The Lost Americans And The College St. Bridge

How could I have been so blind!

The Sheriff gave out the information publicly around a year ago but few people, including myself, understood what he was really talking about. He warned us what would happen but we did not take him seriously. He knew what was going on given his background in City matters and his history.

Remember there is the obvious in the Henderson columns but there is also the hidden meaning. Obviously, he understood that he had written too cryptically in this case and learned. He changed his writing style so that he made it perfectly clear what he was doing.

My only defence is that I just cannot be on top of everything, even something that has taken place constantly over the last decade. I just don’t travel in that area very much so I would not have known about the problems.

Of course, I am talking about the College Street Bridge and its closure for who knows how long. But there is more to it than that, much more!

Remember what the City said in a Press Release:

• “As a result of a recent structural evaluation, it has been decided to close the College Avenue Bridge over C.P.R. to all through traffic for safety reasons. The College Avenue Bridge was built in 1927. It has now reached the end of its useful life. Detour signs are being posted to redirect traffic.”

I was lucky that I was able to find it because there is nothing on the City’s Newsroom page about it. I did see in an Administration Report:

• “As a result of previous inspections and concerns raise, load limits and pedestrian restrictions were placed on the structure in 2004. Public Works has included the replacement of this structure for consideration in its annual budget for at least 10 years.”

It is no wonder that the bridge is at the end of its useful life:

• “no major structural rehabilitation occurred.”

However, as shocking as it is about the failure of the City to maintain a bridge, that is not why I am writing this BLOG.

I received a call yesterday afternoon from an informant who warned me about a matter that can be so damaging to this City that I thought about not writing this BLOG. However, there is an issue of public safety at stake.

More importantly, this matter could be raised by President Obama in his meeting with Prime Minister Harper. I am warning Ambassador Michael Wilson that he had better discover soon what is going on. Thank goodness no one took Councillor Loopy’s suggestion that the President should be invited to Windsor now. The US Secret Service would never have permitted it. That would have been an absolute disaster for our City as you shall quickly see.

There has been a rumour circulating that desperate West Enders are holding for ransom Americans who have become hopelessly lost in Windsor. No one knows how many people are being held captive. The reason for this despicable action is that the West End, other than the Sandwich area, has been totally ignored by City Council.

These drastic measures were deemed necessary if this area is to survive at all. It was a shout out especially to the Ward 2 Councillors who seemed to be so focused on the Sandwich area.

Back to the Sheriff and his warning. In February, 2008 he wrote:

• “There'll be further damage to Casino Windsor and downtown businesses -- which they can ill afford -- with the northbound Huron Church Road closing. It could be days before search parties locate some of those dazed and confused Yanks who were redirected south along Huron Church with endless streams of 18-wheelers and ended up marooned (or is it Morouned?) in the frozen wilds of South Windsor. Or maybe Holiday Beach.

He did not mean to talk about the Ambassador Bridge Project. They would have known how to direct traffic. After all, they are involved in the massive Ambassador Gateway project that closed down expressways in the US for several years. This would have been childs’s play for them.

With his prodigious memory, clearly Henderson knew about the College Street Bridge and knew what would happen when the City had to close it down. He suspected as well what would happen given his terrific connections in the West End. I imagine that he must have received hundreds of letters and phone calls from people in that area begging him to help them out with the Mayor and Council.

There is no doubt at all that certain rogue Bureaucrats at City Hall are working with the West Enders. Notice again what the City said obviously to sucker Americans into the trap by giving them a false sense of security:

• “Detour signs are being posted to redirect traffic”

My informant suggested that I pretend that I was a American coming from the United States into Windsor over the Ambassador Bridge and that I was going to head off to Casino Windsor.

Chances are that I would make a left turn at College to go to the Casino. Here is what I would see:

1) Sign to Casino Windsor

2) A sign saying College was closed west of Wellington and to use Campbell

3) An intersection with traffic lights BUT NO STREET NAME SIGN VISIBLE WHEN ONE IS TRAVELLING EAST and a road closed sign

4) A dead end with a huge Road Closed sign!



There is no doubt in my mind that the dazed and confused Yanks are being seized at this spot by the West End bandits. This is where the ambush takes place. Those that have the ability to do a quick U-turn probably did so and found their way back to the Ambassador Bridge and back to the USA. For those unfortunate others, hopefully they are being treated properly by their captors.

Is there any doubt now why Casino Windsor’s revenues have dropped so quickly? It is not due to the dollar or the cost of gas or border thickening or SARS or the myriad of other excuses that people have used. I am convinced that over the last decade Americans have been warned about going over that College Street Bridge to the Casino by their friends and colleagues due to its structural deficiencies. Now this! That is why traffic has decreased into Windsor in my opinion.

Now clearly Americans have a reason to be concerned with the poor signage and the consequences of being lost in the depths of the City of Windsor!

Now, dear reader, you will understand why the Agenda at the Council meeting is so short on Monday. Supposedly, there is a Strategic Planning Ssession after another "closed-door meeting of Council." Oh there is one all right. The Mayor and Council need to strategize over how they will deal with this dramatic event in our City’s history.

What will we do with Gord only writing one day a week now! Who will warn and protect us now?