Can I Get There From Here?

What has happened to states, counties, towns, cities, and/or villages putting up street signs with actual street names on them, or, at least, putting up signs to give specific directions to a location? I went out to Riverhead today to pick up WIC checks. I mapped it on Google before I left home and did pretty well following the directions. It’s a straight shot on 25A going East. My directions told me to go to Main Street then to turn onto Peconic. I was then supposed to go to the traffic circle and get out of it at the first exit to Rte 63 then I’d find 300 Center Drive. Sounded easy enough.

I got to Main Street just fine. Nowhere, and that’s not an exaggeration, was there a street sign for Peconic. It was just by chance that I made a right turn (I was supposed to make a right onto Peconic) onto some nameless street and came to a traffic circle. How many could there be in this little place? I got into the traffic circle but, again, there was no sign for Rte 63. I was supposed to bear right so I did even though the sign said Rte 51. Then I saw signs for Suffolk County Center but I couldn’t get to the Center because there’d been a fork in the road that wasn’t mentioned on the directions. I’d gone to the right since I had no other information.

Suddenly I was passing the jail and decided that I needed to turn around since the Center was before the jail. I had to back track to get to the parking lot. Mind you, I only got there after driving around the traffic circle a couple of times and going farther up Main Street just in case there was a sign for Rte 63 that I hadn’t seen. I’d already been driving around there for 15 minutes and had called the WIC office to get better directions. The girl I spoke with told me to make the back track that I’d made.

So I made a U-turn and went into the parking lot of what I thought was the Center but the sign on the roadway said it was for Suffolk Community College. Regardless, I turned in and found a lot of buildings in there but no signs anywhere telling me where I was or what street I was on. I called the office again and told the same girl where I was. I described to her the building I was looking at and she told me to keep driving through the parking lot and to look for the brown building. NEWS FLASH: All the buildings there are brown. There was one in the far back of the complex that was dark brown but it was some sort of utility building.

Still on the phone with this girl I kept describing where I was but she couldn’t place my location in her mind. She told me to back track again to the traffic circle and to make the right and I’d see signs for the Health Center, which was the building I needed. Now I’m getting really frustrated because my van wasn’t running very smoothly and I was afraid I’d break down out there in Riverhead, miles from anyone I knew. I had Dolly with me so that would have sucked. Not to mention the fact that I am really uncomfortable getting lost when I’m alone. When I’ve got another adult in the car it isn’t a big deal.

Finally, after driving around for another 15 minutes pulled into a gas station and called the girl back. I told her that I’d try one more time to find the building but I’d go home if I couldn’t. I explained to her about the van and that I didn’t want to break down where I couldn’t get back home. I’m sure she could hear the frustration in my voice. I told her what gas station I was at and what I could see from my location. I also told her that the sign on the road in front of the parking lot that I’d just driven through (while I was on the phone with her) indicated that the college was there. Then she told me that she thought the college was a ways away from them. I asked here, “A ways away from you on the road, or a ways away from you in the parking lot?” Then she got the idea to ask someone else in her office to get on the phone with me.

A woman got on the phone and asked me exactly where I was. I told her. She directed me to go out of the parking lot of the gas station, to bear right out of the traffic circle and to fork left and go onto a smaller road. This second woman stayed on the phone with me and talked me past the first two entrances and into the third entrance of the parking lot. GUESS WHAT!! It was the exact same parking lot I’d driven through the first time when the first girl on the phone couldn’t tell me where I was. This other woman told me to go slowly and to look to my right. There was a sign that said, “Health Center” that wasn’t visible from the way I’d entered the parking lot the first time because I’d gotten there via the first entrance. She could actually see me from the window where she was standing and came downstairs to walk me up to the WIC office.

I went through all of that trouble to find a building that I’d already been looking at a half hour before. Had there been actual signs with real names and directions on them, I wouldn’t have had to keep calling and I would have just parked and gone in when I got there. I also was pissed off that Google Maps, which I use all the time and have never had a problem with, gave me bogus directions to follow. From the time I left home it should have taken me a half hour, at most, to get to the building. Because of the bad directions and lack of street signs and proper Route signs, it took me an hour. I wasted time and gas, and I was pissed.

I’m thinking that a better sign needs to be put in place there. Instead of a sign that just says, “Suffolk County Center” and “Government Offices,” there needs to be a sign like you’d see at the airport. I could be a bigger sign that actually lists the individual buildings, with arrows pointing in the direction of said buildings so that they’re more easily recognizable to those of us who need to get there. I guess I could make a suggestion to the Town of Riverhead but I think I’d be ignored. At least the next time I go there I’ll know where I’m going and won’t have to deal with all the bullshit. What’s done it done and I can’t change it now. I’m really just venting about something, I’m sure, we all deal with all the time. Now I’ll forget about it and just get on with my life.

Until next time…peace to all.