Thursday, March 25, 1999
Wide-vehicle drivers face mandatory court appearance
BY TANYA ALBERT
The Cincinnati Enquirer
Drivers ignoring the Fort Washington Way ban on wide vehicles will have to come back to Cincinnati and face a judge if they're cited for going through the construction zone on the downtown expressway.
Once in court, they could face jail time.
Cincinnati city council members Wednesday unanimously passed an emergency ordinance that makes a court appearance mandatory for anyone who violates the ban on vehicles more than 7 feet wide. Cited drivers also face a minimum $200 fine up to a $500 maximum fine and/or up to 30 days in jail.
There was an urgency to have “greater teeth” in the law, Cincinnati City Councilman Todd Portune said Wednesday.
Cincinnati police have written more than 2,000 citations since construction started last summer. They stepped up enforcement in the area again in the past several days, writing 120 citations between March 15 and Tuesday, said Don Gindling, the city's Fort Washington Way construction manager.
In some cases, police officers have written more than one ticket to the same truck driver going through the construction zone.
“They consider it a cost of business,” said Charles Rubenstein, chief deputy prosecutor for Cincinnati. “The intent of this law is to stop that.”
There have not been any fatal accidents since the construction started and police and city officials want to keep it that way.
Keeping wide vehicles out of the three-quarter-mile stretch is key to doing that. While construction crews are revamping Fort Washington Way, the lanes are only 9 feet wide.
Any vehicles wider than 7 feet are dangerous for the driver and for other drivers moving through the area.
The $146.9 million Fort Washington Way project is designed to narrow the highway, which stretches from the Interstate 71-75 Brent Spence Bridge through the Lytle Tunnel, and make it safer. It should be complete in August 2000.
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