WHITMAN – Speed limits on Auburn Street are a concern for some area residents following road work on that roadway, prompting a request reducing speeds to 35 miles per hour from Bedford Street to Capt. Allen Way and 40 miles per hour from Capt. Allen Way to the Brockton line.
The petitioners say the speeds are similar those in heavily settled sections of Temple Street. No passing would be permitted between Bedford Street and Capt. Allen Way under the residents’ proposal.
Changing the speed limit would take more than a vote from the Select Board, according to Police Chief Timothy Hanlon.
“It’s not as easy as saying, ‘Let’s change the signs and get it done,’” Hanlon said. “I wish it was that easy, because I think probably, we’re all in agreement that those speeds are too high.”
The process is spelled out by and requires approval by MassDOT following a request from the town to the MassDOT district office, which then would conduct an engineering justification study after receiving proposed numerical speed limits from the city or town. The data is reviewed by the traffic and safety section before the state office of MassDOT prepares the regulation and it comes before the Select Board for approval. They also have to wait until the road is repaved to prove the effect on speeds.
Town Administrator Mary Beth Carter said that after the repaving, the police could use its sign board to survey speeds to determine the direction in which the town should go.
The Select Board voted to begin the MassDOT process now, so it would be in a better position to move forward faster once the repaving is completed.
“Our DPW department has limited the speed very well for over a year and a half and we appreciate that,” Robert Kimball, a resident of the Village at Auburnville, said during the Select Board meeting on Tuesday, Aug. 1. “Moving forward, we’re concerned about the speed. Once the new pavement is put in, it’s going to be a superhighway down there.”
Hanlon did agree that the “natural inclination” on a newly paved road with no bumps for a lot of people is to “put the pedal down a little bit more than you normally would just because the road surface is free of defects. That’s really the issue, I think,” he said. “It’s not just the speed, but once it gets paved correctly, we’re going to maybe see that increase.”
The Department of Public Works has been replacing sewer mains on the roadway, which had kept speeds lower.
Some 25 residents had petitioned the board for a reduction in speeds in 2021.
Kimball said there are two curves on the road in the section in which they seek speed reduction – one is “minor,” but the other, at Beaver Street, is “pretty significant” and there is an issue with site lines for drivers looking to the east as they try to exit Auburnville Way.
There are also no sidewalks on that section of Auburn Street, another concern as some of the elder residents of Auburnville Way no longer hold drivers’ licenses and walk to shops on Bedford Street.
“I know a lot of times, when you try to put a speed limit on a road, they do all kinds of fancy tracking of the speed and then they say that’s what the speed limit should be,” Kimball said. “I would like to see the speed limit put on before we get into that position.”
Prior to construction, sections of Auburn Street had a 45 mile per hour speed limit, he said, adding that the section between Hogg Memorial Drive and the Carousel Family Fun Center roller skating rink had changed considerably over the past 25 years.
“It was a rural area when I lived in another town,” he said. “It’s no longer that.”
There have been 165 new units of housing built in the area in recent years with another entering the design phase now.
Kimball read a list of other roads, some state-owned such as sections of Route 18, that have posted speed limits of between 40 and 35 mph.
“You certainly make a good case,” said Board Chair Dr. Carl Kowalski.
Carter said the current speed limit between Bedford and Beaver streets is 40 mph and from Beaver Street to the Brockton line it is 45 mph.
“There is a process in place for the town to make a request to the MassDOT district office to request special speed regulations,” she said. The steps would include the type of traffic study Kimball referred to, if that was something the board wanted to consider.
Hanlon said the department does receive periodic requests for traffic enforcement, which often involve concerns about speeding.
“We also have a couple sign boards we can put out and we do our own little traffic survey to see where we land as far as how many cars are speeding, how fast they’re going,” he said. The speed boards also record data for the department.
“It doesn’t flash back at you,” Hanlon said about the speed boards’ function. “Your speed doesn’t show up – that’s how we do the survey. It records in the background for every car that comes by.”
The Whitman Police conducted speed studies in March and April 2022, including the area of Auburn Street and Auburnville Way, each time recording speeds on the roadway for a week. The average speed was 34.7 mph toward Brockton and 40,1 mph headed east toward Route 18.