Friday, September 16, 2016

Construction Woes

My city is currently widening the street I need to drive on to get to my street. It was due to be widened. Lots of housing tracts have opened up on this two-lane road to the AFB and traffic gets bogged down when someone wants to turn left.

When the first ROAD CLOSED sign appeared, it said it was OPEN TO LOCAL TRAFFIC. That would be me. My street is within the ROAD CLOSED signs.

At first I was able to drive to either side of the closure. A few days into their work, I drove up and had to stop. A cop car blocked the road while men were in the process of changing the sign by crossing off the LOCAL TRAFFIC part. I sat there and waited until they were finished. Cop got out of his car and pointed to the ROAD CLOSED sign. I stuck my head out the window and yelled that I lived on such & such street. He told me to go around. And he didn’t say this very nice. In fact, he was rather rude. Like it was my fault I lived on that road!

Of course, I almost expected a cop on the other end telling me to do the same, but there wasn’t one.

Now, the road isn’t torn up in the middle. They are working on one side. We couldn’t see any reason why we couldn’t use it to get to our street, but I wasn’t about to argue with the cop.

Found out later that the school busses were also told to go around (by a cop) AFTER they were told (by the city) that they could drive through. My friend, who is in charge of these busses, was not a happy camper about that (messed up his whole pickup schedule). Wanted to know when the police overrode the city department. He also wanted to know whose bright idea it was to START this construction after school started. They had ALL SUMMER to do this work!

I’d kind of like to know the answer to that one, too.

The detour signs crack me up, though. The city sends the driver a mile north when it’s less than half a mile south to the next street. You can bet which one I take!

Yesterday at the fitness center I came up with a brilliant idea. Remember me whining about the sun rising late and how I wouldn’t walk to the fitness center in the dark? Well, I decided that I could eat breakfast FIRST, then walk to the fitness center. That way when I walk back, it won’t be too late to eat breakfast. I’ll just have to quit the outside walks when it gets too cold.

I amaze myself sometimes. Or I’m just slow. You pick.

So… Got any construction woes in your area? Feel free to rant here!

Happy Friday!

Stacy

9 comments:

Maria Zannini said...

What a pain! Sometimes I wonder how they figure out these things.

We have major construction in a nearby city where we shop often. They're widening the street which means they had to take land from many businesses. It's a long stretch of road and it's been months so far. I'll be surprised if they get finished before Christmas.

Do you know how long they'll have your street blocked?

Stacy McKitrick said...

Maria - The sign says 90 days... That would take them into November. I believe the asphalt companies around here close sometime in October, so it'll be interesting to see if they complete it in time.

Jennette Marie Powell said...

My city is repaving one of the major streets near my house. I have to either drive on it or cross it to get pretty much anywhere south, so it's a pain. But at least it's not closed! Through most of the summer, they had parts of it down to one lane... to widen sidewalks hardly anyone uses! This to the tune of $2 million. And yet my neighborhood, which has lots of kids and dog-walkers, AND is a bike route, has no sidewalks... go figure.

LD Masterson said...

You amaze me, too. :-) The only construction woe around here is the bridge replacement on Harshman just below Rt. 4. When them began it last spring, Mad River Middle School and Stebbins High both sent home notices of changes in the pick up/drop off procedures to deal with the expected back up. Turns out traffic is flowing very nicely around the construction. Minor slow down but no biggie.

Stacy McKitrick said...

Linda - I amaze you? Awwwww... how sweet! :) I've driven on that stretch of Harshman and the traffic always moved pretty good. Can't say the same about my street, though. :(

Alex J. Cavanaugh said...

Well, that sucks.
We call road construction by its real name - orange barrel storage.

Stacy McKitrick said...

Alex - Yeah, it's orange barrel season here, too. Not too many of those on our street, though. Just big road blocks.

The Happy Whisk said...

True. They did have all summer. WTF?

Stacy McKitrick said...

Ivy - I think our city is just...SLOW!