New Woodburn Community School

NOTHING CLOSE TO 15 MPH SCHOOL ZONE SPEEDS AT OR NEAR EASTWOOD ELEMENTARY

See the WV Division of Highways signs plan, below, for the Mileground roundabout at the entrance/exit to Eastwood Elementary school. Parents and students can expect to see school-front roundabout approach speeds of 40 and 50 miles per hour, and higher.

In theory, traffic speeds in the school-front roundabout will be capped at 25 mph, far above any 15 mph school zone speed limit, as specified in WV Code. In reality – look out.

CLICK HERE FOR THE MOST CLEARLY DETAILED VERSION OF ABOVE MAP (PDF WITHOUT COLOR ADDED)

Also see the subsequent post:

About 70 Signs At Eastwood Elementary Mileground Roundabout And Not A Single Sign Indicates A School

As detailed previously:

<– click to operate and interact
A large multi-lane roundabout is planned to be built by WV Division of Highways (DOH) this year adjacent to the impending Eastwood Elementary site at the intersection of WV 705 and US 119/Mileground Road. In fact, the new school site would lose land to the state by eminent domain, to create the intersection relocation and expansion. This sprawling roundabout with its divided highway spokes would cover about 2 acres and would border and entangle the Eastwood schoolgrounds.

State Law requires that roads bordering and extending 125 feet from schoolgrounds have a maximum speed limit of 15 mph, which would and should include the entire Mileground roundabout and all of its spokes and an additional stretch of WV 705:

§17C-6-1 (1) “Fifteen miles per hour in a school zone during school recess or while children are going to or leaving school during opening or closing hours. A school zone is all school property, including school grounds and any street or highway abutting the school grounds and extending one hundred twenty-five feet along the street or highway from the school grounds.”

HOWEVER, the Law also provides that the head of the WV Department of Transportation (DOT), Secretary Paul A. Mattox, Jr., can override the 15 mph limit:

§17C-6-2. “Whenever the state road commissioner [the Secretary of the DOT] shall determine upon the basis of an engineering and traffic investigation that any speed limit set forth in this article is greater or less than is reasonable or safe under the conditions found to exist at any intersection or other place or upon any part of a highway, said commissioner may determine and declare a reasonable and safe speed limit thereat which shall be effective at all times or during hours of daylight or darkness or at such other times as may be determined when appropriate signs giving notice thereof are erected at such intersection or other place or part of the highway.”