With the new section of North Street between 16th and 18th streets soon to open, the Perry City Council stated its desire at last Monday’s meeting to keep the north-south thoroughfares of 16th and 18th free of stops signs at the North Street intersection.
The stop signs have already been placed, and when the council took up the first reading of an amended ordinance that would have legalized the stops at North Street, they voted to amend the ordinance to keep out the stops.
“Actually, a couple of people have been kind of upset about it,” said Council member Dr. Randy McCaulley, who moved to accept the recommended stops signs but later revised his motion to exclude them. He was supported by Council members Chuck Schott and Barb Wolling.
“I’ve had calls from several residents,” Schott said, “and the first time I saw it myself, I thought, ‘Why are we doing this?'”
“I’ve also had a couple of calls from people that are upset about it,” Wolling said. “I was kind of surprised when I drove up 18th Street last night and said, “A stop sign? There’s nothing out here . . . yet.'”
Perry City Administrator Sven Peterson recommended the stops signs on 16th and 18th.
“In the original plans,” Peterson said, “there was a four-way stop at North and 16th, and then there was just a stop sign on North Street at 18th Street, mostly due to the trail going through there. And then I did make the call to put the stop signs in on 18th Street.”
Peterson said he added the stops because the connector trail, once complete, will bring a lot of bicycle traffic from the High Trestle Trail to the downtown trailhead. He said he was also looking forward to possible difficulties that might arise if stop signs become needed in the future.
“Hopefully,” he said, “in the next couple of years there will be trail traffic going through there quite a bit, and I always feel it’s easiest when something is new to put stop signs in or set a speed limit because it’s much more difficult to train people out afterwards. That was my thoughts behind that.”
Council members John Andorf and Dean Berkland were absent from the meeting, but Schott seemed to speak for those present when he said, “If we have problems with a lot of traffic, and if we have problems down the road with traffic situations, then I’ll change my mind, but right now I don’t like stop signs on 18th and 16th streets.”
Perry Mayor Jay Pattee recalled the words of longtime city council member Wilford Roberts, who “said that we don’t have a north-south thoroughfare on that side of town,” Pattee said. “He felt it was something that was missing. In meeting after meeting, that would come up. So I’ll make his wishes known, too, even though he’s no longer with us.”
Roberts, a significant Perry benefactor, died in January 2016.
McCaulley amended the proposed ordinance to provide for stop signs on North Street but not on 16th and 18th streets. The amended ordinance passed its first reading unanimously. If two more readings are similarly approved at future council meetings, then the ordinance will be changed, and only the stops on North Street will be effected.
