The Connecticut Post recently reported that the police department in Seymour, Ct., is jittery about potential liability issues that may arise from installing traffic calming measures like speed humps on a neighborhood street which is seeing heavy traffic and speeding. According to the article, the Seymour PD is concerned that “low profile” vehicles will sustain undercarriage damage and their owners will sue.
Liability issues have caused some municipalities to balk at traffic calming, but in practice these concerns have proven to be unfounded. A 2003 Transportation Quarterly article by Reid Ewing found that there had been only two successful lawsuits against traffic calming programs, one of which was overturned on appeal.
Connecticut (and New Jersey and New York, for that matter) have immunity by law for the design of road improvements and the decision to use traffic calming on a given street. True, if speed humps are designed so poorly that vehicles get damaged solely by driving over the calming device as intended, the town may be liable. Connecticut courts have used the words “totally inadmissable” and “obviously in need of correction” to describe such grossly negligent designs (the device above would likely be in such categories). Many states and municipalities have adopted design standards for traffic calming. Thanks to the design work of the Institute of Transportation Engineers and other groups, it should be easy for a town to build improvements – even old fashioned speed humps – that don’t cross the line from deterrence to damage and danger.
According to Ewing, governments can further protect themselves from liability by showing that traffic calming was installed in a rational manner: that government documented existing traffic problems, considered a number of alternate solutions, and performed follow-up evaluations of the traffic calming program. Agencies must also provide proper notice (i.e. signage) of calming devices which require drivers to slow down.
Given such immunity, local governments should be more concerned with liability issues that may arise from inaction. According to the Federal Highway Administration, an increasing number of cases are being settled where the responsible government entity identified a problem or dangerous traffic condition and chose to do nothing at all. Traffic calming is not the prescribed answer to every situation, but the government with knowledge of a dangerous traffic condition must reasonably react in some way. In Seymour, the town responded with increased patrols, speed traps, and new stop signs. These steps would likely be viewed as fulfilling the town’s duty and shield it from suit.
Tests show Speed Bumps [or “Speed Humps”] are bad for the planet….
Posted on “autoblog” by Jonathon Ramsey:
The British Automobile Association recently completed an environmental impact study using the Millbrook Proving Ground for the test, by installing temporary speed bumps at prescribed intervals, then using a test car that averages 58mpg @ a constant 30mph, then slowing down and speeding up for each bump. Fuel economy dropped to 31mpg,
The findings correlate with those of Great Britain’s Transport Research Laboratory that found the level of poisonous CO Emissions rose as much as 82% and nitrous oxide emissions increased by as much as 37% on roads equipped with speed bumps.
[Source: Channel 4](UK)
James:
Some factory vehicles do have a low profile, namely being high performance sports cars.
This fear is not a legit one. The article states that the municipality is worried about lawsuits that could arise from damage to the undercarriage of cars with low profiles. The only cars which could be damaged from traffic calming infrastructure are those that are modified (“dropped”) to make them lower to the ground than they are from the factory. No showroom stock vehicle is going to have a problem with speed bumps or rumble strips, and a court would throw this out because no one forced the motorist to make the modifications to the vehicle in the first place.
If a speed hump reduces emergency response times it could result in avoidable loss of life and property. Damage from the hump while traveling the legal speed limit could also be a liability.