No to speed hump

I live on East 6th Street and just learned (Tuesday) evening that the Boston Transportation Department plans to build a “speed hump” in the middle of East 6th between L and M (Wednesday) morning. Learned this via a sign posted on a telephone pole and by talking to my neighbor. How convenient to do this surreptitiously on both Halloween and the date of the Red Sox parade. I don’t own property in Boston (because it’s nearly impossible to as a young professional), but I’ve lived in South Boston for eight years now, my car is registered here, my license says I live here, so I should have some type of say in this type of administrative matter. Possibly more than 12 hours notice would also be appropriate. The last time I checked, the BTD wasn’t a rulemaking administrative body for the city or county, and, accordingly, I have a feeling that this idea needed to be posed to the residents of this area before taking such action. Don’t get me wrong, I think there absolutely needs to be a change made by the city after the unbelievably tragic death of that little boy on July 25. However, the only thing I’ve personally seen as being an effective deterrent to people speeding down L Street without a care in the world is police presence. Putting a speed bump in the dead center of East 6th street still gives a person 200 yards to speed up again — and what is going to happen when the snow comes in a month or two and the plows need to get through? You’ve created either an icy mess on one side of the “hump” or you’ve now torn up a speed “hump”/road — so that the city of Boston can keep churning out the work for street repairs. Put your (our) money where it matters. Pay the cops who stand on L Street and legitimately pull people over for being negligent, distracted, etc. Don’t randomly put speed “humps” in an area that isn’t close to being as heavily traveled as L Street for the purpose of keeping up the appearance of being concerned about safety. This is not going to make this street — or Boston generally — safer. The cops do.

— Christina Knobel, Boston