DATE: Monday, September 1, 1997             TAG: 9708290002

SECTION: LOCAL                   PAGE: B9   EDITION: FINAL 

TYPE: OPINION 

SOURCE: ANN SJOERDSMA

                                            LENGTH:   79 lines

NO MCREST STOPS, PLEASE A MORE CROWDED "DIE-95" IS NOT A VISION OF MOTORING BLISS

There's no rest for the weary traveler. There'll be even less if an idea recently proposed by Virginia gubernatorial candidate James S. Gilmore III sees the light of day.

It may be foolhardy, in an era of endless congestion and construction, to think that a ``rest'' stop along Virginia's highways has anything to do with rest, but I do. I log 25,000 miles a year, many of them on Interstates 95 and 64, and I catch a break at the state-run rest stops when I can.

These quick respites revitalize me. They give me precious moments away from the blacktop jungle of speed, recklessness, anxiety and frustration. For 10 minutes, I can relax.

So when Republican nominee Gilmore suggested that Virginia's 40 rest stops could be made safer by allowing fast-food restaurants and other private businesses to operate at them, because of course there's ``safety in numbers,'' I cringed.

Sure, I thought, bring the mobs of people who would otherwise take an interstate exit leading to fast-food sprawl to the ``rest'' stop. Sure, turn the ``rest'' stop into an over-crowded shopping strip, a teen-agers' hangout, or an even more attractive target for criminals, who could bide their larcenous time, less conspicuously, with a burger and fries.

Sure, take the rest out of ``rest'' stop. And then what, Mr. Gilmore? What happens when we who were once rested no longer have those ``precious moments away''?

The truth is there are already too many people at Virginia's rest stops - especially during summer months - because there are too many people on its highways. And too many of them are hostile, self-centered and in a hurry to get nowhere fast.

The atmosphere on the state's clogged interstates - Virginia's 178-mile I-95 is known as ``Die-95'' - is fast decaying with the worn-out asphalt. This is no secret. The latest report to legislators from state transportation officials about the not-too-distant future describes a hellish vision of gridlocked vehicles and road-improvement projects that are years behind schedule, too long in the completion or simply not undertaken because of lack of funds.

We're choking on each other's exhaust, and Gilmore wants to convert our only remaining oases into ``service plazas'' like those on the 506-mile Pennsylvania Turnpike. Does the man ever get out?

I refuse to give up what little road civility is left. I refuse to give up picnic tables, barbecue grills, open spaces - all vestiges of a much saner, slower-paced yesteryear.

Yes, two people have been robbed and killed at Virginia rest stops - at Dale City, off I-95, and at Elliston, off I-81 - since December, and there have been at least 17 other armed robberies at rest stops, mostly off I-95, in the past 18 months.

But the state has been neglectful. Security has been lax. With their dense shrubbery, poor lighting, isolated buildings and unattended washrooms, rest stops have long been crime scenes waiting to happen. Many times, I've pulled in and immediately out of stops that were sparsely populated. Unless a state patrol car was in sight, I didn't feel comfortable. And at night? Forget it.

A show of police force - not a Burger King takeover - may be all that's needed to prevent most rest-stop crimes. That and public awareness of the situational conditions, such as the time of day, that make travelers more vulnerable.

From the criminal's perspective, no crime is ever random.

Frankly, it's amazing there haven't been more crimes in the congested Washington-to-Richmond corridor, what with population ``spillover.'' Is there any doubt that people using the I-64 New Kent County rest areas are going to be more at risk after today's planned opening of Colonial Downs race track?

It took a murder before the state finally started investing police resources in its highway rest stops: satellite offices, video cameras, increased patrols. Gov. George Allen also backed the hiring of private security guards for the four stops where the most violence has occurred. I wonder what it will take before the state recognizes the value to safety of something as simple as peace of mind.

We need to preserve rest, not endanger it. For in our clamor to get somewhere, we have surely lost our way. MEMO: Ann G. Sjoerdsma, an attorney, is an editorial columnist and book

editor for The Virginian-Pilot.

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