The city of Tucson ranks high in the number of pedestrians being run over, sometimes due to them being impaired by drugs or alcohol, and sometimes due to the drivers being impaired.
The suburban area known as the Foothills that abuts the city to the north seems to be trying to catch up to the city.
That’s especially true on Craycroft and Kolb roads north of Sunrise, and in particular on a stretch near where the two roads meet, close to the Ventana Canyon trailhead.
Take the recent experience of a friend in her sixties who lives alone along the stretch. Her house is about a half-mile north of where my wife Kim and I live.
The friend was awakened at 11:00 PM by a loud noise. Several minutes later, someone rang her doorbell. At the door was a shirtless, shoeless and bloodied young guy. Obviously inebriated, he explained through the locked door that he had just wrecked his car after having an argument with his wife and driving away in a huff.
He asked to use our friend’s phone.
She replied that she wasn’t going to let him in the house and would call the sheriff’s department on his behalf to report the accident. A deputy soon arrived, gave the guy a sobriety test, arrested him for DUI, and led him away in handcuffs.
The next morning, I took a photo of the guardrail he had hit and reported the damage to the county. Kim and I picked up some of the car parts left behind at the scene, just as we do whenever there is an accident along the stretch.
I’ve reported four other crumpled guardrails in the area over the last couple of years. One of them was directly across the street from the guardrail in the above photo. A car crumpled about 40 feet of that guardrail, went down an embankment, and ended up in a wash.
How fast does a car have to go to crumple 40 feet of guardrail?
I’ve also reported scores of knocked-down traffic signs, such as this one:
How drunk does someone have to be to not see this sign in the median?
Other accidents have included a 25-foot saguaro being knocked over, a large tree being knocked down, another large tree being splintered, a fire hydrant being sent flying like a bowling pin, and a car plowing through brush on the roadside and then being abandoned.
In addition, a speeding motorcyclist was killed when he swerved over the center line and was hit by a car near our house several years before we moved there. Someone put a memorial to the guy on the roadside.
More recently, Kim and I were awakened at midnight by loud noises and flashing lights. From our house on a nearby ridge, we saw a car on fire and first responders working on a guy stretched out on the shoulder of Kolb Rd. It didn’t look like he was going to survive. His sporty Audi had gone off the road at high speed, went down an embankment, and hit a large boulder.
Although there are no sidewalks or bike lanes, the route is popular with walkers and cyclists, probably due to the scenic views of the Catalinas and the city below. Also, many guests at the nearby Loews Resort walk or jog along the stretch, oftentimes with their back to traffic, not realizing how dangerous it is. I’ve even seen a woman pushing a stroller with a baby in it, with cars whizzing by two feet away.
It seems as if the county (and city) puts sidewalks and bike lanes where they’re not needed and doesn’t put them where they’re needed.
The 35-mph speed limit is ignored with regularity, and it’s common for drivers to exceed 50 mph, including when they drive by an elementary school. Making it worse, much of the road is hilly, curvy and with poor sight lines. The absence of street lights makes it even more dangerous. Javelinas and even deer have been struck by cars. It’s inevitable that a pedestrian or cyclist will be run over someday.
Judging by the large number of liquor and beer bottles and cans that Kim and I pick up every day on our early-morning walk, a lot of the drivers are impaired. As such, we wear reflector vests and carry flashlights in the dark, and, whether night or day, we step onto the dirt shoulder when cars are approaching.
As is the case throughout much of the metro area, there is no speed enforcement. The absence of enforcement not only encourages reckless driving but also eliminates the possibility that an officer will pull someone over for speeding and discover that the driver is inebriated.
Maybe Pima County Sheriff Chris Nanos can drive over in his Corvette to see the situation firsthand—not that he’d do anything about it. After all, Tucsonans are expendable.
Mr. Cantoni can be reached at [email protected].
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