The road to ruin

SALISBURY POST

We already knew that potholes were a jarring problem on North Carolina roads.

Now comes news of another widespread hazard for drivers: malfunctioning traffic signals. A study by the Raleigh News & Observer found that a third of the state’s traffic lights are on the blink, primarily in larger cities such as Raleigh and Charlotte.

The problems range from burned-out bulbs to lights whose timing cycles are out of sync, disrupting traffic flows and inconveniencing drivers. Malfunctioning signals aren’t simply a safety hazard or an inconvenience; they also can lower gasoline mileage by adding more stops to a trip and worsen air pollution by increasing the time vehicles idle at red lights.

The culprit, state officials say, is a familiar one: a budget bias that favors pouring new pavement over maintaining the highways already in place. In the past two years, legislators have put more money into highway maintenance. But here’s an idea that might turbocharge the drive to put repair work on a par with building new roads: Start naming traffic signal systems — and potholes — after state officials.