Sooke Road between Langford and Sooke is dangerously ill or under-marked for safety. It is especially evident during these long, dark nights of late fall, when sometimes it feels like you need luck on your side to keep finding your lane.
Sure, it is an unlit highway, but most commuters can point to unlit highways with similar conditions – in Washington State for instance, or on the B.C. mainland – where a combination of reflectors and vibrant, reflective, useful road lines make all the difference.
For too long residents of Sooke have complained, but somehow reparations have been overlooked, especially odd, given that the fix does not require serious spending but is relatively fiscally friendly.
Some say a “nontoxic” paint choice for the shoulder and lane lines is at fault, in that it doesn’t hold up well against erosion, and that it doesn’t reflect and illuminate as well as it should.
But there’s also a conspicuous lack of reflective tiles and posts to illuminate bends.
A complaint to this affect was posted on a popular social website (Sooke Social) and instantly garnered comments calling attention to this serious matter of safety and concern for thousands of daily commuters.
Will local politicians and media, please take up this story, and call on municipalities and the Transportation Ministry to make haste on remedying this before we’re reading about fatalities?
Darren Alexander
Sooke
