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End of rezoning can bring calm to Spring Hill roads

Editor: Re: Roads mark a morbid year, Jan. 9 Times.

Why would old news warrant a headline? Looks like the Times is the only venue that thinks it is important enough. The ranking of "most accidents" intersections doesn't seem to change.

Let's have more accountability from the Planning and Zoning Commission staff, the county commissioners, the state Department of Transportation and their review panels.

Why is almost every request for rezoning granted? Before I moved here almost 10 years ago, Spring Hill was considered a deed-restricted retirement community with little traffic, and most crimes were committed in the Brooksville area. These were reasons people retired here. At the time, we were moving away from the very things we now have to live with - an industrialized metropolis.

I remembered when our deed restrictions went right out the window because they weren't renewed in a timely manner, so now Spring Hill looks like a big parking lot with cars, trucks and RVs on every residential easement. It seems fundamental that the ball should have been picked up by the commissioners to reinstate the restrictions in full.

Spring Hill was never meant to attract industry and retail to the extent it has. This appeals to younger couples because now there are more jobs here. And this influx has resulted in the necessity for many more schools and homes and road widenings and traffic accidents. So now we're stuck with it.

What to do? First, stop the rezoning. People want their residential areas to remain residential. Stop making available land into small lots where only two-story homes will fit on them. This is now one big sinkhole because of all the construction making the ground unstable.

Second, install all traffic lights with turn arrows ending in red arrows to eliminate turns on regular green lights. Don't have enough money? Stop waiving impact fees.

Third, eliminate left turns from a lot of commercial driveways, instead of having drivers running into each other because there are driveways facing each other all over Spring Hill Drive and Mariner Boulevard all the way to U.S. 41, State Road 50 and U.S. 19, and a driveway every few feet. I avoid making left hand turns.

Old drivers, young drivers, aggressive drivers - they are everywhere. Deal with them harshly when they cause or are involved in accidents.

The dangerous commercial intersections are an abomination, the result of inept governing bodies.

Let's start reporting all of the accidents in Spring Hill. It just might cause a lot more cautionary driving and road courtesy. It might even get drivers to start using their turn signals, and the police and fire rescue personnel might get breathers.

I don't have all the answers - no one does - but the ones I have put forth would certainly change things for the better.

We must look to our community leaders to implement changes, to stop changing the comprehensive plan at this point, so that we may enjoy safer, more peaceful lives. Shouldn't that be the agenda?

Lights, lights and more lights

Re: Roads mark a morbid year, Jan. 9 Times.

Editor: Looking at the accident chart and article, one glaring fact isn't mentioned. They all took place at busy, major intersections controlled by traffic lights.

Conclusion: Traffic lights do not control accidents. Drivers control accidents.

New subject: Power shortages, etc. Why must each school bus and, in particular, each driver's parking spot, be lit up all night? Also, many school rooms, hallways, parking lots. Wouldn't a few motion detectors suffice?

And how about car dealers? Who shops for a car at 2 a.m. except a thief, and the lights won't stop him anyway. And all those roadside billboards that tell me Joe's Eats opens at 6 a.m. and other advertisements. Is this information I need driving up the highway between 10 p.m. and 5 a.m.?

Come on, America! Turn off hundreds of millions of unnecessary lights.

[Last modified January 16, 2005, 00:33:22]