A strongly worded letter from Mayor Lisa Middleton is rumored to be behind the fix at a major Palm Springs intersection.
Driving the news: Crews from Caltrans took to the intersection of West Vista Chino and North Palm Canyon Drive Wednesday afternoon and finally performed work the community has been pleading for: They fixed the traffic signals.
- Gone are the flashing red lights creating a four-way stop (and a hefty amount of confusion). In their place are the familiar green-yellow-red timed lights drivers are used to at intersections.
Looking back: The flashing red lights had been in place at the intersection for months following a collision that put the regular signals out of commission. As the days dragged on and complaints piled up, city officials tried in vain to explain the situation was not their fault.
- Because the intersection is technically part of Highway 111, a state roadway, it was up to the state to provide the fix. Frequent inquiries to Caltrans provided promises of a pending fix, but no action. That was until Wednesday.
Zoom in: News of the fix was broken like most news these days — via an Instagram story. Mayor Pro Tem Grace Garner reported live from the intersection, alerting her followers that the community’s persistence had paid off.
- “This is such heartwarming and good news for Palm Springs,” Garner said. “Thank you to all the residents who wrote in and let Caltrans know that this was a problem, and to our mayor, and to our engineering department that worked tirelessly to try and fix the problem.”
Our take: It’s not quite time for President Gerald Ford to proclaim “our long national nightmare is over,” but holy cow it sure feels like it. Now let’s see if the traffic synchronization project along 111 can be completed before we’re all in flying cars.
