We have tons of Eyeball Jiggler news this week. It is probably understandable given last month's near-record rainfall. But we pass these along in the hopes that city, county and state roadies will take pity of us and break out the asphalt patches. So let's get right to it.
One of the absolute worst will leave your ears ringing if you hit it squarely and, believe me, if you are making a right turn from eastbound Ulmerton Road onto southbound 34th Street, it will be very difficult not to hit it. It's about the size of BayWalk.
It lurks at the right edge of the road, and during rain, when water collects in that low spot, it becomes a stealth pothole. You can't see it until it cracks your teeth.
By the way, the rest of that stretch of 34th Street, all the way down to 118th Avenue, isn't in great shape, either. But nothing as bad as our No. 1 pothole of the week.
We have an update on the great Beach Drive sinkhole. It is a collapsing sewer pipe.
We suggest that those of you reading this over your Sunday morning Wheatena might want to put the item aside for later, or at least stop eating for a minute.
Sewage and cereal aren't compatible breakfast topics.
According to Mike Connors, St. Petersburg's maven of road stuff (that's a technical transportation title), the pit that formed some weeks ago in the southbound through lane of Beach Drive at Fifth Avenue N, directly in front of the Renaissance Vinoy Resort, was caused by a 48-inch sanitary sewer that decided to come apart.
"It's a system that carries raw sewage to (the waste treatment plant at) Albert Whitted Airport," Mike told us. "The manhole was severely deteriorated, and some of the pipes were messed up and needed to be replaced."
It took a while to get all the pieces in place to do the repair work. For one thing, it had to be coordinated with the Vinoy to cause minimal disruption for visitors. But the work is under way now.
In fact, Beach Drive is closed in both directions at the Fifth Avenue N intersection. There are detours around the project.
No word at the moment how long this is going to take.
Probably just long enough to raise the blood pressure of everyone who has to drive the route.
You may now resume your regularly scheduled eating.
Now let's zip down Fourth Street S to a point just south of 42nd Avenue. Fourth Street is a two-lane road down there, and the entire southbound lane is blocked by an eruption of pavement - stones, chunks, rocks and one small boulder - that used to be road surface.
The lane has been blocked off by orange-and-white sawhorses, so anyone paying attention won't hit this mess.
We suggest that those of you reading this over your Sunday morning Wheatena might want to put the item aside for later, or at least stop eating for a minute. Sewage and cereal aren't compatible breakfast topics.
But be aware that if you are southbound, you will have to cross over into the northbound lane to get around the blockage.
And if you are northbound, don't be surprised to see somebody's headlights in front of you.
Everybody should just slow down and be extra careful until this is cleaned up.
There probably aren't too many people who turn west off 66th Street N onto 51st Avenue, but those who do are in for a really bad jolt if they drive all the way down the street.
Fifty-first Avenue N is a dead-end street. It starts out just fine. But about halfway to the west end, the roadway breaks down completely. One stretch has three gigantic holes on the eastbound side, booby traps so ghastly that we actually drove on the wrong side of the street to avoid hitting them.
That part of the road as a whole looks as if it has been neglected since original construction. It needs help badly.
And now, a reverse Eyeball Jiggler of the Week.
Road crews have made a sweep along 38th Avenue N, plugging dozens of bad potholes and replacing large sections of pavement that couldn't be patched. The work extends east from 49th Street N for at least a dozen blocks.
It makes the ride across town a lot less like a slalom course filled with rocks.
Although . . . if it is bumps you crave, there still is that pesky washboard in the dip under the railroad tracks on 38th Avenue. Those herringbone speed bumps are road patches made necessary by the destructive drainage of the hills beside the road.
I don't know if we're just getting used to them or if it has to do with the smoothing effect of years of wear and tear. But when we drove through that swale last week, the jolts didn't seem as severe as they used to.
Now on to something else.
On Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Street S, between Third and Fourth avenues S, there is a mid-block traffic signal.
It is there, we presume, to allow residents of the Graham Park apartment complex, on the west side of King, to navigate safely across King Street to the shopping center on the east side. There is a crosswalk there, but apparently it wasn't sufficient to stop traffic.
Not that this surprises us. Drivers ignore crosswalks everywhere in this city. Why not on King Street, too?
The problem is, when you are turning south onto King from Third Avenue S, the traffic signal is right there on top of you before you know it. If you aren't expecting it, as we weren't, it will require an unanticipated and frantic scramble to hit the brakes before you run the light.
We have no doubt that the light is needed. But there should be some sort of sign at the corner of King and Third to warn motorists they could run smack into a red light right around the corner.
- 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.
