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April
2005 |
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Getting 'Friendly With Speeders Bike The Drive Expands Minds, Shrinks Waists Caught Red-Handed! Cameras Cut Down Violations Profile: Bike Shop Owners Treat All Bikes Equally Cycling Sisters Seek the Wheel Truth New Events Staff Has Big Plans |
Getting 'Friendly' With Speeders The city of Naperville receives numerous calls from residents requesting action to address speeding and cut-through traffic in residential areas. The vast majority of requests are related to residents' perception of unsafe vehicle speeds on their streets. Our community, like so many others across the nation, is faced with the challenge of implementing appropriate neighborhood traffic calming measures, without negatively affecting mobility and emergency responsiveness. We also must not lose sight of our responsibilities to the community as a whole in regard to maintaining safe and efficient through-street systems. Naperville's Transportation, Engineering & Development Business Group, in collaboration with the Naperville Police Department developed the Friendly Streets traffic calming program to address residential traffic concerns. The process for developing the program involved public meetings, presentations and a final recommendation to the Transportation Advisory Board, and with that board's support, it was adopted by City Council in August 2002. Friendly Streets is a comprehensive program, which includes what staff considers a compilation of the best traffic calming practices from around the world. As most traffic-related problems in neighborhoods result from the local residents themselves, Naperville requires residents and their homeowners association get involved in establishing an action plan that follows the phases of the program. Those phases include education, enforcement and engineering solutions. Since motorists are primarily aware of the posted speed limit, we are dealing with a behavioral problem, not a lack of traffic control devices. It only makes sense to put our best effort toward reaching out to people to enhance their own quality of life. We do that through the education phase, including such measures as out Friendly Streets yard signs ("This is a Friendly Street. Please drive 25."), the Pace Car program (an individual pledge to drive respectfully and obey traffic laws), and neighborhood communications through their homeowners association. The city works diligently to gain the commitment of residents toward making their neighborhood a better place to live. These educational efforts must be recurring to remind people that traffic conditions matter to their neighbors. There have been 35 neighborhood requests for Friendly Streets services since the program's adoption. Only about half of those who request services actually follow through once they learn they have to get involved in the process. When residents express their traffic concerns with such passion, it is reasonable to think their participation would follow. Applicants must return a form with at least 10 signatures of other residents who share their concern, attend meetings, and assist by communicating with the neighborhood and in the development of an action plan. Many never return the application. Actual traffic data is gathered prior to implementing any traffic calming measures, including the educational phase. After the educational phase is implemented, an "after study" is done to determine the progress or success of our efforts. If speeds are not improved, the enforcement phase may be implemented. The police department will arrange special, enhanced enforcement to drive home the point. This phase is measurably more effective than the educational phase, but limited police resources and their other commitments limit their ability to continually enforce speed limits of residential streets. We learned some valuable lessons through nearly two years of experience with the Friendly Streets program. The city classifies its roadways according to our Master Thoroughfare Plan. It establishes roadways as local/residential, neighborhood connectors, collectors, minor arterials and so on. Friendly Streets measures are applied to local/residential and neighborhood connector streets. We found a consistent 85th percentile speed of 34 mph on neighborhood connectors, streets that are still residential in nature. As Friendly Streets establishes 32 mph and above as a speeding concern, we are left with the challenge of defining the right traffic calming solutions specifically for this classification of roadway. It makes less sense to pursue extensive educational measures for these streets as they carry more than immediate residents' traffic. Educational and enhanced enforcement, unless continually applied, are not having lasting success on neighborhood connectors. So, to make the best use of time, we are considering moving more quickly to engineering solutions for neighborhood connector streets. Engineering solutions include special traffic signs, pavement markings and roadway structure changes, such as chicanes and traffic circles. This does not mean abandoning education and enforcement, but to apply our efforts toward the most effective measures, with measurable and lasting success. While the Friendly Streets program has been well-received by residents and is strongly supported by city officials, staff still considers it a reactive approach to addressing neighborhood traffic concerns. When a resident calls, we ask them to get involved in the program. To be more proactive in our services to the community as a whole, rather than neighborhood by neighborhood, we developed Traffic Safety Campaign 2005, which will apply the educational, enforcement and engineering solutions contained in Friendly Streets to the entire city. The campaign will include such initiatives as focusing on safety solutions for three high-accident intersections, city-wide promotion of our Pace Car program, consideration of increased fines for speeding in residential areas, and our efforts to develop consistent applications for addressing speeds on neighborhood connectors. Our challenge remains aligning residents' expectations of city staff toward addressing traffic conditions in their neighborhood with our responsibilities to the overall community. That may mean less attention to low volume, low-speed local streets, but it is a responsible approach to serving the community. We continue to learn through the application of the Friendly Streets program. City staff intends to apply the proper blend of Friendly Streets and community-focused efforts, such as Traffic Safety Campaign 2005, to better serve Naperville. Steve Cope is Transportation and Traffic Services Operations Manager
for the City of Naperville
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