Mount P lives up to its nicknames
Mount Pretentious. Mount Pompous ass. Mount Perfect. Mount Bottleneck, Mount Traffic (one of my faves). And the name given to it when I was in the USAF – Mount Pilot (most of our pilots lived over there). Either way, those people living in the ‘town’ slightly East (even though it’s technically North) of the Cooper seem to live in a different reality. Maybe Mount Utopia would be a better suited name for it.
This is the very same community that felt that traffic circles on US-17 would be best. Not because they’re functional and efficient….but because they look better than flyovers. A traffic circle on a US Interstate. You’re kidding right? Fortunately, SCDOT has the ultimate say on it, and it’s doubtful they’d even consider traffic circles on a major thoroughfare a viable option. But, the latest and greats from the darlings in Mt P was in the P&C today…
It seems that some residents of Mt P don’t like that I-526 carries a 65MPH speed limit. Their argument:
“People come barreling down the bridge. If you’re doing 65 miles per hour, they’ll blow your doors off,” said Hobcaw Creek resident Steve Harry.
“The tires scream. You cannot carry on a conversation in the yard,” said fellow Chimney Bluff Road resident Steve Cordina.
Um, you’re the dumbass that bought your house next to the interstate. Why should the wants of one outweigh the needs of many? It’s like the people that move near the AFB, and then bitch about the plane noise. Hey, dumbass, it’s an airport. It was there when you moved in, it’ll be there when you leave.
“It makes no sense. We have a residential exit here,” he said.
Call me crazy, but if my memory serves me correctly, no exits off of 526 dump into a subdivision. Long Point Rd has a port on it. A cement plant. Shopping centers. The 17 exit doesn’t either. It dumps right onto Hwy 17. At that point I think it drops anyways, to 60 or 55. The residents off the Rutledge Exit on I-26E don’t seem to have a problem – oh…wait…because they’re not whiners like Mount Pleasant.
Mayor Pro-Tem Kruger Smith said he supports measures to make I-526 safer. “Nobody seems to care what speed they go,” he said. “We just don’t want to have any more accidents if we can avoid them.”
Somehow this moron turned the speed issue into a traffic collision issue. Do you think he’d sleep any better at night if there were 200 accidents on that stretch of road or not? What that really means is they’re appeasing their whiny constituents to let them think that they’re doing something, even though the speed limit decision is ultimately out of the town’s hands. If they want to enforce it, slap a MPPD unit on the roadway. That’ll work, it always does. Just be consistent with it…don’t do it for a week and stop.
Up North, when houses are placed close to a highway they place sound barriers up along the highway. As far as I can tell they’re effective. I can think of several places near where I lived in Whitehall, PA, near Allentown that had sound barriers 
up. I can tell you that they wouldn’t work down here. Why? Well, number one is that the whiners in Mt Pleasant wouldn’t like them because they weren’t ‘pretty.’ So they’d be unable to bitch about the noise, but they’d bitch about the appearance. Beggars can’t be choosers. Number two is that this state barely seems to be able to keep up with the road repairs, so monetarily it looks like paying for sound barriers wouldn’t be a good idea. They’d save the money for something else – another 4 year Trolley Road type of project.
Most places up North also have large dirt berms and foliage planted in order to help keep the noise down and to make the walls look a little more attractive. The Garden State Parkway (NJ) has an extensive set of berms and foliage — it’s actually a nice drive (aside from the NJ drivers, etc etc, and that it’s a toll-road).
Anyways. There’s my solution. Slap up some fargon traffic noise barriers and call it a day. Mt P will always have something to whine about anyways…