No more carriage rides by Christmas?

There are times when I think elected officials have way too much free time on their hands, which causes them to come up with cockamamie concepts that don’t benefit the citizenry of Chicago in the least.

Will this soon be an obsolete Chicago site? Photos by Gregory Tejeda

Take, for example, the discussion currently being contemplated around City Hall to abolish the notion of horse-drawn carriages that operate in certain parts of the city – mostly the upscale neighborhoods that draw a lot of tourist traffic.

THERE ARE THOSE people who think it’s downright adorable to ride around the city while being pulled by a horse, most likely with a driver wearing a quaint costume.

Personally, I think there’s something off about riding around while watching a horse’s tail swish about back and forth in front of me, while having to smell the aroma of the beast – and quite possibly also see it defecate on the streets of Chicago while we ride.

In short, taking such a ride is not something I have ever done, or have had a desire to do. But I also think the people who are getting all worked up over this are grossly exaggerating things.

I think that a ban on an aspect of Chicago that some people find intriguing is overkill. I don’t see the harm.

I KIND OF view it as being similar to the game of golf – something I personally have no interest in playing, but I certainly don’t think it would be appropriate to go out of my way to restrict those people who do enjoy it.

Will aldermen someday feel compelled to abolish remaining payphones?

For the record, the Chicago Tribune reported how a City Council committee is scheduled to take up the issue on Wednesday. An ordinance now pending would do a sudden-phaseout of the licenses that carriage operators have to obtain from the city in order to offer such carriage rides.

Since the current round of licenses expire in November, it would make the people who get a carriage ride in coming months to be among the final who enjoy such an experience.

Should tourists spend money at Water Tower Place instead of  horse rides?

If the political people, many of whom seem to be the aldermen representing the wards of the Near North Side that actually have such rides as a regular neighborhood feature, get their way, such carriage rides would become as obsolete as the idea of street cars clanging down city streets.

SOMETHING WE HAVEN’T seen in over a half century.

Personally, I think someone somewhere in a floofy neighborhood is getting too worked up over the aroma of a horse. Which I’ll admit isn’t the most pleasant to experience. But it’s something one usually catches a whiff of for a second or two before it goes away.

I just can’t see it as something worthy of creating a new law to abolish. In fact, this may be one of the few times I’m inclined to agree with those right-wing ideologues who think that any time a government enacts a new regulation they’re somehow impinging on our personal freedoms.

I can’t see how a carriage ride is somehow a threat to Chicago – unless you’re somehow careless enough to step in a pile of horse-dung. In which case, it’s more a case of your own carelessness, rather than some sort of threat to the public safety.

BESIDES, IT MAKES me wonder what would be the next target of people who want to see carriage rides as somehow corrupting the character of Chicago. Will they see those Chicago Police officers who are part of mounted patrol units as some sort of threat to the public safety of the citizenry?

Will we be calling for those cops to be put out of commission? Or will we just try assigning those officers to units of cops riding bicycles around the city?

I bring this up because the most disgusting thing I ever saw that involved a horse in Chicago involved a mounted patrol officer. He was on his horse in the streets that are part of Grant Park when the horse decided to relieve itself.

Keeping 'the Loop' safe?

The flow of urine hit the asphalt pavement, flowed downstream and wound up heading straight for a spot where three teenagers were sitting on the sidewalk. Three teens whose Chicago memories now include the time they got peed upon by the police.

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