That’s Elbert With An E

A Georgetown man and Salisbury man were killed in a head-on collision that occurred Saturday night on US Route 9 east of Laurel. Mario Lucas, 22, of Georgetown was traveling east on 9 when he crossed the center line and hit Mei-Liao Lo, 69, of Salisbury. Lucas died on the scene. Lo was airlifted to Peninsula Regional Medical Center in Salisbury where he died. Lo’s wife was also in his car. She had some non-life threatening injuries. I heard at church that Route 9 was closed from Hardscrabble to Dukes Lumber Road. It was closed for about three hours. It was also reported that police and emergency responders came from Georgetown, Seaford, and Laurel. It hasn’t been reported if alcohol was involved.

Reported in the News Journal

Like it has been pointed out many times, it is a good idea to keep new content on your site daily. I go through these fits of inspiration at least twice a week. They don’t always lead to many posts, but at least they lead to something. Of course I have to share some other things, such as my daughter’s birthday. Today, I’m yawning in the middle of the day running through the events of the past week and thinking about tomorrow’s stuff. What added to the stress of the week was having both, yes both of our autos broke down at the same time for most of the weekend. I got the truck back on the road late Sunday afternoon but in a family of six, a truck that seats three as your primary vehicle isn’t always good. Thankfully I have several friends and family that helped us get everywhere this week, plus living in town makes getting to and from work and school much easier. Today the van is back on the road, in no small thanks to Reynolds Automotive, located just north of Delmar on US Route 13 and some simply miraculous provision for the repair bill.

WordPress has updated the backend of this blog. There’s a very small learning curve to this new interface. which mostly involves getting used to where some of the links are located now. Overall, it is very pleasant! I really love using WordPress. It’s only drawback is that you can’t place Google ads on here nor can you embed things like weather stickers, BlogNetNews ranking, or other stuff like that. It’s why I have an offsite “about” page to accommodate some of that content. If I host my own WordPress blog I would avoid this, but as it is for hosting this is much better for someone getting started.

A mother in Des Moines, IA recently sold her son’s car after finding alcohol in it. Here’s an image of the ad:

Great job, snoopy mom!!

Stories are here and here.

My cousin Scott Collins is featured on the front of Delmarva Crossroads, a weekly paper mailed to homes and published by Gannett/News Journal. It’s about his labor of love, restoring an old police cruiser in honor of his late father (my uncle). The electronic version of that article is here.

Last Saturday, 8/25, I drove up to Seaford to pick up my son from work. The obvious route for me is Route 13. Signs have been up for a while indicating that road work was being done. Anyone that’s driven this road has seen the mess that has been made. I saw lights on and signs indicating a lane was closed so I assumed road work was being done. I realize that Saturday night was a weird time to do the work but I’ve seen weird stuff like that. Traffic was slow, and knowing that I was running late I decided to turn around and take Alt 13. When I saw the turn lanes blocked I figured out it was a DUI stop. So the only thing I could do was wait. And wait. And wait.

When it was my turn I rolled up next to an officer who announced to me he was from Georgetown. He also said they were checking for DUI and seat belt violations. I had neither, so they let me through. At this point I contacted my son letting know I was going to be arriving late.

I don’t have a problem with DUI stops. I’m sure they probably get some violators while inconveniencing those of us that obey the law. People that drive under the influence are a public danger. On the other end of the spectrum are the seat belt violators. When was the last time you were afraid of driving on the road with someone who was not belted into their car? Did you mother ever warn you about being out late because there were people on the road not wearing their seat belt?

The seat belt laws annoy me to no end. This is a zero-tolerance law. If you are seen without your belt on, you are stopped and given a ticket. There is no grace. In addition, if I don’t wear my seat belt, I am the person hurt by my actions if I am involved in an accident. Let’s contrast this with a violation that could harm drivers or pedestrians around me: speeding.

Speeding is a very big problem in our area. You drive at 55 on Route 13 and count the cars that blast by you. Sadly I have seen no aggressive enforcement of those laws. In contrast, how many of us have not heard “click it or ticket”? I’ve wondered if it’s easier to sound tough on seat belts than to enforce the speed limit laws. I’ve been the victim of a driver exceeding the speed limit, loosing control, then crashing into my car knocking me off the road. Believe me, it’s no fun.

I have an idea that might be a help to reduce the high rates of speed. It parallels the DUI checkpoints and might dampen the excessive rates of speed on our roads. I’ll call it a speed checkpoint. DUI checkpoints are manned by state and local police. The speed checkpoints can be manned in the same fashion. Speed checkpoints would need to be spread over a larger area, such as a 7 to 10 mile range. Two officers are placed every 2-3 miles with radar guns. It would net a large amount of speeders in the second and third stops as most habitual speeders will speed up after passing an officer who has stopped a vehicle. If this is applied several times at the same location it would discourage drivers from speeding there.

This is not a post of criticism of our state and local police officers. Our Laurel police officers have been great and responsive to our families’ needs. It is a voice of frustration as well as a voice offering possible solutions to this growing problem.

Let me end this post with a note of praise. Over the last week, the Laurel Police have been set up on Georgetown Road between North Laurel Elementary and the Block stopping speeders. It appears they have been there every day this week at varying times pulling over violators, bringing that area under control. To our Laurel officers, thank you very much.