Traffic Calming Democracy

I smiled a bit when I read this article: the residents of the 4th Avenue/A Street Neighborhood in Iowa City have voted to remove the 'traffic calming devices' (or speed humps) that were placed along their streets to supposedly slow the traffic down- but failed to do so.

The area in question is near my parents house, so I'm well familiar with it, but the main problem there isn't traffic per say, but rather it's proximity to City High School. Kids will be kids, and will, (as it turns out) view such obstacles as a challenge and not slow down at all. Having lived in the area, I know darned well not to drive anywhere between the hours of 3 PM (when Hoover Elementary gets out) and about 4 PM (after all the traffic from City High has calmed down). They really need a traffic light at the intersection of Court and 4th. Or a wider street.

But I am glad to see that the City is being a bit more sensible about such measures these days. The article mentions the infamous 'chicanes' on Highland, which were actually a lot of fun- (it was like running a slolam in your car. And you wanted to do it as fast as possible) and they were, in retrospect dumb. (I voted for them to stay and actually wrote the Press-Citizen urging exactly that, if I recall.) Stop signs, as residents said, would have been far more effective. I'm just glad that the bottom half of Highland with the infamous 'dips' hasn't gone the way of the Lexington Dips (now closed to traffic entirely.)