TRAFFIC IN ANGUILLA NEEDS
MORE CONTROLS
Dear Sir:
Your editorial on “Handling Traffic Jams in Anguilla” in last week’s edition of The Anguillian made me think that we really need to handle traffic on the island much better – both from the police point of view as well as motorists. On Monday, this week, I witnessed a situation at the mahogany tree corner where there was a terrible traffic jam at lunchtime. Cars, buses and trucks were inching their way at the intercession and everybody was depending only on the stop lights there to move forward. I don’t know what the situation was before I arrived but when I arrived there, there was no police officer directing traffic. Then, lo and behold, I saw a police officer standing on the nearby premises of First Caribbean Bank looking at the traffic. To be fair to him, I believe that at some point in time he was on duty at the traffic lights but, if so, I cannot understand why he left so untimely when the traffic jam was still heavy.
Two other matters came to my attention. When it was time to move on, a motorist appeared to have been occupied with her phone stuck to an ear, laughing off her head. The motorist behind her had to hunk his horn for her to drive on. If that wasn’t bad enough, at another traffic jam, the following day, there was this motorist with his speakers blaring, losing all awareness that the lights had turned green. He was fixed on listening to his loud music. There was a law about driving while on the phone. How come that law is not in force? Buddy almost everybody these days is driving with their phones to their ears, a dangerous practice for them and other road users.
I have a question: there are times when the traffic is slow. If no traffic is coming from the two sides of the road, and a motorist is about to drive on that road from an intercession or side road, can that motorist simply drive through the red light? Sometimes a motorist has to wait too long for the lights to change when the intercession is clear of uncoming traffic. I think this is permissible elsewhere like in St. Thomas, US Virgin Islands. What do you think?
M. Browne
(Published without editing by The Anguillian newspaper.)
