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Letter to the editor

Construction to close Bryan Dairy Road

By LORRIE LYKINS
Published June 24, 2007

Bryan Dairy Road will close to motorists at midnight Friday for a construction project that will last about three weeks.

The closing will occur west of Belcher Road and east of Starkey Road. No vehicles, pedestrians or bicyclists will have access to the roadway 200 feet east and west of the railroad crossing on Bryan Dairy. The closure will allow for a two-part project to improve the railroad crossing and adjacent road. CSX Transportation and Pinellas County Public Works will work on rebuilding the crossing and road improvements concurrently.

Detours for commuters are Belcher and Starkey Roads, north to Ulmerton Road. Eastbound motorists can take 113th Street or Seminole Boulevard Alternate 19 north to Ulmerton Road. The suggested alternate route for westbound traffic is 66th Street N to Ulmerton Road. Local businesses will be open and accessible to local traffic during the closure.

For updates on the project, call the Road Work Hotline, 453-3320, or visit www.pinellascounty.org/roadwork.htm.

PARK STREET AND 84TH LANE

Repair should keep signal lights changing

Motorists who regularly traverse Park Street have no doubt been bedeviled the past several weeks by the interminable light cycle at Park Street and 84th Lane. Westbound traffic on 84th Lane (just past Pinellas Village) was stopped by the traffic signal for up to five minutes with no north/south traffic coming through the intersection. Reader Terry Weigand alerted us, we checked it out, then passed the information to county signal management folks.

Ken Jacobs, traffic signal operations manager, sent workers to the intersection to investigate. They found a malfunction in a vehicle sensor for the southbound movement and temporarily changed the setting to assume a vehicle is present every light cycle until maintenance crews can make a permanent repair, Jacobs said.

ST. PETE BEACH

Grant will help fight DUI, aggressive driving

St. Pete Beach police have entered a partnership with the Florida Department of Transportation to deal with intoxicated and reckless drivers.

A $96, 602 grant has provided the community with funds to buy an unmarked 2007 Dodge Charger that's fully loaded with the latest in traffic enforcement equipment. The grant also enables St. Pete Beach police to pay for dedicated traffic enforcement officers who will concentrate on DUI and aggressive driving enforcement. That is good news for St. Pete Beach, which stretches 6 miles and has 118 licensed alcohol-dispensing establishments. City officials say that when compared with cities of similar size, St. Pete Beach has an unfavorable percentage of alcohol-related crashes to non-alcohol-related crashes. They're hoping beefed-up enforcement will reduce the number of impaired drivers.

I-275 AND GANDY BOULEVARD

Posts reappear after spate of unsafe driving

Some motorists have noticed that white posts have reappeared on the northbound Interstate 275 exit to Gandy Boulevard. The flexible plastic posts were taken down a few years ago but have been reinstalled recently. A few commuters have written in to say that the posts are creating a hazard. One reader wrote:

"During the years they were all down, the traffic merged seamlessly as drivers coming off the interstate had ample time to merge into traffic at a harmonious speed to those traveling on Gandy. The drivers on Gandy gave way to allow a car to merge in much like an entrance ramp onto the interstate. However, since the posts have been replaced and the number increased, I have witnessed a near-accident every day, as there is insufficient time or space for a driver to merge into traffic on Gandy. Also, Gandy drivers have been more aggressive of allowing space for merging as it will slow them down since merging drivers have had to come to a complete stop. The posts greatly shorten the right turn lane onto the service road. Traffic during prime commuting hours is backing up in both the right and left lanes of Gandy as the service roads to the east and west of Gandy are heavily accessed during these hours. This exacerbates the problem as drivers trying to merge onto Gandy are at a stop with traffic backed up on Gandy well past the merge point."

We inquired with the DOT, and Kris Carson explained that the posts have been reinstalled in the white shoulder gore area between the off-ramp connection at Gandy Boulevard and the beginning of the right turn lane for the frontage road for several reasons - and all of them come down to bad driver behavior.

"Since the off-ramp is located relatively close to the frontage road intersection, we needed to provide separation between the off-ramp merge area and the deceleration area to enter the right turn lane for the frontage road (i.e. didn't want these two operations occurring at the same point), " Carson said.

Carson said that traffic entering Gandy Boulevard from the northbound off-ramp wasn't yielding to eastbound traffic on Gandy Boulevard. Some drivers were bullying their way in, and/or cutting over at high speed at the last instance to avoid the beginning of the right turn lane for the frontage road.

The DOT received numerous complaints from drivers in eastbound traffic at this off-ramp. The last-minute high speed cut-over traffic coming from the off-ramp was also in conflict with traffic slowing in the right through lane to enter the right turn lane for the frontage road, another dangerous situation, Carson said, and some motorists wishing to turn at the frontage road, were riding the paved (striped out) shoulder area instead of merging with Gandy Boulevard traffic, causing a safety risk with traffic entering the right turn lane for the frontage road at the proper location.

So the DOT had to deliberately slow traffic at the yield point. Motorists are informed on the off-ramp approaching Gandy Boulevard that a yield condition is ahead, along with the yield sign. With the frontage road intersection so close to this off-ramp, DOT determined that installing the posts was the safest alternative.

Until next week, happy and safe motoring!

Please share your traffic concerns, comments and questions with Dr. Delay via e-mail at docdelay@yahoo.com.

[Last modified June 23, 2007, 23:32:22]