TRAFFIC CONGESTION
Study carefully before
expanding HOT lanes
The numbers in “HOT lanes succeed as drivers grumble” (News, Oct. 15) were an eye-opener.
The state is still studying the effect of HOT lanes on traffic while planning to increase the installation of the lanes. This is like getting the fox to study how the chickens will get out of the chicken house. The fox cannot lose in this case. If you do not know the lanes’ impact on the flow of traffic, how do you plan to put hundreds of millions into HOT lanes? As the article stated, “Like them or not, toll lanes are here to stay.”
One needs only to drive down I-85 any weekday morning to see the effect when 99 percent of the traffic is using 80 percent of the road with merging lanes every four or five miles. It does not require analog studies to see the effect of HOT lanes on traffic.
I believe that Georgia, and Atlanta, need to look at how transportation dollars are invested before concluding HOT lanes are here to stay.
WINSTON D. RICHARDS, DULUTH
DEBT DEFAULT
Common-sense plan
to resolve debt crisis
Regarding “What really happens if U.S. defaults on its debts?” (Opinion, Oct. 12), for years, I have been hearing from really smart people like economist Paul Krugman that our national debt is really not a big deal because we owe the money to ourselves.
So, I wonder why Krugman — and the entirety of the mainstream media — has been talking about such dire consequences of a default, with some saying that there could be a “world economic catastrophe.”
Here is a solution: “We” who have borrowed the money should get together with “ourselves” who hold the debt and work out a delayed payment plan on the interest. Don’t we at least owe it to ourselves to talk about it?
LEN CAYCE, LAWRENCEVILLE
CELLPHONES
Mean-spirited ideology
moves Ga. Republicans
Regarding “Ga. first to charge for cell plan” (Metro, Oct. 16), the decision by the Georgia Public Service Commission to charge the poor and less fortunate among us $5 a month for their Lifeline cellphones in order to stop fraud in the program is like a teacher punishing the whole class for the actions of a few. This decision — along with refusing to expand Medicaid, and fighting to prevent the uninsured from getting health insurance — exposes a mean-spirited ideology running rampant through the Republican Party.
If you are down on your luck and struggling, the government has no business making your life a little easier, according to these conservatives; but if you are doing well, the government should give you tax breaks. Is this the philosophy we really want when it comes to our elected representatives?
MIKE HAREMSKI, TUCKER
