Letters to the Editor August 25, 2022

Drive On

Thank you for pointing out that it is time to end the celebration of car culture (“Car Week celebrates cars – and reminds us it’s time to end car culture,” Aug. 18-24). As beautiful as some of the Concours cars are, they represent how we are destroying our planet, while using outdated fuel. I think we are better than that on the Peninsula and in California. I would be more proud of events that change transportation and honor the natural world. Diane Grindol | Monterey

Thank you for your editorial on the need to let go of the “obsession” with the car culture. Monterey County needs to be a leader in climate resiliency that is not dependent on the money that comes with car events and car races. Paola Berthoin | Carmel Valley

I have no problem with electric vehicles and cleaner types of transportation. I have a second home in Seaside and drive a gas vehicle weekly from the San Joaquin Valley to get there, as do many thousands of people every year. The number of EVs on the road is minimal and will be until they are more affordable and practical (charging stations, driving range, etc.). If you increase the number of charging stations, what energy source are they going to use? It won’t be solar or wind most likely. The economy of Monterey Bay is built on tourism and most of those folks get here driving gas vehicles. Paul Enos | Los Banos

I totally disagree on limiting antique car culture. Those old, but fancy cars are barely driven on regular roads these days and the joy they bring to all those 100,000 nostalgia seekers for a week on the Peninsula is certainly worth it. The hospitality industry certainly thinks so. In the future most people will arrive here in their electric cars with people hankering for the old vroom vroom days. One good reason I’m keeping my ’65 Mustang in good shape and in the garage. Roelof Wijbrandus | Seaside

You are an absolute idiot. Take your ethical considerations and your fantastical wish list of how the world “should” be, and please, cram it.

Only a person incapable of rational thought would consider printing and squandering more scrip money which by definition will increase inflation, as an “inflation reduction” act. Classic fuzzy-thinking, manipulative, deliberately deceitful, liberal distortion.

The only good thing about your column, and the only good thing about these acts of incredibly irresponsible idiocy and intentional destruction of the greatest economy the world has ever seen, is that after the economy is completely ruined, and we’re in a massive hyper-inflationary state, and after the county is deliberately flooded with illegal aliens, and after a thousand DAs refuse to charge people for committing crime, and after the weaponization of the DOJ, and after the inevitable economic collapse and riots and food shortages and $10/gallon gas (and diesel trucks that deliver our food don’t do EV) there won’t be a fuzzy-thinking Democrat elected to any office for 20 years. Norm Morris | Salinas

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Upon arriving home tonight, I noted an idling Lamborghini sitting in front of my house for reasons I couldn’t fathom. Within a few minutes his brothers in arms lined up their Lamborghinis and the parade then roared down the street sounding like an army of angry outboard motors. Every year I cringe as the cars start to arrive. While I acknowledge how much these car enthusiasts support our local economy, I also despair at what they do during their time here: clog traffic to an extraordinary level, with travel times doubling or tripling as these guests just drive up and down the main streets parading their pricey cars. With that comes an increase in air pollution. Add to that the noise pollution. All of this for what? So the wealthiest people can display their wealth in an especially gaudy way. I am not impressed. Elizabeth Darovic | Monterey

One of the big contributing factors to the daily need of cars is a result of the restructuring of commercial zoning back in the 1950s. Neighborhood grocery stores were put out of business by the development of shopping centers, far away from our residential neighborhoods. This caused all of us to drive even just for a quart of milk. Large parking lots have taken some of our precious farmland as well. Look at most downtowns throughout America – mostly ghost towns now.

Back home in Belgium as a child, we did not need a car. Trains, buses, bicycles and walking were the mode of transportation. It still is; for the most part, cars in Europe are a luxury. Walter Georis | Carmel

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Great article, but as with all climate activist views, they fail to see the whole picture. The Unites States is not the only contributor to emissions. Until we get other countries involved, the problem will continue. Pete Mireles | via email

Trickle Down

To understand the “tension” between the citizens of Marina/Peninsula and Cal Am, I wish to restate the facts of the California Coastal Commission’s recommendation for denial of the Cal Am desalination project for the Sept 17, 2020 hearing, from which Cal Am pulled its application the day before (“Cal Am’s long embattled desalination plant proposed in Marina is very much a live wire,” posted Aug. 9).

Cal Am plans to resubmit an application soon.

Reasons for recommended denial were based on: 1) substantial impacts to environmentally sensitive habitat areas in Marina; 2) the existence of a feasible and less damaging alternative, i.e. the Pure Water Monterey recycled water expansion project; 3) significant environmental justice concerns based on the Coastal Commission’s 2019 environmental justice policy, including the multiple existing undesirable regional industrial facilities already shouldered by Marina, and the impact on Seaside of future unaffordable cost of water; and 4) the impact of sea level rise that could bury well heads on the shoreline during the life of the project. Facts matter. Kathy Biala | Marina

Biala is a co-founder of Citizens for Just Water.