To refer to the White River Bridge as “410s No. 1 chokepoint” (“State Survey seeks information from 410 drivers,” published July 18) is simply ridiculous.

By definition, a chokepoint is a place where too much traffic is entering a space that is too small to hold it, either because the space narrows or excess traffic is entering. The bridge is exactly as wide as the road leading into and away from it.

The chokepoint is a couple hundred yards above the bridge where 244th is putting traffic into an already maxed out road. Traffic backs up on both 410 and 244th because the traffic flow doubles at that point forcing the speed on 410 to drop dramatically.

Presently, the bridge has exactly nothing to do with it. If all that is done is to double the capacity of the bridge the traffic will just stop when four lanes narrow back into two.

The width of 410 leading into Buckley will have to be widened as well, as will the road from 244th to the bridge. If we want to fix the back-up, the road accepting double the additional traffic has to double in width.

Robert DuChaine

Buckley