SEMINOLE COUNTY, Fla. -- People living along a residential road in Seminole County say traffic has become unbearable with trucks and other traffic taking over the road.
- Homeowners say traffic on residential road is 'unbearable'
- Residents want leaders to reduce speed limit
- Dozens have signed petition to reduce limit to 30
Those residents are continuing to push county leaders to reduce the speed limit.
Vaughn Richmond says his family hears so much noise from the traffic that passes by their North Street home, they can recognize exactly what’s going by.
“You can tell; I’m like, that’s a motorcycle, a muscle car going through, and they rev it up and intentionally blaze down this road,” Vaughn said.
North Street, which runs parallel to and in between State Roads 434 and 436, goes through mostly neighborhoods and residential areas – but eventually leads into an industrial area of Longwood.
Residents believe GPS is directing drivers, especially truck drivers, off I-4 and down North Street because the GPS route is faster than using 434 or 436.
“People are trying to beat traffic, and that’s when it picks up,” Richmond said.
When homeowners asked the county to reduce the speed limit, the county did a traffic study which showed hundreds of trucks were driving down the road each day.
But after that study, county leaders decided to keep the speed limit at 35 miles per hour.
Now, dozens of residents have signed a petition asking county leaders to reduce the speed limit to 30 in another push to alleviate traffic in the area.
Richmond has his own suggestions.
“Do things that could be unmanned and still be good speed controls, like speed bumps or speed islands, where people can’t have a direct line, or slow down every so often so they can’t build up steam,” Richmond said.
Until changes are made, Richmond says his family won’t need to look at the clock when they leave the house in the morning to know if they’re on time or not.
“Three trucks come every morning, and if we miss the third truck we know we’re running late, so you can set your watch to some of them,” Richmond said.
Spectrum News 13 is reaching out to the county’s traffic engineer to see if the county will bring the issue back up for consideration, but so far it’s unclear if that will happen.