Rants and Raves

There's been a lot published recently about the possibility of a housing bubble that will burst and leave people with negative equity in their homes. Can it happen? Has it happened before? The answer is yes and yes. Japan has had a slow housing market for the past seven or eight years so any economy is susceptible.

The economics department of National City Corporation, a large financial institution, did a study to try to identify in the 99 largest US markets where single family home valuations are at a premium or a discount. And good old Palm Beach County per the study is 26% overvalued per the benchmarks used. All of the markets that were more overvalued were in California. Also highly overvalued in Florida were the Miami Ft Lauderdale and Sarasota markets. Big markets like Orlando, Tampa and Jacksonville were basically neutral. The most undervalued, Memphis and Salt Lake City.
You can read the entire study at http://www.nationalcity.com/economics

The most recent edition of the South Florida Business Journal had a study conducted by their parent company, American City Business Journals. Using a combination of poverty levels, unemployment and "poorly educated" residents, it attempted to measure socio-economic stress on a city by city basis.

High on the list of "Most stress" were the Palm Beach County cities of West Palm Beach, Riviera Beach, Belle Glade and Lake Worth. On the least stress city list were Boca Raton, Palm Beach and North Palm Beach. The most stressed large US city, Hartford Ct., middle sized city was Camden NJ and small city was Gladeview FL., a Miami suburb. Of small cities, the four most stressed were in Dade County and Palm Beach County Florida.

Where to live with little socioeconomic stress, Naperville IL, Maple Grove MN or Fort Hunt VA.

An article in the AARP Bulletin for February 2005 detailed the Ten most dangerous cities, for pedestrians. Is it any wonder that 6 of the 10 most dangerous are in Florida. And of course, our lovely peaceful West Palm Beach was included. Study was conducted by the Transportation Policy Project and released in December 2004.

There's been a couple of views in recent years on retesting of drivers over a certain age (generally age 80). Some view it as a must, since motor skills, vision and reaction times tend to wane at a certain point in life. Others, notable AARP and elder advocacy groups think it is a right and it's up to the individual and their family to make that decision.

Guess what, they've never had to drive in South Florida. We've got tons of over 80 (and over 90) residents who still drive (both day and night) and really create a menace on the road. How can you tell? Well, they're driving below the speed limit in the center or left lane. At a traffic light, they stop 40 or 50 feet behind the car ahead. When they have to turn, they are hesitant and appear confused about where the lane goes from the turn.

There was a case this week of a local man (well over 80) who failed to pick his wife up after a medical appointment. The first article in the paper quoted "sometimes he gets confused with directions". Well they found him, almost 300 miles away in Georgia. Bad directions? I don't think so. Just someone who shouldn't be on the road.

Riding around in Palm Beach County, which is required by my job, I see incidents every day which could have been fatal, but weren't because someone was paying attention. I've seen these seniors turn up the wrong side of a divided highway, just stop in a travel lane full of traffic becasue they suddenly realized they had to turn right or left, or in one case last Thursday, drive out of a gas station, over the curbing of the street directly into 3 lanes of westbound traffic.

As someone over 60, I hope when my turn comes, someone takes my car keys and says,"Hey Fred, take the bus>"

Have you ever tried to drive north to south in this county. Today, there is some kind of construction or lane reduction on every through north south road in the county, except Congress Avenue, and that has half a zillion lights. Interstate 95 will have construction into the next millenium. The turnpike is being widened in stages from the Delray exit to Jupiter for the next 8 or 10 years. US444- Rte 7 , Jog Road, Haverhill Road and Military all have reduced lanes soemwhere in the area of Southern Blvd. Go into the city (WPB) and try to go through downtown, good luck. It's been dug up somewhere since the 70's. The people in Palm Beach proper have the right idea. They do all their projects in the Summer when the powerful and deal makers are in Maine or Wyoming. When they come back for the Winter, all road construction is done

If you have a comment, questions or difference of opinion, let me know