Two-lane roads no place to play

I decided to write the following article not so much out of inspiration, but out of desperation and a quest for public awareness.

Public roads are exactly what the title implies: roads/thoroughfares financed by taxpayer dollars for citizens to travel on as they choose. And the public roads available in this day and age range a wide gamut: from gravel roads with potholes large enough to almost get lost in, to paved, two-lane highways, to interstates with four lanes traveling in each direction.

Here in McMinnville, the roads, for the most part, are gravel roads and paved two-lane roads. Though an individual has the right to travel these roads as he/she desires, there are certain laws and guidelines that must be followed.

For example: One has to obey the applicable speed limit in the area he/she is driving. Too, reckless driving is prohibited. Further, one is not allowed to operate a motorized vehicle while impaired.

However, there is another ?public road concern? ? with an ever looming potential for tragedy ? that, by all accounts, has gone unanswered and continues to thrive in McMinnville on a daily basis. Specifically, I am talking about kids riding skateboards and bicycles on primary, two-lane thoroughfares, designed for cars and trucks. I?ll give you a few unnerving, personal experiences to, hopefully, illustrate my point:

A few weeks ago, at night, I was driving down Faulkner Springs Road, heading toward the bypass. Just past St. Catherine?s Catholic Church, I thought I saw some sort of movement, so I decided to slow down, almost to a stop. Lo and behold, there was a young male riding a bicycle in the middle of the lane I was traveling, maybe 10-15 feet in front of me. The bicycle had no reflectors nor any sort of light that would have alerted drivers to his presence on the road.

I was lucky, because had I waited another 2-3 seconds before slowing down, there very well could have been a fatality. I wanted to stop and ask him if his parents knew that he was out on a highly traveled public road at night riding a bicycle with no kind of reflector/light to alert drivers. Though I did come to a stop, I aborted the idea of speaking to the young bicycle rider, because, possibly, some numskull would attempt to turn it around, and allege that I was acting ?inappropriately.? You know what I?m talking about.

After the bicycle incident on Faulkner Springs Road, I experienced another incident even more bizarre. It was daylight, and I was driving down a public street, in McMinnville, at 25-30 mph. From the other direction, in the opposite lane, there came two school-age males on skateboards. Just the fact that the youth were riding skateboards on a two-lane, public street is scary enough, but here?s where it became truly disturbing: One of the skateboarders purposely veered over into my lane and kept traveling toward me. At that point, I applied my brakes and came to a dead stop. The skateboarder kept coming directly toward me, and, just as he came within a few feet of my car, he switched back into the other lane and flipped me a ?bird.?

I have to figure that most adult drivers have experienced such as has been described. Can anything be done to curb it? That?s not for me to answer, but here?s what is likely to happen one day: A driver will not stop in time ? no fault of his/hers ??and will run over and kill someone?s child.

The truly sad thing is that an accident like this will result in two dead people: One will be six feet under, and the other one still will be walking around, dead from a guilty conscience and a broken heart.

Mike Vinson is a local columnist. He can be reached by e-mail at [email protected].