Let's start with a little housekeeping this week, courtesy of our friends, the state roadies.
They are resurfacing Alt. U.S. 19 from West Bay Drive to Drew Street, and we say it's danged well about time. But progress does not come without a price.
The inside northbound and southbound lanes will be closed from time to time between West Bay and Belleview Boulevard starting tonight, from 7:30 p.m. to 7 a.m. for three weeks. As you are inconvenienced, try to keep in mind how much better it will be when the project is done.
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If those of you in South Pinellas will bear with us a moment, we have one other item in this area we would like to mention, and we hope the state roadies are listening. This is a tad farther north than we usually venture for the column, but it's important.
Several readers have brought this to our attention, and we have had a lot of personal experience with it recently, as well. The intersection of S Fort Harrison Avenue and Pinellas Street really, really, really needs a left-turn signal for northbound traffic.
This is the main entrance to Morton Plant Hospital, and it is totally impossible for through traffic to get around left-turning traffic since the road is only one lane in each direction. With so many folks trying to turn left onto the hospital campus, traffic sometimes backs up for blocks.
We don't usually get involved in issues north of East and West Bay drives, but so many people from south county use this hospital that the lack of a turn signal affects a lot of readers of this column.
Would it be so difficult to widen the road by 10 feet to accommodate one left-turn lane?
We hope not.
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Okay, now we're down south again.
A reader brought to our attention a confusing series of school zone signs on 54th Avenue N. After driving the stretch, we can only suggest that the sequence of signs was designed by a automobile brake dealer who needs a little extra cash.
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We drove west on 54th Avenue. Approaching 16th Street, we saw two of those bilious green signs warning of children crossing 54th Avenue. Fine. We're all in favor of protecting children, and if that shade of green helps people notice the warning (it does), the heck with the aesthetics.
Then from 16th Street to the west side of 19th Street, school zones begin and end in the oddest places. There are signs that say, "End School Zone," when there were no signs that started the school zone. School zones end while you are still driving in front of school property.
The speed bounces up and down between 35 and 15 and back again too fast to keep track, even though you are almost constantly in front of a school, first Northeast High, then a preschool, then Sexton Elementary.
And the last "End School Zone" sign is only halfway past Sexton.
What's up with this?
It certainly confused Jessie, and if she can't understand these things, who can?
I later noticed while driving past St. Petersburg High on Fifth Avenue N that the school zone begins about a block and a half before you reach the building and ends a block and a half on the other side. Lights and signage make it very clear that you travel that route at 15 mph when the lights are flashing. And there are no 35 mph signs to clutter up your thinking.
Now that makes sense. Nice, clean and uniform.
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Norma Smith of Largo wrote to ask about the absence of a "No U Turn" sign at Seminole Boulevard at 104th Avenue in Seminole. There is a simple opening in the median there, not the usual U-turn configuration.
It is a little odd that there isn't a sign warning against making U turns, since there is one farther down Seminole at 106th Avenue.
We're not even sure why there is an opening in the median. There are plenty of left-turn lanes along Seminole that could be used for starting U turns. Using the opening at 104th isn't necessary, and it does appear a bit dangerous.
Perhaps someone could enlighten us about this.
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Waldo Rowell invited us to drive a stretch of southbound Park Street between First Avenue N and Central. We did, and we paid for it.
We had just passed First Avenue N when the bottom dropped out of the world. There is a big bump and then a big dip worthy of the finest slalom course in the Rockies.
We have no idea what could have caused that condition, but drivers carry a lot of speed through there, we noticed, and the jolt is major.
If the city can't fill in the dip, at least grind down the bump. Please.
This, most certainly, is our Eyeball Jiggler of the Week.
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We have a bonus EJW this week brought to us courtesy of George Kauffman of St. Petersburg.
It's on northbound Haines Road at 61st Avenue, just before Haines dead-ends into 34th Street. It's another killer dip in the road. George estimates the drop at five to six inches, and after surviving the dip, we think he's got it about right.
Are we sinking into the sea?
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Reminder: It is state law that if your windshield wipers are on, your headlights must be on, too. This means, of course, that you must turn on your lights when it is raining - not when you're cleaning your windshield.
- 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.
