As a regular at the Kroc Center, Tanika Mason can't miss seeing what she thinks is a turn for the worse.
“It's kind of dangerous it's a very quick cutoff there's really no warning whatsoever,” she said.
That's Mason's description of the west bound lane of Broad Street at the Augusta Canal.
As soon as cars get over the top of the bridge, the inside lane suddenly becomes a left hand only turn lane.
“Someone who don't know that lane’s going to end and they go over the hill, and see I'm in the wrong lane it can be a very bad problem I've seen people swerve over to the right and cut people off,” says Linda Smith who also drives over the canal on Broad Street coming to the Kroc Center.
We first reported about the left hand turn lane last summer, shortly before the Kroc Center opened.
We saw a large number of cars get caught in the wrong lane coming over the bridge on Monday, but traffic engineers say it's not raising any red flags, so far.
“Whenever you do something you want to monitor it for about six months, look at it back and we’re about six months, this opened in August so we'll look back will look at the accident data we'll monitor the complaints, it's not really showing it's a problem right now,” says Augusta Traffic Engineer Steve Cassell.
“You're coming up on the hill, when you're going over that hill it changes no I don't think it's proper, says Mason.
We asked her if there is a sign to warn drivers.
“I don't think there is, she said.
There is a sign right before the bridge saying “left lane must turn left” but drivers are missing it.
“Accident waiting to happen,” said Smith.
“It's either you’re going to crash into somebody or you’re going to end up going into oncoming traffic,” said Mason.
The Kroc Center has increased traffic in the area and now Cassell says the lane deserves another look.
“We're looking at dropping the lanes in advance of the bridge we're looking at it we haven't seen it as being an issue, he said.
Cassell says one option is to put in signs above Broad Street instead of on the side warning drivers of the approaching left hand turn.
Email
Facebook
Google
Twitter
Favorites
More
Advertisement