City Council considers town-wide 25 mPH speed limit

In a drastic move to confront speeding, Charlottesville City Council has considered making a uniform 25 mph speed limit throughout the city, an area covering 10.4 miles. At their September 5 meeting, Council heard from a traffic consultant, Bill Wuensch, who reviewed how speed limits are set and strategies to enforce those speeds.
Wuensch first reviewed communities in Colorado and Oregon that considered—but ultimately didn’t institute—a uniform 25 mph speed limit. He then noted that it is more dangerous when motorists travel at varying speeds, as opposed to higher speeds, and that when collector and arterial roads become clogged, drivers start taking neighborhood cut-throughs.
What is to be done about speeding? Education tops the list, the Council was told, in the form of a public service campaign (a la water conservation campaigns during droughts), to let people know why speeding is bad. The consultant also brought up the possibility of raising speed limits on certain streets where speeding is constant, and that increasing fines can also work.
For the most part, Council liked the education idea. “The thing that made a difference for me was getting caught by an officer who just said to me, ‘Ma’am, if you don’t slow down, somebody is going to get hurt,’” said Councilor Kendra Hamilton. “What helped me was having somebody just make me think about what I was doing.”
Police Chief Tim Longo warned that he didn’t want to set up false expectations for citizens, and that with his current staff, he couldn’t enforce a citywide 25 mph speed limit. He said that he would be interested in increased fines. “If there is a way to take a portion of those moneys to fund additional enforcement officers,” said Longo, “we’d be happy to accept those responsibilities.”
Councilor Kevin Lynch, however, had hard words for the report. “What I hear coming back from staff is a great excuse for doing nothing,” said Lynch. “We ought to extend to the streets in the south side of the city, and elsewhere, the same consideration we already extend to the north side of the city,” where speed limits are predominately 25 mph.
Hamilton responded that policy should be driven by data, prompting the council to ask for more numbers on neighborhood roads such as Old Lynchburg.