Published Tuesday, November 30, 2004 State Maintains Hundreds Of Memorials on Roadsides By LISE FISHER New York Times Regional Newspapers NEWBERRY -- Driving back and forth along U.S. 41/27 in western Alachua County, Barbara Boykin regularly passes a grassy spot south of Newberry. There's nothing to distinguish the road's eastern shoulder except for a round sign, decorated with artificial flowers and positioned close to the brush line. It bears the name of Boykin's son LeonDre, who died in January 2003 in a roadside car accident. Troopers reported the Newberry High School graduate was driving north when he tried to pass another vehicle, lost control of the car and hit a stand of trees. He was 24. Her son had been driving to a friend's home in Newberry when the accident happened. An employee at Bear Archery in Gainesville, he had planned to marry this year, his mother said. Some people probably won't understand it, said Boykin, 54, of Archer, but as much as the marker reminds her of the crash it also helps her deal with her son's death. "It gives comfort when I pass by there," Boykin said. "At the cemetery, I know that was the final goodbye there," she said. The marker, however, is "the closure. I know that's the last place he was alive. It does something to me." Boykin isn't alone in her attachment to these simple memorial markers provided by the state. Hers is one of more than 400 that dot roadways in 18 counties that make up the Florida Department of Transportation's District 2. The area includes Alachua, Baker, Bradford, Clay, Columbia, Dixie, Duval, Gilchrist, Hamilton, Lafayette, Levy, Madison, Nassau, Putnam, St. Johns, Suwannee, Taylor and Union. Seventy-six of the markers can be found in Alachua and Bradford counties, said Gina Busscher, DOT spokeswoman for the district. In Florida, the Department of Transportation maintains the signs, which are placed as close as possible to the site where a traffic fatality occurred. They're installed at the request of relatives or friends of someone who died in a crash. Joe Kipikash, a Tampa area filmmaker now involved in making a documentary and a fictional film that explore the idea of roadside memorials, said they can be found around the world. "It crosses all cultural boundaries," Kipikash said of the memorials. Often they mark the sites of fatal auto accidents, but not exclusively. For example, the SW 34th Street Wall in Gainesville still hosts a memorial to five students murdered by serial killer Danny Rolling in 1990. The documentary Kipikash is working on is called "Descansos," a word that's Spanish in origin and means resting places. The term stems from when pallbearers would carry a coffin from someone's home to the cemetery, he said. Wherever they stopped, put down the coffin and rested, the spot was called a descansos and would be blessed. Flowers and tributes also would be placed. Kipikash's description of interviews with people who put up or visit the markers echo feelings Boykin expressed. "They feel a need to mark the spot on Earth where their son or daughter or husband or wife was alive. I hear that time and time again," Kipikash said. In an interview with a Tampa woman, filmmakers found that for four years she has almost daily visited the marker where her 18-year-old son was killed in a vehicle crash. "She just feels this closeness, and she wishes she could have been there to help her son. There's a certain sense of calm and rest comes over her when she visits the place," Kipikash said. But there are other viewpoints about the markers, he noted. In another interview that's planned, filmmakers are looking at the case of a lawyer whose son died in a traffic accident but who has gone on to defend a man arrested for taking down the markers in Colorado. The case involved an argument that the markers violated a separation of religious and governmental interests. And, Kipikash said, there also are sociological aspects to the memorials. "Death -- it's been very sanitized. Everything is very neat and clean. People don't like to talk about death. "It's been suggested in some way family and friends are sort of reaching out to the community and talking about death" through the memorials, Kipikash said. Rules regarding the placement of roadside memorials vary around the country. Florida's Highway Memorial Marker program was launched in 1997, according to the DOT. Busscher said concern about the liability and dangers posed by some memorials was one factor in developing a uniform marker. In some parts of the state, massive monuments were being raised. Busscher named examples where someone constructed a concrete memorial and where markers had been placed in medians, creating a hazard for other drivers. Except for the sanctioned markers, roadside memorials on state rights of way aren't allowed, Busscher said. But, if someone puts up a memorial right after an accident, state employees generally won't immediately remove it unless it's causing a sight hazard for other drivers. Still, hand-built memorials can be found in the area. Some are near roads but on private property. The state's markers were designed so they do not reflect any particular religion, Busscher said. Like state officials who started the program, Boykin said she hopes the memorial for her son, one of three along the stretch of road between Archer and Newberry, not only helps her and her family but other drivers. "It reminds people to drive safer," Boykin said. For more information about the filmmakers' project or to post a memorial online, go to www.roadsidetributes.org. Lise Fisher writes for The Gainesville Sun.