Another summer of Traffic Hell in Livingston County

/

One of the great traditions of summer in Livingston County – along with the Fowlerville Fair, the Michigan Challenge Balloonfest and mosquitoes – is the work of the Traffic Hell Committee.

You’re familiar with the Traffic Hell Committee, of course. These are the fine people who are charged each summer with making it impossible to get from one part of Livingston County to another. They accomplish this through a series of construction projects that are designed to: 1. Improve our roads; and 2. Provide full employment for those people who hold the signs that say STOP and SLOW, most of whom smoke non-stop while they’re doing their jobs.

Historians agree that the Traffic Hell Committee’s best work came in the mid-1990s, when they came up with a plan that made it impossible to get from Brighton to Howell. This brilliant scheme that involved doing major work on both I-96 and Grand River Avenue at the same time, which meant that in order to get from Brighton to Howell, you pretty much had to drive through Ann Arbor.

Well, this year, the Traffic Hell Committee has come close to matching that incredible accomplishment. They unveiled a series of projects in 2010 – many of which are continuing into the fall – that are downright spectacular.

The two biggest projects have tied up Pinckney and Fowlerville. In southern Livingston County, the Traffic Hell Committee decided that it would be fun this summer to make it really, really hard to get from Pinckney to Dexter.

The main road that leads between Dexter and Pinckney is called Dexter-Pinckney Road. (If there’s one thing we’re really good at around here, it’s coming up with clever names for our roads.) In any case, the Traffic Hell Committee decided it would be a barrel of laughs if they closed down Dexter-Pinckney Road by rebuilding the bridge at Portage Lake.

So they closed the road all summer. June, July and August. When the road finally opened a couple weeks ago, I was able to get a look at the new bridge. And while I’m admittedly no expert at building bridges – I know as much about building bridges as I do about Portugese opera – I just have to say: “THREE MONTHS? IT TOOK YOU THREE MONTHS TO BUILD THIS?”

When I heard it was going to take them three months to build this thing, I was expecting the Mackinac Bridge or something. But this? This was just a bunch of concrete that looked like a weekend job. Jeez Louise.

Ah, but all of this is nothing compared to what’s going on in Fowlerville.

Have you driven through Fowlerville lately? Have you? Of course not. NOBODY is driving through Fowlerville these days. Walking, maybe. Biking, perhaps. But driving? No. Nobody is driving in Fowlerville right now.

That’s because Fowlerville Road (or Grand Avenue, or whatever it’s called at that point) is totally closed down, and it’s absolutely paralyzed the traffic flow in Fowlerville. (And yes, there is a traffic flow in Fowlerville.) I don’t know what they’re doing, but it looks way more complicated than the Portage Lake bridge, so I’m thinking that this project might not be done until 2014 or so.

The Traffic Hell Committee was kind enough to schedule this big project in Fowlerville right as school was beginning, which means that anyone who lives south of town probably hasn’t made it to class yet. I hope they haven’t started taking attendance. Seriously, if you live in South Fowlerville (or SoFo, as we call it), like I do, and you have to drive to Downtown Fowlerville (DoFo), you better leave the house with plenty of time to spare.

Last Monday, I had to drive my daughter to tap class at Maria’s School of Dance, and it took me a good 15 minutes to drive from one side of town to the other. Under normal circumstances, it wouldn’t take you 15 minutes to crawl on your hands and knees from one end of Fowlerville to the other. In any event, as summer gives way to fall in Livingston County, I have to tip my cap to the Traffic Hell Committee. They’ve truly outdone themselves this year.

We can only guess what fun they have in store for us in 2011.

DON’T MISS A BEAT

Sign up for our weekly newsletter

We don’t spam!

Sharing is caring!