What They Are Saying About Madison: "This drive-thru world, it just ain't right"

Submitted by Jesse Russell on Thu, 2008-06-26 12:43. Current | Politics | WTASA

The Beastie Boys once said "This drive-thru world it just ain't right" and a Madison Plan Commission member seems to be taking that nugget of wisdom literally. Visitors to the front page of Drudge Report yesterday were greeted with a top right column link declaring: "Wisconsin city may ban restaurant drive-throughs over global warming concerns..." Madison on Drudge, always a good thing, let the bloviating begin.

The story, according to Mike Ivey over at the Cap Times, is that during a recent Plan Commission meeting Eric Sundquist suggested that the city have stricter regulations on drive-thrus in an attempt to reduce carbon emissions from vehicles idling as they wait for food or coffee. This suggestion came during a discussion regarding a new Starbucks that seeks to open at a heavily congested section of East Washington Ave. Two key points seemingly missed by many, but written very clearly in Ivey's article.

1) The Plan Commission is not considering a ban or the tighter regulations at this time. It was simply brought up by Sundquist.

2) Sundquist does plan to bring the tighter drive-thru regulations up with the Long Range Transportation Planning Commission, but has not yet done so.

Below we have collected what they are saying about Madison:

Jess from Ohio writes:

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No official plan has been proposed yet, and I doubt something like this would ever go through, but it is nice to see someone proposing concrete change to deal with the issue of global warming. Of course, I don’t know how much of an effect this would have without more data, especially since the plan would only apply to new stores, not existing options. But it’s an interesting thought nonetheless.

Midwestern Boy (and dane101 contributor) has this suggestion:

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Here’s a simple thought – why not build a drive through with a simple incline. This would allow motorists to kill their engine while they wait for the barista to process their latte, yet move forward once the car ahead of them receives their chai tea.

A commenter on Chuck4's livejournal has a solid question:

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I'm not understanding why they can't just restrict the one, particular Starbucks from having a drive-through (the one proposed by Crown Plaza), based on the obvious traffic congestion there. Where does the leap in logic send someone to "BAN ALL DRIVETHRUS TO SAVE THE ATMOSPHERE"?

GreenDaily writes:

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A few cities in Canada have already banned drive-thrus -- which studies have shown are no faster than waiting in line -- but similar types of prohibition have not made much headway in the US. While I can't say I'm in favor of the ban, it's hard to defend drive-thru culture. It hasn't been good for much except for making us fat and increasing our carbon footprint.

The self-proclaimed Astute Blogger simply yells:

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THERE IS NOTHING THESE GAIA-WORSHIPING AGW ECO-NUTSIES WOULDN'T DO.

AND OBAMA IS ONE OF THEM.

The Midnight Ride writes:

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I believe that global warming is a serious problem, but it should not be used as a reason to take freedoms away from citizens and businesses. If businesses want to provide their customers with the convenience of a drive thru window than they should be allowed to do that. Conversely if customers feel that their action of waiting in line at the drive thru is hurting the environment, or wasting gas for that matter, they are free to go inside.

Freedom Eden writes:

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It would make sense for a Wisconsin city to enact a policy that's not business-friendly.

If there's a way for Wisconsin to hurt the state's business climate, there's a good chance that officials will take it.

It is hardly worth mentioning Justin Phillips at GOP3 because he leads by playing the Nazi-card, thereby completely undermining his entire argument. Additionally, he completely ignores the fact that this is no where near consideration on the city council and writes:

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It’s sickening to think that people care this much more about the environment than a successful economic environment. Do business owners in Madison really not mind bending over and grabbing their ankles for these wack-jobs on the city council?

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