Turn, Turn, Turn

We have lived by the Carmel Highlands Inn for 20-plus years. We do remember the backups; however, after redoing the northbound Highway 1 lanes a number of years ago, our backups decreased in numbers and severity. Before the modification, it was normal in late afternoon traffic (on Friday, Saturday, Sunday and holidays) to be backed up to Carmel Meadows (15 minute wait); Monastery Beach, (30 minute wait); Pt. Lobos, (45 minute wait); or the Highlands Inn (1 hour wait). Fifteen-minute waits on other weekdays, during “go home” traffic times, were also the norm.

Unfortunately, this current modification to the Carmel Valley Road access to Highway 1 (“Carmel Valley Road’s free right turn lane should stay,” Aug. 19-25) has caused the return of these backups. The Carmel Valley folks have to wait only 2-3 minutes between signals. It seems unfair, for those of us living south of Rio Road, to be forced to go back to the much longer waiting periods.

The problem now is that the Carmel Valley folks use up the right lane when we have the green light to cross through the intersection. They also jostle for the left lane, thus slowing and backing up the north-bound Highway 1 traffic. This disruption causes an irrefutable traffic backup for us.

Remember, Rio Road also adds to our problem. Tourists and locals coming out of the Carmel Mission/beach area; or the shopping area, fill up any empty spaces remaining on Highway 1 between Rio Road and Carmel Valley Road between red lights. This problem was dramatically reduced by the previous unobstructed flow of going immediately from one lane at Carmel Valley Road to two lanes, with no competition for space. Our problem is like the camel with too much straw. All it takes is one more car touching the brakes (at peak times), and the results are severely detrimental to our driving times.

Our preference is to go back to the previous concept for Carmel Valley Road: two right-turn lanes on green lights or stopped on red lights. A compromise could be a light that is fully green for them when we have the red light; or, a 15-second-per-car metered light when we have the green light.

Egg-Gravated

It now appears that the owner and feed supplier for Iowa’s giant Wright County Egg and Hillandale Farms, associated with the recall of more than 500 million eggs, has a long record of violations.

Austin DeCoster has paid millions of dollars in fines and restitutions for violations of food safety, worker safety, immigration, sexual harassment, animal cruelty, and water pollution laws in Maine, Maryland, New York, and Iowa. Iowa’s attorney general labeled DeCoster a “habitual violator.”

More than 1,500 people have been reported sickened by the DeCoster eggs, but the Centers for Disease Control estimates that the actual number may be as high as 45,000. His lawyer’s admissions that “contamination is common in poultry operations” convinced me this is indeed an industry-wide problem.

I have found www.vegcooking.com/vegcooking-eggreplace.asp very helpful in making my transition to an egg-free diet.