Bicycles and cars compete for space and right-of-way on Chattanooga streets in record numbers.
Should motorists be courteous and share the road with bicycles? Absolutely. In return, bicyclists should share the cost of keeping Chattanooga streets repaired and in good condition. It's only fair.
This is not meant to denigrate bicyclists, but lots of money has been spent creating bike lanes and bike-friendly spaces in Chattanooga. It's time people who use these improvements share in the cost of maintaining them.
Several cities in Kansas require bicyclists to register and tag bicycles ridden on public streets. Japan, where 10 million bicycles are sold annually and 15% of the population utilizes them as an alternative to cars, has mandatory bicycle registration.
Tagging bicycles makes them more identifiable should they cause an accident or injure a pedestrian. Bicyclists should be accountable for their actions when riding on public streets, same as motorists.
Children could be exempted; tourists could purchase temporary permits to ride on city streets.
As a motorist who travels on Chattanooga streets daily, I would feel more generous when it comes to sharing street space and yielding to bicycle traffic. It's an idea whose time has come.
Tony Smalley, Trenton, Georgia
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Believing Bolton about his exit
As I've been reading about John Bolton's departure from the Trump administration, I find myself much more inclined to believe him that he resigned.
He and I have one thing in common - we were both scholarship students at a private military school in Maryland, McDonogh School. I didn't know him; he was four years behind me. I have no idea if I would have liked him then, although I don't care for him or his political positions now.
Still, I don't think Bolton would lie. The reason for my belief goes back to our schooling at McDonogh. As students, we were required to memorize a poem, "The McDonogh Uniform," written by Eustace S. Glascock in 1879. One of the stanzas says:
"With labor and patience, with wisdom and love,
every thread is drawn to its place.
'Tis dyed in the colors of honor and truth,
with industry's infinite grace."
Honor and truth were emphasized at the school; I don't believe a McDonogh graduate would lie about his departure from this administration. Plus, with more than 12,000 false or misleading statements that have been validated, the president, it seems, can seldom be expected to tell the truth.
James M. Hemsley
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Time for Forrest bust to be moved
The bust of Bedford Forrest in our capitol in Nashville was commissioned in 1973 and completed and installed in 1978. This bust is a witness to the kind of institutional racism that remains in Tennessee.
Forrest's deserved military reputation has long been stained by the massacre at Fort Pillow and his participation in the Ku Klux Klan. That the bust was so lately added can only raise suspicion it was commissioned to give the finger to those advocating for civil rights in the 1960s.
It is past time we removed the statue from our capitol and his day from the state calendar. No disrespect to my Southern ancestors (and mine are deeper than yours), just the understanding its presence is racist and offensive to my black brothers and sisters.
Forrest's bust should be placed in an appropriate historical (versus political) place.
A state commission of historians and scholars and members of the black caucus could surely divine a way to divide the political from the historical and preserve our monuments and history.
As R.E. Lee said about the Confederate battle flag, the Stars and Bars, "Fold it up and put it away." Same with Bedford.
Carter Paden, Signal Mountain