Multi-year effort to slow traffic in area bears fruit
Traffic should be moving through the village are of Unionville a bit slower pace soon, after East Marlborough Township Supervisors formally approved a reduction in speed limits to 30 on Route 82 from the roundabout to Mill Road.
By Mike McGann, Editor, The Times
EAST MARLBOROUGH — Township supervisors approved a reduction of the speed limit in the Unionville village area of Route 82 from 35 to 30 MPH, capping a multi-year effort to slow traffic speeds in the corridor.
Supervisors approved amending the township’s current ordinances Monday night, to cut the speed limit from the roundabout north to Mill Road, but pledged the speed cuts would be just the first methods to calm traffic in the historic village.
While the ordinance goes into effect Saturday, the speeds won’t be in force until the current batch of speed limit signs can be replaced, which may take some time, officials said.
The change in speed limits, though, are likely to be just one of many measures used to calm traffic in the historic corridor. According to Richard Hannum, the township supervisor who has helped lead the township’s Safety Committee study of the area, crosswalks will likely be added and other measures — including signs noting the historic nature of the village.
And work will continue — including looking at sidewalk construction — to make the entire corridor safer for pedestrians. With the new Unionville Park slated to shortly begin construction, as well as Unionville Elementary School and the Unionville Recreation Association complex, in the corridor, the hope is to make the entire stretch safely walkable.
But changing the speed limits — which township officials have sought to do for a number of years but were unable previously to get approval from the Pennsylvania Department of Transportation (PennDOT) — should have a major impact, officials said.
“This is a huge step,” Hannum said.
Hannum gave much of the credit for the change to village resident Jack Greenwood, who worked to find criteria that would get PennDOT approval for the speed change.
While I support this, I do find it somewhat depressing that lowering a speed limit on a quarter mile of road from 35MPH to 30MPH is what qualifies as, in Hannum’s words “a huge step” in East Marlborough. Maybe a new business park with new, professional jobs would be a huge step. The ability to give 40 more traffic tickets a year does not strike me as earth-shattering.