Here we are a year later and the situation on College Acres Drive is getting worse. Really, no sidewalks? A high traffic residential street that connects UNCW at one end (Racine Dr) and College Park Elementary at the other end (Oriole Dr). Wow,,, unbelievable.....

This is obviously a Traffic & Pedestrian Safety issue that is of no concern to the City of Wilmington, although it will be once a UNCW or College Park elementary student gets injured. They must have more pressing issues like trying to decide where & how to build a baseball stadium with taxpayer funds rather than reinvest in neighborhood safety.......

I'm puzzled about what was done to find a solution to this. Was the city contacted about this or was there any followup? In my experience in my neighborhood in Murraysville, it can take a lot of time and individual effort to get something done and can be frustrating. It took us more than 2 years to get the speed limit in our neighborhood reduced to 25 from 35 by going through the "normal" bureaucratic channels. Much of my travels in New Hanover County are as a bicyclist and I see lots of room for safety improvements. Can anyone give me some more information on this?

John Pesackis

Yes- I wrote a letter to Mayor Saffo that outlined the issue, safety concerns, and pictures of elementary classes from College Park elementary walking down the street to UNCW for a presentation- literally on the busy street due to no sidewalks. Mayor Saffo had no reply (obviously just sooooooo busy with important ribbon cuttings around town) but several months later I was contacted by the City Department that deals with sidewalks, only after I showed up at a hearing for Mallard Drive to get sidewalks and speed humps. Personally I don't understand why Mallard Drive received sidewalks and speed humps since they don't have an elementary school at one end of the street and a university at the other end with students constantly risking life and limb to walk and bicycle to school, let alone the residents walking their dogs and children in strollers. A speed limit change would make no difference, since Wilmington Police rarely patrol/set speed traps on College Acres Drive. The rare times that I ever saw Wilmington police 'patrolling' was when UNCW was out of session...duh....way to go!

The woman from traffic engineering was very nice and complimented my letter for outlining why sidewalks and speed bumps are needed on College Acres Dr, but said "0h so many people want sidewalks these days- we just don't know what to do about it". I have an idea- rather than keep building these bike trails that benefit few neighborhoods and connect the city from end to end , how about using theses funds for citizen safety, ie., Sidewalks and traffic calming measures! Oh wait... That makes sense and wouldn't provide a good photo op for the Mayor to ride his bike. I guess it may take a student's injury or death to finally bring attention to this matter. There have already been several pedestrian injuries including dogs being run over.

Also, according to several of the few 'old-timers' ( original residents on College Acres Dr. since the 1960's) the city promised sidewalks as part of the deal
when they incorporated College Acres into Wilmington. Obviously, sidewalks never materialized. The sidewalk and speed hump issue has been an issue and brought to the city's attention MANY times over the past 50 years (!!!) only to fall on deaf ears, all while UNCW has grown and traffic has increased on College Acres Drive.
That's great John that it only took 2 years for your neighborhood to get a speed limit change-congrats!. We've been working on it for 50 years, including getting a real stop light at College Acres Drive & Racine Drive rather than that crazy blinky light which has been a source of numerous car accidents and pedestrian injuries.

You have already done a lot of work on this. It might help to contact the TV stations and/or the newspaper and ask them to look into it. I think that WECT works with SeeClickFix and would be a good place to start. Some media exposure can provide leverage and media outlets can also help in investigating and contacting government departments that are responsible for taking care of problems.

Before I retired I didn't have time to spend on things like this. Now that I can I've found that it can take a lot patience and persistence to solve a problem. I would really like to see you pursue this and am willing to help if I can.

John Pesackis

People could care less.....