Councillors here are considering hiring an outside company to monitor speeds on local roads.
Data collected would give council a heads up on areas of the township to be considered when it comes to speed.
The issue arose Nov. 2 following a discussion of residents’ concerns of speed in the Forestell and Roszell Road of Puslinch.
Council received letters from residents and photos of accident aftermaths in the area.
Mayor Dennis Lever said “I’ve met with some of the local residents about this a couple of times regarding their concerns about the corner.”
Those people submitted the letters and photographs to council.
Public works supervisor Don Creed said the only document he saw officially prior to the meeting referred to the potential of realignment the road.
Lever said he had suggested during budget discussions, council could review how those concerns would fit in relation to other road issues.
Lever agreed, “It’s a little bit puzzling the way these accidents happen.”
He said if one is driving northbound on Forestell and turns onto Roszell, “It’s a decreasing radius corner. You have to increase the turn of the steering wheel to get around the corner.”
Lever said as a racing buff, he noted it is the type of corner they put into race tracks on purpose, because of the difficulty for drivers to negotiate.
“My rudimentary view of this is that this is part of the problem,” Lever said.
Creed added he had done other background work and in 2005, Roszell and Forestell was put on a schedule to reduce the speed limit to 60k/h.
“But there are only two 60k/h signs – which doesn’t make it legal,” Creed said.
He said the other issue is there is no checkerboard, nor any marking chevrons around the bend.
Creed said those could be installed to determine if that has an impact. “I’ve never driven the intersection at night, but I can imagine approaching that corner without a checkerboard or chevrons in place. I imagine it’s pretty blind.”
Creed said that is one avenue council could look at but the approach would cost far less than an actual realignment of the road.
Councillor Ken Roth wondered if rumble strips would help.
Creed said strips “would definitely wake drivers up.”
However, an actually speed bump might slow down traffic, but grinding of the road to make noise strips “probably won’t slow them down a whole lot.”
Councillor Wayne Stokley said a number of residents said the OPP have not been there as often as they would like to reinforce the speed limit.
Stokley wondered if a speed monitor could be placed there as well, to log the amount of traffic and the speeds.
If the data exists, Stokley said the OPP might be more willing to do the enforcement when the traffic is high.
The downfall to that approach said Creed, is the way road signs are not enforceable because they are not legal.
Stokley said his first concern is to get data.
Creed said he recently spoke with a traffic company and the township might be able to obtain traffic count studies at a very reasonable cost.
Those would yield traffic counts and speeds, Creed said. “This may be able to answer a lot of questions on a number of issues we’ve been discussing over the last couple of months. It would give us the data and we would know the traffic counts and what speeds are happening on these roadways.”
Fielding believes that is an excellent idea.
“It seems we’re getting more and more people in with concerns about various roads. We have to have baseline numbers to know if perception is reality.”
As to the Forestell and Roszell situations, Fielding asked if the signs can be corrected.
“That way we know we are giving residents proper notification and the OPP can enforce the speeds.”
Creed said he could start on the project immediately if that is council’s wish.
He estimated it would cost roughly $2,000 plus labour – speed signs, checkerboard and chevrons.
Council endorsed the plan.
Lever agreed on a need to have data on road use. He said council needs an answer to, “What’s the real problem we are dealing with?”
Creed suggested council agree to get numbers for Watson Road and Hume Road as well, since they have been areas discussed by council.
Fielding said there are many who want the speed limits on gravel roads in front of their homes reduced to 60k/h, although there are others who do not want to see that happen.
“We need to have some definite criteria.”
The issue right now, she said, is to have the information to make those decisions.
Creed said councillors might be surprised at the information from the traffic and speed counts.
