Police chief: Brake retarder ban possible

Township police have good news and bad news for Towamencin residents who would like to see loud truck brakes restricted on Sumneytown Pike.

The good news is that restrictions are possible, but the bad news is that PennDOT will only allow signs on a much smaller footprint than township officials were hoping, Police Chief Tim Dickinson said Wednesday.

“We had great success with the advisory signs previously, so that was my Plan A. Unfortunately, PennDOT now will not allow us to do that,” Dickinson said.

Starting in June, township residents in the Mainland Square community off of Sumneytown Pike have asked the township to put restrictions on loud truck brakes as drivers head downhill on Sumneytown, near Wambold Road and just

west of the entrance to the Northeast Extension of the Pennsylvania Turnpike.

Dickinson told the township supervisors Wednesday that temporary advisory signs asking truck drivers not to use those loud brakes did show some success, but after further talks with PennDOT, the state

agency will not allow those advisory signs to be used everywhere police and residents would like.

“On their roads, they have the ability to regulate the signage, and the advisory signs are not PennDOT-authorized signs, so they didn’t want us to use them,” Dickinson said.

“We put them up, and they were actually very successful, because we didn’t have to be just within the areas that PennDOT allows

the prohibition signs — we could get the footprint out farther,” he said.

With the advisory signs now ruled out by PennDOT, Dickinson told the board, only one option is left to address the problem: advertising an ordinance that would prohibit the use of those loud brake retarders, which can only be done within specific areas determined by PennDOT. Those areas are, according to the chief:

• Sumneytown Pike, between Old Forty Foot Road and Wambold Road

• Allentown Road, between Fretz Road/Derstine Road and Forty Foot Road

• Wambold Road, between Sumneytown Pike and Allentown Road, portion within Towamencin Township

• Detwiler Road, between Forty Foot Road and Wambold Road.

“There will actually be two signs: you need one sign at the beginning of the

prohibition, and you need a sign at the end saying it’s the end of the prohibition,” said Dickinson.

“It says ‘Brake retarders prohibited within municipal limits,’ that’s the standard PennDOT sign, and at the end it will say ‘End brake retarder prohibition.’ This way, the truck drivers will know, ‘I can’t use it here, now I can use them,’” he said.

Even with those signs in place, two problems will still occur: police may have trouble enforcing the prohibition, and residents may still hear truck brakes from other large roads that are not restricted.

“First, you have to be able to ID which truck is using the brake retarders. You only know that by noise, and they have different levels of noise, types of noise, and if you have two trucks, you’ve got to be able to know which one it was,” Dickinson said.

Other roads in the area

would still not have the restrictions on the loud brakes, so noise could still carry from elsewhere — supervisor Dan Littley suggested much of the noise comes from the turnpike.

“I think your biggest problem right now are the cowboy jockeys out there, as they see the sound barriers going through the township on the turnpike. They’re just letting the brake retarders take over, just to hear it vibrate off the walls,” Littley said.

Supervisor David Mosesso asked if the township could communicate with the neighboring municipalities — Lower Salford, Hatfield and Franconia townships — to see if they were interested in enacting similar prohibitions, and asked if state lawmakers could be asked to help too.

“It certainly cant hurt to ask them if there’s some change to the law that could be made, some adjustment that would give us more

ability to (enact) these signs,” he said.

“The wheels of state government may take some time,” Dickinson replied.

Penalties for violating the ordinance have yet to be developed, and the board voted unanimously Wednesday to direct staff to develop a formal ordinance, which would need further approvals at the board’s next two meetings.

“Still, what we’re doing is consistent with what we’ve been doing in the first place: we’re trying to increase the footprint of the signage, so you have less of a place where you’re going to hear that (noise),” Dickinson said, imitating the rumbling of the brakes.

Towamencin’s supervisors next meet at 7:30 p.m. on Aug. 23 at the township administration building, 1090 Troxel Road.

For more information or meeting agendas and materials visit www.Towamencin.org.