Weekend fatalities bring out traffic concerns

While Michele Johnson discussed her concerns about drivers speeding down the street outside of her home on Royal Palm Drive just days after a nearby fatal hit-and-run accident, nearly a dozen cars whizzed past her at speeds practically double the posted limit.

During the last two years the speeding has been so bad the noise has actually roused Johnson, 39, in the middle of the night.

Drivers use the half-mile stretch of road to skip some of the traffic on Harbor near the 405 freeway, Johnson said.

Barry Spear, Johnson’s neighbor across the street, shared her concerns. Spear, who drove dragsters in the 1960s, has sometimes chased motorists down the street in his Infinity sedan, and he reminds his neighbors about driving cautiously.

“I can tell they’re going 70 to 80 mph when I hear them at night,” Spear said.

A stark reminder of the danger happened Saturday night when an allegedly drunk driver struck a bicyclist as he crossed the street and Friday night when a multiple car collision killed three, police said.

City Council members will discuss the issue of traffic calming at tonight’s meeting, but Mayor Allan Mansoor said residents should understand that there’s no catch-all solution.

“I don’t believe there’s a one-size-fits-all solution,” he said. “I don’t want to get people thinking that a particular traffic-calming measure is going to solve their problem when the reality is it will just move traffic from one street to the next.”

The city is adding a number of traffic-alleviating measures such as turn pockets and bus turnouts on 17th Street and widening Newport Boulevard. Hopefully this will make it less desirable to cut through residential communities, Mansoor said.

Traffic Investigator Jeff Horn noted that in both weekend accidents alcohol played a role, so traffic-calming wouldn’t have been a factor.

The problem isn’t out-of-towners, but locals trying to beat the freeway commute and college students speeding to class, authorities said. Both roads serve as alternate connectors between Costa Mesa and Huntington Beach.

Horn has experienced the trouble spots along Adams firsthand. A few years ago, an absent-minded driver speeding down Adams struck Horn’s patrol vehicle during a routine traffic stop, he said.