Two Southgate residents attended the city’s Wednesday evening council meeting to express their concerns about traffic near their homes.
The two residents live on Canon Ridge, across the street from Memorial Pointe and said they feel that the traffic conditions on this section of Alexandria Pike are becoming more and more unsafe.
“I was trying to turn left, and there was a guy… who did a U-turn right in front of me,” one resident recalled from a time she was exiting Canon Ridge. “I had to slam on my brakes.”
The residents expressed that speeding on the road, combined with the lack of a left turn out of Memorial Pointe, is causing more accidents. They thanked the local police for the work they have already done in patrolling this area, but also urged them to continue to do more.
“When that subdivision went into effect a year ago, two years ago… the city, we tried extensively to get better traffic control there, a traffic light,” police chief John Christmann responded. “That’s 100% on the Transportation Cabinet.”
Christmann explained that Southgate Mayor Jim Hamberg is working extensively to make changes but keeps hitting “roadblocks.”
The reason, Christmann said, that there is no left turn when leaving Memorial Pointe is because of the speed of people coming down US-27 northbound in combination with the lack of a traffic light. While the police department has been enforcing the no left turn, he does acknowledge that it does lead people to often make U-turns once on Alexandria Pike.
“U-turns aren’t necessarily illegal,” Christmann went on. “It would be tough to get that through a judge to cite someone for making an illegal turn.”
The police chief appreciated the concerns addressed, but also made the residents aware that they can only do so much to patrol the area when other issues need their attention.
Hamberg said that he’s been working to have some kind of change to the area to better support the traffic concerns since before the subdivision was built, but continues to get “no’s” from the Kentucky Transportation Cabinet.
The reason, Hamberg said, is that he was told a traffic light could not be installed because of the area’s proximity to I-471.
“Because there was a traffic light coming off of 471 and another one at Blossom Lane, you couldn’t have a traffic light that close to the radius of 471,” he said.
Mayor Hamberg did give the residents a piece of advice to help him in making traffic changes to the area: contacting KYTC themselves.
“I think the more, I hate to say this, complaints or the more concerns that we get, the better off it’s going to help me fight the fight,” the mayor said.