In the 21st Century, you'd think they would have come up with a better way to symbolize the start of a major construction project, but the ceremonial groundbreaking remains an entrenched tradition, as shown at today's Second Avenue Subway ceremony.
I mean I understand that a giant boring machine can't come crashing through the wall like the Kool-Aid guy, but today's symbolic groundbreaking seemed to satisfy no one. Photographers jostle each other just to get a shot of something that's completely orchestrated for them in the first place. Politicians sometimes wear a pained expressions — and a hard hats — as they flail away at a phony wall with tiny pickaxes.
Can you suggest a better way?
— Michael Clancy
