YORBA LINDA : Stop Signs, Medians OKd to Curb Traffic

Median islands and stop signs will be installed on several residential streets in an effort to discourage motorists from using those roadways to avoid traffic on Imperial Highway.

The City Council voted 5 to 0 Tuesday to spend about $43,000 to install 13 stop signs and five median islands on Brooklyn Avenue and several other nearby streets.

Residents on Brooklyn long have complained that their street, two blocks north of Imperial, is a popular alternative for motorists. The city erected a temporary barricade at one end of the street in 1992 but removed it after residents on other streets said the barricade merely sent more traffic down their streets,

After meeting with representatives from the neighborhood for more than a year, the city developed a plan to install median islands on Brooklyn west of Valley View Avenue and west of 4th Street, on Valley View and Walnut Street and on Wabash Avenue west of Prospect Avenue.

Based on a preliminary design, the medians will be 30 feet by 14 feet, with a tree in the middle and speed bumps on either side. Although they had originally lobbied hard for the barricade on Brooklyn, residents on the street say the medians are a good compromise.

“It’s not our first approach, but we’ve all faced that we need to get on with” a solution, resident Allan Twardos said. When motorists see the medians, “they are going to change their minds about driving down Brooklyn. It takes away the visual effect of Brooklyn as a half-mile speedway.”

The council also approved several other steps to reduce the number of motorists and how fast they drive, but it delayed funding for those items until the next fiscal year.