Roadside Memorials

rover

rover

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Route 6 between Bolton and Columbia Connecticut is known as Suicide Six. We are reminded regularly that this @10 mile stretch has one of the highest rates of fatal injuries of any road in the country. Connecting two strips of divided highway it is flat and more or less straight. It runs almost dead east to west, meaning that eastbound morning and westbound afternoon traffic is driving directly into the sun. The speed at which traffic normally travels on this two lane road is simply too fast. With no stop signs or traffic lights, the biggest dangers are the many small side roads from which cars turn onto the main thoroughfare.

I knew immediately what had happened yesterday when, some 9 miles away, rescue vehicles and State Troopers raced through the center of my town down Route 316. I learned shortly later from a radio traffic report that another accident had occurred at the intersection of Long Hill Road.

The Towns, State, Army Corps of Engineers, and environmentalist all agree that the only way to make Suicide Six safe is to reroute it and make it a divided highway as it was intended to be. All oppose parts of all of the plans that have been drawn though.

Taking the path of least resistance the State is now widening and repaving Route 6. Of course, in addition to "improving" sight lines, the new smooth road surface leads to even faster speeds. The construction also is an opportunity for the State to remove the impromptu memorials to those killed in accidents over the years on this road. Today a 16 year old girl is in critical condition after being Life Starred to the hospital yesterday. I only hope the cost of indecision and failure to correctly address this situation didn't suddenly go up. And I hope not to see another memorial indicating the worst outcome occurred, again.

Photographs taken with a Holga 120 FN
 
This hits close to home, Rover. We have many of these memorials on the twelve mile stretch of state highway between Hailey and Ketchum, Idaho. Same politics at play...same tragic outcome.

I attended the funeral of a close friend six weeks ago, saw her husband just a few days ago at the market -- it's really tough. She was forced into the oncoming lane by a driver that pulled onto the highway and didn't see her, and was subsequently hit head-on. I was going to photograph the hundreds of motorcycles that gathered in town the day after her funeral (for both our annual "Toy Ride" and to pay further respects to her), but I couldn't do it -- it just didn't seem right.

D2
 
Powerful shots, Ralph. Holga is in good hands, as I can see.
I particularly like the fuzzy/dreamy effect in the shots - well suited to the subject.
Chilling and very powerful!

Denis
 
I agree, powerful shots. I had the image pegged as a Holga before reading it - very typical of them, and a very good use for that type of intentional distortion/aberration. Well done!

Best Regards,

Bill Mattocks
 
Thanks guys, I had taken the photographs a week or so ago but had not scanned them. I was intending on writing a little different story, but the accident yesterday drove the immediate point home for me, again.

The problem of Route 6 in CT is decades old. It was intended to be a divided highway connecting Hartford and Providence RI but was never completed. The legacy is a long list of horrific accidents. This was also one of the major considerations of location when we bought our house. My wife used to drive this section of road each day going to work. Now she picks up 6 just east of the bad section.
 
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Please add these images to your gallery. I'd like to be able to find them in the future. They are incredably powerful shots that I want to put into my favorites list.

My wife's first husband died in a car accident much as described and so these types of thing have a personal meaning as well.

Thank you for posting them.

William
 
Yes, powerfull shots.

Rover, if they widen the road, at hopefully the people coming in from side streets will see the people approaching at any speed. It sounds to me, though, that wire rope barriers could be installed down the particularly dangerous section to avoid crossovers. That said, there's also some good research from Norway (IIRC) on reducing traffic speeds with the use of some simple white paint. If the road is widened, but white lines used to "narrow" the available lanes, and stripes running perpendicular to the direction of the road, the effect of "narrowing" the road leaves sight lines open, but average speeds will decrease. I can hunt a link to the research if you like, it might be a good compromise that's easy to get through the local councils?

Cheers,
Steve
 
Steve, thank you for the info. I actually have a friend who is an engineer with the State Department of Transportation. He tells me that there is a room's worth of information and research that has been done and the "solutions" have been found. What you describe sounds a little bit like what they are currently doing to the road. The speed limit is also very heavily policed. I am sure that will be stepped up again in reaction to the most recent events.

I will post the pictures in the gallery as requested William.

Thanks again guys.
 
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