



The City recognizes that residential streets occasionally have higher speeds and traffic volumes due to shifting traffic patterns and new developments. Isolated, occasional and daily conditions of high speed can affect neighborhood livability. With help from citizens and the City's efforts in education, enforcement, and engineering, these concerns can be addressed. View the City of Kenmore Traffic Speed Mitigation Policy flowchart.
Citizen involvement and data collection are integral parts of all traffic calming projects. The people who live and work in the area of concern have the opportunity to become actively involved in the planning and decision making process.
The City takes regular traffic speed data on arterial roadways and has been collecting speed data on residential roadways in response to concerns. You can check to see if speed on your street has recently been measured here.
What is the Neighborhood Traffic Calming Program?
The Neighborhood Traffic Calming Program addresses neighborhood traffic concerns identified by citizens and/or community groups. Through active participation by citizens, we can identify the problem, plan the approach, implement solutions, and evaluate their effectiveness.
The City’s traffic calming toolbox includes three categories of solutions referred to as the three E’s: Education, Enforcement, and Engineering.
The City will look to citizens to help identify specific neighborhood characteristics that should be taken into account when identifying solutions. Solutions will be evaluated to ensure that they best serve the neighborhood, do not negatively affect emergency access and other public services, and, in the case of physical devices, have support of a majority of the residents who will be affected.
Why would our neighborhood or street want to participate?
Neighborhoods may participate in the program if citizens notice:
In the case of each of these situations, citizens should notify the city, and this will initiate the process. A Citizen Action Request may be submitted via the online form on the city website, by phone or by filling out a form at the front desk. Collection of data will be scheduled by the city, and after tabulation and analysis of the data on recorded speeds and volumes, citizens will be involved in the selection of tools that are appropriate to alleviate any excessive speeds or imbalanced volumes.
What can be done now to address vehicle speed concerns in residential areas?
What can be done in the future?
If data collection confirms an issue of excessive speeds, volumes, or rate of collisions, the installation of traffic control devices will be considered. Each of these devices is unique and specific criteria have been established for when and where they may be used. Physical in-road devices can also have other impacts on emergency services, neighborhood noise, and diversion of traffic to other nearby routes.
Other tools for addressing concerns can include road striping revisions, street signage revisions and operational revisions. Use of the most appropriate tools is determined by traffic engineering analysis by city staff. Vehicle volume thresholds in the collected data must be between 300 and 3000 vehicles per day to be considered in the Calming Program. Volumes outside of this range are either too low for devices to be effective when compared with education and enforcement, or high enough that the road is considered an arterial and requires further study.
Additionally, one of the two following thresholds must be met for a road to be considered for changes in the Calming Program:
Based on the data collected and the topography of the area, tools to address traffic concerns may be recommended. Any recommended action will be based on sound engineering and planning principles. Safety remains paramount in the decision-making process, including access for public safety vehicles. To ensure there is consensus among citizens that would be directly affected by these changes and the potential impacts they may have, neighborhood meetings will be held and majority support (60%) is required before proceeding with construction of the physical devices.
How does this program differ from the Neighborhood Transportation Plans?
The Neighborhood Transportation Plans Program (NTPP), the details of which can be found at this link, was a collaborative engagement of citizens within defined Kenmore neighborhoods to address traffic and mobility problems proactively. The NTPP collected input primarily in late 2015 and early 2016. There may have been issues which were not raised during this process, or which occurred after this process which may be candidates for the Calming Program. During the initial rollout of the NTPP, requests to engage in the Calming Program were to be directed to the NTPP. The Calming Program is now the primary means of addressing citizen concerns following the completion of the NTPP for each Kenmore neighborhood.