You probably know that Germany has a famous and excellent highway system called Autobahn. On the Autobahn there is no speed limit unless there is construction. Some miraculous thing might have happened a few years ago and part of the Autobahn moved here onto Koloa Road between the Lawai traffic light and the 25-mile speed limit sign at the Kaneshiro ranch.
Make no mistake, there is another 25-mile speed limit sign at the Kaumualii Highway end of Koloa Road too, but the Autobahn-ghost has occupied the one mile stretch in the residential area with houses and even a private school very close to the road.
And this ghost is up to no good. It has a spell on most vehicles traveling on this section of the road forcing them to go pedal-to-the-metal. This includes visitors’ cars, Jeeps, local cars transiting on this road, trucks, cement trucks, even fully loaded double-trailers.
That means a constant flow of vehicles traveling at 60 to 90 miles per hour endangering anything that is alive on and around the road. And this goes on all day from 4 a.m. to midnight, with the heaviest traffic on weekdays between 7 a.m. and 11 a.m. The noise of the high-speed traffic makes hearing or conversation almost impossible in the houses close to the road.
There must be another mischievous ghost present, too, who misdirects the Kauai Police Department to go somewhere else, because there are no police stakeout or radar checks on this section. A few years ago, we had some at least once or twice a week, but the situation has become much worse and that seems to scare away the police from this area.
Earlier this month, TGI had an article about the new campaign of KPD to catch unbuckled drivers and passengers.
Nice effort, but the expected result is far less than catching insane speeders on the described section of Koloa Road.
If they’d measure the speed of vehicles from an unmarked car just for an hour the results will support a plan to fine about 100 violators per hour provided, they have the skill and the manpower to control both ends.
Oh, I forgot another TGI article recently indicating a shortage of police officers on Kauai. Well, here is the solution: From the fines collected in one day on this section of Koloa Road they can easily finance the monthly salary of three policemen. If KPD is not interested, they can sell the 25-mile speed limit signs for scrap or as collectibles as the most inefficient traffic signs in the world.
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Margit Samu is a resident of Koloa.
Source: The Garden Island
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