The City, I don’t know when, has changed the speed limit on Main Street between Farmington Rd and University street from 30 mph, to 25 mph.
That means radar cars will be out for sure because what the Uplands and Arbor residents want, including Bradley, they get.
I have no problem except that many un-expecting motorists will probably get tickets. I have no problem with tickets as it were because if you are on Main heading towards University, you know that is the “Chute”. Cars will actually race you in the right lane just to pass and get over before the mandatory right turn lane at University. I have seen cars I know must be doing 50 and 60 mph racing to the stop light. I myself, was driving and was doing almost 40 and I was passed by 3 cars on the right.
Still how they quietly got approval and changed the speed limit is amazing. It is a major street whether the Uplands likes it or not and if they are going to ticket speeders, as they should, then they better write some tickets to those Bradley students who think of nothing of walking across the street anywhere they want.
Ah hell. Who am I kidding. That is probably why they lowered the speed limit in the first place. So the kids can cross where they want. It will be interesting to see if traffic slows down as people in this town don’t drive. They qualify. Like it was NASCAR. I have actually witnessed a driver tailgating another and swerving back and forth like he was trying to keep his tires hot. Amazing.
If this pace keeps up, I predict speed bumps, 15 mph limit, no turns, and maybe a toll just to drive down Main, a public and very major thoroughfare inside of 2 years.
Before you post and tell me blah blah blah, First, I have no problem with the lower speed limit but be fair and enforce the jay walking too. If you want a private street, fine, don’t expect my tax money to plow it or upkeep it. If you want privacy and a quiet traffic free neighborhood, then buying a house across from a major University off a main street, named Main Street wasn’t probably a good idea. Maybe back in the 30s when most of those home were built but not now. So I think it’s wrong to penalize the whole city for a few and really, this is what this lower speed limit does and so does the No Turn signs posted and the cut backs installed to discourage cut throughs. I mean, if I wanted to smell vinegar, I’d move next to a vinegar factory, want students and parking problems with traffic? Move next to a University. Want quiet? Move to the country or Idlebrook.
10 comments:
It is the "secrecy" and Special Interest projects that anger people and this is a classic example! Your closing advice RE vinegar 'N residence is spot-on-right. It is like people who move next to airports and then complain about the noise. The Main/University area is a traffic disaster in every aspect anyway.
You do realize that some 2/3rds of the traffic on Main street is neither going to nor coming from the West Bluff. It is not Bradley traffic.
Traffic on I-74, before they expanded it was greater than it is today. When they closed the I-74 exits to redo them, much of that local traffic moved to Main St. When the I-74 exits reopened much of that traffic did not go back to using I-74.
There has also been a shift in traffic patterns away from Lincoln-Howett, MLK, and Nebraska, toward the use of the Main St. route.
It isn't a 'local' traffic problem associated with the presence of a university.
You are soooo wrong.......about the NASCAR analogy. They swerve back and forth to keep their tires clean of debris (pronounced DAY-bree for you non NASCARers). And if you wanna see some racin' in the mornings, go south on 29 out of chilli each weekday. hahaha
Neal
Mahkno, Have you driven Lincoln or Howett? Since they installed the bike lane, those streets are unbearable especially if you get behind a bus or a slow driver. I avoid those streets at all costs and as for traffic using I74 to get across town, how? I mean I use 74 to cut over to Knoxville from University but other than that if you are going downtown or even out University from the south end, you are using Main.
Most of that Main St. traffic is going East-West not North-South. We were surprised by that finding too.
Mahkno: LOL. OK I'll give ya that one. Still, with someone living out by Bellevue or in the south end, how would these people use 74 to lessen the traffic on Main? You can't avoid it plain and simple. What should be done is that the campus police (they love to pull people over) should radar Main and make people adhere to the speed limits. They should also ticket jaywalkers as there is nothing I love more than to get stopped at Farmington Rd then get stopped at the Bradley parking deck so a bike rider can ride across the street and then have to stop because 2 kids are standing in the turn lane at University. Streets are made for traffic. The posted speed limit is rarely observed. Drivers race each other to get that left lane before University. Even Stevie Wonder can see that.
BU owns that area. Period.
PAP thanks for the heads up, I travel up and down Main street several times a day. I didn't notice the change until you mentioned it. Seems like the kids at Bradley have to have headphones on or a phone in there ear 24/7. They do walk in front of traffic, without a care in the world. I would run one over, but I would have to wash my truck.
it's surprising that they didn't do this after the pakistani pedestrian guy was plowed down by a garbage truck near main and university.
I was just down there today and a group of students insisted on crossing Main a 1/2 block west of Bourland right through lunch traffic.
ASSHOLES.
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