News

Old Studio Road at 106: ‘The Crosswalks That Lead to Nowhere’

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Prompted by a request for a crossing guard that would help get kids cross Route 106/Old Stamford Road from the area of Old Studio Road, toward South, Saxe and the high school, town officials are trying to answer a bigger question about how whether there’s a way to create a safe pedestrian walkway along that stretch of Route 106 itself. The difficulty is that, although there are crosswalks there—for example, at the southern end of the Old Studio Road horseshoe—there’s no safe route for pedestrians once they’ve landed on the eastern side of the state road. “They are kind of crosswalks that lead to nowhere,” New Canaan Police Capt. John DiFederico said Tuesday during a meeting of the Traffic Calming Work Group. Composed of police, fire, CERT/emergency preparedness and DPW officials, the work group fields requests for traffic calming measures. At least one parent from the west side of Route 106 there (Old Studio Road, Richards Lane) and South School officials had inquired about the possibility of putting in a crossing guard at the crosswalks, DiFederico said.

Government

Concerned Parents Seek Oenoke Ridge Crosswalk at Parade Hill Lane

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Parents in the area of an acknowledged major intersection for commercial trucks are requesting a crosswalk to give their kids a safe route to town. A number of new families have moved into Parade Hill Lane and the houses fronting Oenoke Ridge Road near it, so that up to 20 children are now in the area, including many that are now at an age where they want to walk to town, according to John Sheffield of 24 Parade Hill Lane. “We wanted to see what the possibility would be to put in a crosswalk across Oenoke, from Parade Hill Lane to Parade Hill Road on the other side,” Sheffield said at the Sept. 17 meeting of the Police Commission. The idea would be to hook up with the sidewalk that runs down toward God’s Acre along the eastern side of Oenoke Ridge Road.

Government

New Crosswalk Behind Kiwanis Could Extend Walk-Able Access to Downtown New Canaan

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Seeking another way to help New Canaanites walk safely from residential neighborhoods to the downtown, officials are eyeing a plan to install a new crosswalk on Old Norwalk Road, up the hill and behind Kiwanis Park. The crosswalk, at Old Kings Highway, would connect on the west side of the road to a footpath that runs through the woods down to Kiwanis (see map below). And that park soon is expected to connect, by way of a new sidewalk running up to Main Street, to the downtown. Proposed by a town resident, the new crosswalk would, in theory, make it safe for people to walk across Old Norwalk Road from Old Kings Highway. Department of Public Works Assistant Director Tiger Mann said, pending his review, a recommendation to create that mid-block crosswalk would go to the Police Commission, which has final say.

Around Town

Safety in Mind, Town Eyes New Striping for Morse Court Entrance

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In response to safety concerns about motorists who turn right from South Avenue and into Morse Court—and then immediately travel in the “oncoming traffic lane” to parallel park along the curb there—public works officials will more clearly stripe the intersection. Morse Court is not a roadway by the town’s definition, but rather an access way for the parking lot, according to Tiger Mann, assistant director of the New Canaan Department of Public Works. Because Morse Court sees virtually no motor vehicle accidents, police do not target vehicles parked with their left tire to the curb, and parking officials prioritize the numbered spots over those parallel-parked, Mann said. A resident’s safety concern about the practice came to the town’s Traffic Calming Work Group, of which Mann is a member (along with members of the police and fire department, and CERT). To deter motorists turning off of South Avenue onto Morse Court and then pulling to the left to park, the DPW is planning to “strip the entrance and exit lanes with directional arrows and a double yellow stripe down the middle,” Mann said.

Around Town

After Resident Petition, Town Eyes Traffic-Calming on Parade Hill Road

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Town officials are collecting data on cars’ speeds on Parade Hill Road and plan to enforce selectively the 25 mph limit there after residents said that pedestrians, bicyclists and drivers are at risk because trucks and other motorists travel and take blind turns too fast. Parade Hill is a popular cut-through between Routes 124 (Oenoke Ridge Road) and 123, including for commercial traffic on Interstate 95. Residents this spring petitioned the town to slow down the vehicles that use it. On Tuesday, members of the Traffic Calming Work Group agreed to put up speed sentries and, with hard data in hand, selectively enforce the 25 mph speed limit there. Parade Hill Road resident Mary Maechling said vehicular traffic seems to be getting increasingly fast, especially on weekdays, and that she sees many near-misses up near a blind curve toward the top of the road.