KINGWOOD — After being told stop signs may be removed from Miller Road, Kingwood Council will consider whether it will continue to maintain state-owned roads in town.
Mayor Jean Guillot said that last month Kingwood received verbal notification to remove stop signs on Miller Road.
The signs have been there at least 15 years, from the time the road was extended and farmland developed to build Pine Ridge (formerly Heartland of Preston County), Preston Manor apartments and single-family homes.
Residents concerned about speeding through the neighborhood requested stop signs on Miller Road to slow traffic.
State Department of Transportation Information Corps Manager Jennifer Jo Dooley said the state Division of Highways (DOH) took Miller Road into its system April 28, 2000.
“All signs in WVDOH right-of-way have to meet certain requirements such as height, reflective tape, breakaway post. A traffic study is also required to see if ‘Stop’ signs are necessary for intersections of this type (T-intersections),” Dooley said in an email to the newspaper.
She said the Preston County DOH supervisor “is trying to meet all policies consistently throughout the county.”
So, “‘Stop’ signs not placed by WVDOH, and not warranted by policies and procedures, would be removed. Moving forward, our district is going to request the traffic engineer to review this route to see if the current conditions require ‘Stop’ signs,” Dooley said.
“Why after 20 years?” the mayor wondered. “To me, if you want to take those stop signs down, you should do the study first.”
He said people in the area want the signs.
Kingwood Recorder Bill Robertson agreed the study should come first. He recalled that Kingwood and other towns handed some roads over to the DOH several years ago under a program that was to provide better maintenance through cooperation.
“I think they’ve got bigger things to handle than stop signs on Miller Road,” Robertson said of the DOH.
The signs slow people down, Robertson said.
“I know if they come down, speed will be a problem,” Kingwood Police Chief Charlie Haney said Tuesday.
He hopes that if the DOH removes the signs it considers other traffic calming devices, such as speed humps, which are larger than speed bumps.
Guillot said he’s asked for a list of all streets in Kingwood that are owned by the DOH and the matter will be on the next council agenda. Tunnelton Street and Main Street, for example, are state roads.
The mayor said council will discuss whether Kingwood will continue to plow and do other maintenance on the state-owned roads.
Mowing rights-of-way
Kingwood is also asking that the state mow its rights-of-way more often. Guillot pointed to the intersection of W.Va. 7 and 26, and along W.Va. 7 (Main Street) above the Kingwood Post Office as examples.
Dooley said the DOH isn’t required to follow city ordinances and mows Priority 1 Routes, like W.Va. 7 and 26, three times a year.
But “some cities prefer to have their routes mowed more times per year, so those cities may request permits to mow the routes themselves. There are several cities in our district who have done so,” she said.
“I thought that if we had city ordinances that were stricter than the state they had to follow city ordinance,” Guillot said. “Why does the state only have to mow three times a year when we ask our citizens to keep their lawns mowed?”
He’s asked the city attorney to look into it.
Council will meet 7 p.m. Tuesday at city hall, on Tunnelton Street.
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