For weeks back in Vermont we heard about how the town of Castelfranc was in an uproar because a round-about was being built up Iron Bridge Street street, Rue Pont de Fer. As in Vermont, more and more truck traffic is congesting the streets of small towns, cutting them in two, gradually rotting the houses to either side. The highway running through Castelfranc used to be called the 911 but for some superstitious reason was changed to 811 about 9 years ago.
Anyway, during the construction, the town temporarily relocated the trash bins, les poubelles, to where they had been before we bought the house: right outside our kitchen window. We paid the piratical mayor a ransom of €1,500 to relocate them to the parking lot, so Francis got a kick out of sending us pictures of them back in our viewshed.
We also received a notice from the town about how stickers would be issued for windshields and the cops would check to make sure that through traffic stuck to specified routes and only residents were using the interior streets. Residents were encouraged to scowl at transgressors. This went on for more than two months and then....like a pregnant elephant grunting out a flea, the "roundabout" turned out to be nothing more than some tentative traffic calming, some marks on the intersection.
