Sunday afternoon showed why trucks are not supposed to be on Boone Avenue, after a tractor-trailer tore down power lines and a utility pole.

Winchester Police have been trying to combat the problem by ticketing truckers who use the route from Maple Street to Boone Avenue as a shortcut from Interstate 64 to Interstate 75, or vice versa.

According to Winchester Police, calling it an uphill battle is an understatement.

“The officer will ask if they have a delivery in the city,” Winchester Police Chief Kevin Palmer said. “A lot of them will say they’re cutting through. Once they’re told it’s not a truck route, they blame it on their navigation system.”

Truck traffic is supposed to get off at exit 94 and take Bypass Road through town to Ky. 627, he said. A lot of navigation systems, Palmer said, do not show Boone Avenue is not a truck route.

Getting the situation fixed has fallen on deaf ears, if the message ever reached actual ears. GIS officials contacted multiple vehicle navigation service companies, but nothing has happened.

“That’s not going to get fixed,” he said. “There’s a dozen signs on I-64 that tell trucks to get off at the 94 exit. If the signs aren’t getting looked at and data is flawed, then we’re left with enforcement.”

Officers have been stopping trucks on Maple Street before they get into downtown and have been writing tickets.

Unlike local drivers and residents, tickets may have little effect on most truckers, he said.

“This tractor-trailer may never come through Winchester again,” Palmer said. “That doesn’t mean we won’t cite them, but it won’t have the same effect. The quote I heard was, ‘There’s no lesson to be learned here.’”

Because Maple Street and Boone Avenue are state highways, Palmer said the city can’t add additional signs to warn truckers.

Palmer said he would like to find a landowner who would allow the city to install a large sign, bigger than what the state has already installed, warning truckers not to go through town.