The Bloomington City Council recently reduced the speed limit on Hershey Road between GE Road and Ft. Jesse Road from 40 mph to 30 mph.  The undersigned individuals believe that this new limit is unreasonably slow for this stretch of road, which encompasses no residential driveways and carries 11,000-13,000 vehicles daily between GE Rd and College Ave and 6500 vehicles daily between College Ave and Ft. Jesse Rd.  (Source:  Illinois Department of Transportation - Getting Around Illinois website, traffic counts for Hershey Road north of GE Road and south of Ft. Jesse). 

During a special meeting on December 19, 2016, Alderwoman Painter was quoted as saying "the people" had requested this change.  Per input received back from local residents, this petition had roughly 166 petitioners, primarily from one neighborhood where residents may have a difficulty turning left onto this stretch of road.   Given public concern since this decision, it appears that many residents of Ward 9 hold a different view -- that this will be a frequent inconvenience to thousands who travel this major artery daily.  There is also a concern that this area will be a "speed trap", by setting such a low speed limit on a non-residential stretch of road, where surrounding roads like College and GE have significantly higher speed limits. 

The opinion of residents of nearby subdivisions in Ward 9 is that insufficient public input was gathered on this decision.  Given the amount of concern expressed in forums on Next Door (neighborhood social networking site), a decision was made to create a Change.org petition that would voice concern about the change and show City Council the number of people who would like an alternative.  

 The undersigned individuals would like the council to do the following: 

A)  Consider the input of the individuals signing this petition, as it is believed this change negatively impacts far more than the 166 individuals who requested the speed limit in a petition presented at a December town council meeting.

B)  Host a special public session, presenting additional research and hearing  concerns on this issue.  The perception is that this change was proposed at a meeting just a few days before Christmas and passed less than a month later without sufficient public input.

C)   Change the speed limit again.  The council could revoke the change entirely and change the speed limit back to 40 mph on this stretch of road.  If it is determined after public session that a change is still needed -- we would like to suggest that the speed limit be set at 35 mph for this stretch of road.  This would be a compromise solution that reduces the limit slightly but also limits the inconvenience that the 11,000 plus residents traveling this road every day will now face.