Dangerous traffic, crosswalk on Broadway

Another semi truck goes blasting by doing 40 mph and picking up speed, pedal to the metal. Leaving downtown Sonoma, West Napa St. and Broadway/State Route Hwy 12. Clouds of toxic dust kick up from the median that never sees the brushes of a street sweeper.

The asphalt is crumbling from years of lack of maintenance or repair. Asphalt is so crumbled under the barely visible two double yellow lines that re-striping them is probably impossible.

Another car does a illegal U-turn across the two sets of double yellow lines leaving town at a high rate of speed. The posted speed limit is 25 mph but scarcely no one does the speed limit. Why should they? There’s no law enforcement.

A frail elderly senior citizen, a woman on a cane steps unsteadily into the crosswalk at Broadway and McDonnell St. This crosswalk is shorter in length to cross than the other two in the vicinity. It is the most dangerous crosswalk as it does not have flashing lights.

It’s this crosswalk that someone is most likely to be killed or injured by a speeding motorist. At the very instant the woman steps into the street two cars go whizzing by at high rates of speed. The elderly one is lucky today. No one in a speeding metal vessel, head down, texting, kills someone in a poorly marked crosswalk.

The elderly lady reaches the other side of Broadway safely. She walks ever so carefully on the sidewalk. She avoids, evades the raised parts of the cracked sidewalk that need grinding down every six months because of tree roots. Other pedestrians haven’t been as fortunate. I’ve witnessed three elderly people trip on the raised concrete. Fall hard and have been injured badly. Two had to be taken away by ambulance.

Finally she reaches her car. Carefully opens the driver door and climbs in. As she goes to start the engine she sees a envelope under her driver windshield wiper. Unsteadily and exhausted from the day, she climbs out of her car and retrieves the envelope.  It’s a $40 overtime parking ticket issued by Sonoma Parking Control.

A souped up Mustang roars past her at the same moment she tries to get back in her car. He revs his engine and his illegal mufflers roar like a tormented Dragon. Too much for the woman, so old, frail and tired. She has a massive coronary and dies on Broadway.

co owner of San Francisco Arts & Crafts

546 Broadway, Sonoma