Neighbors have complained for years that motorists use Lincoln and Sunset avenues and McClellan Street as shortcuts from downtown to UMass.
AMHERST – Motorists traveling from downtown to the University of Massachusetts will have to go more slowly after the Select Board approved the installation of speed bumps on three nearby streets.
But this is only part of what the town is doing to address the ongoing speeding and volume issues.
Department of Public Works Superintendent Guilford B. Mooring requested approval for the speed bumps on Lincoln and Sunset Avenues and McClellan Street.
They are to be installed as the roads are repaved. The town has embarked on a $4.5 million repaving project.
Mooring said that Sunset Avenue and McClellan Street are on this year’s repaving schedule with Lincoln on for next year.
Motorists use these streets as shortcuts from downtown to UMass and neighbors have complained for years.
The town had installed speed cushions in late 2007, but vehicles were able to straddle them.
They will not be able to straddle these, Mooring said. The speed bumps “will be something like a raised crosswalk,” the kind near Amherst College. They will be graded, he said, and be marked by white stripes.
The Department of Public Works earlier this year considered a plan to close Lincoln Avenue at the North Hadley Road intersection to prevent drivers from using Lincoln as a straight route from Amity Street to Massachusetts Avenue and UMass. But many in town opposed it.
In a memo to the board, Mooring reported that “the major concerns were that the roadway systems that would replace Lincoln Ave. are not capable of handling the increase in traffic.”
To also address the traffic, the department is recommending a multi-step process, Mooring reported, including the upgrades under way at the Big Y and University Drive intersection.
Other proposed changes include upgrading the intersections at Amity Street and University Drive and at East Pleasant and Triangle streets.
The hope is that more motorists would enter the university on University Drive.
Select Board chairwoman Stephanie J. O’Keeffe said Monday night that she thinks that “this an excellent minimalist solution .¤.¤.¤. It’s nice to be able to have a solution to have an impact,” she said.