Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: FRIDAY, June 8, 1990 TAG: 9006190347
SECTION: SMITH MOUNTAIN TIMES PAGE: SMT-1 EDITION: BEDFORD/FRANKLIN
SOURCE: TRACY VAN MOORLEHEM STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: LENGTH: Long
When friends or relatives who are not familiar with the area call directory assistance for her number they ask for a Moneta listing, because that is her mailing address. But because she actually lives in Franklin County, there is no phone information under her name in the Bedford County listings.
Even state bureaucrats - whose job it is to keep track of people's whereabouts - are confused. One year the state Department of Motor Vehicles issued Patrick a car registration for Bedford County and Fairfax City before it figured out she lives in Franklin County.
In the crazy quilt of postal and phone zones around Smith Mountain Lake, Patrick said, residents have learned to expect the unexpected and to tolerate the frustrating.
For example, the Wirtz Post Office was moved to Burnt Chimney but the name was not changed. Now Wirtz residents have Rocky Mount addresses and Burnt Chimney residents have Wirtz addresses.
A telephone call across the 500-yard Hales Ford Bridge costs $.90 from a pay phone because it's a long-distance call.
People who live in Franklin County but have Bedford County addresses sometimes get a break on their homeowners and car insurance because companies assign rates by zip code, according to Philip Hager, owner of Hager Insurance.
The confusion is a result of the mammoth development and population boom in the Roanoke River basin since the hydroelectric reservoir was completed in 1966. The rural phone exchanges and post offices were not designed to accommodate the influx and have been slow to adapt to the demands of newcomers sprinkled along 500 miles of shoreline. These residents, many of whom are accustomed to city conveniences, all want the same address: Smith Mountain Lake.
Ten years ago, for example, there were two homes in the area that is now known as Bernard's Landing. It made sense for the Moneta postal carriers to swing by and deliver the mail rather than have a separate post office. Today there are at least 264 units in that development alone. Growth all around the area has multiplied similarly, but there is still no local post office.
Patrick said more post offices should be built to improve service in high population areas and to correlate mailing addresses to actual home locations.
"Or they could call everything Smith Mountain Lake and deliver mail by zip code if they insist on having the offices in such ludicrous places," she said.
Patrick has written scores of letters to elected officials and the postal service to try and standardize mail zones in the area, but little has changed.
"There's no getting past the garbage of the post office. They're going to do it their way, the most inefficient way," Patrick said. She said that local postal workers have been very helpful but regional decision-makers have not been receptive to suggestions.
David Fields, the Postal Service Director of Communication for Central and South West Virginia said he is not aware of a problem with postal zones in the area.
"Over the last three years we've had only about two or three complaints. It's not uncommon for zones to cross. Our boundaries were never set up to be on county boundaries," he said.
Patrick did mobilize enough support four years ago to persuade the Postal Service to add a new "contract" station at the intersection of State Routes 122 and 616 in the Fairway Village Shopping Center, the most densely developed area on the lake. But because the station is run by a contractor, not the U.S. Postal Service, it sells stamps and other services, but cannot distribute mail.
If Patrick misses the mail delivery and has to pick up a package or certified letter, she has to drive to the Moneta Post Office, 15 miles - and a long distance call - away.
Ron Willard, developer of the Waterfront and The Water's Edge golf communities, said he often hears complaints from residents of his developments who move into the area and are confused by postal and phone service.
When Willard opens an office in the Scruggs area later this year, his mail will be delivered out of Moneta. The mail generated by Willard's new office - which he estimated to be more than 500 letters a day - will put an extra burden on an already busy post office.
Moneta postmistress Thelma Meador said that of 268 boxes in the office all but eight are rented. When those are taken, she said, the post office will be able to offer only general delivery to others who would like to rent a box.
Willard said there is a great need for the contract station at Fairway Village to be upgraded to a full-service post office. He thinks that if it was given a Smith Mountain Lake name it would identify the shore area properly, too.
His company spends $3,000 per month for phone service at two lake offices, in part because a call across the lake is long distance.
To be competitive, many lake businesses install both Bedford and Franklin lines so customers can call without paying long distance rates. "If you want to be in business here you just about have to." said Chuck Hoover, a retired dock builder and former president of the Smith Mountain Lake Association, a civic group.
A big step toward solving identity problems was taken three years ago when the Womack Publishing Company began publishing a Smith Mountain Lake phone book. The move consolidated listings from four different phone books.
AT&T also helped by cross-referencing phone numbers from three counties under a single directory assistance listing. Before, callers who asked for a friend's or relative's phone number at Smith Mountain Lake were told that no such place existed.
Diane White, a representative of the lake phone book, said the directory assistance system is still not foolproof. "Sometimes they can find you and sometimes they can't," she said.
White said she thinks the telephone companies have made an effort to help, but because the lake was put in the middle of several counties and exchanges there isn't much they can really do to alleviate confusion.
And to confuse matters even more, Bedford, Franklin and Pittsylvania counties are served by three different telephone companies and two different area codes. A call between two companies' calling areas is long distance, no matter how close they are.
Don Reid of C&P Telephone Company, which serves Bedford County, said one possible solution would be Extended Area Service, which allows phone customers to "extend" their local calling area by paying a monthly charge and a percentage of the regular long distance rate per call.
Setting extended service would require a lengthy process, however, including surveys and a petition to the State Corporation Commission. C&P is considering EAS service linking Bedford County with Roanoke and Lynchburg, Reid said.
While nearly everyone seems to be concerned about postal and phone zones in the area, most are content merely to grumble about it. Few actually complain to the people who can change service; it's an inconvenience, but not intolerable.
Fields said the Postal Service does not plan to build any new facilities. It might consider expanding in other ways, however, such as new contract stations.
Memo: CORRECTION