[BC] Traffic reports

[Thomas G. Osenkowsky]

> Now you have stomped on another pet peeve of your usually mild-mannered
Editor.

I have the same opinion.....however....it's a matter of practicality.
Here in the Danbury, CT area we have people who commute to
NYC from the Waterbury, CT area. Easily a 2 hour each way
run with no impediments. Add any accidents, lane closures, etc.
and it escalates from there.

We have I-84, I-684, Saw Mill River Parkway and many two
lane major secondary roads. Even with aircraft, it is nearly
impossible to adequately cover all these roads with accuracy.
For the Greater Danbury area this would be a 20 mile radius
from the center of Danbury.

One would need multiple sources of coverage from 0530 to
0900. When I worked in Mt. Kisco, NY we used a CB radio
and that gave us a wealth of information about I-684 and the
Saw Mill. But someone had to man the radio fulltime. Tapping
into regular commuters is one resource, however, an incident
can occur two minutes after they have passed.

Getting accurate, timely traffic info is a difficult task, requiring
major resources. Even the NYC stations have to cover NJ,
Long Island, upstate....a tough job even for a helicopter. Not
even the State and local police can be on top of every incident.
Many times we tell them what is going on. We get calls from
listeners in a traffic jam asking us what's going on.

Tom Osenkowsky, CPBE