Citation

Black T. Am. City Cty. 1998; 113(9): 7 p..

Copyright

(Copyright © 1998, Penton Media)

DOI

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PMID

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Abstract

More and more, pedestrians, bicyclists, and homeowners must put up with hyperactive traffic and inconsiderate drivers who seem always to be in a hurry. The answer, many communities are finding, is traffic calming, or using engineering, street design, and electronic means to lower traffic speed. Nascent in the United States, traffic calming began more than a quarter century ago in Europe, a land of narrower streets and smaller cars where "walkable" cities are more the norm. Medians, traffic circles, speed bumps, humps, elevated sidewalks, and sidewalk "bulbs" protruding into the street are among the wide arsenal from which traffic engineers can draw. They also can employ high-tech devices such as "photo radars" that check vehicle speeds, record the license plate numbers of violators, and automatically issue speeding tickets that will be mailed to the offenders. While traffic calming is intended primarily to slow and thin traffic, it can put a damper on criminal activities such as drug dealing and prostitution as well. Even so, law enforcement officials and other emergency personnel are some of the main critics of traffic calming. They note that traffic calming measures can interfere with access and response times. While traffic-calming processes and solutions may vary from city to city, one thing remains constant: planning and discussion generally take far longer than implementation.