With the new elementary school opening in August, this measure gives the neighborhood options and as this is our first traffic calming hearing, I am very interested in hearing opinions from all the residents affected. Public Hearing Documents
The City of Dunwoody, GA will be conducting a Public Hearing on Monday, April 13, 2009 at 7 pm to consider accepting the attached plan and initiating the final petition process for Traffic Calming in Land Lot 361 of the 18th District on Village Creek Drive between Womack Road and Olde Village Lane.
The residents of Village Mill Subdivision have been working with DeKalb County for over eight years to address the excessive speed of vehicles traveling through the neighborhood. DeKalb County performed a traffic study in 2005 that confirmed that speeding does exist on Village Creek Drive between Womack Road and Olde Village Lane. The 85th percentile speed of 39 mph on a road posted at 25 mph, meets the criteria for traffic calming measures which is generally accepted to be 11 mph or more over the posted speed.
The initiator(s) from the neighborhood met with the DeKalb County design engineer for this affected area to discuss alternate methods of traffic calming available to them and to review the proposed plans. DeKalb County held a Public Meeting with the neighborhood in April 2008 and worked with the residents to develop the attached plan to install six (6) Speed Tables on Village Creek Drive. The initiator(s) took this plan back to their neighborhood and they conveyed to the staff that they are in support of the attached proposed design and with moving forward to the final petition process. This plan was presented to the DeKalb Board of Commissioners for acceptance and the initiation of the final petition process in October 2008, but the BOC tabled the action due to the pending incorporation of the City of Dunwoody.
The initiator(s) have requested that the City pick up and continue the process with this neighborhood at the point in the process they were with DeKalb on December 1, 2008 when the City was incorporated. This Public Hearing has been advertised and appropriate signs have been posted notifying residents in the area. If the plan is accepted by the City Council, the initiator(s) will have 90 days to acquire 65% valid “yes” signatures from the 46 affected property owners in the affected area on Village Creek Drive and Village Creek Court.
These "traffic-calming" areas tend to be unattractive. How will this affect home sales in this area? I would not think these would be too attractive to potential homebuyers.
ReplyDeleteI agree with you that most of the measures I've seen around the Atlanta area are not attractive. In part, I think this is because when an effort is made, it is repeatedly damaged by careless drivers. I know this was the case on West Nancy Creek Drive. The first efforts they installed were attractive, but several times over at least a few months, people kept overrunning the pavement stones used as borders, damaging everything planted within.
ReplyDeleteI find speeders, especially those who do not appear to be paying any attention to their surroundings, even less attractive than the means deployed here to calm traffic. I know when I've shopped for houses, many times I've refused to even stop for a look if I've noticed lots of fast traffic passing.
I live on Valley View Road and our massive speed bumps do not deter all who use the road as a by-pass. Most mornings and evenings as I wash dishes and prepare food at the window, I watch and chuckle as the same folks try to save time and bottom out or leave the ground. However, I know the bumps slow most folks who might otherwise speed down the road. The county removed them for a time and speeds rapidly increased until the county replaced them.
Just a thought...
Thank you for your thoughts - I was just contemplating on how those speed islands are viewed.
ReplyDeleteAlso, how do we go about getting these on Peeler Road? I was almost blown over by the wind of a speeding car just getting the mail out of my mailbox.