a potential terrorist threat.
*****************
Two recent letters to the editor of The Suffolk Times merit correction/clarification, although I don't choose to correct/clarify in the paper's pages themselves because the ferry issue already has taken up more than enough ink. But blogspace is free, so here goes.
Dear Bill Albertson: It absolutely frightens me to think that Southold Town's vulnerable waterways were under your jurisdiction when you were a Southold Town Trustee. (I also wonder if you're one of those former town officials who have been granted a lifetime free pass on Cross Sound Ferry. Are you?) Your dangerously simplistic take on the ferry traffic issue has done this town a great disservice. Case in point: Your Oct. 12 letter to the editor. What makes you think ferry traffic wasn't the major contributor to the traffic jam that occurred after the recent accident on the Orient-East Marion Causeway? A local resident may have caused the initial accident, but the miles-long traffic backup certainly wasn't due to local traffic. It was a result of ferry traffic, pure and simple. And where's your concern for the emergency vehicles whose path was blocked in the aftermath of the accident, or for the potential emergency evacuation of our community? If Cross Sound Ferry can't be blamed for the traffic cited in your letter, who can?
Dear Carolyn Kramkowski: How reassuring to have your take on the ferry traffic issue all the way from Murray, Kentucky. And what does controlling parking on the shoulder of a state road have to do with the fact that I use the ferry myself? Nice try, but you have not succeeded in confusing the issue. Despite Cross Sound Ferry's persistent attempt at disinformation, this debate is not about ending ferry service between Long Island and Southeastern Connecticut. It is about controlling the traffic that has increased by 1,200% while Southold's population has increased by 12%. FYI, Ms. K.: When Joan and I moved here in 1977, there were about a dozens car ferries a day; now, in the summertime, there can be upwards to 60 ferries a day, including the gamblers' express fast ferries. No, we're not moving... but you might as well stay in Kentucky if you have such little regard for the future of Southold Town.
Would that I could say that I've been busy with other matters -- and, to a certain extent, I have: overseas travel (in connection with my and the former Joan Giger Walker's 60th birthdays); personal business (rebuilding a house damaged in the hurricanes of 2004); and quasi-public business (Times/Review Summer Tennis Tournament, Southold Citizens for Safe Roads, East End Student Film Project) -- but the truth is I stopped writing mostly because I had a sense no one was reading this blog, which was something of a letdown after years of regular reader reaction to my Suffolk Times column. But now I've come to the (belated) conclusion that I need to maintain this blog for myself and no one else. And that's because I still like to write, even if there's no one else out there to read what I have to say. So please sit back and don't read this.
The most excitement I've had in a long time came at (can you guess?) Cross Sound Ferry's Orient Point terminal last week. My nephew, Nelson Walker III, and I were there in connection with a documentary film Southold Citizens for Safe Roads is making on the ferry traffic issue. Nelson is the filmmaker (with previous projects screened on The Sundance Channel and a current project pending for inclusion in this winter's Sundance Film Festival) and I was serving as his driver, caterer (in other words, I sprung for lunch) and key grip, whatever that is.
Let us set the scene: Nelson was standing atop a big mound of dirt/sand/stone that CSF has piled up on the edge of the bay beach, just east of the ferry docks. He was filming the east parking lot and the so-called "Trust Property," where CSF seeks to locate an additional 451 parking spaces. I was waiting in my pickup truck. We'd been there less than five minutes when another pickup pulled up, and a fellow wearing an Orient Fire Department baseball cap identified himself as an employee of the ferry company and asked us what we were doing. Long story short: he didn't like what we were doing and asked us to leave, which we immediately did. (I personally have a little trouble with his invocation of Homeland Security concerns with our photographing a parking lot and an empty field -- having seen, just that morning, en route on the ferry from New London to Orient, literally dozens of tourists photographing the John H -- but we did not argue.) We departed immediately for Orient Point itself, where we shot some scenic footage of ferries passing one another in the waters off the Orient Point lighthouse.
Upon our return to the terminus of Route 25, however, we were intercepted by two Southold Police Department patrol cars. After asking to see my driver's license, one of the officers informed me that I was henceforth banned from going on Cross Sound Ferry property. Why, I asked. Because of my "past problems" with the ferry company, he replied. What problems, I asked. I don't recall that he gave a satisfactory answer, but my suspicion is that my past public criticism of the ferry company and the traffic its ferries generate was at the root of the problem. I did not complain at the time -- probably because he was carrying a 9mm handgun -- that he did not appear to be mediating a difference of opinion between a ferry company employee and the aforementioned film crew, but instead appeared to be representing only the ferry company's point of view. But I did tell him I would need to see the order in writing because I had never caused a scene or presented any sort of a threat on a CSF boat or at one of its terminals. Besides, isn't this the same company that invokes interstate commerce every time Southold Town government wants to impose any sort of controls (read: zoning) on its operations? In other words, is CSF a public carrier or not? And can they ban a passenger simply because they don't like what he has to say? I wouldn't mind getting answers to those questions in a court of law.
So far, that cop's so-called order hasn't been tested, mostly because I have not returned to the CSF terminal since discussing the matter with Police Chief Ty Cochran. I told him we have no intention of returning to film the terminal or ferries -- mostly because we already have the footage we need, but also because CSF asked us to cease and desist.
Stay tuned for updates. Joan and I no doubt will need to use the ferry again one of these days, and it will be interesting to see if they've got my name in their reservations computer as a potential terrorist threat.
*****************
Two recent letters to the editor of The Suffolk Times merit correction/clarification, although I don't choose to correct/clarify in the paper's pages themselves because the ferry issue already has taken up more than enough ink. But blogspace is free, so here goes.
Dear Bill Albertson: It absolutely frightens me to think that Southold Town's vulnerable waterways were under your jurisdiction when you were a Southold Town Trustee. (I also wonder if you're one of those former town officials who have been granted a lifetime free pass on Cross Sound Ferry. Are you?) Your dangerously simplistic take on the ferry traffic issue has done this town a great disservice. Case in point: Your Oct. 12 letter to the editor. What makes you think ferry traffic wasn't the major contributor to the traffic jam that occurred after the recent accident on the Orient-East Marion Causeway? A local resident may have caused the initial accident, but the miles-long traffic backup certainly wasn't due to local traffic. It was a result of ferry traffic, pure and simple. And where's your concern for the emergency vehicles whose path was blocked in the aftermath of the accident, or for the potential emergency evacuation of our community? If Cross Sound Ferry can't be blamed for the traffic cited in your letter, who can?
Dear Carolyn Kramkowski: How reassuring to have your take on the ferry traffic issue all the way from Murray, Kentucky. And what does controlling parking on the shoulder of a state road have to do with the fact that I use the ferry myself? Nice try, but you have not succeeded in confusing the issue. Despite Cross Sound Ferry's persistent attempt at disinformation, this debate is not about ending ferry service between Long Island and Southeastern Connecticut. It is about controlling the traffic that has increased by 1,200% while Southold's population has increased by 12%. FYI, Ms. K.: When Joan and I moved here in 1977, there were about a dozens car ferries a day; now, in the summertime, there can be upwards to 60 ferries a day, including the gamblers' express fast ferries. No, we're not moving... but you might as well stay in Kentucky if you have such little regard for the future of Southold Town.
posted by Troy Gustavson at 9:25 AM
5 Comments:
Welcome back. It is good to read your voice. Keep it up. A fan
You have some interested readers, I'm quite sure of that. Keep writing for your sake as well as others.
So did you take the CSF up to Boston or did you drive around?
If you're so upset over the traffic, I don't understand why you're not also attacking the vineyards and the farmstands.
Dear Anonymous: Yes, I took the ferry. Again, don't try to make this an all or nothing at all argument. It's possible to control ferry traffic and still have the ferry on our terms (not theirs).
And if you don't see the difference between ferry traffic and farmstand/vineyard traffic, then I'm certain nothing I say will change your mind. But here goes anyhow: 90% (and perhaps more) of ferry traffic is using our town as a bridge to New England or Western Suffolk. Very few of those cars benefit our town in any significant way or transport our local residents. The farmstand/vineyard traffic, on the other hand, is a major component of our LOCAL economy. It generates local sales (and the trickle down effect from those sales), local jobs and local land preservation. It seems so basic to me, but obviously you don't get it. Sorry about that.
:Troy Gustavson (see, I'm not afraid to sign my name to my opinions)
good reply troy. i read your blog too when i remember. kip.
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