City needs to take traffic safety on Marine Drive seriously

Understandably the nation and city of Bremerton are concentrating many of their efforts to combat homelessness, but somehow the city is missing a real threat to the community, traffic safety.

This is my fourth letter in about four years, trying to somehow to urge the mayor and city council to adopt a program of traffic safety on Marine Drive without success. I don’t expect to achieve much with this letter because the city seems to be preoccupied with protecting the homeless while failing to protect citizens from speeding drivers.

I seriously doubt whether the city has a plan to provide sidewalks or other measures of safety to Marine Drive, though one of the mayor’s chief projects as outlined in a Sun article on Nov. 1, 2022 reported that new road and sidewalks planned for Almira Drive and View Ridge Elementary in 2025. The article went on to report that a 5 million dollar project was planned to provide reconstruction of Almira as well as new sidewalks for students attending View Ridge.

Why isn’t Marine Drive included in the list of projects to increase traffic safety through the construction of sidewalks as well as other communities? Interestingly enough, the mayor attended View Ridge Elementary. Marine Drive is close to Crownhill Elementary and still no sidewalks. Surely there must be some financial programs within the state and federal government for more traffic safety on our streets.James Hackett, Bremerton

This article originally appeared on Kitsap Sun: City needs to take traffic safety on Marine Drive seriously