As if it wasn’t painful enough checking my son’s Fifth Grade math homework…
I had to suffer through the following story problem…
Okay, so the answer is that Wildflower Trail will be just under 6 miles long. All well and good, right? Wrong. Let’s stop to consider a few things…
- Why can’t the trail be extended another sixteenth of a mile to make it an even 6 miles? No one is going to like the fact that the trail falls just short. Bad planning. By the way, is this section of the plan referenced in the comprehensive or park plans?
- The trail will extend off the map, which means that it is likely to travel behind existing homes, which means that the five year time frame is going to be delayed due to multiple public meetings. I’m thinking seven years at best for trail construction, likely ten years, and never ever at worst.
- Is there funding secure in a capital plan? Is this dependent upon grant funding? Is this portion of the tax levy dedicated to parks? What kind of surface are we considering for the trail? That is going to have a huge impact on cost. So many unanswered funding questions.
Who knew that Fifth Grade math could be so nuanced? At least, question number 27 deals with the world’s smallest gecko and that sounds interesting. Go figure.
I am questioning the meaning of extend 2 1/2 times – do they mean so that the new length is 2 1/2 time the current length
or do they mean that the extension is 2 1/2 times the current length.
I read it as 2.5 times current length, but we shall see when the homework is officially checked at school :0)