Saulter Road residents discuss sidewalk, traffic options

Saulter Road residents want sidewalks, but the geography and length of their street makes that both difficult and expensive.

After a community meeting with Saulter homeowners on June 24, Ward 3 and 4 representatives and city employees are looking at ways to make the project more manageable. Of the more than 40 people who attended the meeting at Homewood Library, only four present objected to the idea of sidewalks. Those opposed said they didn't like the idea of removing trees to make room for walkways or how close the sidewalks would be to their homes.

Greg Cobb, who works in the city's Building, Engineering and Zoning Department, has studied Saulter Road and said the steep grades on either side of some sections of road would make sidewalks difficult to build, and the narrowness of most of the existing street prevents the city from cutting into the road to build the walkways. This, combined with the need for a bridge to connect the pedestrian path to Broadway Street's sidewalks, results in an "off the charts" total cost for the project.

Cobb estimated that putting sidewalks along the entire two-mile length of Saulter would have a minimum cost of $500,000. It would also take multiple years of construction. The city has an overall sidewalk plan for the entirety of Homewood, and this cost has kept Saulter lower on the priority list up until this point.

Some residents, both in opposition to and in favor of the sidewalks, asked if they would do anything to prevent runners and walkers in the street. Cobb said the city cannot force people to use the paths, but hopes most people would choose the safer option once it is there.

Pedestrian safety is a significant part of why Saulter residents want sidewalks. There are problems with speeding on the road, and in the week leading up to the June 24 meeting, Police Sgt. Key Smith assigned more patrols to Saulter Road. Smith said they wrote 42 citations in four days. About 86 percent of those were Homewood residents, and the overwhelming majority of cited Homewood citizens lived on Saulter or the adjacent streets. While some commuters do use Saulter as a cut-through road, Smith suggested homeowners "need to talk to your neighbors" to help reduce speeding.

Residents and their city representatives discussed speed humps, extra stop signs and other methods to slow down traffic, but Cobb and Ward 4 Representative Barry Smith said the most likely options to help would be extra speed limit and hazard signs, including ones with flashing lights, and a road diet, which visually narrows the road to make drivers more likely to slow down.

Cobb said putting landscaped islands in the middle of Saulter is one possible option for a road diet.

To close the meeting, Barry Smith said the list of concerns raised about sidewalks and speeding would be part of ongoing discussion of whether or not sidewalks are possible. She said the city will look at short term solutions to help traffic issues since sidewalks and road diets are both long-term projects. Additionally, the city is going to look at ways to break Saulter Road sidewalks into more feasible segments, which could move it up the city's priority list.

More meetings about sidewalks on Saulter Road are likely to be called in the future.