Who in the city do I contact to get speed bumps put on my street? I live in the middle of

[Bobbieo]

a right angle cul-de-sac and for the second time this year 2 cars have crashed into 2 houses on the corner. The second crash occured Sunday night and the car actually landed inside the bedroom of a home 2 houses down from me. Luckily no one was home and no one was seriously hurt and the house has already been condemned. If we have another earthquake like we did on April 4th, the house won't have to be razed.

This is about the 12th accident on this corner in the past 20 years and slow down signs don't cut it. The police and firemen who were here agree that we need speed bumps. How do we neighbors speed up the process before someone is killed?

[ixion]

1. it depends on how your local gov is organized, but the process is the same:

find some politician to bribe, bribe them, receive speed bumps.

[Bobbieo]

2. And I tell people I get serious information on DU!!!! Thanks for nothing.

[RC]

8. Hey, it's the American way.

[ixion]

9. okay, seriously

if you have a mayor/council style-government where the city council has the power, the go to the city council. In your OP you don't provide specifics, so it's hard to offer anything concrete, even if I could.

But if you don't think there's some type of quid-pro-quo involved, I think you're in for a surprise. ;)

[OmmmSweetOmmm]

12. I have never seen a speed bump on a public road.

[ixion]

15. I have

they're at some point in a few up-scale neighborhoods.

[eShirl]

16. I have - now the fire department WILL NOT use that road, they will use side streets

instead; otherwise the fire trucks bottom out on the speed bumps

it's a major city road, too - to the state airport and National Guard Reserve base, and it's the shortest route from downtown to a couple big shopping centers and the interstate highway

[donco6]

17. We have them. n/t

[REP]

20. Streetview 444 Church St, Mountain View CA

That's one of many speed humps on a public street in my town.

[taterguy]

3. Speed bumps are rarely used on public streets due to ambulances and fire trucks

As for "speeding up the process", contact your representative, but since you didn't post where you live, we have no way of knowing who that is.

[The Straight Story]

4. In Ridgecrest, CA, we had speed dips. A lot more effective than bumps

bottoming out the car...ouch.

I would contact your mayor's office and go from there.

[Robb]

5. Yup. Mayor and city/town council folks.

Start with the politicians, they can point you to the people who actually do things in local government, but their pointing helps get things rolling. :)

[Edweird]

6. I would focus on mitigation/attenuation in the meantime.

Plant sturdy trees or build a (legal and permitted) retaining wall/planter. Maybe a fence with 4x4 12ga. steel concrete filled posts set 6' deep in 36" diameter bases. That will protect you and your neighbors and loved ones. Changes to roads and traffic control are typically difficult to initiate (legitimately). If you live in "Mayberry", it might be a piece of cake; if you live in Houston or Chicago it becomes a big deal.

[uppityperson]

7. Do you have a mayor or city council you could contact?

Do you have a mayor or city council you could contact? How about neighborhood petition, signed by those police and firemen also?

Is it paved street? One of my old neighbors (on a dirt road) regularly dug speed dips to slow people down. The city kept plowing them over, he kept digging them. Not that I'd advocate breaking the law in such a way, but just sharing a story.

[Ian David]

10. Meantime, concrete planters do wonders to stop run-away cars.

[Bobbieo]

14. I am a long-retired journalist in Yuma. AZ but have made a few enemies in my day

on the other side of the political fence. So, I'm going to go for my local state rep - an old friend. This has become a serious situation that needs to be remedied ASAP.

[Canuckistanian]

11. Go downtown

Find a little bar called "Napoli's". Go to the bar. Ask for Gino.

He'll fix you up.

[Tutonic]

13. Contact Public Works Director or Traffic Commission. They will

study situation including number of accidents, traffic citations, etc., and confer with you.

[704wipes]

21. You want HUMPS not bumps

Speed humps are the latest, lower and flatter but cars need to take them at 20mph
and I have not seen a problem with emergency vehicles here taking them.

We got them in this non-rich neighborhood because there was too much cut through traffic racing through
at rush hours and endangering school buses & kids. That could be an argument for them for you too.

Once we made it slower to cut through these neighborhoods than to stay on main thoroughfares that might
be clogged, then the cut through traffic decreased, and the traffic that remained slowed the fuck down
except for drunks on Friday night who got airborne at one of the humps and took out some mailboxes
going backwards after their brief flight.

Good luck - if your councilman is a republican have a regular voting republican contact him.
If it's a dem, you contact him for the neighborhood.

Same drill for the mayor's office.

Call the police often and ask for 'speed enforcement' during school bus times, because
if you are having a neighborhood speed problem I guarantee they are passing stopped school buses as well,
and if you can get the school system to complain via their drivers that they are being passed with stop arms out in this neighborhood that will
help get 'humps' installed.


Now when you get them, assholes will try to avoid them, even assholes in their big rugged SUVs, but they have to slow down
in order to put a set of wheels in the gutter to avoid them with one set of wheels, so same effect.

Some people will have to put nice big decorative rocks in their lawn at the ends of the speed humps if this happens to the extent that grass is being driven on, which the assholes stop doing after a while when they figure out they have to slow down to 20-25 either way.

And for anyone who finds them annoying, fuck you, you are the people we have to protect school buses and kids from. Go Screw yourself.

[eShirl]

24. No, these are what I'm talking about in my post above.

The policy for emergency vehicles is to use the side streets instead of the main road with the 20 mph speed humps, bumps, whatever you call them.

[flvegan]

18. If you're really worried, I'd fabricate a "drainage ditch" along my front.property line.

Speed bumps will take an age to get installed even if they agree with you.

An 18" deep "drainage ditch" puts any car, truck or SUV (short of Grave Digger) on its roof if done right. Once the bumps are put in, you can fill the "drainage ditch" back in.

[RB TexLa]

19. It has to basically get cleared by the major homeowners insurance companies, if they say it will

lower response times and cause them to raise rates a municipality will not put them in.

[amborin]

22. we want these, too

apparently, it's necessary to live within so many feet of a school

[704wipes]

23. see my post #21 above

If the traffic is endangering school buses/kids, it may be a key for you.
It was in our neighborhood.