Dear Mahatma: I read where an Oklahoma law forbidding motorists on four-lane highways to impede traffic by traveling in the left lane resulted in dozens of citations since going into effect last year. Sixty people were cited for violating the "left lane" law during the first three months it was enacted. Too bad they never ever issue these tickets in Arkansas. -- Grumpy Old Coot
Dear Grumpy: Congratulations on living up to your name.
Let's review. Arkansas Code Annotated 27-51-301(b) says vehicles shall not be operated continuously in the left lane of a multilane roadway whenever it impedes the flow of other traffic. We asked the Department of Finance & Administration to define "never ever" for the years 2016 and 2017.
The Driver Services Division found 421 such tickets issued in 2016 and 363 in 2017.
What you really meant to say, Grumpy Old Coot, is that you personally never saw law enforcement write a ticket to some clod who was clogging up the fast lane on Interstate 40 while you were commuting from Little Rock to Conway.
Just because you didn't personally see it doesn't mean it didn't happen.
We have some further information about this from The Associated Press, which reports that in Virginia, from July 2017 through April 3, more than 16,000 people were cited under various parts of that state's law against driving too slowly in the left lane of a multilane highway.
Holy ... fill in the blank! Sixteen thousand is a whole lot more than dozens in Oklahoma, or 421 and 363 in Arkansas.
We are compelled to note that the matter of slowpokes in the left lane has been addressed here since either the invention of the automobile or the invention of this column, whichever came second.
Dear Mahatma: I have a couple questions about the intersection of Cantrell Road and Pleasant Valley Drive. According to the signage, the road which heads north from Cantrell opposite the northern terminus of Pleasant Valley is "Pine Buro Road." I have discovered that "buro" is a rather obscure alternative form of "bureau," meaning "a chest of drawers." How did this road get its name? Has it always been called "Pine Buro?" I don't remember ever seeing the name until the intersection was upgraded. -- Drew
Dear Drew: We suspect hardly anyone knew about Pine Buro Road until a reader wrote in to say the signage at the new northbound Interstate 430 on-ramp inadvertently sent him up Pine Buro Road and into someone's driveway. The Arkansas Highway and Transportation Department, to its credit, changed the signage in the state agency equivalent of a New York minute.
But, frankly, we have no idea whom to ask these questions. Stumped, we are, as Yoda would have said. When stumped, we to turn to the wisdom of the crowd. That is, we ask our readers.
People, what's up with the name of Pine Buro Road?
Vanity plate on an Acura: AAHH.
Fjfellone@gmail.com
Metro on 06/16/2018