Mad Traveler visits again

A year ago, a Youtube character who bills himself as the “Mad Traveler” visited our fine city and published a trash job. I wrote about it, Mark Scheer wrote about it, and people reacted.

On his first visit, David Seminara focused on squalor and pondered what the hell happened to Niagara Falls.

When he returned, he was more positive, visiting nicer neighborhoods and wondering maybe, just maybe what if. He even raved about Gadawski’s.

He was back on Easter weekend, trashing the city as never before and asking, quite aptly, how in a year’s time nothing has improved.

He spent significant time staring at Milstein Squalor (wait, is that redundant?) and talking to people outside Tops Market on Portage Road, including a couple who came here from Alabama a few years ago, a couple who came from Buffalo within the last 6 months and a woman who used to be homeless.

Seminara was on the money in noting nothing got better in a year but he didn't look in the right places. He didn’t visit the new balloon attraction or Rainbow Air’s tourism center.

He did wonder why the Culinary Institute hasn’t led to a thriving economy on Old Falls Street and why Blue Cardinal never did anything on Main Street. He didn’t know the Blue Cardinal properties are now in the hands of the city with redevelopment plans afoot.

He aptly wonders how Delaware North can sell a $2 slice of DiCamillo’s old-fashioned for $11 and why there is nothing to draw people out of the State Park. He even laughs at One Niagara as a tourist trap, a horrific spectacle looming in the distance.

His premise, that Niagara Falls is going nowhere fast and needs a gigantic infusion of governmental competence (wait, is that an oxymoron?) is on the money.

He doesn’t see the Heritage Gateway’s under construction, the planned renovations at the Niagara Club and Hotel Niagara or a host of other capital projects in the works.

Add up what NYPA, USA Niagara and the Greenway Commission have in the works and it comes to almost billion to be spent in the next 15 years even without Centennial Park or a Data Center. Will it make a difference? Who knows.

But when he asks how people feel about Niagara Falls I remain optimistic.

Here’s a link. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YJBhcKUUEao