Speed Limit

Four Perryville residents were killed and two others were criticalIy injured in a one car accident on a rural Cecil County road yesterday afternoon when their crowded car struck a tree.The vehicle was traveling south at more than double the posted speed limit in the 200 block of Principio Road near Port Deposit about 3 p.m. when it went out of control on a curve, state police said.The Dodge Shadow -- which was traveling between 75 mph and 90 mph on a road with a posted 35-mph speed limit -- split in half when it struck the tree; two female passengers were ejected, police said.

The State Highway Administration is preparing to resurface Interstate 95 between Routes 32 and 216.This weekend, lanes will be closed along northbound and southbound I-95 between the interchanges from 9 p.m. Friday to 11 a.m. Sunday.Concrete patching will be done in preparation for the resurfacing project this summer. The project will include safety improvements such as upgrading guardrails and roadside rumble strips and installing new pavement markings.The road will be milled -- its surface removed -- repaired and resurfaced.

City Hall unloaded hospitals, college, jails, schools, hopes to ditch courts, and will take over foreign policy instead.Twenty died when a Marine Corps plane above the speed limit and below the altitude limit cut a ski lift cable not on the map. Nobody was at fault.Monica is sorry for what happened, not for what she did.Whoever thought they would live to see Willie Don boosting Kweisi for mayor?Pub Date: 3/08/99

Two elderly Kent County women were injured yesterday evening after a gunman followed their car for 18 miles and then fired two shots into their car in a possible road rage incident, according to the Kent County sheriff.A 73-year-old woman was shot once in the hip and taken to Maryland Shock Trauma Center in critical condition, said Sheriff John Price. The other woman, also believed to be 73, was injured by flying glass and metal and taken to Kent & Queen Anne's Hospital.The women, whom Price declined to name, were returning to Kent County from a shopping trip to Dover, Del., when a man driving a dark-colored Ford pickup began following them in Millington, the sheriff said.

People who live in communities along the creeks and rivers of northern Anne Arundel County all share a passion for the water. But a spreading dispute over use of one creek shows that homeowners love their waterfront lives for different reasons.The Riviera Beach Community Improvement Association has asked the state to impose a 6-knot speed limit, about 6.9 mph, on part of Stony Creek, a favorite area for water-skiers and boaters. Association members say that wakes and waves from the water activity are major contributors to beach erosion.

Two children riding bicycles were injured -- one critically -- in separate incidents in Anne Arundel County yesterday when they rode into the paths of oncoming vehicles. Police said neither child was wearing a safety helmet.Shelby E. Tribull, 8, of the 1100 block of St. George Drive, was in critical condition last night at Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore, a hospital spokesman said. Shelby was air-lifted to Hopkins after she was struck by a car at Skyway Drive and Hampton Road in Arnold about 3: 30 p.m.Anne Arundel County Police Officer John R. Bull said Shelby was riding her bike down a hill on Skyway Drive and went through an intersection at Hampton Road and into the path of a Ford Aerostar van.The driver of the van, who was traveling below the 25-mph speed limit posted for the road, was unable to stop in time to avoid hitting the youngster, Bull said.

It should be a patch of urban paradise: a street corner with coffee, bagel, dry cleaning, video and bakery businesses all clustered together.But residents and business owners say one thing is disturbing the peace: traffic speeding along the narrow strait of West Cold Spring Lane in the heart of Roland Park's three-block business district.At West Cold Spring Lane and Schenley Road, no stop signs or lights stall traffic. Only a faded crosswalk marks a path across the street. The posted speed limit is 25 mph.The speed limit seems lost on drivers who whistle by in all manner of vehicles: cars, delivery and mail trucks, city and school buses and tractor-trailers.

A Westminster man charged in a fatal drag race on Route 140 last week has accumulated 26 points on his Maryland driving record in the past three years, prosecutors say.And a Parkville man charged in the accident has been cited for speeding twice, police say.Frederick H. Hensen Jr., 21, of the 700 block of Old Westminster Pike, Westminster, was being held yesterday in lieu of $25,000 bail after his arrest Friday on auto manslaughter and related charges.According...

A Westminster man charged in a fatal drag race on Route 140 last week accumulated 26 points on his Maryland driving record the past three years, prosecutors say.A Parkville man who also was charged in the accident has been cited for speeding twice, police say.Frederick H. Hensen Jr., 21, of the 700 block of Old Westminster Pike, Westminster, was being held in lieu of $25,000 bail yesterday, after his arrest Friday on auto manslaughter and related charges.According...

PRESIDENT Clinton's latest imbroglio may not be scandal lite, but it certainly is scandal quick, first propelled as if by demons and then, slowing down, perhaps to disappear, but probably just resting and gathering strength for another torrent of lurid installments.Whatever, its tempo is quite different from that of the Watergate affair a generation ago, which, in retrospect anyway, moved at a stately, measured pace, like a minuet. Then, the cadence seemed to be report, White House denial, more reports, more denials and later, House investigations led by the late Rep. Sam Ervin, punctuated and enlivened by such characters as G. Gordon Liddy, John Dean and Martha Mitchell.

Public whining over speed cameras appears to have, at least momentarily, softened hearts at the Maryland State Highway Administration. The SHA has decided that motorists shouldn't have to pay a $40 fine for driving too fast in construction zones for another two weeks. While that's great for scofflaws, it would seem to thwart the original purpose of the measure: to make work zones safer for both construction crews and motorists. The law has only been in effect since Oct. 1, but 900 warnings have already been sent to violators.

A proposal from Mothers Against Drunk Driving (MADD) to require ignition interlocks for all drunk-driving offenders in Maryland has received a lot of support lately, including in this newspaper. At first glance it might seem like a good way to get drunks off the road, but there is an important argument to be made against the mandatory use of these devices in the cars of all offenders. Ignition interlocks are in-car Breathalyzers that prevent a vehicle from starting if its driver's breath registers above a pre-set blood-alcohol concentration limit.

Drivers can expect to see speed-monitoring cameras operating soon in about a dozen school zones in Baltimore County, and those caught exceeding the posted speed limit by 12 mph will face a $40 fine. The County Council authorized the speed cameras in a 6-1 vote Tuesday. The council added amendments limiting the number of cameras to 15 and requiring an annual report. Councilman T. Bryan McIntire dissented, saying, "I think it's more effective to have police on duty." Administrators will have to negotiate a contract for leasing the equipment and bring that back to the council, before the cameras are installed.

That's not schooling As a former teacher in both public and private schools and, presently, as an advisory teacher for a well-known home schooling program, I was dismayed by the article, "Where whatever children do is schooling" (Sept. 3). I disagree that children can guide their own learning without some type of structure or curriculum. Most parents, I believe, would find teaching their children in this manner incredibly challenging, to say the least. No one can argue that reading to children isn't enormously beneficial, but only a few children will learn to read just from this method, nor will they necessarily learn to read or do math via video games.

There are plenty of reasons why the Baltimore County Council should approve speed cameras tomorrow - at least 104,155 reasons, to be precise, as that's the expected enrollment in public schools. Under the state law that passed earlier this year, the county has the authority to use unmanned cameras to enforce speed limits around schools, and there's little doubt of their necessity. That county residents are prone to speeding around schools is not in dispute. Officials need only point to the 1,794 speed tickets issued within one-half mile of a public or private school from 2005-2007, the last period for which such an analysis is available.

A drive to put Maryland's new speed-camera law to a statewide vote failed to gather the necessary signatures for a referendum, prompting local officials to immediately vow Monday to deploy speed cameras in the Baltimore area. Maryland for Responsible Enforcement, the group organizing the petition drive, said it fell fewer than 2,000 signatures short of the required 17,883 signatures - or one-third of the total needed to put a referendum on the ballot in the next election. The group had to meet that initial threshold by midnight Sunday.

If you're a speed-happy Marylander who occasionally drives into Virginia, you'd better leave your lead foot on this side of the Potomac. Unlike in Maryland, where cotton-candy traffic laws virtually invite extreme speeding, Virginia takes such behavior seriously. Under the laws of the commonwealth, exceeding the speed limit by 20 mph or more is classified as reckless driving. Going 80 mph or more, no matter what the speed limit, is also reckless driving. That's a Class 1 misdemeanor under Virginia law, punishable by a jail term of up to a year and a fine of $2,500.

Police chiefs across Maryland want to replicate a Montgomery County speed camera program that brought in more than $2 million in county revenue last year and, according to one study, significantly decreased the number of speeders in monitored areas. Under the plan backed by Gov. Martin O'Malley, cameras would be authorized in work zones on expressways and controlled-access highways where the speed limit is 45 mph or greater. Cities and counties could establish their own programs in school and residential zones where the speed limit is lower.

Two weeks ago this afternoon, an inch and a half of snow fell in Western Maryland. It should have been no big deal. Snow has been falling in that location, near Myersville in Frederick County, since long before there was a Maryland. What was different this time was that some of that snow fell on Interstate 70. Sometime after the snow began falling, there occurred a chain-reaction crash involving 47 vehicles, including six tractor-trailers. Two women died in the pileup. At least a dozen people were seriously injured.

Q&A Yamon Figurs ran a blistering 4.30 seconds in the 40-yard dash at the NFL scouting combine before being selected by the Ravens in the third round of last year's draft. Figurs' passion for speed reached new limits during the offseason. Q: What did you do for fun during the offseason? A: We got some jet skis and rode them all summer long [in Jupiter, Fla.]. It was the first time I owned my own jet skis, and I got some super-fast ones that go about 80 mph. Q: Is there a speed limit on the water?