BY CHRIS GAETANO
Staff Writer
JEFF GRANIT staff A section of Davidsons Mill Road will soon have its speed limit reduced from 50 mph to 35 mph. SOUTH BRUNSWICK – The speed limit on Davidsons Mill Road will likely soon be lowered from 50 to 35 mph, much to the relief of residents fed up with speeders on the narrow, two-lane street.
The first step in reducing the street’s speed limit was taken during the South Brunswick Township Council meeting on Tuesday when a resolution authorizing a study on that road was approved. The purpose of the analysis is to confirm what police, township officials and area residents have believed for years: that most of Davidsons Mill Road is not suited for travel at 50 mph.
“We believe it warrants a reduction,” Police Chief Raymond Hayducka said during last week’s workshop meeting, when the idea was discussed.
Most of the street, which runs between Cranbury South-River Road and Route 130, already has a 35 mph speed limit due to previous efforts from area residents, though a small stretch has remained a 50 mph zone for many years. This fact has been a sore point for those living on that street who are concerned about the safety and noise levels in the road’s residential sections.
According to Davidsons Mill Road resident Bill Klimowicz, the partition was an incomplete solution that still left some inconvenienced.
“One section was helped with a speed reduction while another section had cars speed by their homes faster than ever,” said Klimowicz, who added that cars coming off the nearby turnpike tend to keep traveling swiftly down the road, despite the speed limit on most of the street.
A small patch of road in the industrial section will remain 50 mph, though it is relatively far from residents.
The completion of the study will allow the township to establish a new speed limit under local authority. This was contrasted with letting the state Department of Transportation conduct a study of its own, which Sgt. James Stoddard said would take at least a year. Presented with these options, the council agreed to put its own engineering team to work before setting a new speed limit for that road. South Brunswick officials agreed that the time to reduce that street’s speed limit has come and enthusiastically supported the initiation of a study.
“I think this is a roadway that we know we’ve all had tremendous complaints. I mean, it makes sense to me that that road is not a 50 mph road. I think that this is a proper way to combat this,” said Mayor Frank Gambatese.
Davidsons Mill Road and the vehicles that travel upon it have been the subjects of local complaints for many years. The street is located in the eastern section of South Brunswick, where warehouses and farm fields share an uneasy co-existence, standing as a patchwork contrast between the area’s rural past and industrial present. The nearby turnpike and the industrial developments built around it have been points of contention for residents who claim that their proximity to these structures has negatively impacted their quality of life, mostly due to speeders, truck traffic and pollution.
“This eastern area of South Brunswick has been punished by warehouse traffic,” said Klimowicz.
The township has made repeated attempts to mitigate the problems through various regulatory measures, though these have not always been effective. In addition to the 35 mph speed limit on most of Davidsons Mill Road, there has also been a weight limit and, in the warehouse section, a physical median meant to block trucks from making a right turn into the road’s residential area. Klimowicz has said, though, the signs are routinely ignored and the median has been run over.
Hayducka noted that police often set up direct patrols in that area, though officers can only be in so many places at once. With this in mind, though, he is confident that the reduced speed limit will make a difference.
“There’s over 600 streets in the town. We can’t be there all the time, so we think this should assist us in reducing the speed in getting people to slow down,” said Hayducka.
Klimowicz agreed reducing the speed limit on Davidsons Mill Road is the right move, though he noted that it will probably take drivers a little while to get used to having to slow down on that street. He said that the turnpike ramp acts as a speed booster for people exiting into South Brunswick.
“This lowering of the speed limit is a move in the right direction by our town officials and the South Brunswick Police Department,” Klimowicz said.
During the workshop meeting last week, Councilman Joseph Camarota said that there were other roads in town that also could stand to have a speed limit reduction, such as Beekman Road, and perhaps the council should also focus on them. Meanwhile, a private developer agreed to conduct a study on how to prevent trucks from wandering into the residential area of Davidsons Mill Road as a condition for the board’s approval of a warehouse expansion. This study is still pending.