Not everyone wants to go straight

The problem

Here’s a riddle for you Watchdog groupies, inspired by a question from Mark Puhak of Overland Park:

Q. What is ramrod straight but comes with a curve?

A. The newly reconstructed Quivira Road in Overland Park, where drivers may not have mastered the learning curve.

Puhak gives high marks to the new roadway south of Interstate 435. But he said northbound drivers can easily get into the wrong lane at 119th Street, where two left-turn lanes were reduced to one.

Despite overhead signs, Puhak said, left-turners mistakenly choose the far-left “through” lane and find they’re supposed to go straight. He thinks pavement markings would help.

The answer

Overland Park’s traffic engineers hit the fast-forward button on video from that intersection and decided against any changes.

“We did not see anyone trying to turn left from the through lane,” said city traffic engineer Brian Shields. “This review covered different time periods on multiple days.”

Someone else raised the same issue with the city, saying drivers make a lot of U-turns north of 119th Street so they can double back to go west.

“We looked at that situation, too,” Shields said. “Our observations showed that people making the U-turns were coming from the apartments on the east side of Quivira … who didn’t have an option to go south other than going north and making a U-turn. There were also a few drivers who must have found it easier to make a U-turn to go to the 7-Eleven store on the west side of Quivira.”

The Watchdog says that if that 7-Eleven sells beer on Sunday, he’s there.