A bolt from the blue

Many years ago, the floods of 1957 and 1963 spurred the development of the Fishtrap Reservoir, and that necessitated a new route for U. S. 460. The relocation of this highway started at Mouthcard, and ended once the Millard bridge had been crossed.

There were, however, two anomalies at either end. In each instance, cars on a major road, namely U. S. 460’s traffic, had to yield to traffic from a side road. Anyone who ever had to commute to Pikeville on U. S. 460 remembers the bottleneck the Millard Bridge stop sign used to produce. Luckily, the powers-that-be reacted quickly, as they usually do, and in short order, a mere 30 years or so, the Millard overpass was built, and that problem was solved.

On the Mouthcard end, however, that anomaly still exists. Traffic from State Route 1499 has priority over traffic on U. S. 460. Well, it isn’t as though this produces any bottlenecks here. No, traffic proceeds smoothly enough through this intersection.

No, the problem here is with eastbound traffic. The stop sign here is at the foot of Card Mountain, the steeper of the two mountains on relocated U. S. 460. That portion of the highway on the Mouthcard side is extremely curvy, as well. As a result, eastbound vehicles have no passing lanes.

Most traffic deals with this pretty well, even though you sometimes have to crawl off the mountain behind the gravel trucks or larger coal trucks that constantly prowl the road. Because these drivers know the trick of using the Jake brake, you seldom see any of them get into trouble.

Long distance truckers, on the other hand, who may just be passing through a mountainous area for the first time, might not know how much to gear down. Yes, there is a sign with blinking lights that warns of the steepness of this road, and one that even warns of the dead-end stop that lies ahead.

Still, every now and again, an out-of-state trucker will start down Card Mountain and burn his brakes up before he gets to that stop sign. When he can’t stop what is by then a rocket sled on rails, and since this unforgiving intersection has no where to take an out-of-control semi, well, let’s just say that the thing has to end badly.

Badly, as in the horrible accident that took place on Monday of this week. This time, a South Carolina driver came off the mountain, out of control, and, in trying to find a way out of his predicament, tried the futile maneuver of going off the left-hand entrance from 1499. That took the life of one truck driver in the late 90’s. This time, the truck driver survived. Tragically, two Ashplundh employees, who were just beginning their days work, did not.

These are the latest of the many fatalities that have taken place here. What has always been desperately needed is a runaway truck ramp, preferably of the gravel arrester bed variety, but none has ever been built.

I can’t imagine why, either. It’s not a $10 million Millard overpass this area needs. It just needs something that would let motorists and pedestrians travel through this intersection without worrying about being struck down by a bolt from the blue.