Letters to the Editors

What benefits are there to another Wal-Mart?

I am a former resident of Cypress Pointe RV Park in Palm Harbor and am very concerned that on Tuesday at 6:30 p.m. the Board of County Commissioners of Pinellas County may approve the rezoning request of the Wilder Corp. that would allow the construction of a Wal-Mart Supercenter on U.S. 19 near Klosterman Road.

If this project is approved, the increased traffic on U.S. 19 will result in many more accidents on this already deadly stretch of highway. The Development Review Services Board has concluded that the commissioners should deny this application for rezoning, citing traffic concerns as one of the main reasons for this recommendation.

If the commissioners do approve the rezoning after this recommendation to deny, my questions to them are:

Why even have the office of Development Review Services or any of the other county agencies that have worked so diligently and have spent countless hours studying the proposal and have held several hearings to gather information and comments (both pro and con) from the community and the attorney for the developer? Why spend taxpayer dollars to fund county offices that are staffed by professionals if you choose to ignore their recommendations?

Is receiving money from Wal-Mart for the Belcher Road extension to Klosterman that significant that it's worth risking the lives of thousands of additional drivers on U.S. 19?

Have any of the commissioners been to the Wal-Mart Supercenter at U.S. 19 and Ridge Road in Port Richey? The increased number of crimes at that location has been a constant problem for the Port Richey Police Department. The traffic at that intersection is near gridlock much of the time. Do the commissioners want that in Palm Harbor?

And finally, commissioners, other than the increased revenue to the county from generated sales taxes, what possible benefit would having yet another Wal-Mart Supercenter be to Pinellas County?

I'm hopeful that the commissioners will follow the advice of the office of Development Review Services and deny the petition for rezoning.
-- Gerry Cload, New Port Richey

Lauding county's courage, insight

The county examiners have both courage and insight to recommend three times that Wal-Mart should not be able to change the zoning to permit a supercenter on U.S. 19.

The problems are many: traffic backups, accidents and deaths, gas and oil from the parking lot polluting Lake Tarpon, destruction of an environmental area with trees and wildlife, air pollution, and some homeowners will face large property value declines.

The final decision will be made by county commissioners on Tuesday at the County Courthouse, 315 Court St., Clearwater.
-- William and Rhoda Gold, Palm Harbor

Wider and faster road doesn't mean safer

Re: To some, new lane adds to U.S. 19 fears, story, March 7.

I and many of our citizens feel that this new lane makes U.S. 19 more dangerous but that is not to say that some of the improvements made were not good.

The changes that were made to the medians that channel cars into a much safer position to cross our highway are great and the new sidewalks that are being installed are very much appreciated. County Commissioner Karen Seel and her fellow commissioners are to be commended for pushing for these improvements and making all of our lives a little safer.

Yet there is much room for improvement and some of the changes made appear to make U.S. 19 more dangerous rather than less dangerous.

For example, before the "safety improvements" there were many places motorists could move to the turn lane, slow down to 5-10 mph and be able to turn into a business or shopping center with a reasonable degree of assurance that they would not be rear-ended.

Now when you are in the right lane and want to turn into a business, cars are coming up behind you at 55-60 mph and you hope and pray that they can slow down in time before hitting you.

Conversely, when you pulled out of a business you had a lane, even if it was a short one, to speed up a little before you had to merge with high-speed traffic. Now you have to merge with this high-speed traffic from a dead stop. How is this safer?

Before the changes were made, there was a place where the buses could pull over; now there is none. There is also no place where motorists can pull over if they have a problem, and when the police pull someone over they will now be blocking an entire lane, not just the right-turn lane. The citizens who are waiting for the bus on one of the bus stop benches are also in more danger as the bench is now only about 5 feet from traffic that is going by at 55 mph or faster.

It was stated in the article that before the improvements were made, there were only intermittent right-turn lanes and that created dangerous situations where drivers would pull over and then have to go back to their original lanes because the lane suddenly ended.

In my opinion all that was done was to replace one dangerous situation with another. Now drivers can cruise in the right lane going 55 mph-plus and all of a sudden they are faced with a sign that says "right turn only." They then have to swerve back into the lane to their left to avoid making a turn. This is just as dangerous as before, if not more so as they are now traveling at a much higher speed.

The statement from the Florida Department of Transportation spokeswoman Marian Scorza that, "You are adding more capacity to the roadway and you are making it operationally safer" is also misleading. Making a road wider and faster does not equate to safety. If the goal of the FDOT was to allow some of our motorists to get to their destinations a little quicker, then you have succeeded. If the goal was to make U.S. 19 safer for the majority of our citizens, then in my opinion you have failed.

There is a big difference between a continuous right-turn lane and a high-speed lane that you can turn right from. A dedicated right turn only lane would be much safer.

And to all of you who need to be somewhere so badly that you have to put the rest of us in danger and peril for our lives, why don't you just leave your house a few minutes earlier?
-- Peter Nehr, Tarpon Springs city commissioner

Time to rethink concert schedule

Doesn't anyone in our Clearwater government have any common sense? A concert at Coachman Park during the start of spring break? The traffic was backed up for miles in both directions.

There should never be a concert at Coachman Park or on the beach during March or April, ever. Wake up, city officials.
-- Eddy Stout, Clearwater

Your voice counts

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