Lawrence
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Sprint brings LTE to parts of Kansas, Illinois and Massachusetts
Has anyone else noticed a surge in locations getting newly-minted LTE of late? Sprint has, and it's joining the bandwagon with a further five areas from today. Users in Lawrence, Topeka and Wichita in Kansas, Waukegan-Lake in Illinois and Barnstable-Hyannis in Massachusetts will be able to slurp down Big Yellow's new service soon, if they can't already. The company has also revealed that Chicagoans, Angelenos and New Yorkers will be getting 3G service thanks to the company's Network Vision program, as it continues to swap out its aging Nextel hardware for something a little more futuristic.
Sonic fan gets town's pet hedgehog ban overturned
An 11-year-old Sonic fan's crusade has overturned a citywide ban on hedgehogs in Lawrence, Kansas. As reported by KTKA, young Judson King wanted one of the super-fast and incredibly agile rodents as a pet, but they were illegal, so he spent three years getting a brief together petitioning city commissioners to overturn the law. The town elders couldn't find a reason behind the blue creatures' banning in the first place, so Master King now has his own pet hedgehog -- Luke.After doing some research of our own, we've discovered the reason Lawrence banned hedgehogs in the first place. In 1944, a Dr. Eikopf Robotniksky settled in Lawrence, and he just so happened to own a pet echidna. Echidnas and hedgehogs do not get along well, and thus hedgehogs were given the boot. No, really. We're not making this up.[Via GamePolitics]
Talking on the phone + riding your bicycle in NJ = $250 ticket
Here at Engdaget we completely support laws that make the roads a safer place for everyone, but this is a little ridiculous. Legislators in New Jersey are trying to pass a law where it would be illegal to talk on your cellphone and ride your bike. No, not a motorcycle, a bicycle. (Yeah, we know what you're thinking.) The rider would get a ticket for doing such and the fine would range from $100 to $250. We guess it could be worse -- we could live somewhere like Lawrence, Kansas or Honolulu, Hawaii where your cell phone can get you a all all types of trouble with the law. [Via Textually]
Lawrence wants to ban phones completely from roads
We're not usually the crazy protester types who'd brave the cold and firehoses for something silly like woman's suffrage, (Just kidding! We love you ladies!) but we're all ready to get out tempera paint and signage for what seems like a pretty steep rights issue in Lawrence, Kansas. Seems they're trying to best all those current cellphone laws on the books -- most of which require a handsfree device to use your phone in the car -- and want to ban phones use while driving altogether. "If you pass a ban that just prohibits the hand-held devices, you're sending a message that the hands-free devices are safe, and that is false," said Paul Atchley of Kansas University, an proponent of the bill. Seems a little bit of shaky reasoning to us, but we're no professor. T-Mobile has spoken out against the ban, stating: "We think there are distractions just as great. I suppose if you also want to ban McDonald's coffee and kids in the back seat, then we wouldn't oppose it." We say amen to that, and just dare the Mayor of Lawrence to take our phone away from our cold dead fingers -- after we roll our SUV during a particularly heated conversation, of course.
