Julia B. Buxton's Haunted Bridge

Having crossed its span over 18 million times in my life and being an amateur paranormal investigator, I can say with virtual certainty that the Julia B. Buxton Bridge is haunted by one or more evil spirits. There is no better explanation for the inordinately high number of breakdowns and accidents that I have witnessed on that bridge over my 30 years of driving. How else can you explain the depressing feeling that grips you as you cross the mighty Connecticut?

I suppose that part of the gloom could be due to the sad prospect of leaving Agawam behind as you travel to your significantly less charming destination. How then do you explain the anger and violence that threatens to explode from your chest as you cross westbound, back to our beloved hometown? For those of you lucky enough to work in Agawam, the daily crawl over the South End Bridge is an expedition fraught with peril. Many is the time that I have had the feeling that someone, or some thing, is pushing me to swerve from the line of cars patiently waiting in the right lane to escape the bridge’s clutches and slam into the car cruising down the left lane. Something wants me to force the car of that VIP (that is bypassing the entire backup in order to dive onto the off-ramp at the last second) into the guard rail and hopefully over it to land upside-down on the other side. I’m able to resist only by realizing that the VIP who deserves to get home before all of the rest of us might be a fellow Agawam citizen. Godspeed, whoever you are. Maybe you should call ahead for a police escort. We could all stop our cars, get out and kneel with our foreheads on the pavement as you pass us if that would help.

I also think we need to get Jennifer Love Hewitt to come to Agawam and speak to whatever entity is responsible for causing cars to run out of gas or break down smack dab in the exact middle of the bridge. Maybe she could convince the spirit or spirits to wait until the rotary to cripple the car. It’s at least a weekly occurrence that some poor soul is stuck waiting for a tow while two lanes of angry motorists alternate glaring angrily at each other and at the victim of some ghost’s cruel joke.

The traffic situation at the evening rush hour is getting worse. Just getting onto the bridge is grueling whatever direction you’re coming from. Even after you successfully escape from the bridge, you are in danger of being struck waiting to enter the rotary. My cars have been hit twice and my wife’s once while waiting for cars to pass. Apparently, the driver (assumedly not an evil spirit) behind us has decided to go ahead and enter the rotary while looking out their right ear. The evil spirits haunt that off-ramp too.

Perhaps it’s time that we move up that timetable for redesigning and reconstruction of the Route 57/Route 5/South End Bridge and South End rotary. Right now it’s on the same schedule as the project to finish the other end of Route 57. If the current letter writing campaign to get these projects in motion isn’t getting any traction, maybe the Governor and the Massachusetts Highway Department would be swayed if they knew about the dangerous poltergeists and other supernatural phenomenon that we are experiencing way out west. Granted, an exorcism may be cheaper, but the projects are already “planned”. Let’s just get going on them. I want to see them completed before I cross that bridge one last time.