Council OKs signs to slow traffic through Smallwood

Effective Dec. 1, motorists will face four-way stops at the intersections of Lawson Road and Eden Drive and Lawson Road and Dimock Road in the Smallwood subdivision.

Washington’s City Council approved the four-way stops during its meeting Monday.

Smallwood resident Howard Miller supports installing the four-way stops on Lawson Road. He asked the council’s support for the four-way stops “so we can slow traffic down on Lawson Road.” Miller said he has concerns about speeding on Lawson Road by some motorists. The four-ways stops will help ease that problem, he said.

Some motorists use Lawson Road as a shortcut to reach P.S. Jones Middle School, John Cotten Tayloe Elementary School, Greenville and Williamston, adding to traffic on Lawson Road, he said.

“The problem is getting worse every day. I ask that you think about this. You have people who walk in that neighborhood, that ride their bikes. We have young children back in the neighborhood again on that street,” Miller said. “I am told that the police department clocked somebody at 75 miles per hour in a 25-mile (per-hour) zone on Lawson Road. That’s ridiculous.”

The four-way stops have opposition.

Before the council met Monday, day, a man who identified himself as a Smallwood resident called the Washington Daily News to voice his opposition to the four-way stops. He also expressed concerns that he and others did not learn of the proposal to install the four-way stops until late last week. He said that notification gave little time for opponents of the four-way stops to learn about the proposal’s details and publicly express their opposition.

The man said he and others believed there was little, if any, use in attending the meeting because “it was a done deal.”

In other business, the council adopted a resolution of intent to close and abandon part of East Main Street and its right of way at Havens Gardens and the Norfolk Southern Railway track. Currently, the segment in question is blocked off from traffic.

A public hearing on the proposal is scheduled for 6 p.m. Dec. 12 in the Council Chambers in the Municipal Building.

Closing that section of East Main Street likely would help ease traffic concerns at and near the intersection of East Main Street, Park Drive and Hudnell Street, city officials have said.

For additional coverage of the council’s meeting, see future editions of the Washington Daily News.