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SATURDAY • MAY 21 • 2011
23RD STREET
Traffic signal network may improve commute City expected to approve spending for fiber-optic cables By Chad Lawhorn clawhorn@ljworld.com
A little fiber may be just the thing for your commute. Lawrence city commissioners at their Tuesday evening meeting are
expected to accept a police officer sees it and $150,000 grant from the radios it in, or a citizen Kansas Department of sees it and calls us,” said Transportation to connect Shoeb Uddin, city engiall the traffic signals on neer. “With the new sys23rd Street to a fiber-optic tem, if there is any type of network. problem, it will give us an The network will allow alert right at our desk, and we can diagnose the probthe traffic signals to be betCITY lem right away.” ter synchronized and also COMMISSION The project also will will allow the city to more quickly spot problems that develop. give the city more ability to change “Right now if there is a problem the signals for special events, such with a light at one of those intersec- as graduation or Kansas University tions we either have to see it, a athletic events. Also included in the
be as revolutionary as interstates. I’m confident that it will have a lot of benefits that we don’t even know of yet.” The city won’t receive the grant money, however, until July 2012. Uddin said the city likely would be ready to install the network sometime next summer. This will be the second grant the city has received from the state in recent years to install fiber-optic cable for traffic signals. The signals
‘You can almost feel the history’
Strong p.m. storm
High: 83
project will be cameras at key intersections — not red-light cameras because they are illegal in the state — to help city officials monitor changing traffic conditions. But Uddin said that’s just the start of what the new system can do. Connecting the traffic signals to the fiber-optic network will allow the city to create what engineers call an Intelligent Transportation System. “Pundits in the industry compare Intelligent Transportation Systems to the interstate highway system,” Uddin said. “They think this could
Low: 60
Today’s forecast, page 10A
INSIDE KU loses to K-State in baseball showdown In the first game of a crucial series, the Jayhawks lost to their in-state rivals 11-10 in 10 innings Friday in Manhattan. Page 1B
Please see TRAFFIC, page 2A
BAKER UNIVERSITY
Going small pays off big time for senior By Kyle Davis kdavis@theworldco.info
WORLD
Queen’s speech moves many Irish
ONLINE: For a complete list of Baker University graduates, see LJWorld.com
Queen Elizabeth II wrapped up the first visit of a British monarch to the Republic of Ireland on Friday. She won rave reviews for her only public speech during the trip, in which she addressed the tense relations between the neighboring countries. Page 7A
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QUOTABLE
How could they have given such a kind pope the head of a Fascist?” — 71-year-old Antonio Lamonica, talking about a new, modernist sculpture of Pope John Paul II in Rome. Some Italians and tourists say looks more like Italy’s wartime dictator Benito Mussolini. The Vatican on Friday slammed the giant artwork outside Rome’s Termini Train Station, saying it doesn’t even resemble the late pontiff. Page 8C
COMING SUNDAY Look for a Kansas University Commencement section listing all of the university’s graduates.
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Richard Gwin/Journal-World Photo
PAUL BAHNMAIER, LECOMPTON, CENTER, TALKS about moving the state capital back to Lecompton as Kansas House Speaker Mike O’Neal, R-Hutchinson, left, and Gov. Sam Brownback listen on Friday in Constitution Hall. Kansas lawmakers were on hand to help celebrate 150 years of Kansas statehood.
Lawmakers mark Civil War’s beginnings at Constitution Hall By Scott Rothschild srothschild@ljworld.com
LECOMPTON — In a celebration of Kansas’ past and future, state leaders gathered Friday to commemorate where many say the Civil War started: Constitution Hall. “The fight starts here,” Gov. Sam Brownback said of the upstairs room where the Kansas territorial legislature approved a pro-slavery constitution, which then started a historic chain of events. “You can almost feel the history and feel the bloodshed,” Brownback said to the more than 50 people who gathered at what Brownback called a “solemn” event. Passage of the Lecompton Constitution ignited blowback from anti-slavery forces, led to a brawl in
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Lincoln would not have been elected if not for the Lecompton Constitution.” — Paul Bahnmaier, president of the Lecompton Historical Society the U.S. House, split the national Democratic Party and allowed Abraham Lincoln to win the 1860 presidential election with only 39 percent of the vote. Paul Bahnmaier, president of the Lecompton Historical Society, coordinated Friday’s event to help the state recognize Lecompton’s historical role in both Kansas and U.S. history. “Lincoln would not have been elected if not for the Lecompton
Constitution,” Bahnmaier said. Brownback said the Lecompton Constitution galvanized average Kansans to reject “an institution that was an abomination. We started the fight to end slavery.” Kansas entered the Union in 1861 as a free state, less than three months before the Civil War started. Both events are being recognized on the 150th anniversary. Brownback spoke about battles during the “Bleeding Kansas” period and mentioned that his mother grew up on property in Osawatomie where abolitionist John Brown had stayed. Bahnmaier said Lecompton, located in Douglas County between Lawrence and Topeka, is as historically significant as any major Civil Please see LECOMPTON, page 2A
Seabury students take steps to next level By Mark Fagan mfagan@ljworld.com
ONLINE: Watch the video at LJWorld.com
While 22 seniors graduated Friday from Bishop Seabury Academy, the private school’s entire enrollment literally stepped up during a ceremony befitting the tight-knit community that provides a collegepreparatory education and more. This is, after all, what families do. “You know everyone,” said Nick Lutz, taking turns posing for photos with members of his own family and exchanging hugs with members of his extended
one in the gym at 4120 Clinton Parkway. “It’s a little more meaningful when you’re in such a small community.” In a gym filled with faculty members on stage, seniors in the front row, others behind them and then dozens of family, friends and supporters filling seats on the floor and benches in the school’s new bleachers, the Episcopal school put on its unique morning ceremony with plenty of pomp and circumstance. Mike Yoder/Journal-World Photo Faculty lauded several DURING THE STEPPING UP CEREMONY at Bishop Seabury honorees: ● Marshall Taylor Thur- Academy’s commencement, the emotions of the man, co-valedictorian, moment affect graduating senior Sarah Henry as she hugs faculty member Matthew Patterson during the Please see SEABURY, page 2A event Friday at the school’s gym.
BALDWIN CITY — Baker University senior Justin Morello was not accustomed to a smallschool or small-town atmosphere. Morello spent nine years in Cologne, Germany, which is home to nearly 1 million people, and graduated from Blue Valley North High School in Overland Park. While also considering attending the University of Florida, which would seem to fit the large-school trend, Morello chose Baker. He was the only one from his high school to do so. This week, as he awaited graduation from the small, private Methodist school, Morello credited Baker with opening up doors that might have stayed closed had he gone to a bigger school. “I wanted to be more in the small-school atmosphere,” Morello said. “I think that really, really, helped me out, and I don’t think I would be as successful if I chose to go to a university Please see BAKER, page 2A
Baker graduation ● Baker University is honoring
more than 700 graduates this spring. ● The traditional baccalaureate service will be at 9:30 a.m. Sunday at First United Methodist Church in Baldwin City. ● At 1 p.m. Sunday the ceremony will be held for 174 undergraduates in the College of Arts and Sciences, School of Nursing and School of Education. Hoot Gibson, chairman of Baker’s Board of Trustees, is the keynote speaker for the undergraduate ceremony Sunday. Gibson, a 1973 Baker graduate, spent his entire professional career in the insurance industry, serving 25 years as president of Midwest Builders’ Casualty, one of the region’s largest providers of worker’s compensation coverage to the commercial construction industry in the region. His daughter, Emily, is a member of the Class of 2011. ● The School of Education will honor 188 graduate students at 4:30 p.m. Sunday. Tom VanSickle, who has a career in politics, law, real estate development and property management, will address School of Education graduate students Sunday. He served on the Baker Board of Trustees from 1981 to 1988. ● Last Saturday, the School of Professional and Graduate Studies recognized 183 undergraduates and 196 graduate students.