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One of the front page stories in the local paper today is about how a traffic signal downtown is broken, and won't be fixed for months because of Katrina. It's not that a major traffic signal maker is in the strike zone of the hurricane...it's more interesting than that.
Stoplight manufacturing is fairly predictable, all in all. You need X new units per year for new developments Y units per year for repairs due to accidents, storms, and simple wearing out. And while the manufacturers have some ability to increase capacity, Katrina has overwhelmed that and then some. Priority is being given to replacing all the destroyed signals on the Gulf Coast, so any lower priority signals are just going to have to wait a few months. Trained personnel are also at a premium, so you won't see parts simply shifted from really low priority lights to low priority ones.
Ripples. I wonder what ripples we'll see next, or if we'll even recognize them when we do see 'em?
Stoplight manufacturing is fairly predictable, all in all. You need X new units per year for new developments Y units per year for repairs due to accidents, storms, and simple wearing out. And while the manufacturers have some ability to increase capacity, Katrina has overwhelmed that and then some. Priority is being given to replacing all the destroyed signals on the Gulf Coast, so any lower priority signals are just going to have to wait a few months. Trained personnel are also at a premium, so you won't see parts simply shifted from really low priority lights to low priority ones.
Ripples. I wonder what ripples we'll see next, or if we'll even recognize them when we do see 'em?
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The story's below the fold, and it looks like it's actually two stories merged into one. There's also a chunk on the "continued on the back page" part about a local mailbox manufacturer being asked to drop everything and concentrate on gulf coast restoration efforts.
So maybe the editor got the stoplight story days ago, but decided it wasn't enough to run (or ran a capsule version buried inside where I didn't see it), then got the Auth-Florence piece yesterday and merged the two.
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Though I confess I think they've gotten better recently. Not nearly as funny as #73, which had the same still-frame of a person in mid-syllable for about a week....
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So, I'll watch the Cards' games :)