Resident wants answers on Speed Cushion “pilot”

November 3, 2016 · 0 Comments

After reading a recent article appearing in The Auroran entitled “Safety trumps cost as speed hump project moves forward’, I submitted the following questions, in writing, to Town Council:

1. One of the councillors told me that Council made a decision not to delay the installation of speed humps on Mavrinac, Kennedy West, and McMaster due to “severe safety concerns”, even if it meant going over budget. What criteria constitutes “severe” concerns as opposed to lesser ones?
2. How was it determined that the three streets slated for the pilot project met these criteria?
3. Are those same three streets the only ones in Aurora which met these criteria and if so, how was that determined?
4. By deterring speeding, is the pilot project aimed at “reducing” accidents or “preventing” them on these same three streets, as both scenarios differ widely in scope?
5. Why can’t data obtained from streets that have already had similar speed humps in place (i.e. Kennedy and Golf Links) for longer than the proposed duration of the pilot project be used to determine the efficacy of it? (Hold on a sec! Doesn’t that mean the pilot project isn’t really a “pilot” project?)
6. One of the Councillors told me that, in the future, “the remaining streets having concerns with Traffic Safety/speeds brought forward….will be going through the warrant process and will need to qualify before further traffic calming measures are implemented.” What are the qualifications?
7. One of the Councillors told me that the concern of residents coming forward with traffic safety issues is why she brought the Traffic Advisory Committee back – “to handle such requests and ensure proper processes are followed avoiding this type of situation.” Were proper processes not followed in this case? Exactly what is “this situation” that Council wishes to avoid?

Interestingly enough, Council has declined to answer any of these questions.
One can only speculate as to the reason. Perhaps it’s because someone is questioning why so much tax money is being wasted on a project that has not been proven to be warranted. Perhaps it’s because someone is questioning why the safety of families on three streets in Town is more important than the safety of the families on all the other streets.
Perhaps it’s because Council heard a localized special interest group of homeowners yelling, “The sky is falling, the sky is falling!” and without bothering to look and see if it actually was, decided it was in the best interest of all homeowners in Town to go ahead with the funding anyway.
Perhaps someone from Council would explain to Auroran readers, a lot of whom don’t live on the three designated streets, like myself, why this “pilot project” is in the best interest of everybody in Aurora.

Stewart Ivol
Aurora