Loganville updates ordinance on traffic calming devices

With traffic often a bone of contention for residents in Loganville, the City has updated its ordinance to include specific language on traffic calming devices.

At Monday’s City Council meeting, City Attorney Robyn Webb explained that although the devices are referred to in the ordinance as traffic calming devices, these devices do include speed humps. Residents in Teresa Lane had requested, and are getting, speed humps to help slow down the traffic on the road. However, the updated ordinance to be voted on at Thursday’s City Council meeting lays out the criteria for neighborhoods that may request traffic calming devices in the future. Webb said the change to use of the term “traffic calming devices” gives the city council a little more flexibility should other means of slowing down traffic come up in the future.

“The other big change is this does allow for partial funding by neighbors who are petitioning,” Webb said. “They would pay 50 percent of the device itself and pay for property acquirement and any landscaping around it. It is possibly that may not be necessary, but they need to know that any kind of road may have right of way, but we don’t own it.”

Webb said before the city would consider a traffic calming device for a neighborhood 75 percent of the property owners in the neighborhood, with one petitioner per household, had to petition the city. There are then other qualifications needed for residents to apply for a traffic calming device in a Loganville city neighborhood.

According to the terms of the ordinance, traffic calming devices can only be installed on two-lane roads maintained by the City of Loganville within residential neighborhoods. Before the city will consider installing such a device in any particular area, the city’s streets and highway division of the Public Utilities Department will conduct a study to ascertain whether a speeding problem exists based on a standard of an 85th percentile speed of at least 10 mph over the posted speed limit of 25 mph or less. Also, the daily traffic on that particular road must be less than 4,000 vehicles and the structure of the road must be such that the traffic calming devices can be spaced between 250 – 500 feet apart and not located in any curves or on hills.

Officials said under this ordinance a petition by residents in Huntington Ridge for speed humps in the neighborhood does not qualify.