traffic

jerry. the city will start a traffic survey on 47th ave. on monday, march,6,2000. Traffic counters and speed checks will be set up on about the 4400 block of 47th ave. for about two days, also streetlight intensity and placement will be investigated as well as street striping. regards jon.

By Jon Davis

traffic/speeding

Well here we are again one year and 4 months after posting the original message and nothing has changed on 47th avenue speeding problems. I have accomplished a study performed by the city on speeding after getting 20 concerned 47th ave. residents to sign for a study. Guess what; the city agrees that we do have a speeding problem, the other complaints about street lights,sidewalks,improper street striping,schoolzones;etc. have been ignored by our great;fantastic city management;as usual. We the people are not important. When someone is injured by this traffic, I will be the first one to sue the city for negligence in ignoring these problems. The local police officers also agree that we have a''very bad problem'', however they cannot be inforce on this street 24 hours a day 7 days a week. Something positive still needs to be accomplished with this problem. We need more of our residents to unite to stop these speeding jerks before they maim or kill someone.

Your Speeding Problems

Boy have we been in your shoes.

I live at 31st Avenue and Larkspur and the speeding problems was also out of hand. I complained about it forever it seemed to no avail. My son was hit by a car (and fortunately survived) and that's when I took matters into my hands.

It is a long, frustrating process. I too had to get the signatures just to get the study done. They agreed that we had a speeding problem...ranges in speed from 3 mph(probably us pulling into our driveway) to up to 80 mph. Unfortunately, the speed isn't what the study looks at...it is the amount of traffic. We were ''excessive'' on that one too (an average of 138 cars an hour). This is a residential street, 25 mph speed signs, lots of kids. I don't know if you are aware of it or not, but the city does not pay for any ''traffic'' fixes (speed humps, deterants, etc). You and your neighbors have to figure out how to pay for it. As for us, I secured the money (requested help from local businesses) and then began the pursuit of installing speed humps.

First off the city doesn't like to have them installed. They have to pay to maintain them. You will be required to obtain 70% approval signatures of the ''affected'' boundaries (the city will give you those boundaries). It takes less of a percentage to close the street off all together (I found that strange). You will also have to have 100% approval of those people where the speed humps will be within 100 feet of their homes. The speed humps must be 500 feet apart and 100 feet from any stop sign.

With 100% approval from my ''affected'' boundaries, and payment in full ($250.00 per hump--$500 if you don't qualify for the ''excessive traffic'') we had our speed humps installed.

Our traffic problems still exsist. Teenagers use the humps to ''peel out'' on. Since they are so far apart, people build up speed, just to have to slow down for the next one. Some people will even drive on the sidewalk to avoid them. We even had a police officer tell us that they don't like to travel streets with humps, so they don't patrol our street.

It took alot of work on our part. The city helped us none. And we still have problems. I think that you are more on track about calling the speeding hotline. Eventually, they get tired of the complaints and they will send officers out to sit and ''do paperwork'' on your street. This deters speeders because they are uncertain as to when the officers will be there.