Intersection has long been deadly site
By SUSAN MARSHALL
Contrubting writer
"Sometimes you can actually hear the impact of a wreck at the intersection of U.S.-50/77 from your home," said Scott Zogelman, director of the Florence Ambulance Service. "First you hear the horn, then the truck brakes locking up, and then the impact.
"You know before you even get the call what has happened," he said. "And there is a special punch in the pit of your stomach when you know the wreck is at that intersection. It almost always is bad. You can just count on it."
Zogelman, who has served with the ambulance crew for eight years and director for three years, emphasized the need for the Kansas Department of Transportation to do something at the intersection.
"It's just time for some kind of coordinated campaign to get it taken care of," he said. "We need to either lower the speed limit — and enforce it — or build an overpass."
Zogelman indicated his preference would be to build an overpass, though he admits getting approval for such a project will be tough to accomplish and even if approved, completion would be years away.
Currently citizens of Florence are fronting two campaigns to heighten awareness with the KDOT. Melvin and Cricket Ruthoff have started a petition that people can sign at the Florence Market.
Several dozen signatures of people from Cassoday, Cedar Point, Florence, and Peabody already are on it.
The petition states that "the undersigned
Similar petitions are being circulated in Marion.
Rick Burcky, who is webmaster of the Florence web site also is working on an e-mail campaign to KDOT offices and government officials.
According to Zogelman, these projects have merit, but a coordinated effort also should be pursued so that the effectiveness of these projects isn't lost.
"We hope to get an organizational meeting started soon in Florence," he said. "Several people have good ideas about working toward a solution, but it just needs to be coordinated so it has the most effect."
Zogelman said that 17 injury accidents, with four fatalities, have occurred at the intersection in the last two years. Three of those fatalities occurred since January.
"The problem is that it has been going on for decades," said Ann Brenzikofer, Florence City Clerk. "Before U.S.-50 became a 'super-two' in 1994 or '95, the speed limit was 45 mph. When they were getting ready to build the new highway, they contacted the city to see what the council and police department thought would affect traffic and the community. Delvin O'Dell (city police chief at the time) and I tried to gather as many statistics as possible hoping to get them to keep the lower speed limit. But they raised it to 55 mph."
A copy of a June 1995 letter from Brad Gower, traffic engineering associate for KDOT, to Brenzikofer and the city council reveals that the city had requested additional signage at the U.S.-50 stop signs following an accident in May, 1995.
Gower wrote that the city's request for "U.S.-50 Does NOT Stop" plates to be attached to the stop signs was denied because "
Gower added that the KDOT had "
But Brenzikofer said that within two years the additional plates were installed as traffic accidents at the intersection continued and the death toll rose. Each stop sign on U.S.-77 currently does have the added plates warning motorists that traffic on U.S.-50 does not stop and to "Look Again."
Jeanie Meirowsky, a member of the ambulance crew since 1978 and a former Florence mayor and city councilman, said the intersection has been a problem for as long as she could remember.
"It seems most of the really bad wrecks are a car going north on U.S.-77. It stops, then pulls right out in front of a semi heading west on U.S.-50," she said. "I don't know if anyone has kept an exact count, but that seems to be how most of them happen."
Zogelman agreed. "Even if the truck has slowed to 55 mph the impact is deadly. For some reason, people just don't see them coming. Many times the drivers of the semis say the people in the car seem to look right at them, but they pull out anyway," he said.
He also noted that with the exception of one accident at night, all the others since the new "super-two" highway opened have been daytime accidents when good weather and good visibility are evident.
"What that means to me is that there is a design flaw," he said. "For some reason people just can't see what is coming at them."
Both Zogelman and Meirowsky agreed that motorists need to sit at the stop sign for several seconds and look both ways more than just once.
Zogelman said that several people suggested the city erect a billboard announcing that drivers are approaching a dangerous intersection and then listing the date of the accidents and the names of the victims. "Or even just a huge number on a sign with the notation that that is how many have died in recent years," he said.
Lois Bailey no longer works with the ambulance service that she and her husband were instrumental in starting in the Florence community. But she remembers working a lot of accidents at the intersection in question.
"Even before they 'fixed' U.S.-50, that was a bad intersection. It seemed that people we talked to who had minor accidents were from Oklahoma or Nebraska and those states had four-way stops at major intersections. They just expected the U.S.-50 traffic to stop," she said.
"One lady even told us she stopped because the light was red and when it turned green, she went. That was when we had the red blinking light in the middle of the intersection. But it never did turn green. She just expected it to."
Zogelman is hoping to get people together from Florence and Marion, as well as law enforcement officers and state officials including representatives of the KDOT.
"We need to work together and get a plan to take care of this," he said. "Ignoring it will only mean some other family will be going through the grief the Cady and Sherbert families are going through."
