The vanishing sidewalk
I spotted this bedraggled lot of state employees walking in traffic on Commonwealth Avenue in Harrisburg today and snapped a photo with my cameraphone. It illustrates yet another of my perennial complaints about being a pedestrian in Harrisburg, how contractors casually block off sidewalks for their own convenience and tell you to walk somewhere else. There's a perfectly good sidewalk on the other side of that barrier, but now that construction has started on the Commonwealth Judicial Center in that big hole on the far side, pedestrians got the boot.
Much the same happened when Verizon did construction work on its central office tower at Second and Pine a few months back. Signs near both the Verizon building and the Judicial Center warned pedestrians to cross to the other side of the street. Inconvenient? Too bad.
This wouldn't happen in New York City, where contractors erect elaborate covered walkways for the convenience and protection of pedestrians when they have to infringe on the sidewalk. I suspect city law requires that, as it should here. Such a law recognizes an immutable fact about humans: they tend to travel the shortest distance between two points, not some wacky zigzag pattern for the convenience of contractors.
A couple of months ago, when the roofing contractor at Salem Church on Chestnut Street helpfully taped off the entire sidewalk while he stripped shingles off the back of the church, I just lifted it and went under. An employee of the roofer came huffing up and ordered me back outside the tape. In this instance, I would have needed to go back an entire block to safely cross the street. I ignored him and his yelps and kept on walking. Sic semper tyrannis!