Homes and shopping centers seem to sprout up overnight around here, so why is it taking so long to fix Creedmoor Road?

I'm talking specifically about an intersection north of the Outer Loop where Creedmoor meets Shooting Club and Nipper roads. It's really two intersections, but the two roads are so close that it could be considered one intersection.

As we reported in December, the intersection's configuration is a recipe for accidents. To cross from one side of Creedmoor to the other, motorists have to turn right from Nipper onto Creedmoor, then make a quick left onto Shooting Club (or vice versa).

Creedmoor is a two-lane road at that point with no turning lane. So if motorists have to wait for oncoming traffic before turning, vehicles behind them must come to a full stop -- at the bottom of a hill, with no shoulders to veer onto.

Too often, they cannot stop, as one(!) recent week shows:

On March 29, a 3,000-gallon propane tanker hit a vehicle on Creedmoor waiting to turn onto Shooting Club, according to Chief Ronald Roof of the Bay Leaf Fire Department. On March 31 a tractor-trailer did the same thing. On April 1, a vehicle that may have been trying to avoid a stopped car lost control at the intersection, Roof said.

The three crashes sent seven people to the hospital.

The DOT is putting in turn lanes on Creedmoor, but that work has been delayed by the need to move utilities and to get funds authorized to acquire right of way, said Wally Bowman, a regional DOT official.

Work will not begin until August or September, and could take up to 90 days to complete, Bowman said.

"We're doing everything we can to expedite the process," Bowman said.

Let us hope they do. As Roof put it: "I just hope we get to those intersection modifications before we kill someone."