Quote Originally Posted by Larry OKC View Post
SoonerDave: I have always wondered about that area and am asking honest questions...what are the stats for the Shield's onramp? How does that compare to other areas of the City? In other words, is that area above the norm (accidents, injuries & fatalities)?
I would very much like to know, Larry. I don't have the stats, just my own eyeballs as I drive the westbound side of that road every workday on the way home, and I don't think its an exaggeration at all to suggest that there is some substantial accident at that location during rush hour at least two out of the five regular work weekdays (M-F). I would say, but without the same level of confidence, that at least one of those accidents required ambulance transportation for at least one of the involved folks. I don't know how I'd go about collecting or researching that data, but it surely would be nice to have.

See, for me, many of the upgrades and changes to various roadways in the OKC area are due to very practical things like easing congestion, rerouting, accommodating more current road use information, replacing old structures, and all of those are perfectly reasonable motives. But this business of seeing someone in an accident, typically multiple times per week, potentially seriously if not fatally injured, with the design of the interchange largely the reason, just compels me to get off my duff and grump about it somehow. If, for whatever reason over whatever period of time, OKDOT made this mess, I think it should be incumbent on them to make cleaning it up a priority. Even if part of that long-term solution includes a short-term nuisance of closing an exacerbating entrance ramp.