Who keeps account of roadside debris?

Funny sight of the week: Jessie and I were driving south on Interstate 275 last week, somewhere south of Gandy Boulevard, when we saw a work crew on the side of the road picking up debris and piling it in a trailer hauled by a white van.

This is not an unusual sight, and we were about to turn our attention back to the road when we saw that the white van was painted along the side with the name, Smith Barney.

We hurried to the office and checked the phone book to learn if there might be, perchance, a Smith Barney Trash Hauling service or a Smith Barney Landscape Specialist. But all we could find in any regional phone book was Smith Barney, the brokerage house.

We knew the financial fallout of the Enron mess would stretch far and wide, but this is ridiculous.

We have had so many questions lately about a particular sign on I-275 that it smacks of a letter-writing campaign. Usually, we don't respond to letter-writing campaigns, but the question in this case was sufficiently interesting that we decided to seek an answer.

Southbound on the interstate, at the exit for Fifth Street N, there is a sign directing motorists to the Florida Orange Grove Winery. When we have asked the state roadies in the past about the reason for interstate signage that seems to promote private enterprise, we have been told that it is the choice of the political jurisdiction in which the sign appears.

Thus the sign for International Plaza northbound on the Howard Frankland Bridge. And the sign for Baywalk in St. Petersburg. We expected the same answer for the winery.

But not so.

The winery sign is there because state law says, if the winery wants a sign, it can have one.

No, you can't make wine in your kitchen and qualify for an interstate sign. Florida Statute 599.004 is quite explicit about that. A wine-making operation must qualify for the Florida Farm Winery Program to earn highway signage. There are five criteria:

Produce or sell fewer than 250,000 gallons of wine annually.

Maintain a minimum of 10 acres of vineyards in Florida.

Be open to the public for tours, tastings and sales at least 30 hours a week.

Apply annually for recognition as a Florida Farm Winery; and

Pay an annual fee of $100.

If you do all this, state law says, the following applies:

"Upon the request of a certified Florida Farm Winery, the Department of Transportation shall acquire and place Florida Farm Winery logo, emblem and directional signs on the rights of way of interstate highways and primary and secondary roads. All costs for placing each sign shall be paid by the certified Florida Farm Winery requesting the sign. However, the cost of placing a sign shall not exceed $250 and the annual permit fee shall not exceed $50."

Why, you might well ask, would our legislators -- in their infinite wisdom -- do this for wineries and not for, say, Ralph's Brake Lining and Croissant Shoppe?

Because, as the solons explain in section 599.001, "viticulture, the production and utilization of grapes, is an underdeveloped agricultural commodity enterprise in this state."

Perhaps true. But we'll never be mistaken for the Napa Valley. For one thing, you would be hard pressed to find a valley in Pinellas County, except at the edge of a landfill.

And please, if you are a certified Florida viticulturist, don't write or call and complain that we're making fun of you. We're not. Though we might be having a bit of sport with the Legislature.

Those of you who live just north of downtown St. Petersburg probably know this already, but it is worth mentioning for all the rest of us. The city, in its infinite wisdom (St. Petersburg has first dibs on the infinite wisdom left over from the Legislature -- a considerable quantity) has decided that Eighth and Ninth avenues N from Fourth Street east should be two-way.

Never mind that these streets barely would be wide enough for two lanes if nobody parked along a curb. But people do park along a curb, which means Eighth and Ninth avenues are now two-way, one-lane streets.

Hmmmmm.

If two cars approach from different directions, one must find unused curb space among the parked cars to pull over and yield.

"We did it because the neighborhood wanted it, but we're a little uneasy about it," said St. Petersburg's street guru Mike Connors. "We're especially concerned about Eighth Avenue because it is particularly narrow. There are a couple of streets farther north that were made two-way where there really aren't two traffic lanes, and they seem to have worked out. We're hoping this does, too, but it is going to require some driver caution."

Also courtesy. If the driver of the vehicle traveling next to the parked cars doesn't want to pull to the curb or can't find space to pull over, the result could be a dandy standoff. Let's hope nothing turns ugly.

The most bizarre aspect of this move by the city is the east intersection of Ninth Avenue at Fourth Street. Ninth is supposed to be two-way there. The sign on the left curb shows it as two-way. But there are three lanes, and all of them are for westbound traffic. Two are through lanes and one is a left-turn lane for southbound Fourth Street.

There is no traffic lane for vehicles crossing Fourth Street eastbound on Ninth Avenue.

Jessie votes to stay out of the neighborhood altogether, which is probably what our friends living there hoped for all along.

And now, Dr. Delay's Terrible Traffic Tidbits of the Week.

About 35 percent of all Americans are concerned about being in some kind of transportation accident, according to a February survey by the federal Bureau of Transportation Statistics. Nearly one out of four people rated themselves as "very concerned." Jessie thinks this is probably accurate on a national scale, but way understates the sentiments in this area, where driving habits should strike fear into the hearts of at least 98 percent of the people on the road.

In 2000, 48 percent of people age 85 and older had driver's licenses, according to the Federal Highway Administration. In Jessie's humble opinion, being 85 should not preclude someone from holding a driver's license. But it does seem that at some point the state should stop renewing everybody's license by mail. Even younger drivers should have to prove from time to time that they can actually still see and hear.

We will return next week with the rest of our regular features.

-- Dr. Delay can be reached by e-mail at docdelay@sptimes.com, by fax at (727) 893-8675 or by snail mail at 490 First Ave., S, St. Petersburg 33701.

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