Antone's Nightclub
Traffic Flow Planning Would Solve Problems
RECEIVED Fri., Feb. 17, 2006
Dear Mr. Vincent J. May,
Why, in the first place, toll 290 East, which has been completed for decades now and is not a very high-volume road [“Postmarks,” Feb. 17]?
Background concept: how to mess up a road. Install long red lights on it, and make sure that traffic must stop for most, if not each of them. Vehicles will collect at each stop, and add, when the light turns green, to the portion of the cross traffic that turned in the same direction. This enlarged group stops at the next red, joining those already there, and the absurdity continues ad nauseam, hideously compounding congestion that was irresponsibly/artificially created to begin with.
As to why any competent traffic-management outfit would do such a thing, take a look at 183, the improvement of which has become the stuff of entire careers (this 4-or-5-year project has lasted at least 25 years now). Need I amplify? Make 290 a nonfunctioning joke to get folks clamoring for an upper deck, or flyovers, or some other highly expensive long-term project, and if folks fail to clamor, put a toll on the road to pay for the anticipated boondoggle.
Remember, 290 worked until the developers started looking east, and it could/should still be working.
Why, in the first place, toll 290 East, which has been completed for decades now and is not a very high-volume road [“Postmarks,” Feb. 17]?
Background concept: how to mess up a road. Install long red lights on it, and make sure that traffic must stop for most, if not each of them. Vehicles will collect at each stop, and add, when the light turns green, to the portion of the cross traffic that turned in the same direction. This enlarged group stops at the next red, joining those already there, and the absurdity continues ad nauseam, hideously compounding congestion that was irresponsibly/artificially created to begin with.
As to why any competent traffic-management outfit would do such a thing, take a look at 183, the improvement of which has become the stuff of entire careers (this 4-or-5-year project has lasted at least 25 years now). Need I amplify? Make 290 a nonfunctioning joke to get folks clamoring for an upper deck, or flyovers, or some other highly expensive long-term project, and if folks fail to clamor, put a toll on the road to pay for the anticipated boondoggle.
Remember, 290 worked until the developers started looking east, and it could/should still be working.
Duane Keith