AMHERST — Three traffic-calming devices known as mini roundabouts, installed along Heatherstone Road in summer 2024, will remain intact for the time being.
While the Town Council received a recommendation in July from its Town Services and Outreach Committee that the mini roundabouts be removed, and alternatives be explored for reducing speed of traffic in the Echo Village neighborhood, councilors on Monday postponed any decision on their removal.
Instead, after 45 minutes of discussion, councilors asked those who represent that part of town, known as District 2, to meet with residents to find some kind of agreement, before the town spends $10,000 to remove the scaled-down roundabouts.
Council President Lynn Griesemer, who represents District 2 with Councilor Pat De Angelis, said she wishes the mini roundabouts had never been installed.
“This thing is a mess. We’ve had a district meeting only on this issue, and every time we bring the conversation up, there isn’t a consensus,” Griesemer said.
The concept for them came with adding new sidewalks and removing a planter island on the road that cuts between Pelham Road and Aubindowod Road, with debate among residents about those measures, as well.
Griesemer said potholes filled the road prior to its resurfacing, so the mini roundabouts were seen as helping to slow traffic. But residents need to understand that the road isn’t on a list for speed humps, if the mini roundabouts go away.
“And if it’s on a list, it is way behind a lot of other places that are requesting that,” Griesemer said.
De Angelis said she worries that adding speed humps would have a negative impact on the condition of the road, which is largely shaded during the winter months.
At Large Councilor Andy Steinberg, who chairs the town Services and Outreach Committee, said the mini roundabouts were an untested design not in use in any neighboring communities.
“It has turned out to cause a lot of problems for some residents and a lot of unhappiness, but there were also some residents who were saying ‘we like the road a lot and we are concerned about speed on the road,'” Steinberg said.
They have tight space for all vehicles and both larger vehicles and some passenger cars are just driving over them, he said, noting some drivers are confused as they are making turns to adjacent streets before they get to the mini roundabouts.
District 5 Councilor Bob Hegner, too, said many people are not abiding by the purpose of the roundabouts.
“Many drivers don’t treat them as roundabouts, they treat them as just obstructions in the middle of the road,” Hegner said.
District 4 Councilor Jennifer Taub said councilors were told they would only be there on a trial basis.
“I do feel we have to honor that commitment to the community,” Taub said, adding feedback from many is that the road is actually less safe.
District 1 Councilor Cathy Schoen said that councilors were told they were inexpensive to install and easy to remove.
“I never thought these were a good idea,” Schoen said. “The residents asked for speed humps, that’s what they asked for, and they got a trial of mini roundabouts.
District 5 Councilor Ana Devlin Gauthier said she remains confused about why this project was pushed through when there are other priorities for road projects, and wondered if the safety of the road was really hindered by the mini roundabouts. If that’s the case, she said, the town should spend time to educate the public on their use.
Town engineer Jason Skeels in a memo presented data that the average speed went up from 22 mph to 24 mph, still below 25 mph, of the 200 cars that drive on the road daily, though that is likely due to smoother surface. That is based on Urban SDK, a subscription service that anonymously tracks, records, and analyzes connected vehicle speeds and locations and provides data summaries including speeds, volumes, times and locations.
Skeels expressed skepticism that the mini roundabouts have any impact.
“The best solution for individual speeding problems is enforcement. Traffic calming
measures do not solve bad behavior,” he wrote.
His memo also showed that similar roads, Old Farm Road and Farmington Road, which were also resurfaced, had no major increase in speeds. This prompted At Large Councilor Mandi Jo Hanneke to question why traffic calming was needed on Heatherstone.
A future solution may fall to a new committee, said District 3 Councilor George Ryan, observing that if the Town Council forms a Transportation and Parking Commission this would provide more coherence, consistency and clarity in deciding where trafifc calming is used.
