By MARK DEVOLDER
Los Alamos

Driving in Los Alamos in the last couple of days has been miserable – drivers tailgating half car length behind my vehicle as well as behind other vehicles, drivers can’t stay in their own lane, small cars weave in and out of traffic, drivers speed, etc. Hurry, hurry, hurry. Every day in Los Alamos is getting to be worse than driving on a Chicago freeway on a Friday night. Vehicles there routinely weave across five traffic lanes. Enough is enough. Safety is out the window.

It is apparent to me that automobiles in Los Alamos County are the real weapons of mass destruction and not what LANL is designing. Perhaps we should start installing Los Alamos County drivers and their vehicles on top of ballistic missiles instead of warheads.

I have tried to make a case for improved driver training. However, the time for that has come and gone.  Ticketing drivers does not appear to be accomplishing anything. I believe that the only solution is for LAPD to start impounding vehicles. The drivers can walk home.

The major problem is where to store one third of the vehicles operated in Los Alamos County. Los Alamos County is relatively small and a large/secure (well lighted) impound lot is needed. Maybe it would be a better idea to impound the vehicles and then auction the vehicles off as rapidly as possible – say within a week.  

Many years ago, one of the LANL engineers saw a child chopping on a live tree at Fenton Lake. The engineer walked up to the child and said, “Gee! That sure is a nice axe. May I take a look at it?” The child handed over the axe. Then the engineer proceeded to throw the axe into Fenton Lake. I imagine that the axe is still there.

Maybe something will get done if a Los Alamos County driver kills someone important in Los Alamos County like a member of the County Council or some important LANL/DOE official, etc.