To the editor:

What is the big deal about cul-de-sacs?

How can the city commissioners think in any way that living in a cul-de-sac limits contact with your neighbors more than on linear streets? Or that there is less sense of community by living so closely with your neighbors?

If anything, a sense of neighborliness and friendship is promoted by this type of sharing. Maybe I’m oversimplifying the joys of living in a cul-de-sac, but it is so nice to wave to neighbors as they come and go. And there is also a safety issue of traffic awareness. You are aware of and know every car and person going in and out of the cul-de-sac. Occasionally, a strange car will drive in thinking it is a through street, but it is a very safe environment for children.

Perhaps that is why you have a choice when you buy a house. Some families enjoy the closeness and safety of this type of neighborhood. For those who don’t, they can choose to live on linear streets. But doing away with or limiting cul-de-sacs is a failure on good neighborhood planning.

I’d like to think that others in a cul-de-sac feel as we do.

Karen and Jack Keim,

Lawrence