Residents of Cosmo City took matters into their own hands when they erected their own speed humps on a road where speeding drivers are a major problem.
Even though their intentions were good, at the end of the day it was illegal to build their own speed humps without the permission of the Johannesburg Roads Agency (JRA) and the Johannesburg Metro Police Department (JMPD).
JRA has provided the necessary steps to legally obtaining traffic humps to help communities avoid getting into trouble with the law:
- Speed humps must be warranted as per SA Road Traffic Signs Manual (SARTSM) and City of Joburg (COJ) Traffic Calming Policy Requirement, and Traffic Assessment.
- The ward councillor’s support will be needed as well as an approval letter
- A scaled A2 engineering design drawing depicting the position of the proposed traffic calming hump
- A letter of support from the City of Johannesburg’s Regional Directors Office
- A letter of support from JMPD who are responsible for speed law enforcement.
These documents must to be submitted to the JRA Traffic Engineering and Analysis Department for assessment and approval.
On receipt of approval from the JRA;
- The applicant or appointed contractor must obtain a wayleave form from the JRA prior to starting any construction
- A suitably qualified contractor may be appointed to install the traffic calming humps. The appointment of a contractor is a matter between the applicant or resident’s association and the contractor
- The speed hump(s) construction must comply with the JRA specifications which are to be provided by the JRA on approval of application
- The contractor must comply with all JRA construction safety rules and regulations and stipulations within JRA wayleave
- A JRA engineer or technician and inspectors must have supervisory access to the site at all times
- The site should be formerly handed over to the JRA on completion, a final inspection will be conducted before issuing a certificate of compliance.
“Speed humps also have disadvantages that residents might want to consider such as speed humps being a problem for emergency vehicles and fire engines. Apart from the major discomfort to ambulance passengers, they also delay response times substantially,” JRA operations manager Bertha Peters-Scheepers said.
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