For A West Side Comprehensive Plan - American Planning: Fill & Download for Free

Our Lady Of the Angels School was the last major school fire catastrophe in the United States, happening on December 1, 1958 in Chicago. The school was gravely unprepared for a fire- it lacked a proper alarm system and comprehensive evacuation plan, and notification to the Chicago FD was severely delayed.Reforms implemented in the wake of this disaster greatly improved school fire safety.On Dec. 1, 1958, fire swept through Our Lady of the Angels School on the West Side, killing 95 people -- 92 children and three nuns.In the photo, which appeared in the Chicago American and Life magazine, [Fireman Richard] Scheidt is seen carrying the body of John Jajkowski from the school. John was one of 19 dead children Scheidt carried from the school. He was haunted by what he saw that day, Kugelman said.Source: Firefighter in Famous Photo Dies at 81

YES, because it will make the world a safer place.I'd like to add a different angle to Alex Lightman & Philip Egger's brilliant answers and that is: PEACE, where I would like to quote John Kerry:Simply demanding Iran capitulate makes a nice sound bite, but it is not a policy; it is not a realistic plan. Success is not whether [the deal] meets all the desires [of one side]. The test is whether it leaves the world safer than without. The comprehensive plan of action we are moving toward more than meets that test.Obama was right in extending his hand to those who are willing to unclench their fist. 90% of Iranians want the sanctions lifted. They want peace with the West, more than anything else. We should believe them:The whole point of the Iran Framework Agreement is to provide Iran a way out of their nuclear ambitions without losing face.After 35 years of cold war, both sides had to first build trust (watch Jon Stewart in Middle Eastern Politics: A Love Story). Building trust started with the U.S. publicly admitting U.S. complicity in using WMD against Iran, CIA Files Prove America Helped Saddam as He Gassed Iran. After that they admitted to assassinating Hezbollah's Mughniyeh. In return Hezbollah restrained from further attacking Israel.For the United States and the West, ending this cold war will bring three enormous benefits: First, Iran may prove a more reliable U.S. ally than Saudi Arabia. Iranians are better educated and more pro-American than their neighbors across the Persian Gulf, and unlike Saudi Arabia, Iran has some history of democracy. Thursday’s nuclear deal may pave the way for a positive relationship with the Iranian state that is actually undergirded by a positive relationship with the Iranian people. The most important aspect of any deal is trust, and the Iranian people trust America (and Germany) as you can see in the Survey below (conducted by Iranianwire).Second, it could empower the Iranian people vis-à-vis their repressive state. As Columbia University Iran expert Gary Sick recently noted, Iran’s hardline Revolutionary Guards “thrive on hostile relations with the U.S., and benefit hugely from sanctions, which allow them to control smuggling.” Thus “if you want regime change in Iran, meaning changing the way the regime operates, this kind of agreement is the best way to achieve that goal.”Just look at the pictures how euphorically Iranians have reacted to the agreement. They’re not cheering because Iran can keep 6,000 centrifuges out of 20,000. They’re cheering because they know that opening Iran to the world empowers them, both economically and politically, at their oppressors’ expense. With the agreement moderate-reformist camp will win the 2016 Iranian legislative election, both for the Islamic Consultative Assembly and the Assembly of Experts. It is most likely that this new Assembly of Experts will choose a successor to Khamenei as Supreme Leader of Iran.Finally, ending the cold war with Iran makes it easier to end the civil wars plaguing the Middle East.Iran having a nuclear bomb poses Z-E-R-O threat to the West (except Israel), but - in the below infographic - the black blob in the middle - Islamic State (IS) - is a ticking time-bomb. IS is the #1 reason why we should militarily engage more in the Middle East. It must have been more than coincidence that on April 2nd, the UN Labels Syria, Iraq “International Finishing School for Terrorists": Those who eat together and bond together can bomb together, the experts wrote. The globalization of Islamist Extremism, particularly visible with Islamic State, but also evident with al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (in Yemen), poses a medium-term threat through plug and play social networks for future attack planning – linking diverse foreign fighters from different communities across the globe.As we can see from the above infographic, Iran is key to solving the conflict in Syria, Iraq and Yemen. In all three countries IS and Al-Qaeda have exploited the rift between Sunni and Shia to their advantage, instigating a Sunni-Shia civil war. We cannot destroy the Islamic State without a solution for the future of Syria and Iraq. And for that we need Iran not as our adversary but as our ally. Iran wields sufficient influence over Assad and the Shia militias to force them to negotiate a diplomatic solution.Besides, since June 2014, the United States and Iran are ever closer collaborating militarily (but: Shhh! Don't tell anyone!); Iran is providing the boots on the ground in Iraq and is sending the coffins home.With this agreement, Barack Obama has now begun the process of ending America’s cold war with Iran. In so doing, he has improved America’s strategic position, brightened the prospects for Iranian freedom and Middle Eastern peace, and brought himself closer to being the kind of transformational president he always hoped to be.

This is El Paso del NorteThat is the name that was given to the place by Don Juan de Oñate a Spanish conquistador back in 1598. He celebrated the real first Thanksgiving celebration with local Indians on the bank of the Rio Grande near the present-day town of San Elizario, TX.The town with the same name of Paso del Norte was established in 1659 on the south side of the river. It took all the way until around 1850 to get a town and county founded on the northern side in an area that was then considered to be part of the territory of New Mexico and had changed hands after the U.S.-Mexican war of 1836.1888, the name of El Paso del Norte in Chihuahua was changed to Ciudad Juarez in honor of the Mexican president Benito Juarez who had to take his government into exile all the way to the border from the advancing French intervention army, until finally driving them back south and then out of the country.So basically, there is only one city. And it looks that way, too!The flat, southeastern part of the El Paso/Cd Juarez metroplex. Can you tell which part is in Mexico and which part is in the U.S.?The Rio Grande goes right through the picture! But the river is neither big nor wild (it is called Rio Bravo in Mexico) - but usually bone dry!The downtown area of both cities. Now this is easier now. The few high-rises are in downtown El Paso. The mountains in the back are called Sierra Juarez, whereas the not related nor connected mountains of El Paso are called Franklin Mountains.There are three major border crossings between both countries, within city limits. These are called the “Downtown bridge”, the “Free Bridge” and the “Zaragoza Bridge” from west to east. You can also cross the border between Guadalupe, Distrito Bravos and Fabens some 20 miles to the east or at San Geronimo-Santa Teresa, some 15 miles to the west in midst of the desert.The border crossings within city limits are extremely busy, waiting times by car usually exceed 60 minutes during daytime all year, pedestrian crossing waiting times in downtown sometimes exceeds 30 minutes, as both commercial centers are easily reachable on foot.The usual everyday language here is Spanish. On both sides of the border! Even the agents at the checkpoints and where you apply for your travel permits are completely fluent in Spanish. I am recognizeable white but was commonly appoached in Spanish when shopping in El Paso when I went there mit my Mexican wife and our three daughters. Everybody assumed that I spoke Spanish - which I of course do. Some 85% of all “Paseños” speak Spanish as their mother tongue - but most learn enough English at school to be fluent in that as well if required. In Juarez, only people with an interest in commerce and industry speak English fluently - or those kids who were born in El Paso, go to school there but live in Mexico - and that are more than you might assume.So there is no language issue between the two parts at all.The main difference between El Paso and Ciudad Juarez lies in the way governance is deployed. Rule of law, Law and Order, sometimes stifling, onerous rules are far more present and enforced than in Ciudad Juarez.Legal drinking age is 18 in Juarez and 21 in El Paso, Prostitution was never much prosecuted in Mexico, but is heavily regulated in the U.S. There were regularly scheduled bullfights in Juarez and you can still take your bets on cockfights there during the large city fair. You could purchase all but the most stringently-regulated pharmaceuticals in any Juarez farmacy without a prescription. Building codes are far more lenient in Juarez, but a typical lower-middle class home in Juarez is far better built than a similar house in El Paso.There is also an imporant difference in cost of living; overall it is far lower for a similar lifestyle in Mexico than in El Paso. On both sides you find “Colonias marginadas” or poverty-ridden neighborhoods, but far more so in Juarez than in El Paso, mostly because of the heavy influx of people from Southern Mexico during the 1980s-1990s. In these 20 years, the population in Ciudad Juarez went from some 500′000 to almost 2 million, the city thus grew without planning deep into the flat, sandy desert southeast of the center and into the ravines and gullies of the Sierra Juarez.Over 40% of all “Juarenses” live below the Mexican poverty limit. This often means, that these families do not own a car. Hence, the public transport system in Juarez is very dense, and gets used heavily and despite them still relying heavily on re-painted old U.S. school buses, it is quite efficient but quite an experience to ride - while in El Paso it is basically inexistent. This means that you only get to visit El Paso from Juarez if you have access to a car. So many people in Juarez go to great lengths to get themselves a car, no matter what, even if they keep living in a makeshift home made from pallets and cardboard. A car and qualifying for the cherished Border Crosser Card are the two greatest status symbols in Ciudad Juarez.The Embassy of the United States in Ciudad Juarez is one of the largest you will ever encounter - and it is the place where these visa cards are processed for all of Mexico. Hence you find a myriad of hotels and fancy restaurants close to the Embassy, from clean and simple to luxurious, as all Mexican applicants have to travel to Juarez for their visa interview. Even those from the swanky neighborhoods of Mexico City.My wife, myself and our daughters lived quite lavishly in Juarez, at least from 1998–2011 - far better than most Swiss I might add, as I don’t know too many people here owning a 2200 sq ft two-story home on 4500 sq ft of a city lot with an SUV and the kids in private school. I was able to afford some five overseas trips back to Switzerland and a few nice outings into New Mexico and Texas, as well as inside Mexico. We have family across the border - as most people do here - and we basically went visiting or shopping in El Paso or over in New Mexico once a month. My sister-in-law was visiting us even more, usually every weekend when we were not at her place. Her kids occasionally spent the entire summer at our place as I would set up a large pool for them and our kids (The water would be used to irrigate the lot, a conspiciously green spot in a sea of browns that could be seen from above. Once a helicopter hovered for minutes above it, probably looking what the jungle was all about)Shopping in El Paso is a real thing for people living in Juarez. A lot of things are actually cheaper there than in Mexico, mainly consumer electronics and appliances, but also clothing and meats, specially dog food. One of the few things you could NOT bring back from the U.S. were guns and ammo that sell freely in Texas. This is also heavily enforced and applies for Americans and Mexicans alike. You get a prison term for carrying an unlicensed gun in Mexico. The list of items you cannot bring back has since grown considerably. People also like to gas up in Texas, as gas-pump cheating is unknown in the U.S. -but very common in Mexico.Americans meanwhile come to Juarez to go to the doctor. Medical care in Mexico is actually excellent, doctors are bilingual - and care is affordable even without insurance. Some come from afar, not just El Paso. There are several large fully-equipped private clinics and hospitals - and a host of smaller neighborhood clinics still good enough for my wife to have our daughters there. As long as there is no comprehensive public health care system in the U.S. this business model will keep thriving.Dentistry is another reason to go to Juarez for - and there is still a reasonable flow of patrons going to the local restaurants from El Paso, whereas the once fabled Juarez nightlife had been gutted, almost anniquilated by the Juarez Drug War between 2008 and 2012. Maybe some of it has come back since we had left 2011, but nightlife in bars and discos was still a shadow of its former self during our last visit in 2018 - and violence was still present, but at a much, much lower level.People from El Paso also visit family - and some get foodstuffs not available with the right taste or quality in El Paso. Some foods are far cheaper in Mexico than in El Paso, but with NAFTA a lot of that carries “world market prices” now, including avocados which now can be exported freely into the U.S. Avocados used to be the poorman’s taco filling in Juarez, now they are getting scarce - as some of the Mexican harvest winds up as far as Switzerland. A special purchase you can get only in Juarez are medical herbs and “magic spell ingredients” at the Cuauhtémoc City Market. There are also “consultorios” of so called “brujos” (wizards, sorcerers - as they are often male). Herbal medicines are also on sale in regular specialized farmacies, such as “Xochipilli” found in every shopping mall. Some of that stuff actually works like a charm!If you know where to look, you will also find authentic Mennonite cheese, the best cheese west of the Greenwich meridian. Says this Swiss!So yes, “getting the best of both worlds” is what living in the Juarez-El Paso metroplex truly means in a nutshell. It applies for people on either side of the border, despite of the heavy restrictions placed on Mexican nationals against visiting the U.S. Restrictions and regulations on the border started to increase notably after September 11th, and Mexico started to enforce their border laws as well during the drug war, so now you often have a line to contend with to go in and a line to go back.Pleasure trips into the wider U.S. are uncommon for Juarenses. There is just not much there! The next sizeable town from Juarez/El Paso is 5 hours away and that is only Albuquerque. It’s 12 hours to Dallas, some 8 hours to Phoenix and also 12 hours to Los Angeles and Denver. People actually drive that - but not often, maybe once a year or less - and not everybody. Shorter trips for people in the know lead to Ruidoso (New Mexico) or Cloudcroft, some 3 hours away plus the line. You get to see trees! In Mexico, you travel almost twice as far to see a forest. If you care to watch Mexicans trying their luck on skis, head up to Ski Apache! These of course are often folks from the upper class, from as far away as Chihuahua City or even Mexico City.I have known people personally from El Paso who had never left the Juarez/El Paso metro area, and our daughters believed that the United States to be only El Paso and New Mexico right into their teen years.Covid-19 has not made that border hopping any easier, of course. As of now, pleasure trips by land crossings into the U.S. are called off completely. Americans still can go to Mexico and are allowed back in without quarantine though.As already stated, we lived very well on the Mexican side.However, back in my days, there were laws in place in Mexico that stipulated that no foreign national could own property along the border or right on the beach anywhere in Mexico. This means that I could not register any property to my name, but I could register a car into the border register and get a phone contract to my name. You will need a receipt from an utility to your name for a great many things in Mexico, even for official business sometimes.So the house was on my wife’s name and on hers only. So better watch out who you are getting married to! But even she had to be on alert - and ready for a fight for what is rightfully yours. In Juarez, real estate fraud was and maybe still is rampant - and your chances as a foreigner to get your day in court about something like this are slim. I (and my wife, of course!) are talking from proper experience with this. She won, of course. People are easily deceited by her “innocent country girl gaze and smile” - and will then find about her bad side.If you plan to live in Ciudad Juarez in your own house you better call Saul…. or any Mexican lawyer seasoned in Mexican immigration law and property laws. In order to live in Mexico, even right on the border, you will need proper Mexican paperwork being done, called the FM-3 or FM-2 formats, these are valid for a year and renewable every year until you live for 5 consecutive years in Mexico, when you qualify for permanent residency and/or citizenship. After a while, American border patrol agents at the checkpoints will start to ask about your Mexican immigration papers if they see you as often as they saw me.You also will need an U.S. passport now. Saying “American” at the checkpoint is no longer sufficient - it was until September 11th 2001.If you are open to accept a different outlook on life in itself, you like to learn new skills like fixing your water heater on your own and changing your flat tire in a business suit before going to work and the like you will enjoy yourself in Juarez. Be self-reliant and be in charge of your own life. Mexico City is far, far away. And El Paso is not really close to Washington D.C. either - and not to Austin for that matter. Depending on what you plan for a living you should do well enough.We used to live in a lower middle class “Colonia” in Juarez:Our old home in JuarezThe view from the rooftop across Colonia El Granjero. A mixed neighborhood of homes, rental properties (“vecindades”), businesses and a few small factories and private schools. Roads were mostly paved, not a given in dusty Juarez. We lived some 10 minutes by car from the Zaragoza Port of Entry.There are also gated communities - but I don’t like the feel of those - and would rather join a drug cartel than living to the whims of a Homeowner’s Association.