Round and round we go. Or do we? It's probably too soon and unfair to gauge motoring improvements designed for the revamped but still obsolete Bourne Rotary.
You may know this busy traffic circle, at the foot of the Bourne Bridge, south of the Cape Cod Canal. Since April new painted traffic lanes have been added for safety.
I write for the Cape Cod Times as a freelancer. But more important, I live in Monument Beach in Bourne, south of the bridge, and I have to drive through the rotary a lot. Often four times a day. Sometimes more.
Mainly, I try to avoid it.
It’s vacation time, though. Sand and sun. There have been heat waves and a long holiday break as well as the Bon Jovi concert at Gray Gables and changeover Saturdays. The county fair. Road Race weekend pending. Folks visiting.
Lots of Cape visitors.
A decade ago
Rotary changes were first proposed by Bourne officials a decade ago. The idea was to resolve congestion, improve motoring safety, reduce backups to and from the bridge and make the area safer for bicyclists.
The Cape Cod Commission weighed in. So did the state Department of Transportation. There were calls for better roadway signs to guide visitors. New traffic lines were proposed.
A decade later, some improvements were implemented. This was framed by state objectives to discourage Route 25 eastbound motorists from using the Bourne Bridge and Sandwich Road to reach Route 6. That would, official sentiment noted, reduce Bourne Rotary impacts.
Across a decade, ideas changed. But basically, the goal was to reduce motoring confusion, end sudden and maddening lane changes and resulting traffic accidents as well as lowering the tension of drivers.
Now, a redesign for the rotary
Now the rotary has been redesigned, revamped, relined and re-asphalted. White lines and squiggly arrows in the asphalt. To soften the motoring experience. New signs as well.
But for motorists, without Siri telling them where to go and when to do it prior to the bridge and rotary, the new signs are situated where it seems impossible at times for drivers to safely merge or change lanes. The result: bonehead weaving and merging.
Meanwhile, drive times have changed
Drive time. Rush hour is another word to use. But I like drive time.
Drive times now stretch Thursday through Sunday evening. Yes, it’s summer. The Cape is more inviting than ever. And the housing crisis has prompted more commuting across Bourne Bridge.
Those drive times start earlier in the morning now, continue toward noon, extend in the late afternoon through the early evening. Backups grow longer.
This puts new traffic on back roads south of the bridge, notably on Shore Road and County Road. Now there are 18-wheelers, beer delivery and cola trucks and Peter Pan buses along with cement mixers and other vehicles driven with little regard for speed limit postings in neighborhoods. The goal? Avoid the northbound MacArthur Boulevard backups, of course.
An erosion of quality of life
All this leads to an erosion of quality of life for the community. It has been axiomatic for decades that savvy residents avoid the rotary and bridge on weekends. And that it is best to normally leave at least 30 minutes to reach Main Street, Buzzards Bay, from downtown Monument Beach. To cross the canal from Cataumet? Better leave yourself an hour during drive times.
So, some residents are being forced to change their grocery shopping, day care and school pickups, dental and medical appointments, participation in Council on Aging programs and restaurant dining decisions.
After years of trying to persuade supermarket companies to open a Bourne store, now some residents are forced to sacrifice shopping in Sagamore for stores at Mashpee and Falmouth, with their higher grocery prices.
A look back, way back
In the late 1950s, MassHighway proposed a cloverleaf to replace the Bourne Rotary and expedite traffic headed down-Cape across Camp Edwards to Route 6 at Sandwich. Bourne selectmen liked the proposal.
Eminent domain kicked in. There were controversial land-takings. Appeals of takings disrupted Bourne’s political order. The undeveloped tracts are still commonwealth property. They likely will figure into new Bourne Bridge plans, if they ever evolve.
In the early 1960s, Bourne selectmen asked the state to nix the cloverleaf. MassHighway acquiesced, in part to devote resources toward a Route 25 highway extension through a Buzzards Bay horse farm.
The circle has endured as an outdated motoring obstacle that Bourne residents have come to avoid whenever possible.
So, we all deal with a revised rotary. Still a relic. And there’s a basic premise. If you go and you find you have your best shot to enter the circle? Well, take it. Don’t look sideways. Hit the gas. Just like always.
Paul Gately is a former newspaper editor.
