It Took Just Four Minutes!

On my way back from the farmers market this morning, I decided to linger a while at the notorious intersection of 6th & Columbia to observe the traffic and see how long it would take to notice something amiss with a driver, a pedestrian or both at the same time.  It's a dangerous intersection that has produced plenty of accidents, and the red lights are run regularly.  Things tend to get really dicey when the farmers market is in town, especially when the bounty is in.  (For the first market this year, there was freshly picked corn to be had!  We have the best corn in the country!)

The intersection, as always on Saturday mornings for 7 months, was busy with plenty of cars, some trucks, and lots of pedestrians headed in all directions, crossing the streets while getting to and from the market.  With camera in hand, I decided to give myself about ten minutes before walking home and getting out of the heat.  I was able to get home sooner than I thought, because it took no more than 4 minutes for a wrong way driver to pull up right in front of me at a red light not meant for drivers' eyes.  Fortunately, there were no pedestrians crossing 6th at the time, and the car -- after turning left on red -- somehow successfully made it onto Columbia without incident, though not without annoying at least one other driver.   The wrong way driver had travelled either from the alley in the middle of the block or from State Street, possibly travelling the entire block in the wrong direction.

The driver made a left on red in the wrong direction!

This is the intersection that for several months has been missing the green light facing north that once allowed pedestrians headed south to safely CROSS (THE TRUCK ROUTE) ON THE GREEN.  That is the missing light that DPW Superintendent Robert Perry recently told the public and the council that he was "glad was missing." That is the DPW Superintendent who had two CROSS ONLY ON GREEN signs installed AT SEVERAL INTERSECTIONS on Warren Street last year. That is our DPW Superintendent who is acting more and more like a child and a jerk these days. Just in case you are still unaware, Robert Perry took home over $117,000 last year. 

He is well aware that the intersection of 6th & the truck route is without any stop lines, crosswalks or CROSS ONLY ON GREEN signs, and he doesn't seem to care one bit about it. No surprise there.  More than anything, pedestrians tend to annoy our DPW Superintendent.

Red and white cars good, black cars bad!