Road work cities' job

Lorain and Amherst city officials have finally worked out a plan to fix Cooper Foster Park Road, but the will to get the work done came from the Cleveland Clinic.

Given the history of repairing and maintaining the road that serves as the border between Lorain and Amherst, the clinic's attitude is refreshing. In explaining why the clinic would agree to pay for reconstructing the road, hospital spokesman John DeAngelo expressed the reasoning in terms of people.

He said the clinic has 200 employees and 500 patients who use the road every day. How many more residents, municipal employees, business owners -- both existing and potential -- do the two cities have?

We understand the quirky situation on that particular roadway, which requires the two cities to work together to get anything done. We also understand the residents of both cities suffer while the two governments spar for control of any project that would ease the suffering.

The combined populations of the two cities is more than 100 times the 700 employees and patients that moved the clinic to agree to pay for the road improvements. The populations could possibly much more if the two cities could find a way to work together to keep this major arterial roadway in decent shape.

Cities are not collections of buildings, streets, water mains and sewers. Cities are groups of people who have come together and rely on those buildings, streets, water mains, and sewers to work as they are intended.

City governments, not hospitals, are put in place to see the infrastructure needs are met. Now if we want Mayor Taylor and Mayor Krasienko to perform surgery...never mind.