How to retake Horse Pen Creek Road
The following is a Counterpoint:
By Jim Clark
There has been quite a bit of coverage on the traffic moving on New Garden Road and Horse Pen Creek Road. I’m one of those citizens who moved into the quiet, affordable subdivisions along Horse Pen Creek long before there were private schools or private sports clubs planned or built. The neighborhood has changed, and it isn’t because of the people who live there. Twice a day, traffic along Horse Pen Creek Road is a nightmare imitation of some demented racetrack or car-chase movie; it’s only a matter of time before someone is fatally involved in an early morning wreck along this once-picturesque road.
From 7:15 a.m. to almost 8, residents risk their lives trying to merge on to Horse Pen Creek, facing blind corners or other obstructed views, with bumper-to-bumper traffic coming from opposite directions and often 15-20 mph over the speed limit.
Recently there was an article about how the city is thinking of widening the road to four lanes with a median. This is at best a joke. At worst it is a perfect example of someone who hasn’t a clue what the issue is. We residents can’t safely get on to the only road leading out of our subdivisions because of the influx of people dropping their children off in the mornings at private schools that we can’t even afford to send our children to. Wanton development of our neighborhoods has run amok and will result in a fatal accident some morning.
Here is an easy two-step plan that all of us along Horse Pen Creek can follow to retake our neighborhood:
1. Slow down to 25 mph along Horse Pen Creek in the mornings. The resulting gaps in traffic will allow us to safely pull out and get to work without having to wait 10 minutes for a traffic break. It also might force the nonresidents to alter their routes so they won’t be slowed down by us middle-class homeowners who live there.
2. Vote every incumbent off the City Council and county commissioners. They sure aren’t serving our needs. They are more interested in allowing more empty strip malls and vacant apartment buildings to go up than to improve a road by just adding a few stoplights. Vote them all out.
The writer lives in Greensboro.
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