With the future completion of the planned overpass at routes 1 and 16, the hope is that travelers will travel nonstop to the Delaware beaches.
But the overpassed Route 1 will not take travelers to the beaches but to Five Points, which isn’t the gateway to sand and surf, but rather the entrance to the Lewes-Rehoboth parking lot. From Five Points to Dewey Beach, Route 1 has become a parking lot with lights which connects with other parking lots like the Route 24 lot.
The pages of the Cape Gazette have been overflowing with local traffic angst for years, and in the last year it has progressed to palpable anguish over the overflowing automobiles on our roads, and the ad hoc solutions to the consequences of the lack of planning.
The state motto for the portion of Route 1 from Route 16 to Five Points is now, “South is the new north.” The major problem with our roads isn’t the lack of overpasses, and it cannot be solved with making northbound drivers go south for a U-turn or vice versa. The problem is the volume of traffic. This volume is causing both delays and deaths. Route 1 has already been deemed the most dangerous highway for summer traffic in Delaware (https://www.asecurelife.com/most-dangerous-us-highways-for-summer/).
Overpasses have a role in improving traffic flow on Route 1, but that is not the only role they will play. Rather they will only more rapidly deliver carloads of visitors and residents to the backups that pile up at Five Points and routinely stretch back over the Nassau Bridge and beyond.
With the completion of the Route 1 overpasses and the continuation of the unrelenting overbuilding, the backed-up traffic has the potential to reach the planned Route 16 overpass, which will make it an overpass to nowhere.
But in Sussex, nowhere really is somewhere - it is where all the thoughtful and tormented complaints about the deterioration of driving in our county have unfortunately gone.
Michael Salvatore
Lewes
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