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There are many kinds of traffic problems in Roanoke besides drivers who run red lights.

Shouldn't we have fine-issuing robocop cams for those as well?

Here are a few suggestions on OTHER kinds of automatic cameras we need locally. Please post yours as comments below.

I'll likely be exploring this issue in a future column. So when you post your comment, please use a REAL email address (it will not be available for anyone to see except me).

• On-ramp cams that will fine drivers who hit their brakes, rather then their accelerator, when they're merging into traffic.
• Cams that fine drivers who drive MORE than 10 mph BELOW the speed limit.
• Cams that fine driver who litter.

What other kinds of revenue-producing, traffic-ill curing cams do we need out there? Post below, folks!

One of Interstate 81's soon-to-close rest areas? Photo by Stephanie Klein-Davis, The Roanoke Times

It is time to retire Virginia's venerable tourism ad slogan, "Virginia is for Lovers," which turns 40 this summer.

What was once sexy and naughty is today about as worn out as your average bordello madam. Besides, it discriminates against those who, by choice or circumstance, are not exactly loving it up these days.

We here at Casey's Discount Ad Agency have come up with something much more newsy and factual, a finely tuned egalitarian motto to grab both the sex-mad and the celibate.

Even Del. Robert Marshall, R-Manassas, the legislature's Prude Caucus chairman, couldn't object to this one:

"Virginia is for bladders."

Big, expanding bladders, that is.

Giant, balloon-like reservoirs that can hold enough fluid to douse a respectable campfire, or deice a small plane.

Read the rest of the column here. And don't forget to write in with your own suggestions!

I and a handful of other Roanoke Valley cycling enthusiasts would like to introduce you to the joys of bicycle commuting.

There's no better day for that than Friday morning, which marks the Roanoke Valley's fourth annual Clean Commute Day.

Consider this an invitation to join us on a guided ride to work downtown and play a role in a fun and growing event. Depending on where you live, we'll help you get there. Our goal is to make this the biggest and best Clean Commute Day ever.

You'll meet other folks interested in bike commuting, be treated to a healthy breakfast and, if you wish, you'll be interviewed on camera about your reaction to the ride.

Read the rest of the column here.

Our subject today is wrong left turns, one-way entrances and the sometimes tortoise-like pace of progress over at Roanoke City Hall.

All of those items overlap in the story of why no fix has yet been made to a busy intersection in Northwest Roanoke that was identified as broken at least four years ago.

It also hints at a lot more: Why it took so many years to do anything with Victory Stadium. Why we're on amphitheater site No. 3, with still no city amphitheater. And why, four years and lots of studies since the city took back management of the Roanoke City Market Building, it's mostly the same old crummy building.

The dysfunctional intersection is right outside Roanoke Regional Airport. It's where the eastern end of Thirlane Road, Aviation Drive and Towne Square Boulevard all come together in a wholly impractical way.

Read the rest of the column here:

Traffic on Interstate 81/The Roanoke Times file.

Tuesday's column outlining some of the responses I received about traffic jams in Roanoke didn't do full justice to all of the chatter. Sorry about that folks -- I simply didn't have room. So here, we'll run a list of responses that didn't make it into the column, as well as the full responses I received that were truncated in the follow-up column for space reasons.

Your responses have been informative and fun to read. Thank you for taking the time to compose them. And please keep them coming! This is a great conversation.

In case you missed it, here's a link to the original column soliciting your views of traffic improvements that are needed around here.

And here's the blog entry where there were a bunch of comments posted (a couple of which are repeated here).

First up is a message from Elliot Bayer of Roanoke:

Thanks for your Sunday column. I think the worst traffic problem in the valley is Elm Ave at the intersection with Williamson Rd. Motorists routinely block this intersection causing a terrible bottleneck and making for many angry drivers. I'm a courier required to use the Elm Ave exit at I-581 and the Webber expressway six to eight times per day. At our rush hour in downtown, drivers coming from Jefferson St will pull into the intersection with Williamson Rd even when they see that traffic on the other side of the intersection is stopped at the traffic light. Then, those drivers turning left from Williamson Rd onto Elm east bound will add to the blocked intersection.

More than 2 years ago, I contacted the Police Department. Instead of committing an officer to spend some time at the intersection, I was told that they would contact Public Works to see if signs could be placed in the area asking motorists not to block the intersection. There are no signs and I doubt that signs would help, since the signs that say do not block hospital entrance are routinely ignored. One or two officers standing in this area on a varying schedule could eliminate or reduce the problem, and if citations were issued, the City would have a little more revenue.

Read more »

Let's play a little game. With apologies to Meredith Vieira, we'll call it, "Who Wants to be a Traffic Engineer?"

Here in the Roanoke Valley we're blessed in many ways, and one of the most obvious to outsiders is the relative lack of traffic jams.

Compared with the Hampton Roads Bridge-Tunnel in Tidewater, or daily nightmares on Interstates 66 and 95 in Northern Virginia, or west of Richmond on sunny mornings along eastbound Interstate 64, we've got it easy.

But even drivers in Western Virginia occasionally roll into pockets of short-lived daily frustration. And I'll bet The Roanoke Times readers know where each and every one of them is.

Intimately. With steering-wheel-pounding, blood-pressure-soaring, horn-honking familiarity.

So consider this an unscientific poll, if you will.

The first questions are: Where's the worst mini-gridlock you experience? And why does it irritate you the most? Read the rest of the column here.