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Be patient, Tyrone work will -- eventually -- end
© St. Petersburg Times It's bad enough, we think, that Tyrone Boulevard, including the area in front of Tyrone Square Mall, is such a mess these days. Worse news is that the project is not scheduled for completion until some time in December, well into the holiday shopping season. Doing the mall this year isn't going to be an easy choice. But that's the shortsighted version of events. When the project is completed, the Tyrone area is going to be a better place. For one thing, that right-hand lane to nowhere will be gone. You know the one we mean. You are tooling southeast on Tyrone in the right lane, and it becomes a right-turn-only entrance to a remote corner of the mall property. And there the lane ends, just a few dozen feet short of the Tyrone intersection with 66th Street. It has been thus for years on end, and there was no good reason for it. And now, the problem is about to be fixed. It is just one element of an $11.6-million construction project that extends 3.9 miles from Fifth Avenue N to Park Street. It includes concrete rehabilitation, asphalt replacement and drainage improvements. Damaged curbs, traffic separators and sidewalks also will be repaired or replaced along Tyrone. Turn lane improvements will be made at several locations in addition to the aforementioned intersection at 66th Street. Curb ramps will be installed. Construction crews will install new mast arm traffic signals at Fifth Avenue N, Ninth Avenue N, 22nd Avenue N, 66th Street, 68th Street and 38th Avenue N. So be patient. This will end, and life will be better for it. What prompted us to delve into the Tyrone Boulevard situation was an e-mail from Linda Zellner, who wrote to complain that the concrete patches in the road made for rough driving. We suspect that's because the work isn't finished. Remember Interstate 275 when the concrete replacement was in progress? It felt like dozens of washboards until the state roadie contractors brought out the milling equipment and smoothed out everything, new and old. Hopefully, the same thing will happen along Tyrone. Some of you have discovered this already, but for those who haven't, we're delighted to bring you the news that the Bryan Dairy Road/118th Avenue cut-through to Interstate 275 has opened. It provides truly hassle-free and almost traffic signal-free travel across the waistline of Pinellas County from the Gulf beaches through Seminole and Pinellas Park. The downside of the road's opening is that it doesn't do anybody any good if they're not going to St. Petersburg or points south. The only ramp that is ready for traffic is the one from eastbound 118th Avenue to the southbound interstate. If you are traveling from St. Petersburg to Seminole, you'll have to take your old route. Additional ramps will be opening in the next few years. Not only is this new road helpful for those driving east from the Gulf beaches, it is a boon to commuters headed to St. Petersburg from mid county and north county. Instead of fighting through the horrors of Ulmerton Road's Miracle Mile (so-called in my book because it's a miracle if you don't have an accident there), motorists can drive south across the Bayside Bridge, continue south on 49th Street and make a left on 118th Avenue. The county has not, as yet, responded to our plea that they lengthen the duration of the left-turn signals at that intersection, but we are hopeful that this will happen soon. We don't get it. More than a month ago, the city of St. Petersburg resurfaced several blocks of First and Second avenues S in the heart of downtown. Within days, crews were back to repaint lane lines, parking spaces and crosswalks on First Avenue S. While they painted lane lines on Second Avenue S, they've never come back to repaint the parking spaces or the crosswalks, including a mid-block crosswalk between Fourth and Fifth streets S. The sign is still up on a post saying a crosswalk exists there, but you'd never know if from looking at the asphalt. We have renamed this stretch: St. Petersburg -- The Forgotten Blocks. It's time for the Eyeball Jiggler of the Week, though this week it should be Jigglers, plural. We have had this complaint about 62nd Avenue NE before. It is a pothole breeding ground. If potholes are ever an endangered species, 62nd Avenue NE is where their recovery will begin. You can't beat the things to death with a stick up there. The city fills them, they pop open again. Time after time after time. We suppose it's partly because of all the rain we've had this summer. The water seeps in under the patches and lets traffic beat the asphalt to smithereens. By far, the pavement is in the worst shape in the left lane eastbound from just before Hobson Street NE to Foch Street NE. The westbound lanes have had their share of chips and dents, too, but most -- not all, but most -- of the patches have held. A lot of drivers are using 62nd Avenue NE as a back way around all the road work at Snell Isle and Shore Acres, and the additional loads on the road aren't helping any. The city really needs to get up there and do some work. Yikes! And now, Dr. Delay's Terrible Traffic Tidbits of the Week. In 2001, the federal roadies tell us, nearly 42,000 Americans were killed and more than 3-million injured on the nation's highways. If the cost in human life weren't high enough, we also learn that in 2000, the economic cost of traffic crashes was estimated to be $231-billion, the equivalent of 2.3 percent of the U.S. gross domestic product. Now, that's really gross. -- 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, FL 33701.
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