Most Roanokers are familiar with the stretch of road on U.S. 220 where a fuel tanker crashed and caught fire in a fatal accident. It all happened in the northbound lane near the Franklin Road exit in Roanoke.
Neighbors who live near that road say it’s full of accidents.
"We continue to say there's something going on over there. There's got to be a reason why all these vehicles are wrecking, and it's in that exact area,” said Tammie Brewster.
Ten On Your Side went to VDOT. Spokeswoman, Heidi Coy, gave some very specific accident information in that one stretch of the road, showing how many accidents were in that curve in the northbound lane. There were 14 accidents in the past five years. Those numbers only reflect accidents with an injury, fatality, or accident damage over $1,000.
Roanoke City Police have all the accident reports encompassing a larger part of U.S. 220. In both northbound and southbound lanes between Elm Avenue and Franklin Road, there were 30 crashes in 2007. So far in 2008, there were 14 crashes. Those numbers reflect varying degrees of severity.
"After any accident, we'll go out to see if there's anything obvious we can do to make improvements, whether it be raise awareness about speed, terrain, or anything about that,” said Coy.
Coy said the road was designed in 1971.
"This road was designed to use it at no greater than 55 mph, so we encourage folks really to follow the speed limit and be careful out there on the roadway,” she said.
But it’s too soon to say if there’s anything VDOT should do about this road. They say they are still waiting to hear the cause of the accident.
VDOT says that area of U.S. 220 averages 63,000 cars a day. That’s more than some areas of Interstate 81. For example, on I-81 near exit 150, the road averages about 41,000 cars a day.
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