Your turn: We need a permanent solution for crashes at the North Main/Auburn roundabout

If you haven’t heard, June 3 the City of Rockford will bring the Main/Auburn roundabout down to one lane. This is temporary and part of a test on how to make the city’s most crash-prone intersection safer.

As a resident of one of the neighborhoods abutting the roundabout, I’m glad some action is finally being taken. As someone who spends hours there nearly every day in the spring and summer tending to flowers planted by Friends of Veterans Memorial Circle volunteers, I can tell you this action is not enough.

We need more than our well-meaning Public Works department putting a Band-Aid on a decade-old problem. We need interdepartmental problem-solving. We need the Rockford Police Department to step up with traffic enforcement — not just at Main and Auburn, but on streets and intersections throughout the city.

This roundabout reflects the overall lack of control on Rockford streets.

My wife and I travel throughout the Midwest for work. We visit bigger and smaller cities. Rockford’s road culture is NOT NORMAL.

More: Lane changes coming to Rockford's North Main and Auburn roundabout

Coming up on our sixth year of living in Rockford, I fear I’m assimilating into the craziness. On a recent drive on Illinois Route 2 from Riverside Drive to Auburn Street, I kept up with the traffic flow. When I looked down, I noticed I was doing 48 mph in a 30 mph zone.

Talking to longtime Rockfordians, I get the impression this situation has been going on so long they’ve accepted lawless streets. I also know Rockfordians who have been schooled on proper driving by the Loves Park Police Department. They will tell you you’ve got to watch your speed in Loves Park.

Last year, when we met with Kyle Saunders, the city’s former Public Works director, to discuss the accident rate at Veterans Memorial Circle, he identified three factors for safer driving on city streets: education, enforcement and infrastructure.

Going from two lanes to one lane at the roundabout now only addresses one of these: infrastructure.

For the roundabout coming in the next two years nearby at Whitman Street and Ridge Avenue, education needs to start now.

We strongly recommend the city invest in public service announcements ASAP. Being proactive about roundabout education works in Wisconsin. Google "take it slow" "WisDOT roundabout television commercial" — and try getting that catchy jingle out of your head. That was recorded in 2013. Wisconsin now has more roundabouts on its state highway system than any other state.

For the roundabout in question at Main and Auburn, where there was no comprehensive education before it was built, we need to double-down on enforcement.

At that meeting with the Public Works director last year, it was made clear to us the 15 mph signs on every approach to the Main/Auburn roundabout are an advisory speed limit—and that police can’t ticket anyone for going over an advisory limit.

But police can ticket for violations of the statutory speed limit, which is 30 mph. So, let’s bring that on!

Ask any of our watering and weeding volunteers and they’ll tell you drivers are approaching and flying through that roundabout way faster than 30 mph.

You might be as shocked as I was to find out that within the Rockford Police Department, there are only two radar guns for speed detection. I have no idea how often they are checked out.

Recently, the Rockford City Council approved purchasing traffic enforcement equipment that will be installed in 40 squad cars. I applaud this initiative by elected officials.

When that equipment arrives, I hope police commanders will direct their officers to use it.

It’s hard for me to criticize our police department. I get that they’re understaffed and that, as I keep hearing, their priorities must be domestic violence and violent crimes. But that focus ignores the bigger safety threat for many of us: getting into our vehicles and driving our streets. Police can react to reports of domestic violence and violent crimes. They can gain control of road safety.

If we want to stop thrashing at the leaves of the Main/Auburn roundabout problem and strike at the roots, we need police ticketing for speed, failure to yield, and failure to allow pedestrians the right-of-way in a crosswalk.

Whether the roundabout is one lane or two lanes, all of the above will still be issues. We need a permanent solution—at the Main/Auburn roundabout and at other problematic intersections across our city.

The perception by some that although the accident rate is high at the Main/Auburn roundabout, the severity of accidents is low (mostly fender-benders) dismisses the fact that after 10 years, we have failed to advance the learning curve for safe driving in a multilane roundabout.

During the pilot program for the lane reduction, the city will be taking public comments. I encourage everyone to speak up and demand that police make their presence known and start enforcing.

Ernie Redfern, a Rockford resident, is a U.S. Army veteran and co-chair of Friends of Veterans Memorial Circle.

This article originally appeared on Rockford Register Star: Your turn: Demand a permanent solution at North Main/Auburn roundabout