Downtown Speed Bumps Rejected; Could Kent Place Be Dead-ended?

CHATHAM – Residents say that Kent Place handles more than its share of downtown traffic. It’s used as a cut-through from Cross Street to parking lots behind the town offices and the Chatham Squire, and its narrow width makes it dangerous for pedestrians who must share the road with cars, SUVs and delivery trucks that rarely obey the suggested 10 miles per hour speed limit.

 “They go ripping down that street fast,” Steve Principe, who owns the house at the corner of Kent Place and Cross Street, said at the Aug. 5 select board meeting. “Trucks do it, delivery trucks do it. I have been fearful for years.”

Principe and others have been working with the traffic safety committee on ways to improve safety on Kent Place since 2022, said chair Joan Craig. But the proposal brought before the select board last week — installing two temporary speed bumps on the road — was rejected by the select board by a 3-2 vote.

 A majority of the board said safety is a concern on many town roads during the summer, and allowing speed bumps on Kent Place would set a precedent for other residents to request the traffic calming devices on their streets. Even before last week’s hearing, two requests were made for speed bumps elsewhere in town, said Public Works Director Rob Faley, who did not support the request.

 “What I’m trying to prevent is having DPW staff spending all spring putting out speed bumps and spending all fall picking up speed bumps,” he said, “because they have to be removed for winter for plowing.” Anchoring temporary speed bumps into the pavement also leaves holes that can lead to deterioration of the road surface, he added, and permanent speed bumps or humps would create drainage issues.

 Board members questioned whether speed bumps would address what appears to be the main problem — the volume of traffic on the narrow roadway. Craig agreed, saying that she wasn’t sure the speed bumps would deter vehicles from using the road, which she called a “pathway” because of its narrow, one-vehicle width.

 “It’s not necessarily the speed, it’s the volume,” she said. Usually the committee would reject speed bumps, she added, but committee members felt the situation was unique, “one that should not set a precedent in town.”

 Instead of speed bumps, the board voted to ask town staff to investigate making the road a dead-end street by blocking off the east end, where it meets private property near the building that houses Emack and Bolio’s Ice Cream. Board members also agreed to hold a public hearing to officially lower the speed limit to 10 miles per hour; technically the current speed limit is 30 miles per hour, and the 10 mile per hour sign on the roadway now is advisory, according to Deputy Police Chief Lou Malzone.

 A traffic count over a four-day period over Labor Day weekend last year showed 861 vehicles trips down Kent Place, Malzone said. The majority of the traffic — 643 vehicles — travels east from Cross Street, with 218 coming from east to west. The average speed is 16 miles per hour, he said.

 “There’s a lot of volume on Kent Place, which I think is the main issue,” Malzone said. “It is quite a cut-through.” It’s nearly impossible for two vehicles to pass on the narrow lane, he added.

 “It’s virtually one lane, or a one-way road, or should be,” said Select Board member Shareen Davis.

 Consideration was given to making the road one-way, but Malzone said that would funnel more traffic through the town offices parking lot. Principe added that it would be unfair for the property owners on the street to have to travel through the parking lot to get to their homes. 

 While he sympathized with Kent Place residents, Chair Dean Nicastro opposed speed bumps, which he said create a “citified look. We have enough of that going on in this town.”

 “The fact that speed bumps don’t look nice shouldn’t be the reason we chose not to install them,” said Adrian Principe. Making the road a dead-end would be her first choice, she added.

 Davis, who supported speed bumps along with board member Jeff Dykens, saw no harm in trying out the traffic calming devices. “I think safety is the concern here,” she said.

 “This time of year, there are safety issues all over town,” Nicastro said. “Unless you have a police officer on every street corner, we’re going to have to deal with these things.”

 Dead-ending the road could create other problems, such as forcing delivery trucks onto Main Street, traffic safety committee member Diane Rowlings said.

 “By doing that you’re moving the safety concern from Kent Place to a safety concern on Main Street,” she said.

Board member Cory Metters said that at one time, the road dead-ended at the private parking lot at the east end.

 Town Manager Jill Goldsmith said she would work with staff to develop a recommendation regarding the road as quickly as possible.