Survey in Simi Valley Shows Support for Speed Humps : Traffic: Residents say they make streets safer. The poll will be presented to the city, along with a request to install the mounds on Appleton Road.

Simi Valley speeders beware: Speed humps are here to stay.

A city-conducted survey of 438 residents who have speed humps on their streets showed that more than 75% believe the asphalt mounds help slow traffic and make their streets safer.

“I have never really supported speed humps, but as long as people are happy with them and they meet the city criteria, I will vote for them,” Councilman Bill Davis said.

The survey, conducted at the City Council’s request, will be presented at the council’s meeting Monday, along with a petition from homeowners on Appleton Road who would like speed humps installed on their street.

Resident Glen Benton led the effort to install speed humps on a stretch of Appleton Road south of Royal Avenue after he clocked drivers whizzing by his house at 60 m.p.h.

“It got to the point where you couldn’t even get out of your driveway,” he said. “Then I started talking to some people around here and I found that I wasn’t the only one who was upset about it.”

Benton gathered the signatures of 19 of his neighbors between Harrington Road and Currier Avenue and took them to the city. A city study of the traffic flow found that 4,600 vehicles use the road each day, exceeding the 25 m.p.h. speed limit 94% of the time.

If the proposal is approved, the total number of speed humps in Simi Valley would increase to 52 speed humps on 26 streets.

The Simi Valley council first permitted speed humps in 1987. They are wider than speed bumps found in many parking lots and tend not to jolt cars as harshly.

Their gentle slope also makes it easier for fire trucks and police cars to get over them quickly in emergencies.

“People who live on the streets like them,” Mayor Greg Stratton said. “So far we haven’t had anybody screaming to have us take them out.”

The survey also left space for respondents to comment on concerns about the speed humps, or to suggest changes they would like made.

Some residents reported that daredevil drivers take on the humps at full speed, accelerating and then bouncing over them noisily. Other drivers maneuver around the humps, swerving into the gutter close to the curb, residents reported.

But extending the humps from curb to curb to prevent such avoidance would obstruct the path of water flowing into the gutters and could cause flooding problems, a city staff report said.

“You’ll always get somebody trying to get around them,” Stratton said. “But I think for most people, they work very well.”

At Monday’s meeting the council will also consider installing a traffic signal at Los Angeles and Christine avenues and improving signals at half a dozen other sites.

If approved, four signals on Los Angeles Avenue and two on Royal Avenue would be changed to allow drivers to turn left on a green arrow and also on a green light.

Most signals now permit cars to turn left only on the green arrow. By allowing cars to turn left on the green light, traffic will move along more smoothly, said Hank Hein, principal engineer with the city.