Buffalo City

I hiked over to the Central Library today which is about a twenty minute walk through the center of downtown. People, this is one dirty city. Litter blows about everywhere, and there needs to be more available trashcans with signs around. Not only the ubiquitous plastic bag is caught in tree branches or rolls down the sidewalk, but empty paper cups with the plastic tops and straws sticking out of them are legion. Wrappers. Food, mashed up food is on the sidewalk, the middle of the street, or left at the bus stops.

To see a clipped, well kept area is unusual. Lafayette Square has a once a week during the summer free concert gig, and the once apparent grass has been stomped away to hard packed, dusty dirt that must turn to mud during a rain. You could, however, stay afloat by walking on the clusters of cigarette butts which form a sort of mat. Not to mention the crappy self promoting teen behaviors demonstrated on YouTube after one of these concerts, but I am guessing that it's not the music that's the draw anymore, but the opportunity to go get publicly drunk on a summer night. Maybe I'm wrong. Enlighten me with a comment, please, if it's only a few bad apples.

The thing is, where the heck is this garbage coming from, because even though I trotted to and fro, there aren't enough people downtown to create this mess. Is it the empty storefronts? The above-ground subway down the middle of the main street? The lack of people friendly venues? There is a void, here, of city pride. The city could step up the cleanliness, police presence, and attract some shops to take a chance down here. Who comes down here for shopping and lunch anymore? If your job isn't in the city, you don't get here.

The library says that it's attendance is up, elevated by people looking for something to do that doesn't entail driving. Good. In fact, fabulous. Come on, come into the city, it really could be such nice place and fortunately, it's the direction we are headed in. The waterfront is beautiful, but we want something to do in the city besides the lunchtime jazz and architectural tours. The place is a ghost town on the weekend. I can see why.

In the soaped-up windows of the former AM&A's store, someone scraped a prominent note saying, "Buffalo builds bad character." It wasn't just put there yesterday, probably has been there for months, could we please get rid of it? You see something like that everyday and it is one more kick in the pants on an already overloaded human. You are what you read. If you can't get into the building, could something be pasted over it?

We have to start somewhere, in a public arena that everyone enjoys. On our streets, with the demolition of the boarded up housing, getting after absentee landlords. Lay some brick down in the Square so that it really looks like a square and is easier to maintain than the mud. Oh it goes on and on, but this walk was an eye opener for me. It was a signal of the apathy of local government which has trickled down to the people as too large a job to be tackled. Clean. Up. Downtown. Now.

Ranting wears me out, I'm hitting the sack. Dark orange moon slowly rising.