Oakland Ave Closed

the city will close Oakland Avenue between Walnut and Freeman for the immediate future for replacement of water mains. We are trading off short term inconvenience for long term infrastructure improvement 

National Bike Month Events

Once again, Carbondale pedals furiously into National Bike Month. Here is a list of the events the city has planned.

Free Parking

City council is considering some form of free parking for downtown. Back in the 1990s, most downtown parking was free. However, in order to avoid paying for a parking sticker, a lot of students would park their cars in downtown and leave them for several hours. Putting in parking meters eliminated that problem. Now, with about 10,000 fewer students, this may be less of a problem.

Apparently a lot of businesses have employees that drive to work and need to park. If they do not get out to their parking space before it expires, they get a ticket.

There is a solution currently of course. Employees or their employer could purchase downtown parking passes for the staff from the city but I do not see a lot of people taking advantage of them. The city could also talk with Memorial Hospital about using the hospital's parking garage. If I recall rightly, the hospital has no objection to people parking on the upper floors of the structure. Of course, after parking there, it is still a good 10-15 minutes walk to downtown.

Bob Butler

In case you missed the news, longtime Marion mayor Bob Butler passed away yesterday, about a year after he opted to not run for another term. From the news, he had moved into an assisted living facility after leaving the office. 

Small Maker's Market

In case you want to pick up some items from local crafters and artesians:

Blink Small Maker’s Market is designed to help support and celebrate local artists, crafters, and vintage sellers with monthly pop-up small maker’s markets in downtown Carbondale.

Carbondale, IL May 5^th, 2019: Blink: Small Maker’s Market will host its inaugural pop-up market in downtown Carbondale on Sunday, May 5th, 3pm-6pm featuring arts, crafts, vintage, music and more. The market will be held at 101 W. Monroe Street in Carbondale, next to the Old Train Depot and the Cellar.  Blink will be held on the first Sunday of every month in various downtown locations in Carbondale.

The first pop-up market in May will feature local artisans: Brianna Pay, ART Cougar, Kelly Sparks Salchli, Samantha Ronketto,  ILH Studios;  Heady Yeti, Nanna’s Notions, GraceNote Metalworks, and Twisted! By Lisa; and local vintage sellers: GeekBetty Vintage and Goodbirger.

Ellie Burkey will be discussing essential oils during the pop-up and offering an assortment of simple blends, roller balls and rubs.  Twisted! By Lisa will offer a DIY bracelet tutorial for only $5 (ages 10+).  ILH Studios will offer personalized sketches and caricatures.  Shaad Schubert will be playing an acoustic set of original songs.

Free to attend. For more information, email blinkcarbondale@gmail.com

Hwy 127 Open

Highway 127 reopened south of Alto Pass, but only one lane. ITOT has put in place a one lane bypass with a traffic light while the reshoring and rebuilding of the main road takes place. Apparently the rain caused part of the road to start cracking and sliding into the valley below

What Students Want in a University

I have taught at SEMO for about 20 years and every semester I have made a point of asking my student why they chose to attend it. Admittedly, this is a non-random sample but the overwhelming reason is

Program--students choose to attend SEMO because it offers a particular program or major.

Secondary reasons include:
financial aid package
scholarship
location--either close to home or (less often) far away from home.

I have never had a student yet cite the appearance of the campus or any sports teams or facilities (except those attending on an athletic scholarship) as a reason to attend.

New Businesses In Downtown

Looks as if there are 4 new businesses open or opening soon in downtown Carbondale. As new Crossfit studio has opened in the location vacated by the previous one, just south of the new Reema's location. In the small shopping complex across the street, 2 clothing boutiques have opened and a hat shop has a sign in the window "Opening soon".

Protestors Calling for Henry's Resignation

A small group of about 25 protesters gathered in City Hall yesterday to call for Mayor Henry to step down following additional information coming out about the incident that took place at the Mayor's home just before the election. Saw another small group of about a dozen outside city hall this afternoon with one of them getting interviewed by someone from Channel 3.

Hibachi Grill

It appears that, according to a post on FB, that SIUC just bought a hibachi grill for one of the dining rooms. Yes, food is important but making sure all of your programs get funded probably takes priority. I think the the students would get along with out grilled food just fine, not so sure about programs.

Mayor's Plans

According to the current Carbondale Communique,here is what Mayor Henry plans to work on during the next year:

Reconstruction of oakland from Walnut to Chautauqua to put in a new water main

Repaving Freeman from Oakland to Glenview

Completing the Highway 13 expansion from Giant City Road to Read Station Road, including a multiuse pedestrian path

Bike/pedestrian path from Oakland to New Era Road

More recreational opportunities at Cedar Lake

Continuing neighborhood based police patrols

Increased number of community events, similar to Halloween.

Furniture King

If you drive by the Furniture King on each Hwy 13, you will see the store windows filled with "Stor Closing" signs. It is only if you look closer, or got a letter in the mail from the store, that you will see at the bottom of the windows in letters only a tenth the size of the store closing ones, "For Remodeling". Not a big fan of this type of marketing as people who drive by are going to see the "Store Closing" signs and that is what they will remember, not the "for remodeling" subtext.

Carbondale Population Over the Decades

with the interest in the upcoming census, I decided to take a look back at the population of Carbondale over the past several censuses

1940--8550 
1950--10,920  +21.7 %
1960--14,670  +25.5%
1970--22,816  +55%
1980--26,414 +15.8 %
1990--27033 +2.3%
2000--25.597  -5.3%
2010--25,902  +1.2%
2017--25,899 (est.)  0.00%

The population of Carbondale doubled between 1950 and 1970, primarily because of people drawn here by SIUC. Not by coincidence, I would bet, the town's population peaked the same year SIUC's did and, while Carbondale has not seen the same decline in numbers than SIUC has, the town is only about 3 times as large as it was prior to WW2.

Election

Looks like a good election if you were an incumbent in Carbondale. Mike Henry won relection as Mayor and Adam Loos and Tom Grant got re-elected to city council. Only Navreet Kang lost his seat to returning councilman Lee Fronabarger. Jane Adams, Kirsten Trimble and Jessica Sergeev all won seats on the Park district board and the resolution calling for exploring merging the Park District into the city passed handily. A major concern of merging the two will be the amount of debt the Park District still bears from Hickory Ridge Golf Course, which will take years to pay off.

Statement by Mike Henry

Mayor Henry posted the following, regarding the domestic incident on his Henry for Carbondale Mayor Page:

By now you may have read in the Daily Egyptian that my wife, Terri, and I had a visit from the police department Sunday night. We had family visiting, and some tensions had arisen, and Terri and I were arguing about it across the room.

Our porch doors were open and our arguing drew the attention of a police foot patrol, who were walking the neighborhood in response to some recent thefts. Ironically, they were doing exactly what they should have been doing as part of the targeted foot patrol policies I have been encouraging.

There was never any violence, or threat of violence. Just some hurt feelings in a difficult family situation.

Domestic Incident

Apparently a "domestic incident" between Mayor Henry and his wife got loud enough last Saturday night to attract the attention of a pair of Carbondale Police officers on foot patrol near the house. No arrests or charges filed but the investigation has been forwarded to the Jackson County States Attorney's office

Election Tomorrow

You can still early vote at the Carbondale civic center today or at your favorite/assigned precinct tomorrow.Seeing a lot of signs for Colombo and a lot of late arriving signs for Henry. Not too many for the individual council candidates, save for Kang.