(UN)RELIABLE SOURCES: 033
CUTTING THROUGH TOWN

by FRANK O'DONNELL
JUNE 3, 2007

I was hanging out in the North Providence High parking lot recently, after a recent Babe Ruth baseball game at the high school field on Smithfield Road. It's a bit of a hike up and down the hill, but at least my windshield won't fall victim to a foul ball.

While I chatted with my buddy, I marveled at the traffic going in and out of the parking lot. It was Sunday, and even with the end of the school year fast approaching, I was certain these were not students doing some last minute cramming.

These were cut-through artists.

People who do whatever they can to avoid the congestion of North Providence's main thoroughfares by cutting through the back roads and parking lots of our fair town.

In other words, North Providence drivers.

If I've got to get from Centredale to Marieville and I don't have an hour to spare, I can do it without ever setting tire on Mineral Spring Avenue.

I've never actually used a stopwatch to see if I'm making better time, but it really doesn't matter. As long as I'm moving, I feel like I'm getting where I'm going more quickly.

A faithful correspondent disagrees with that concept. "All the cut-throughs I use from one end of Mineral Spring to the other. I realize my father was right. The shortest distance between two places is going straight, not taking side streets."

I suspect she and her dad stand alone in that belief.

Let's face it. This town is filled with cut-throughs, and we all use them.
I asked the members of the North Providence Gang to weigh in on their favorite – or, alternatively, most notorious – cut-throughs.

Most folks were more than forthcoming – some confessing that they make liberal use of cut-throughs, others pointing fingers. One Gang member was straightforward after sharing five of her favorites. "I have some secrets I don't want to let on," she wrote.

Birchwood School seems to be a popular alternate route, allowing motorists to avoid the lights at Douglas Avenue and Mineral Spring Avenue. The speed humps in front of the school, and beyond on Birchwood Drive, do little to dissuade the cut-through professionals. "Most of these offenders have their boom boxes blaring," reports one member of the Gang. I'll turn mine down from now on, I promise.

Mineral Spring Avenue Getty gets used regularly to bypass the light at MSA and Smithfield Road. No surprise, as that's been put at the top of just about everyone's list of the worst intersections in town. If only we could get the Department of Transportation to agree.

Douglas Plaza provides a way to ignore the lights at MSA and Douglas, if you're heading west on Douglas. "Just cut past Town Fair Tire," directs one Gang member, "zoom over the speed bumps, go past Cingular, and boom, you're on Mineral Spring without catching the light once or twice."

On the other side of the street, folks use the Brooks parking lot similarly.
Then there are actual streets, like Cooper Street down in Marieville, used to circumvent the lights at MSA and Charles Street. Cooper runs from the Stop & Shop on MSA to the upper part of Charles. Even the variety of lights at its MSA entrance and the two stop signs on the street itself don't turn the cut-throughists away.

The one cut-through mentioned most often is Fitzhugh Street, running up from Douglas Avenue to the high school. "That's become way too popular," writes a Gang member. "During the morning when school is going in, forget it. The line of cars goes almost to Douglas."

Sort of defeats the purpose of the cut-through, don't you think?

But, as another Gang member writers, "Hey, it's nice scenery with the houses, their flower gardens and all. I could pick up some decorating ideas, right?"

And if they ever put that Lowe's in at Rizzo Acres, just hang a right at the bottom of Fitzhugh, and get those decorating ideas serviced right away. Meanwhile, the cut-throughists will be blazing new trails through the new lot.

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Care to join the North Providence Gang? Occasionally, I send out e-mails to get the Gang's opinion on a variety of topics related to our town. If you'd like to get in on the fun, send me an e-mail at frankocomedy@cox.net and I'll sign you up!