What Should be Done on Smithtown's Main Street? [Poll]

Just one week ago AARP, in association with the Greater Smithtown Chamber of Commerce, Vision Long Island, the Tri-State Transportation Campaign and The Courtney Sipes Memorial Foundation, held a forum at the Frank Brush Barn to discuss the .

There was a lot of . One prominent speaker in favor of roundabouts was Assemblyman Michael Fitzpatrick, R- St. James.

“I am a very big fan, I do believe that they work, I’ve done some homework on it … if you look for solutions inside the box they’re gone, they’re not there,” he said. “I believe in it, I want to talk about it, I want to help people understand it." 

A local that spoke out in favor of roundabouts was Greg Suhr of Kings Park, who does patient transporting for doctors and maintenance work during the day. Suhr said roundabouts would work in Smithtown if the public were educated on how to use them.

“The public needs to be educated how to use these lanes. Once you know how to use them it will smooth everything out,” he said.

However after posting the story on the forum, the Smithtown Patch comment section blew up, mostly with readers opposed to roundabouts.

"They took the roundabout out in Pittsfield MA. Instead, they put in pedestrian crossing lights that cannot be ignored," wrote reader E Baum. "They hang in such a way that it is impossible to miss them. The situation has greatly improved there. Roundabouts are very difficult to navigate."

"My concern is that other than possibly at route 111, and on Edgewood at Landing and River Road, they are not needed on main street it's self ... Stopped cars in the left lane create a dangerous situation for all the other traffic," said reader UncommonSense. "The roundabouts are supposed to keep traffic flowing at a steady pace. In our case we need to stop traffic to let cars make the lefts from a safe, unencumbered turning lane, and then let traffic continue on out to 25a/ 25 at the east end."

We'd like to set up an open forum for your ideas in our comments section on how you think Main Street should be set up. In addition to a discussion in our comments we added a poll with some of the ideas presented in the comments.

This is your website, your town, so let your ideas be heard! Join the conversation, tell us what you think needs to be done to improve Main Street.