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241 N. Grant Street
PO Box 1108 Canby, OR 97013 Phone:
503.266.6831 |
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K.C. Humphrey is a man of statistics, and he compiles a list no one wants to make.
Mind you, his job is an important one, because it helps the state determine where the state will put its money for traffic safety improvements.
Humphrey is a transportation safety advocate for ODOT, compiling crash statistics on state highways for the Portland metro region, which includes Canby.
From 1999-2001, there were 12 fatalities between here and Oregon City, prompting officials to designate a stretch of the road as a safety corridor, one of 14 in the state.
Safety corridors are sections of state highways that ODOT has identified as having a fatal and serious injury crash rate that is at or higher than 110 percent of the three-year statewide average for a similar type roadway. At one point, Canby’s fatal crash rate was at 170 percent of the state average.
With the latest crash last week that killed two Oregon City women just south of South End Road, that marks five fatalities between Canby and milepost 15, roughly a mile north of South End Road, since June 2005.
That’s right in the center of that safety corridor, yet state troopers still say it’s one of the most dangerous stretches of road in the entire region, if not the entire state.
I was out covering last week’s crash, and I stood at the top of a berm on New Era Road, standing among 25 area residents and drivers. Most of them exclaimed things like “another one,” and “how many died in this one.”
It’s gotten to the point where these crashes are expected, and this is a safety corridor.
I doubt I’m surprising anyone by saying that based on my observation, the safety corridor isn’t saving lives.
Yes there are the signs telling us the fines are doubled in this area, yet everyday, cars continue to blow by me like I’m standing still. They fly by cars in the right lane at the merge point near South End Road, hoping to save a minute on their drive to Oregon City.
Yet in my year of driving this stretch, I’ve seen perhaps two or three people pulled over in the safety corridor.
Why? There aren’t enough troopers patrolling this stretch of dangerous road.
If you’ve ever driven Ohio highways, you’ll see few people drive more than five miles above the speed limit.
The reason is simple: state troopers are out in force, enforcing the speed limit. The same can be said when entering the Canby city limits, a lesson many of us including myself — have learned the hard way. What happens? People start driving the speed limit.
Are these roads dangerous? I’m not an expert like Mr. Humphrey, but they don’t seem any more dangerous than any other road.
It’s the drivers who are dangerous, and dangerous drivers are driving unchecked.
It’s time our state adequately funded our state troopers to make our roads safer.
Either that, or Canby will remain on Humphrey’s list, a list too many grieving family’s wish they were never on.
— Steve St. Amand
Editor |
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