DATE: Sunday, April 27, 1997                TAG: 9704250013

SECTION: COMMENTARY              PAGE: J4   EDITION: FINAL 

TYPE: Letter

                                            LENGTH:  193 lines

LETTERS TO THE EDITOR - THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT

The Anti-Destination League

Would you like to know why so many people run yellow and red lights? It doesn't take a study to figure it out. The culprit is the Anti-Destination League, a dedicated group of bureaucrats (loosely referred to as traffic engineers) located in the city halls of Norfolk and Virginia Beach. Their objective is to cause frustration and anger in normally well-behaved citizens. They have succeeded.

Traffic lights exist at almost every intersection, and they have been timed so that when your light turns green, the next one will be red when you get to it. You think I am exaggerating? Try traveling Boush/Duke past Waterside or, better yet, Military Highway or Virginia Beach Boulevard. If you really want to raise your blood pressure, drive from the Naval Base down Hampton Boulevard to Scope (or the opposite direction).

The Old Dominion University study concludes the ``runners'' are all of us regardless of race, age or gender. That says it all! We don't need re-engineered intersections or an education program. Eliminate the problem.! We need synchronized traffic signals.

Joe Jaap

Norfolk

Light site a problem

There is no excuse for running a red light. However, I don't think this was a big problem when the stoplights were at the beginning of the intersections. People would tend to make sure they were stopped by the time they got to the light.

Now that the lights are on the far side of the intersection, there seems to be a big problem getting stopped at the beginning.

Joseph P. Sciortino

Virginia Beach

Use surfboard as armor

Pedestrians in Virginia Beach are at risk. No one stops at marked crosswalks, even if there are lights. Down at the Oceanfront, crossing Atlantic Avenue can be especially dicey during the tourist season. If anybody stops for pedestrians, everybody else beeps their horns and just doesn't care. It helps to have a 10-foot surfboard to help block the way for other pedestrians to get across. Few people like fiberglass in their grill.

C. D. Thomas

Virginia Beach

Beware of the boulevards

I was under the understanding that pedestrians always had the right of way, as do people on bikes. But around here, people are so concerned with getting where they're going, that they don't even pay attention to the pedestrians.

Two very dangerous places to have to cross the street are Virginia Beach Boulevard and General Booth Boulevard. and down in Chesapeake, very difficult. places to cross are widely spaced out.

Alicia Ray

Virginia Beach

A sidewalk would help

We really do need a sidewalk from Northampton Boulevard down Pleasure House Road to Shore Drive. There's none there at all. Also, to have continuous sidewalk from Shore Drive down Pleasure House Road, to the end, would be a great help. The traffic is fast and heavy on that street and we really should have a sidewalk.

Charles Ellerton

Virginia Beach

Put bridges over creeks

I would like to see bridges put over small creeks for biking. . . . I came from the West about two years ago and biking and walking were very important there. We walked everywhere - schools, shopping, parks and woods and things like that.

I find that the corners are very inaccessible to biking, especially with small children, and many streets do not have sidewalks or they're overgrown or not complete around the block so that children can stay safely on a sidewalk and not have to enter the roadway.

Jill Friestad

Norfolk

3 rules for safe walking

Be a smart pedestrian: 1. If you can, walk on the sidewalk, not in the road. 2. If there's no sidewalk, walk on the edge of the road facing traffic. 3. Be extra careful when it's dark.

Barney Bern

Virginia Beach

Most dangerous candidate

The most dangerous pedestrian walk that I know of is the curve where there is no sidewalk between Potters Road and Lynnhaven Parkway and that is a four-lane road going into a six-lane road.

Steve Chapel

Virginia Beach

No $$ for walkers, bikers

I commute on a bicycle daily across Northampton Boulevard between Shields Road and Bayside Road. There's a causeway there on Northampton Boulevard, and it gets a lot of bike traffic as well as foot traffic. But there's no sidewalk between the lake and the highway, and it's quite well-traveled by motor vehicles. I feel I'm at risk, as well as the numerous other residents in this fast-growing area. . . . The state has spent lots of money developing a computer-aided traffic analyzing system; however, the people on foot and bikes get nothing.

Richard McCulloch

Virginia Beach

Walkers lack sidewalks

We live down in Great Bridge and there's absolutely nowhere you can walk. There are two-lane roads with no shoulder. It's very dangerous, and children don't have anywhere to ride their bikes. I would love to be able to walk, but nobody puts sidewalks in anywhere anymore.

Kathy Horack

Chesapeake

Switched from walking

When I was young, I used to walk all over Norfolk - I mean, all the way from Main Street to Ocean View. Of course, not all on the same night. I never really felt afraid, but as time went on and there became more auto traffic and people began coming in from other places, I more or less quit. I got a car and I went out in a car more.

Richard Carver

Norfolk

Try crossing Pacific Ave.

I live in the old Beach borough neighborhood, which I believe is the highest pedestrian and cycling area in the city. Most of our streets down here don't have sidewalks, none have bike trails or lanes. We just recently got street lights for the first time.

Getting across Pacific Avenue is like taking your life in your hands. Now we're going to have dedicated trolley lanes on Atlantic Avenue, and that's going to create more traffic congestion onto Pacific. Children and old folks, who knows how they can get across Pacific?. It's really tough.

Barbara Yates

Virginia Beach

Risks crossing downtown

I think that most of Norfolk is suburbs and is fairly bad for pedestrians. I often walk on Colley Avenue, crossing the streets, and I find that drivers will speed up to try and get by you or they almost make you jump backward. Or if you're over halfway, they'll zig out into oncoming traffic, almost making you drop what you may have in your arms. Downtown, the worst spot I've seen is between Selden Arcade and Monticello Arcade. Routinely crossing in the walk between the two, I've almost gotten hit. You really take your life in your hands right there.

Roy Irlam

Norfolk

Lower turnpike speeds

I've been driving the length of Centerville Turnpike now for four years. It is a narrow, curving, two-lane, rural road traveled by school buses, large trucks and farm equipment. In many places, the ditches on both sides are deep enough to lose a large truck. The speed limit along much of the road is 55 mph, and that does not seem sufficient for many of the Mario Andretti wannabes who commute this byway.

How many more fatalities, head-on collisions and vehicles lost in canyon-sized ditches will it take before they drop the speed limit down commensurate with the road condition?

Willie Hennessy

Virginia Beach

Stop-less stop signs

In Norfolk, hardly anyone stops for stop signs, and many drivers are exceeding the speed limit when they run the stop sign. I have yet to see anyone stop at the stop sign at the intersection of Early Street and Denver Avenue. The city could make a fortune ticketing drivers who run just that one stop sign. Whenever I approach an intersection, I slow down and stop, even when the other driver has the stop sign.

Donald Self

Norfolk

Trapped at Wards Corner

So happy to read headline in paper, ``Area rates 7th safest in nation for walkers.'' The people making that study never had to walk across streets at Wards Corner in Norfolk. The walk lights only stay on long enough to get you halfway across. The ``No Turn On Red'' is never used by drivers. They will run you down.

Just last week an older woman was trapped halfway across - no one even slowed down to allow her to get across. It was sad to see. She did make it across in time.

A. T. Nolls

Norfolk

No walk at the Y

I live in Kempsville Greens, one mile from the YMCA at Mount Trashmore and cannot walk there. I would start out down Baxter and when I go to the intersection of Baxter Road, which becomes South Independence, it's a dangerous intersection. I haven't counted them, but it's probably nine or 10 lanes to cross. The Y is on Southern Boulevard, and there are lots of people who would like to walk that nice distance, but we know that it is far too dangerous.

Louise Graves

Virginia Beach

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