Fleeing Hurricane Rita - Update September 23, 2005, 01:52:32 am Yahoo Message Number: 58291It took us 7 hours to travel 228 miles from Montgomery County, north of Houston, to Fredericksburg, TX, in the TX Hill Country. We left at 1 PM Weds and arrived at 8 PM. This is a trip that would normally take us 5 hours. This was a piece of cake, compared to people who left on Thursday, and are still stuck in traffic. The message to the State of TX is: Get your act together! If you know a large hurricane is heading your way, make sure that roads designated as evacuation routes are adequately supplied with gasoline tankers or military re-supply vehicles, porta-johns set up at points along the highways, traffic lights at intersections are turned off and replaced with live traffic officers, and make the highways one-way...SOONER! More highways, set up to allow one-way evacuation traffic during emergencies, must be a priority. As far as I can tell, there was NO public transportation available, other than air travel for those who already had tickets, and buses for those without other transportation from the coastal areas only. If you lived inland, you were on your own.If you are someday faced with this situation, don't wait to see how bad it is forecast to get, or even the direction it it forecast to head. Put as many miles between yourself and the coastline as possible, as soon as you possibly can. This will give you options you would not have otherwise. Obviously, if you have a LD, or another RV, keep it gassed up and in ready-to-roll mode. Best wishes to all in the path of Rita, wherever she decides to head!Sharon N.
Fleeing Hurricane Rita - Update Reply #1 – September 23, 2005, 12:35:24 pm Yahoo Message Number: 58302In a message dated 9/22/2005 10:53:14 PM US Mountain Standard Time, writes: The message to the State of TX is: Get your act together! If you know a large hurricane is heading your way, make sure that roads designated as evacuation routes are adequately supplied with gasoline tankers or military re-supply vehicles, porta-johns set up at points along the highways, traffic lights at intersections are turned off and replaced with live traffic officers, and make the highways one-way...SOONER! More highways, set up to allow one-way evacuation traffic during emergencies, must be a priority. Sharon, glad to hear that you made it out safely! Your comments to the State of Texas are right on. As I watched the reports on TV, I kept commenting on why the h*ll they didn't open up the south bound lanes (or the lanes coming into the area) to people fleeing. They finally did, but too late to be of any real help...as of last night when we turned off the TV, traffic was still bumper to bumper. It's not like hurricanes are unknown in that region of the country, and after the experience with Katrina, you'd think the local and state governments would have been better prepared. If the politicians would take their heads out of the sand (or wherever else their heads may be), maybe they could actually do something useful.Linda Hylton 2004 Red 23.5' TK Timer Valley SKP Park Sutherlin, OR See where we are: http://map.datastormusers.com/user2.cfm?user=1167[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
Re: [Life With A Lazy Daze RV] Fleeing Hurricane Rita - Update Reply #2 – September 23, 2005, 01:07:57 pm Yahoo Message Number: 58306QuoteSharon, glad to hear that you made it out safely!Your comments to the State of Texas are right on. As I watched the reports Quoteon TV, I kept commenting on why the h*ll they didn't open up the south bound Quotelanes (or the lanes coming into the area) to people fleeing. They finally did, Quotebut too late to be of any real help...as of last night when we turned off theQuoteTV, traffic was still bumper to bumper. I have to chime in here, not to defend the state officials, but to say that everyone has a lot to learn from this experience. As with Katrina there is a lot of media attention to the evacuation process that tends to not provide sufficient facts to draw accurate conclusions. Here in Austin I felt inadequately informed by national and local TV feeds. Last night one local station began airing feed from channel 11 in Houston. Finally there were explanations as to why this and that was or was not happening.I won't even began to describe the logistical challenges two million evacuees has caused.Our hopes and prayers are with those is harms way.Malcolm Austin, Tx
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