RoadsideOnline

The car of a girlfriend of mine recently died, or rather, as is so often the case, it required yet another costly repair that ultimately is not worth it. Time to go car-shopping. Due to her limited budget, and hoving to the Car Talk guys’ sage advice, she wants to get a used car, in decent condition, with not too many miles on it. We were talking about this because I have bought several used cars over the years. So I said to her: good luck, honey!

Car-shopping is a challenge, to be sure. It is a big purchase for most everybody, undertaken with some trepidation, some concern about not getting a lemon or buying somebody else’s money pit, some anxiety about getting into debt (many of us cannot buy a car with cash, outright), and maybe a dash of excitement or anticipation (gawd, how nice it will be to get behind the wheel, turn a key, and have the dang thing reliably start up!).

This comes to us by way of the Buffalo News thanks to a tip by Doug Smith. Apparently, even when Walmart destroys, it doesn't always follow through on its plans to fill the void it leaves. Perhaps this is a mixed blessing, but now the folks in the Niagara region have neither a great roadside attraction nor a soul-crushing place to buy fodder for the landfill.

Bruce Andriatch: Overbuilding is leaving us with eyesores

Pat Bannister fought so hard to prevent Walgreens from building a store in Kenmore that even after the store was built, he vowed to never go in there.

Then one day, he needed to make a purchase, and the store was so close, and . . .

“I broke down,” he said.

But he never became a fixture at the store on Delaware Avenue. Really, no one did. The store wasn’t there long enough.

In most ways, that now-vacant drugstore is no different from the hundreds of empty buildings that dot the landscape across Western New York. But it is a stark reminder that for all their certainty about how great a project will be, developers are no better at predicting the future than anyone else.

That point was reinforced most recently in Evans, where officials were prepared to welcome Walmart to the community. The nation’s largest retailer wanted to build on the site of the former Grandview Drive-In Theater.

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If you want to live in a walkable community you could do worse than to move to the town of Putnam.

Putnam sits hard against Rhode Island as part of what Connecticut likes to call its "Quiet Corner," the state’s northeastern region. This is a beautiful part of Connecticut, far removed by more than distance from where the state shares the grime and gloom of New York City. The Quiet Corner of Connecticut is made up mostly of rolling rural hills, quaint New England villages, the occasional private boarding school and some of the most scenic roads in America.

It’s easy to imagine that Putnam once was the center of commerce for the region. Its small downtown flanking the Quinebog River is filled with solid brick buildings and surrounded by giant porched and gabled homes, many long-ago subdivided into apartments as prosperity left the town behind.

We found this story thanks to the wonderful blog "Free Range Kids" by Lenore Skenazy, which advocates letting kids be kids, where it's okay to make mistakes and pick up a few bumps and bruises along the way. Read more of her blog here.

Dropping kids off here? Better lace your shoes up

Kristin Rushowy

Yes, it was built with a kiss 'n ride lane. No, the school doesn't want parents to use it.

In fact, P.L. Robertson elementary in Milton, which opened this week, has been designated a "walking-only school," where students will be strongly encouraged to use their feet – or bikes or any other active way – to get there.

It is part of a broader initiative at the Halton District School Board to stop traffic jams around schools and get students moving.

Gridlock in the parking lot and surrounding streets is an all-too common problem for schools in the Greater Toronto Area, thanks to parents who insist on driving their children, even if they don't live all that far away.

Read the rest here...