Last week, to celebrate its 50th anniversary, BART released its vision for the next 50 years: more frequent trains, new stations on existing lines, reconfigured cars, prettier stations.

Today, we’re back to earth: the headline was BART has little cash to fund big dreams. Among the ideas being questioned was to erect canopies over underground entrances. Pigeons would poop on them, and they “would add visual clutter to the already crowded streetscape.”

Not if they’re done right. Could anyone object to a 21st Century update of the classic Parisian Metro entrance: