Sometimes, in small ways, this Getting There gig is downright gratifying. Particularly when it can help a reader get something fixed.
One example is an e-mail that came Feb. 16 from Crossan McDonald of Baltimore.
For me one of the most hazardous stretches of road that I travel is Keith Avenue, the connector between Interstate 95 [the first exit after the Fort McHenry toll booth] and Broening Highway.
To properly appreciate the problems, one has to travel this road at night. On any given evening, over half of the street lights are out of service, and the white paint lane markers are so faint that they are barely visible. I usually have to use high beams to see where I am going.
The road's lighting has been in poor repair for years, and I keep hoping someone will fix it, but it seems that no one feels as terrified as I do.
It turns out that Keith Avenue, an efficient shortcut between I-95 and the Dundalk and Seagirt marine terminals, falls under the jurisdiction of the city. I passed the complaint along to the Baltimore Department of Transportation, which delivered. Spokeswoman Adrienne Barnes said workers replaced 34 burnt-out lights on that stretch of road.
Barnes said a call to 311 would have yielded the same result as a call from The Baltimore Sun. Readers are invited to test that assertion and let me know the results.
The spokeswoman said the city appreciates such alerts from motorists. She confirmed my suspicion that the city tends to get fewer calls about industrial areas than residential areas. So alerts from places such as Keith Avenue are especially welcome.
I passed this news along to McDonald, who reported back March 3. He wrote: "I drove Keith Avenue a couple of nights ago, and, much to my surprise, the lights had been replaced, and I could actually see the road. Thank you for your help."
That's not all. Last Wednesday, the city announced its intention to close Keith Avenue over the weekend for additional streetlight work. Barnes said the avenue should be fully lit by the time you read this. Thank McDonald.
Benjamin Rosenberg of Baltimore also weighed in last month with a question involving city lights.
There are literally dozens of non-working street lamps on both sides of the Jones Falls Expressway and many of the bridges over the highway. The result is significant stretches of unlit or poorly illuminated roadway. These areas include virtually the entire portion of the JFX that lies within the city limits - from Northern Parkway to Fayette Street. Can anything be done about this?
