Like there isn’t enough for us to worry about in the larger world, other nations wanting to end America and all it stands for, whether they will successfully cyber attack our power grid, water supplies, hospitals, there are also plenty of issues on our own back forty to concern ourselves with.
Right here at home, gasoline is tapping $4 a gallon while diesel is close to or more than $6. That puts even more pressure on already stressed family (and business and city and school) budgets.
There has been a huge water release from Canton Lake to prop up Oklahoma City via Lake Hefner. Yes, there is a contract. Yes, OKC is entitled to the water. It is just a bitter olive to chew when it seems like they haven’t stopped washing cars and watering lawns. Maybe they could shut down the car washes that are on nearly every corner until the current water crisis is over. Just an idea.
Work has started on the intersection at the Y west of Watonga. Even that isn’t without controversy even knowing that improvements there were definitely needed. Some area residents say it isn’t enough, there needs to be an overpass built to take traffic from the Thomas side to the Canton side and vice versa.
I’m not sure that is going to happen, and I don’t believe it will happen during this phase of construction. The Oklahoma Department of Transportation works eight years out, meaning a plan is drawn and engineered a long time before the first shovel full of dirt is moved.
Then the plan works its way through right of way purchase if needed, traffic studies and all manner of other technical steps. By the time the work has begun, major changes don’t just happen. They may be implemented down the road, but not right now.
While not discounting the idea of an overpass somewhere down the road, I have wondered about a stop light there. Would that work? Could it make the revamped intersection safer? Would it slow east-west traffic too much? I suspect ODOT might look at the addition of a traffic device (the fancy name for a stop light) sometime, but probably not until the work now underway is completed.
And lastly, Watonga has lost a sweet, sweet lady, Esther Arnold. She and I served on the board of the Ferguson Home Museum together and she was unfailingly kind and patient with everyone. Hers is an illustration of a life of service, a life well lived. I imagine the Lord is saying, ‘Well done, good and faithful servant.’ We will all miss her and we should all strive to be more like her, knowing we cannot fill the void she leaves.