Seems like city problems could’ve been prevented
>>Print ViewPublication Date: 11/19/2009
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Why is it that in a city with a university that boasts one of the strongest engineering programs in the nation, little issues (lead content, wastewater treatment, road construction) that require exceptional engineering skills seem to be lacking sufficient ingenuity?
This semester the community was informed the lead content of a few buildings on Purdue’s campus was over the legal limit. Yes, the University got the content tested and fixed soon after, but why was it over the legal limit in the first place? Seems like we’ve got enough smarty-pantses in the College of Engineering alone to have prevented this little “blip” in campus health and safety.
Another city problem is the Wabash River. Most of you freshmen aren’t aware yet, but once it gets warmer in the spring you’ll be quite uncomfortably aware of the fecal scent, which lies dormant all winter, wafting from the Wabash. This pungent smell could be due to our inefficient wastewater treatment plant possibly allowing some of the unclean waste to infiltrate the Wabash. It’s not as though the Wabash just smells that way. Just as where there’s smoke, there’s fire: Where there’s a smell of feces, there’s feces.
And one of the more recent city problems that could have been prevented by better engineering is the sinking of a section of Lindberg Road into Celery Bog. A bridge over the bog has been proposed by engineers, but we’re wondering why a bridge wasn’t the plan in the first place, thus saving all the money spent on that section of road over the years? If we’re not mistaken, a bog is a bog for a reason: Literally, it’s defined as a “small marsh or swamp,” and the verb “to bog” means to cause to slow down or get stuck. No wonder Lindberg is “getting stuck” where it has been placed.
It’s been said Liberal Arts students ride on the coattails of Purdue’s engineering reputation. After these problems, though, we may not want to ride those coattails any longer if they’re going to be soaked in lead, feces and algae.