Council wants portable radar speed sign

Police Department would use device throughout community

Madison Village is planning to purchase a portable radar speed sign that the Police Department can use.

Madison Village is planning to purchase a portable radar speed sign that the Police Department can use in locations throughout the community.

Village Council, at its meeting this week, heard the first reading of legislation to appropriate $3,270 to purchase the sign, as well as related software and brackets.

Council could not pass the measure on an emergency basis because it lacked the four votes needed to suspend council rules. Council member H.O. Jay Adams and President Duane Frager were absent from the March 4 meeting, leaving just three remaining members to vote on legislation.

A purchase order to acquire the sign and accessories from A & A Safety also was tabled until the next council meeting on March 18.

The idea to purchase the portable speed sign was discussed by council and Police Chief Troy McIntosh at the workshop that preceded the panel’s Feb. 19 meeting.

During the session, village leaders discussed possible solutions to reports of speeding on Hyder Drive.

“I brought up that our officers have been up there (on Hyder Drive) quite frequently since this was first brought up back in January,” McIntosh said after the March 4 meeting.

McIntosh told council at the Feb. 19 workshop that police haven’t detected any speeding issues on Hyder

“This is a portable item that can be easily moved if we have reports of traffic concerns in a certain area. We can leave it there and be able to determine what kind of problem we have, the time of the day it might be occurring, and it could help us to do some targeted enforcement in these areas.”

— Madison Police Chief Troy McIntosh

Drive, but after further discussion on traffic enforcement throughout the village, the sign came up as an option.

“This is a portable item that can be easily moved if we have reports of traffic concerns in a certain area,” the chief said. “We can leave it there and be able to determine what kind of problem we have, the time of the day it might be occurring, and it could help us to do some targeted enforcement in these areas.”

Hyder Drive resident Rick Goodnight appeared at the Jan. 7 council meeting, and said that his dog recently was run over on the street. The motorist then stopped and admitted to driving 40 mph — 15 mph over the street’s posted speed limit — at the time the canine was struck.

Goodnight said he has noticed vehicles speeding frequently on Hyder Drive and was concerned that a child might get injured or killed. He also requested that stop signs be posted on the road.

At the Feb. 4 council meeting, village leaders shared their thoughts about what might work to slow motorists on Hyder Drive, a dead-end side street located just east of the village’s downtown, on the south side of Route 84.

Village Engineer Eric Haibach said stop signs are not speed-control devices and wouldn’t help to slow drivers.

While Adams suggested portable speed bumps that could be taken out for the winter or as needed, Councilman Mark Vest countered that speeding is a traffic violation that needs to be addressed through the Police Department.

Councilman Robert Lee talked about how other Northeast Ohio cities have successfully addressed speeding problems through the use of portable traffic cameras.

McIntosh said on March 4 that in addition to enhanced police surveillance in the early part of the year, he researched traffic crashes and citations on the street for a longer period of time.

“We looked back over the last two years and we didn’t find that there’s been a single other accident up there on Hyder Drive. And very few citations have been issued up there,” he said.