Letters to the editor:
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Rail On, Knoxville

I enjoyed your article about the possible use of streetcars in Knoxville. I hope you have success with them. As a Knoxvillian by birth and temperament, although a Texan by economic necessity, I enjoy following the ups and down of my hometown in the Metro Pulse.

Houston has roughly the topology of a pool table so there are few limits to suburban expansion. Lots of people drive to work every day, some for upwards of an hour each way, on ever more crowded freeways that seem to be in a constant state of "upgrade." Downtown is so clogged you don't want to get in the car to go out for lunch so you are captive to the places in walking distance.

There is a bright spot to all this. Metro has just completed a "starter" light rail project. It runs a bit over seven miles and passes through downtown, the museum district, the zoo and park, the medical center, and the Astrodome/Reliant Stadium/Six Flags complex. MetroRail just started service Jan 1, but as people get used to the new mode of travel I expect we will see redevelopment all along the route. They plan to add up to 60 more miles of rail in the coming 15 years if this project is well received. Eventually the system will connect both airports, downtown, the important cluster areas, and even into the suburbs. I can't wait.

Bryce Giesler
Houston

Unfair Bias

You published an article a couple months ago called "Revival of the Letterpress" which focused exclusively on Yee-Haw Industries. I thought the article was an example of biased reporting, or incomplete reporting at best.

The article accused a local artist of "cloning" the Yee-Haw style and exploiting it for his business, Revolution Letterpress. The owners of Yee-Haw make it "abundantly clear" to your reporter that "they don't want to talk about it." Your reporter made sure their grievances were aired, nevertheless. As far as I could tell, Revolution's owner was not given a chance to respond to the accusations. The shops are only blocks away from each other on Gay Street—yet your reporter didn't bother to get both sides of the story.

I am a graphic designer who works in Knoxville. I don't know the owners of Yee-Haw or Revolution Letterpress personally; but I think that in the art/design community, everyone acknowledges that we are influenced by other people's work. This influence—intentionally or otherwise—comes out in our own work. I think Yee-Haw makes a pretty serious accusation when they cry outright theft of Kevin Bradley's style, which is itself, highly derivative of the work of folk artist Howard Finster. I am not the only one who thinks this.

With that said, I think Kevin Bradley's work is great and Yee-Haw deserves all the recognition it currently enjoys. However, the work coming out of Revolution Letterpress merited attention in your article as well.

Alexis Langley
Knoxville