Lightly populated precincts and light posting ahead

I've been posting on fewer and fewer successive days lately - this attributable to two things. Either I do not have the extra money to go travelling or I have nothing new to add. Had I been babbling on and on as I am known to do now and then, this upcoming week would have been one of those that I would have given you the warning that there is light posting ahead. It is Derby Week which tends to fill up one's calendar.

The Left Bank of the Ohio River near Milepost 606 is celebrating Derby Week, culminating in the 134th Run for the Roses, America's premier horse race, The Kentucky Derby, this Saturday at Churchill Downs in Precinct I-127 in South Louisville. I doubt anyone has ever identified the track by its precinct number. The land the track is located on is actually divided between two precincts, I-103 and I-127. The track and most of the buildings are in I-127, which according to Secretary of State Trey Grayson's website has no voters living therein. I-103's territory includes the handful of buildings on the backside where a handful of horse-types are registered to vote. I-103 also includes the land north of the track known in the old days as the Heywood neighborhood.

You may wonder why there is a precinct with no voters in it. That's a fair subject. Jefferson County has six such precincts. They are B-167, H-130, H-140, the aforementioned I-127, M150, and N-135. The easy answer for most of these is simple geography. B-167 is found along the south side of Thixton Lane from Risen Lane east to Zoneton Road. A strip of land across the front of the lots along Thixton Lane, about 8/1000's of a mile wide (according to the State Highway Department, which maintains both Thixton Lane (KY2053) and Zoneton Road (KY1116), is the reason. That strip of land is physically in Jefferson County, in the 3rd Congressional District. But, the homes facing Thixton in that stretch are in Bullitt County in the 2nd Congressional District and they vote in a Bullitt County precinct. Nonetheless, every square inch of land has to be in some precinct, and the handful of square inches along Thixton Lane in Jefferson County are in Jefferson County precinct B-167.

We'll skip H-130 for a moment and move to H-140. H-140 is a rectangular piece of property accidentally created due to two things. The realignment of Minor's Lane (or Minor Lane as Louisville-Jefferson County Metro officially calls it) west of I-65 along with the southern boundary of a Senate District line drawn in the 1996 Redistricting caused the creation of H-140. Minor's Lane was realigned to the west but the precinct line follows the old right-of-way. The 1996 boundary had formerly followed the line of Southern Ditch but a part of it was redrawn to follow the right-of-way line of the Outer Loop. This created an area with no voters and about six acres of land, almost all of which is a part of the I-65/Outer Loop interchange in southern Jefferson County.

Skipping over I-127 takes us to M-150. M-150 is some luscious greenspace running along both sides of I-64 in the Irish Hill area near Lexington Road. It was cut-off from M-142 with the drawing of a Senate district in the 2002 Redistricting, and thus had to be assigned a new number. Much of is in the Lady Bird Johnson Greenspace which includes Beargrass Creek and a bikepath on the north side of Cave Hill Cemetery. M-150 could possibly acquire voters at some point since there are a few developable parcels on Lexington Road in this precinct. On the other hand, neither B-167 nor H-140 could ever have any voters, although someone registered at 2800 Outer Loop (which is a McDonald's) was once inadvertently placed in H-140 as opposed to H-134 where the McDonald's is actually located).

N-135 came about in the 2002 Redistriciting in an effort to extend the 43rd House district upriver toward Harrod's Creek, a plan which I would have opposed if anyone had asked me, but State Representative Larry Clark, who had a hand in that redrawing, didn't specifically ask me, although we did discuss it at a luncheon-date in the Fountain Room of the Galt House. It is a strip of land on the northwest side of the old River Road right-of-way, taking in riverfront property, much of which is industrial. At one time prior to the 1937 flood, this area was populated with two communities, one white, one black, separated by Beargrass Creek, which at that time was referred to as the Beargrass Creek Cut-Off, although no one calls it that anymore. Generally known as The Point, this area was inundated in the flood and never recovered. River Road has been widened just southeast of the precinct line to a boulevard, a widening which is scheduled to continue to the northeast eventually to Zorn Avenue. There is a development planned for this area, at the northwest corner of Beargrass Creek and the new River Road, which if ever built, would populate this precinct as well as a part of L117, the precinct of which those people living south of the old River Road right-of-way would be a part.

That leaves I-127 and H-130, neither of which have any voters nor can they. One is for Churchill Downs; the other for the Airport. I can tell you why I believe they are there, but I wont. I'll leave that to your imagination. They were drawn purposefully and for a reason. I'll add that the Fairgrounds, which the State no longer calls the Fairgrounds, but rather calls it the Kentucky Exposition Center, is in H-114, a precinct with 31 voters, 21 of whom are Democrats, 7 are from the Dark Side, 3 are independents, and all of whom are split among the sexes by a 17 to 14 margin in favor of the males. H-114 is a remnant of the old H-119, the old H-114, the old H-130, and part of the old I-104 when Highland Park was still a place and not just a memory. Eventually, with the buyout by the Airport of most of the land that is left H-114 will be voter-less. Until that time, the ability to sell alcoholic beverages on Fairgrounds property is technically in the hands of those 31 voters, if and when they might want to join the temperance movement and make a name for themselves.

Happy Derby Week.