Lakewood Boulevard lights

Dear Editor:I went shopping at Best Buy at Downey Landing and for the first time experienced the new re-aligned Lakewood-Clark (I refuse to recognize the puff name for the street between Imperial and Lakewood - just ridiculous) intersection, and just wonder: what were they thinking? To put another signal in without ripping out the one for Downey Studios, plus the one at Lakewood-Donovan/Ross which was only (or largely) put in to accommodate southbound traffic needing to access Clark Street (or at least, that's how the motoring public saw it as flow down that narrow, apartment-building lined street sky-rocketed) is...what is the word I'm searching for...nuts! You now have a stretch of Lakewood Boulevard (which was a great conduit for travel through Downey as it had a minimum of signal-controlled intersections - usually restricted to major cross streets) jammed up with signals at Donovan/Ross, Columbia Way, Downey Studios and Alameda - all in a space of approximately 1/4 mile. Aren't there some guidelines from DOT/CalTrans on the minimum proximity of signal placement that are relevant? This is nothing but a recipe for gridlock; or would be if we actually had a functioning economy where goods/services/people were in motion. Why is Downey Studios still given Lakewood Boulevard access, and not re-aligned over to Bellflower Boulevard at that signal for Steve Horn Way, which would be much more logical, and still have easy freeway access? -- Drew Kelley, Downey

********** Published: January 5, 2012 - Volume 10 - Issue 38