RAMPING UP OVER THE RAMP

I am not in the habit of being unnecessarily critical (okay, STOP LAUGHING), but a local elementary school is building a ramp for disabled students and visitors that looks more like a thrill ride at am amusement park.  Now, I cannot be absolutely positive about the whole thing because, with a week before school is set to start, the ramp is not finished, and the entire construction zone is cordoned off to trespassers (also known as "taxpayers").

First of all, the ramp is about the length of the Titanic with a slope that rivals an Olympic ski jump launch.  It appears from what the common man can see that the ramp twists and turns at a severe downgrade.  If anyone remembers the Speilberg movie Duel with the evil run-amok eighteen-wheeler, I envision wheelchairs careening down the ramp to their inevitable crash-end, a triumphant Dennis Weaver jumping up and down at the top and raising his fists in victory.

Second of all, there does not appear to be any scoring marks in the concrete, so, in the case of rain or ice or snow, unlike the postal delivery, your disabled victim will not always be delivered safely.  Can you even imagine an electric wheelchair hitting the ice and just going ... and going ...  Or what about crutches?  I had crutches during the worst icy winter we've had in decades.  My crutches needed ice-climbing spikes (which I doubt had been invented then, if they even have been yet), and that was just with a short but sloped driveway.

Thirdly, this ramp is long, so long that by the time someone on crutches makes it down to the field, gym class or recess would be long over.  And getting back up the ramp?  Who is pushing here?  The school will have to hire power-lifters or those strongmen/strongwomen competitors just to get kids down and back before the end of school.

Lastly, the ramp has smooth, wide walls that only come up about three feet.  This, my friends will be a skateboarder's and/or inline skater's idea of Disney World.  There will be wax all over the edges of that ramp's walls before the concrete has completely set.

Okay, okay.  It seems like I'm being a overly critical and somewhat picayune.  Not true.

For a while, one of my sisters needed a wheelchair when she had a bad break in her leg.  I also had an uncle whose progressive Multiple Sclerosis required a wheelchair.  Our house (at the time) had steep walkways in the front and back to get into the house.  Yes, we pushed them both -- my sister and my uncle -- so they could enter our house.  When I tell you it's damn tough work pushing a wheelchair up a lengthy ramp, I'm speaking from experience.

It is my understanding that this mega-ramp isn't just for disabled children and adults, and that there will be slides and other "fun" things added into it.  Between the ramp's length, design, lack of safety features, low wall, "fun" features, and its rather tedious grade, I'm not holding out high hopes for a successful application.

But, hey, I have yet to see the entire ramp once the construction blockade has been lifted.  Furthermore, I really HAVE been wrong before; once or twice, possibly, but I do believe that it has happened.  I really and sincerely hope that I am wrong about this ramp.