Despite Light Traffic, Safety Concerns Warrant Stop Signs

Dear Street Smart:

I’d like to call your attention to some unnecessary stop signs at a T-shaped intersection in Ventura.

I’m talking about Petit Avenue and North Bank Drive.

Over the past two years I have driven through that intersection several hundred times at rush hour and on weekends.

In all that time, I have seen just four vehicles using North Bank Drive east of the intersection.

The bottom line here is that there will never be enough traffic coming from North Bank Drive east of the intersection to warrant this three-way stop.

Whoever planned these stop signs obviously never visited this location.

The signs are a waste of money and a nuisance to drivers because they are totally unnecessary.

If whoever designed this plan needs to justify his work, let him change the sign for westbound North Bank Drive to a yield sign and get rid of the other two stop signs.

Elmer Ferber, Ventura

Dear Reader:

Though the signs may seem unnecessary now, they are part of a larger, more traffic-filled vision for that intersection.

A subdivision now under construction at Petit and North Bank will eventually consist of 153 homes generating an estimated 2,000 vehicle trips per day, says Ventura traffic engineer Nazir Lalani. This is ample traffic to justify a three-way stop, he says.

Perhaps even more importantly, the city decided to install the stop signs to improve safety at the intersection.

Before the signs were installed, cars turning from Petit onto North Bank tended to squeal around from one street to the other without stopping or checking for oncoming traffic, Lalani says.

The signs force drivers to come to a stop before turning.

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Dear Street Smart:

In my opinion the westbound Lynn Road off-ramp from the Ventura Freeway is extremely dangerous.

I have used it almost daily for a year and a half and have the same feeling each time I come to the Lynn Road overpass, preparing to turn left and go south.

As one comes to Lynn Road there are several traffic lights that are all visible at the same time.

If one comes to a stop at Lynn Road, the two lights that actually control the off-ramp are red, but in the same direction one can plainly see a green light that controls Lynn Road traffic.

I have quite often started to go onto Lynn Road because this third light is green, when in fact the lights controlling my lane are red.

All of this confusion could be cured by merely putting longer sleeves on the light controlling Lynn Road traffic so it cannot be seen from the off ramp.

William G. Israel, Thousand Oaks

Dear Reader:

The situation is indeed a dangerous and confusing one, says Caltrans traffic engineer Luu Nguyen.

After investigating the problem you pointed out, Caltrans workers have tilted the traffic light on Lynn Road so that cars coming from the freeway off-ramp do not simultaneously see green and red.

“We think this will solve the problem,� Nguyen says.

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Dear Street Smart:

Often when I’m driving I notice large eighteen-wheeler tractor trucks trying to unsuccessfully navigate tight curves and steep grades in Grimes Canyon on California 23 and on Dennison Grade on California 150.

Many of the trucks are so long they cannot make turns without their wheels going three or four feet into oncoming traffic lanes.

It seems physically impossible for these trucks not to cross the double yellow line on these dangerous, curving roads.

This is a lethal accident waiting to happen.

Why are they not banned?

Robert L. Smith, Fillmore

Dear Reader:

It is, as you say, physically impossible for some large trucks to make narrow highway turns without crossing into oncoming traffic lanes, says Caltrans traffic engineer Luu Nguyen.

The California vehicle code does not allow Caltrans to ban trucks on state highways, except where the road cannot support the weight of the vehicle.

Unfortunately, the code doesn’t mention width or length.

However, as part of a statewide project to improve highway safety, Caltrans is installing signs discouraging large trucks from traveling on narrow, curving highways.

In Ventura County, signs will be installed on highways 23, 33 and 150.