• Traffic dangers • Sarmento supporter Traffic dangers My wife and I are sad to say that we will not be returning to the beautiful Garden Island where we have spent one to two months on an annual basis for
• Traffic dangers
• Sarmento supporter
Traffic dangers
My wife and I are sad to say that we will not be returning to the beautiful Garden Island where we have spent one to two months on an annual basis for the past 15 years.
We’ve made a lot of friends on Kaua‘i and will miss them dearly.
I’ve read many letters to the editor in your paper in regard to the terrible traffic in the Kapa‘a and Wailua area (“Blood Alley”), but none have mentioned what I’m about to relate.
In the past it was a given that the heaviest traffic occurred during “rush hour.”
Now gridlock can occur at any time of the day on Kuhio Hwy.
The deaths on this road have also gotten our attention, seeing that we drive this road on a regular basis, having a condo in Kapa‘a.
It’s been my observation that tourists tend to observe the speed limits and other rules of the road while the “locals” tend to flaunt their ability to speed past rental cars every chance they get and enjoying it, only to end up at the same traffic signal down the road as the car they passed.
There’s little respect for the people who have travelled many, many miles to experience the ambiance of the island.
It’s like we’re in the way of the Kauaian drivers, whether they’re males or females.
In good conscious I can’t recommend Kaua‘i as a vacation spot to my friends and associates any longer.
The effort, planning and cost just aren’t worth the rudeness displayed by the young (mostly) people in their pickups and sedans.
They probably have no idea the negativity they’re causing, or the potential loss of revenue Kaua‘i could experience when people like myself say, enough is enough.
Let them, Kauaians, have the roads.
We’ll vacation somewhere else where the residents observe speed limits and are considerate and courteous to visitors.
Yes, there’s heavy traffic at most popular resort areas today, but you know what?
Usually it’s the local residents who become angry at vacationers who disobey traffic laws, not the other way around.
On Kaua‘i, visitors try very hard to observe these laws in order to stay alive today, which isn’t easy when they’re practically being run off the road by you know who.
The county might as well remove all of the 25-, 30-, 35- and 40-mph speed-limit signs.
Trust me, they’re not being observed!
Finally, what’s with locals driving just before sunup and just after sundown with no headlights?
Is this just a “cool” thing to do along with speeding?
It’s a real challenge to be on the roads during those hours.
(Does Kaua‘i have driver’s ed.? If so, it isn’t working.)
Just before leaving the island, I found myself behind a pickup truck with four small children bouncing around on the flat bed in the back.
I thought to myself, what’s wrong with this picture?
Then I realized where I was.
One should just go with the flow and accept the fact that the aloha spirit is changing.
Jimmy Jones
Minnetonka, Minn.
Sarmento supporter
I commend Alfred Sarmento for his willingness (TGI May 16) to respond to the mindless polemics put forth in a few letters published in the GI.
I had read the letters he was responding to, as well as prior letters from the same authors.
While the immediate cause of their ire changes, their responses are always utterly predictable.
It’s as if we have a group of strident anti-war, anti-establishment, Marxist “revolutionaries” who came to Kaua‘i during the Vietnam era and have learned nothing since.
They are living in the past and are prisoners of their own discredited radical left philosophy.
I doubt that their diatribes are given any serious attention by anyone beyond the small circle of their friends and fellow believers.
Myles Fladager
Koloa
Against Sarmento
I was amazed, appalled, and amused by the viciousness of Fred Sarmento’s letter in the May 16 Forum.
His comments, apparently sparked by letters to the editor published the previous Sunday, were way over the top.
Regarding the Iraqi prisoner abuse, Mr. Sarmento says that “The letter writers…attempt to profanely accuse President Bush and his administration for these acts of moral depravity.”
I reread the letters he references, and did not see anything like that.
One letter says that “if” Bush and the officer in command of the guards had knowledge of the acts then they should be held accountable.
That doesn’t seem unreasonable to me.
Mr. Sarmento then continues his hateful tirade by saying that “…the Democrat Party has been the home of nearly every left wing, socialist, anti-Christian kook group in our country, from radical homosexuals to the atheist loving ACLU.”
As an atheist myself, I had to laugh at his characterization of atheists as a “left wing, socialist, anti-Christian kook group.”
Perhaps Mr. Sarmento needs to get out more and actually meet some of these people.
He may find that we can be just as (if not more) moral, patriotic, and compassionate as his own favored groups.
Brian Christensen
Lihu‘e
