From Robert Whitcomb’s “Digital Diary,’’ in GoLocal24.com

The upside of disaster. The  COVID-19-caused lack of traffic has let road and utility work,  such as replacing century-old gas lines in Providence’s Federal Hill neighborhood, be done much faster than anyone could have anticipated a few months ago. Which is a reminder that fixing America’s decrepit infrastructure in a sort of WPA-style program would not only employ some of the people who have lost their jobs in our open-ended economic crisis; it would also make us more competitive over the long haul.

Bucking the Bike Bathos Redux

How to bring back rental-bike-and-scooter companies to Providence, firms that have left because of thefts and vandalism?

For one thing, JUMP, Lime and other “micro-mobility” companies must do what they failed to do before – properly staff their services for oversight, which they have tried to do on the cheap. For another,  all these vehicles should be  locked in racks between use,  and in very open and visible places,  so that the police are more likely to monitor them. And surveillance cameras should be installed wherever possible. And as I’ve written before, there should be more serious punishments for stealing and vandalizing these vehicles.

Finally, enforce the traffic laws for bike and scooter users for a change!! Stop riders from going the wrong way on one-way streets, running stop signs and red lights, and keep them in their lanes. Will it take a couple of these wild riders getting slammed by a car or truck, and maybe killed, to get the city’s attention and start enforcing the law?

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Meanwhile, Providence, like many other towns and cities, has closed off blocks of streets to most vehicular traffic in response to the pandemic, turning them into walkways, which I guess many people like, especially now that warm weather is here and after months of COVID claustrophobia. But how is it working out for deliveries, especially now that Amazon is everywhere? How do people living along these closed-off streets (though they can come and go) like it? And will these closures cause traffic  jams as more people start driving around on our mostly narrow streets as the pandemic controls are gradually lifted?