A reporter, who otherwise got little about Roosevelt Island right, once wrote that our largest “crop” here appears to be stop signs.  That was in the days when the signs were on those posts planted in tubs of concrete and set on Main Street’s center line.

That’s changed now.  Our stop signs are off the roadway now, on curb posts or affixed to the concrete of a building.

And something else has changed.  Drivers seem to feel increasingly free to ignore the stop signs, in some cases barrelling through two or three in succession, accelerating all the way.

The other night, as I was making my customary full, dead stops at the signs (trying, I suppose, to set an example), the driver of a white van behind me sounded his horn, then pulled out, passed me, and charged through two stop signs before hanging a left into forbidden territory in an alleyway between Eastwood buildings.

An emergency, I thought.  But when I passed the alleyway, the driver-in-a-rush was leaning on his vehicle in casual conversation with somebody.  No emergency, and illegally parked.

There is, I suppose, a natural tendency to cheat stop signs... to “kiss” the brake pedal and, having made sure nobody’s headed into the crosswalk, to roll on through.  This may be especially true on Roosevelt Island, where your automatic transmission barely shifts out of its lowest gear before you encounter another red octagon.

And it could be that cheating the stop signs then leads to ignoring them altogether.  A few mornings after the episode of the white van, I was biking and making the transition from sidewalk to street via a crosswalk.  I was traveling at double or triple walking speed, and I surprised a driver who was either not stopping at all, or was in the process of a kiss-stop. He had moved his foot back to the accelerator pedal.  Rattled by my sudden appearance, he barely managed to stop short of kissing my rear wheel.

He was annoyed.  So was I.

Thus, the question:  What can we do – what can Public Safety do – to enforce the law on stop signs?  I suspect that a few weeks of handing a moving violation citation to anybody who fails to make a full stop would go a long way toward discouraging the practice.  And for those who ignore the signs completely, a reckless driving charge might prove a cure.

I also think that adding the word FULL to the signs, and posting some kind of warning at the ramp, might help.  Something visual indicating a change of attitude on the part of Public Safety should certainly accompany any change.

That may not be it.  But whatever it is, it should start yesterday.  Let’s get Roosevelt Island traffic under control.

DL