Widening road would not make the Knolls safer

In response to the Acorn's March 7 article "Park district has issues with Knolls development," Ventura County requires two exits for a development like the one proposed in The Knolls, an especially important rule in a fire-prone area like ours.

Since the developer has only one exit, he's asking the county to drop those rules.

The rule changes that will be sent for approval to the county Board of Supervisors won't give the developer a second exit, but it will add 250 or more vehicles to the traffic jam trying to escape the next brush fire.

Narrow, hilly and winding, Katherine Road was created about 90 years ago.

It was recorded as a 20-foot right-of-way and averages about 23 feet in width today.

County requirements say the way to bring it up to standard is to widen it to 40 feet, but that could result in dozens of lawsuits as homeowners fight the confiscation of their properties. Instead the county proposes to drop its own standards and allow the developer to widen the road by about two feet.

This negligible widening would eliminate the shoulder along the road, which is heavily used by equestrians and cyclists and in place of sidewalks for the many young children walking to their school and parks.

With no sidewalks our children would be at the mercy of every vehicle whizzing around the many blind curves along the road. Tragedy would literally be around the corner.

Several things strike me about this widening proposal. Is the county preparing to drop key highway and fire safety requirements? Is the county preparing to take private property?

Is the county preparing to place our children at risk? Is all of this simply an excuse to justify approval of a project that may block our only exit and place the entire neighborhood in extreme risk during the next fire emergency?

Will our supervisors allow this to happen? Gary Selvaggio Santa Susana Knolls