and more Front Royal rings in the season - Warren County Report

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higher, citing the flooding that interrupts
our travels maybe 0 days
out of 365. VDOT tells us they will
build us a bridge that will last another
75 years or whatever. And
they will ban trucks. Hah! Listen to
that, Sheriff McEathron. Increase
your budget to pay for round-theclock
traffic duties at the bridge to
enforce VDOT’s new law.
By the way, getting back to the
Town’s entrance bridges, one of
which will shortly be renovated
or replaced – can anyone see,
from their autos, the beautiful
river vistas both east and west
given the “safety walls” that VDOT
engineers erected? There is a better
way to do it. I drove across the
14th Street bridge in Washington
a week or so ago where they built
adequate safety barricades without
spoiling the view up or down the
Potomac.
Back to the “low water” bridge,
VDOT will tell you (and so will
certain members of the Board of
Supervisors) that a larger version
of the present span is needed to
accommodate increased traffic
flow. First, many of us who live
around here don’t want to encourage
increased traffic flow through
our inadequate country lanes and
byways. Sticking with a (semi)low
water bridge, single lane, a bit
higher, will DISCOURAGE traffic
and be about $5 million, give or
take a million or so, cheaper. – All
taxpayer dollars, remember! As
for present-day traffic volume, has
anybody waited more than a min-
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ute or so to get across? Has anyone
really cared about the slight delay?
Have we seen traffic backups at the
bridge entrances beyond two or
three cars? Fire trucks? True, the
local volunteer department cannot
quickly get to the other side of
the bridge (though its ambulances
can) but there are responders on
the other side. Faster and increased
volume of traffic and trucks on the
Happy Creek side will most certainly
endanger young children.
Their parents, ignored, have been
telling us so for months.
Much has been made of the
dangers of the low water bridge
during high water and we grieved
recently over the drowning
death of a young woman who,
by happenstance, shared my last
name. In its wisdom (oh! that
Early December, 01 • Warren County Report • Page 7
Morgan’s Ford Bridge
someone in authority would have
thought of it before) the board
of supervisors erected two stout
gates and a warning system before
the bridge approaches. And that
solved the problem of the deadly
mix of flood waters and a 1st
Century GPS system of navigation.
So, throw that one over the side,
VDOT.
Back to my first observation
of the governor leaving Warren
County out in the cold insofar as
additional funds for tourism were
concerned and the inconsistencies
of our county government. On Nov.
30, I heard our county executive
extolling the virtues of the Shenandoah
River and the plans that were
in hand for riverfront property development
on the former Fishnet
property which is to become Rock-
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land Park. As that beautiful area is
developed, less than two or three
miles away on the same waterway,
a VDOT-designed bridge will destroy
the ambience and tranquility
of another part of the river.
The irony of the thing!
Tree replacements
continue
In 013 the Beautification of
Front Royal committee will continue
Phase of the Pear Replacement
Program by removing more
Bartlett Pear trees.
“They are in the wrong place,”
said town horticulturalist Anne
Rose, “and there is damage on the
existing trees.”
The size of the tree pits will be
increased and the pears replaced
with sweet gums, elms, red oak,
sycamores and an upright ginko.
A fall planting is preferred, according
to officials.
By Samantha Weaver
• It was the third president of the
United States, Thomas Jefferson,
who made the following observation:
“The man who reads nothing at all
is better educated than the man who
reads nothing but newspapers.”
• Those who study such things say
that a rainbow can’t be seen at midday;
the optical phenomena are visible
only in the morning or in the late
afternoon.
• In 1982, a radio station in Allentown,
Pa., thought its rating could use
a bit of a boost, so it came up with a
contest: Three contestants, selected
at random, would live on top of one
of the station’s billboards (portable
toilets and sleeping bags were provided).
The last one to give up would
be awarded a mobile home. The problem
was, nobody wanted to give up.
The three men who climbed to the top
of the sign at the end of September
were still there come March 1983.
In that month, one of the contestants
was arrested for dealing drugs, but
the remaining two stayed aloft until
May. Once the freezing winter was
finally over, the radio station decided
to declare both of the men winners.
• As the end of the year approaches,
you might consider an old British
tradition of fortune-telling. Light a
candle, place it on the floor and jump
over it. If the flame does not go out,
you’re likely to enjoy good luck during
the coming year.
• If you’re like the average American,
you use between 75 and 100 gallons
of water every day.
• The Sahara Desert is nearly as large
as the continental United States.
***
Thought for the Day: “If at first
you don’t succeed, try again. Then