Pulaski County officials are looking at reducing the speed limit on County Road 250 North. Last week, resident Greg Hilderbrandt asked the county council and commissioners to lower the speed limit from 55 to 45 miles per hour.
“There’s five residences right there in the middle,” he said. “Three residents have children. There’s another resident halfway down towards the airport that has children. And with the increased traffic over the 40 years I’ve lived there – it’s way increased and now we have the tractor-trailers going to Black Gold and when those guys go by, the house rattles and the trees shake. And it’s a danger to pull out of your driveway.”
Any speed limit change to a Pulaski County road has to be approved by both the county council and the board of commissioners. As a first step, council member Tom Roth suggested keeping the standard speed limit of 55 miles per hour for the time-being but posting signs there to remind drivers. “See how that works,” he proposed. “If that doesn’t help, then we change the speed limit.”
Council members approved his motion by a vote of five-to-two. Council member Linda Powers voted in favor. But she later said she misunderstood the motion and that she wanted the sheriff’s office to monitor the area for a month first.
The commissioners did not act on the request. Instead, it was decided that the two groups would revisit the issue, once police have had a chance to monitor traffic there.
Sheriff’s deputies began that process Thursday morning, and Sheriff Jeff Richwine reported back to the county commissioners on Monday. “From 6:35 to 8:35 on the 14th, they clocked 82 cars,” he said. “The fastest was 72 miles an hour. The next was 67. There were 17 of them traveling from 60 to 64.”
Based on that information, Richwine felt that Hilderbrandt had a legitimate complaint. However, the sheriff also planned to do a similar check during the evening one day this week.
This isn’t the first time residents have called for a lower speed limit on 250 North. County officials took steps to establish a 45-mile-per-hour speed limit on the eastern portion of the road about a year-and-a-half ago.
