The in basket: Betsy Raleigh and Michael Maria wondered why the
city of Bremerton abandoned its experiment with an all-way stop at
Burwell Street and Pacific Avenue so quickly.
“The reader who suggested that it be an all-way stop was right and
the intersection worked beautifully for the few days that the city
used this technique,” Betsy said. Michael said, “Traffic seemed to
be flowing fine as a two-way stop. Do you know why the city
changed it?”
Monthly Archives: September 2007
Unexpected change at Kitsap Way and Marine Drive
The in basket: Roy Holland wrote in August to say, “With (the
paving of) Kitsap Way nearly completed I see a change is being
made. I am wondering if it is a mistake or on
purpose.
“For many years it has been illegal for eastbound traffic to make a
left turn from the Marine Drive traffic light back west for several
hundred feet. This included (turns into) R&H Market,
Money Tree and the pizza shop. There were double yellow lines and
diagonal hashing in between.
“Now there are just two yellow lines with no hashing,” Roy
said. “Has the city decided to make a left turn there legal
now?”
Pointy-topped road sign posts
The in basket: Sharp-eyed Bob Wilson of South Kitsap writes, “I
have recently noticed the sign posts used by the county are of two
types. One has a square flat top and the other has a pointed
top. The pointed top posts appear to be the new style
post. The pointed top is made by making an angled cut on each
of the four sides of the post.
“Why is the county using the pointed posts, and are they paying
more because of the extra cuts involved in producing the posts? ”
he asked.
Winners and losers at new Silverdale interchange
The in basket: Pat, who didn’t provide a last name, encountered
the nearly complete new interchange where Highways 3 and 303 meet
in Silverdale and declared it no improvement.
She was surprised to find the northbound Highway 3 on-ramp from
Kitsap Mall Boulevard gone.
“I thought I would exit easily onto North 3 by Applebee’s, but no,
I had to go over the freeway and turn toward old Bremerton. After
waiting a long wait at the stop sign (that we never had to do
before….) or get hit by traffic coming from East Bremerton, we
could proceed north to the Hood Canal Bridge.”
“Was that the original plan?” she asked.
Speeding not a big problem on Bayshore Drive
The in basket: Georgianna Sweet, who lives at the Golden Tides
senior housing complex on Bayshore Drive in Silverdale, says a fire
hydrant near the building has been hit twice this year by speeding
drivers.
She wonders about tactics to slow cars down in their neighborhood,
where a lot of older people walk. She mentioned speed humps.
Inside the SR3-SR304 tangle
The in basket: Marty Buswell sounds a frequent complaint when he
writes, “How long must we suffer the idiocy of Highway 3 merging to
one lane going (toward) Gorst. One day last week, it was backed up
all the way to Kitsap Way. I have seen cars leave at Loxie Eagans
only to exit the other side to cut in line further up.
“Our Commissioner Ray Aardal back 20 years ago had lined up the old
Evergreen floating bridge for pennies on the dollar to bypass the
metropolis of Gorst,” Marty said, “but was shut down because some
politicians owned property around Gorst (Rumor has it).
Change made at Pacific and Burwell
The in basket: A reader wrote to the Road Warrior blog saying,
“Now that Burwell is shut down between Pacific and Park (in
Bremerton), I wonder why the
light at Burwell and Pacific isn’t shut off and the intersection
made
into an all-way stop until the tunnel construction is complete
and
Burwell is reopened.
Lakes form on bridge in rainstorm
The in basket: Ronda Armstrong of Central Kitsap said that the
early morning downpour that occurred Sept. 4 created large pools of
water at each end of the new Tacoma Narrows Bridge.
The van in which she was carpooling hydroplaned but didn’t lose
control, she said. They were in the HOV lane, but when she got to
work, a co-worker said it happened to her one lane over.
She wondered if heavy rain would create a continuing problem on the
new bridge.
Leaving Colman Dock to the south
The in basket: Tom Wisniewski of Bremerton asks, “Is there any logical reason the Washington State Ferries almost invariably force all traffic leaving the terminal in downtown Seattle to proceed south on Alaskan Way?
Signal work on Labor Day Sunday
The in basket: The view from the porch of PJ’s Market in my
South Kitsap neighborhood on the Sunday of Labor Day weekend
included a county signal shop crew working on the signals and
controller box at the intersection of Woods Road and Mile Hill
Drive.
One of the assembled coffee drinkers, a union electrician,
speculated that the crew might me making triple time for working on
a holiday weekend, especially Labor Day, a holy occasion for
unions. He wondered whether that was a good use of tax money.
