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Residents again hope for signal to end traffic
By JACKIE RIPLEY
© St. Petersburg Times, WESTCHASE -- Getting onto Hillsborough Avenue from Silvermill Drive has never been easy. And now that the area along that stretch of highway has developed into a commercial corridor, it's harder than ever. "Hillsborough is very big and busy with six lanes," said Helen Gordillo who lives in Bay Port West, a housing development off Silvermill. "Now they've added restaurants, a gas station, Lifestyles gym, a dentist and new apartments." The recent closing of Pistol Range Road, once used by Bay Port West residents to get in and out of their subdivision, has further exacerbated the problem. "We used to go out on Pistol Range, exit north and hit Old Memorial Highway and go from there," Gordillo said. "But now it's a dead end and they've put a curb in and you can't go left on Hillsborough." County officials turned Pistol Range Road into a dead end to ease traffic in and out of the new Alonso High School, built at the site of the former pistol range. Traffic woes, however, are nothing new to Bay Port West residents. They've been trying for years to get a traffic light at Silvermill and Hillsborough. And for years they've been turned down. But they're asking again. During a recent town hall meeting between Upper Tampa Bay residents and Hillsborough County Commissioners, Gordillo asked for a traffic signal at silvermill, explaining how difficult it is to cut across six lanes of traffic. "You have to dart out there," Gordillo said. "Then you have to sit there in the middle between three lanes of traffic." County traffic engineers told Gordillo that Department of Transportation officials would have to be notified because Hillsborough is a state road. DOT officials have agreed to take another look at the intersection; however, they say they will not put a traffic signal there because of the close proximity to Hillsborough and Montague Street, an intersection that recently got a traffic signal. That signal, however, has not been turned on because the traffic does not yet warrant its use, said Marian Pascion, DOT legislative liaison. One solution might be a traffic control technique called "channelizing," a method in which the median is configured to allow turns in only one direction, Pascion said. "We have to see how the accidents are happening," she said. Or an access road could be built that would allow Bay Port West residents to cut over to Montague, said Steve Valdez, county spokesman. Yet, because there is no money in the budget for the project it won't be happening anytime soon, Valdez said. "There may be a parallel road in the future," Valdez said. "If they put a library in there, or when the property gets built out." - Jackie Ripley can be reached at (813) 226-3468.
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