Dear Editor,
A couple of days ago, I was almost killed – on a crosswalk on a dry afternoon.
96th Avenue ends at a T-intersection at Glover Road in Fort Langley. On the north side of this three-way intersection is a crosswalk marked by white lines on Glover Road. There are also two unlit stick-people crosswalk signs on the sidewalks at either end.
So I’m about five feet into the crosswalk, walking west.
My head is on a swivel, as I watch each driver of the three stopped vehicles to make sure none of them are moving. I’m as nervous as a cat in a kennel full of dogs.
The cars going north and south on Glover Road are both stopped.
There’s a truck stopped at the stop sign on 96th.
I’m crossing.
Suddenly, the truck guns his motor and moves his vehicle into the intersection.
He’s a full-sized transport truck with a full load of construction lumber.
My eyes bug out. I can’t believe what they’re telling me.
The truck is bearing down on me as fast as he can. He’s about to smash into me with the middle of his front bumper. I break into a run – and barely manage to avoid getting hit.
I stop and stare at the driver going past, a couple of feet away from me.
His eyes are bugged out too. He’s also terrified, staring back at me.
He beetles his way out of Fort Langley.
This driver, who had been patiently waiting at his stop sign for the traffic on Glover to clear, saw an opening, a break in the traffic on Glover Road, and went for it. He didn’t even see me – a six-foot, overweight guy on a crosswalk in the middle of the day.
This particular intersection – at Glover and 96th – needs a stop sign going north on Glover and another one going south. Relying on some goofy crosswalk to stop traffic is a recipe for disaster.
With all the gangs of little children I see crossing that intersection – and the speed of the traffic on Glover – I’m expecting our first fatality there any day now. If I hadn’t been blessed with catlike reflexes, that person would have been me. And today, almost the same thing happened again.
Peter Kravchuke, Fort Langley