Hanks: Furious about all the canyon crashes
Letter to the editor
About the issue of semi-trucks and the insane number of accidents in Glenwood Canyon of late: It has not been solved. From the looks of it, nothing has yet changed. Yet another hideous accident and full I-70 closure through the canyon occurred today.
It is totally out of control and beyond ridiculous. What is being done about it? It needs to change — and now. It needed to change yesterday.
Need some ideas? What about police escorts? Two times a day, semi-trucks get escorted by law enforcement through the canyon, so they can do it safely; other than that, they don’t go through.
What about serious fines for these companies and employees who are causing these accidents, closures, damage to the road, oil spills, and sometimes causing injuries and fatalities?
Need more ideas? Special trainings and certifications for any semi-truck driver who will be driving along the I-70 corridor of Colorado. No semis at all allowed through in a snowstorm. Devices attached to the trucks controlling their speed. Chaining up required. Video surveillance and stiff fines and loss of licenses for going too fast. Semi-truck companies paying for any and all costs related to semi-truck accidents.
We community members are furious and fed up, and something needs to change immediately. I’ve written to the governor, I’m writing to CDOT, I’m writing to our local officials, and to the editor. Do we need to protest in order to make some changes happen?
Any excuses related to needing to gather more information or too much cost to make changes are unacceptable. This is costing lives, road damage, people stuck for hours on end, businesses being affected, people can’t get to necessary medical appointments, environmental damage caused, and on and on.
Seriously, I ask CDOT and our government officials, the semi-truck companies, and their drivers: How many more unnecessary and completely devastating and infuriating accidents need to happen to do things differently? We are furious.
Alana Hanks
Silt
