THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Wednesday, February 7, 1996 TAG: 9602070408
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B3 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY KATRICE FRANKLIN, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: SUFFOLK LENGTH: Short : 42 lines
It happened three years ago, but the sights and smells of the accident are still fresh in the minds of many downtown residents.
Seven hundred pounds of pig parts spilled on Main Street, blocking the thoroughfare. The accident, caused when a driver slammed the brakes on his truck, was a visceral signal to many in the city that too many trucks were traveling through the heart of downtown.
Eventually, the City Council barred trucks that weren't making local deliveries. Now the council is looking to strengthen those regulations and widen the no-truck zone.
``We need to add teeth to the ordinance,'' City Manager Myles E. Standish said in an interview Monday. ``Say we have a chronic abuser, we would need to be able to enforce it. We need to give the Police Department the enforcement capability.''
The council will hold a public hearing tonight in Council Chambers in the City Hall complex on a provision that would add language that it is ``unlawful'' for truck drivers to travel through downtown Suffolk - except for picking up supplies and making deliveries.
The council also wants to expand the restricted area for trucks to include Main Street from the Nansemond River Bridge to Carolina Road. The ordinance already includes Pinner Street, between Newport and Katherine Streets; Kilby Avenue; Brook Avenue; Granby Street; and Fayette Street, all east of Caroline Avenue; and York and Cedar Streets, south of Hall Avenue.
Since the ordinance took effect last September, truck traffic in the area has plummeted from an average of 4,000 trucks to 1,200 a day, said Thomas G. Hines, Suffolk's director of public works.
Instead of traveling through downtown Suffolk to reach U.S. Route 13 and State Route 32 to North Carolina, trucks have been rerouted to the city's Industrial Access Road from Wilroy Road and Pinner Street to County Street and Dill Road, where trucks can pick up routes 13 and 32. by CNB