Question for Action Line:
There’s a fence between Aspen and Holly on Florida Road that has some sections recently replaced and others recently destroyed. It seems like every time one section gets redone, another gets torn down or destroyed in some fashion, taking months (if ever) to get replaced. It’s too tight a spot for an accident to take out the fence in the sections that are missing, and I haven’t heard of any recent reports that would offer an explanation. Is that fence owned by the city or the homeowners? My general curiosity has me wondering who could be behind the Florida Fence Mayhem
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Fence Investigator
Dear Fence Investigator,
I went up there to take some pictures, and I agree it didn’t look like the angles were right for a car to cause those breakages, especially with the curb there – but it also didn’t look like bear damage. So I went and talked to a resident in the neighborhood behind there and it turns out it was in fact two different car accidents! The first happened months ago in the section that is now rebuilt – it happened in the middle of the day and there seemed to be no impairment by the driver, who stopped and took responsibility. The other one that is still broken happened more recently, in the middle of the night and the driver has not been located.
And here’s what Tom Sluis at the city had to say about it: “The city is responsible for repairs to that stretch of fence along Florida Road because it is located in the public right of way. The fencing was installed when the road was rebuilt after voters graciously passed ballot measure 2A in 2005, which paid for not only upgrading the road, but building the library and many open-space acquisitions. The fence helps reduce traffic noise for nearby residents. Unfortunately, there seems to be some bad mojo on Florida. The Endurance artwork that was peacefully on display for 14 years at the roundabout near Chapman Hill has been hit twice in two months by vehicles, and the fencing has been struck multiple times over the past few years. The city’s streets divisions makes repairs each time, and while they are very good at installing 6 (foot) pickets, it’s time and money the city would rather put to use elsewhere. As to why the accidents are happening, the city is preparing to conduct a traffic survey of the roundabout area to see what’s going on. Maybe we’ll take some of the PKE meters from Ghostbusters and a few ghost traps.”
Email questions and suggestions to [email protected] or mail them to Action Line, The Durango Herald, 1275 Main Ave., Durango, CO 81301. Today’s Fun Fact: The saying “good fences make good neighbors” comes from the 1914 Robert Frost poem “Mending Wall.” As some folks know, the poem is actually a retort to the neighbor’s view that “good fences make good neighbors,” with the writer beginning his thoughts with “something there is that doesn’t love a wall,” him being that something, along with wildlife and hunters who might want unobstructed passage. In old New England parlance, a “stone fence,” is what most of us would call a “wall,” and are mortar-less structures made from the stones pulled out of the rocky soil to enable farming – most of which are now found in the middle of the woods after those areas once cleared of lumber for farming have grown back between housing tracts. Despite his skepticism of the need for inter-neighbor barriers, Frost in fact participated in maintaining his own stone fences throughout his life.