Tuesday, September 8, 2009

Heading north to take care of stuff.


Farewell Sebastian Florida, hope to be back very soon.



Got to take care of business in Burlington Ontario then I'll be back.



While traveling through Virginia, I heard a really disturbing bit of news then saw evidence of what I heard.


Due to budget restraints Virginia is CLOSING 14 of it's 42 REST AREAS and I've heard similar stories in other states.


What about DRIVER FATIGUE, TUNNEL VISION, HIGHWAY HYPNOSIS, SAFETY BREAKS ? ? ?


Just how many deaths does it cost to keep a rest area open?



One sleepy driver killed per year crashing into the ditch because he was too tired to make the next exit,


Ten dozy drivers per year crossing the median crashing head-on into unsuspecting oncoming traffic because they didn't stop 196 miles ago at the last rest area,


One hundred drivers killed per year because they fell asleep behind the wheel and left the road striking whatever or whoever was in their path only because they couldn't find a reasonably safe place to pull off the Interstate and rest for a little while ? ? ?


I say keep them open and add more for safety's sake . . . and the occasional pee.

Let Corporate America fund them with advertising revenue and concessions. I'm not talking about full blown service plazas just small food and beverage concessions and advertising opportunities to support maintenance of the rest area.

How much can it cost to cut the grass, have a couple of lights on, supply water and clean toilets?

I'm just thinkin' . . . . . . .


More on road safety at http://www.ezee.ca
Forklift Safety at liftright.net
Listen to Pete Harris while you surf.

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6 comments:

Eddie Garcia said...

Rest stops are far and few between in Georgia as well. I know it is expensive to maintain the stops but for safety's sake they need to be shutting down other sites instead. Of course a person can always pull off on the side of the road if they get that tired. Hopefully this will not become an epidemic in other states as well. Thanks for the post!

Friends 4 Life?!

Sparky said...

well I just came back south from Upstate NY last week and was happy to see all the rest areas In PA were still operational. I agree with you. wait until the truckers start parking on the side of the interstate then maybe they will get the hint, typical bureaucratic BS if you ask me someone thinks they can save a nickel.

Jackie said...

Well as far as Virginia goes it probably won't matter that much anyway Don.

VA. has had a law for a long long time that truckers can only park for 2 hours in any of their rest areas.

Every trucker in the world tries to get through before their shut down time comes.

Walter didn't make it once and was forced to shut down in a rest area in VA.

A D.O.T. certified state trooper woke him up and even after looking at his log book, made him get up, get dressed and move on down the road.

Now that makes a lot of sense doesn't it.

Why do they do these things? The DOT stays all over drivers all the time. Yet on the other hand if the public really knew just how unfair many states and the DOT are to drivers they might have a different opinion.

They make laws that nearly impossible for a driver to adhere too, they won;t allow them to sleep over night in certain rest areas.....this what causes driver fatigue most of the time.

Great report Don!! You becareful now!!:-)

Con Artist Trickster said...

I don't know how how it's actually going on there, but I got a lot of problems with traffic in my country as well. And, I do believe what we have here is, still by far, worse than the one you got. Insufficient roads, overly packed with Valentino Rossi and Lewis Hamilton wannabees. Here, the roads ARE INDEED dangerous place. (Oh, I live in Indonesia by the way)

VetTech said...

I just did the I-95 run too... is Georgia EVER going to finish contrsuction LOL

Protaras Cyprus said...

Hope your trip was successful!