Most of us have great admiration, and rightly so, for those with the courage to hold pubic office. Unfortunately, it appears at times that their collective vision becomes blurred and the four-year term of office leads to foresight being replaced by "foursight."

Hence, the proposed solution to the parking crunch downtown is to increase meter rates, increase parking fines and construct taller buildings.

If our federal fisheries minister of the mid 1990s had followed the same logic he would have said, "OK, boys, fish are scarce so what we'll do is increase the quotas, decrease the prices and allow the use of depth charges to make the fish easier to catch."

It is likely foursight with little regard for parking that put a skating rink and convention centre in the downtown. Maybe there's a common thread here since the same era replaced a memorial with an overgrown corner store and which produced the misplaced monstrosity at Fort Townsend, a historical site in its own right.

We can have confidence though, that the fresh new council will find solutions. We may yet avoid having to employ the Yogi Berra-ism, "Nobody goes there anymore, it's too crowded."

Derm Browne

St. John's