WABE asks Watkins, do those neighborhood ‘slow down’ signs work?

WABE webpage for story featuring Kari Watkins, 'Do the "slow down" signs around Atlanta work?'

Audio player for WABE story 'Do the "slow down" signs around Atlanta work?'

Atlanta NPR member station WABE used the unusual example of a Looney Tunes character dangling a “go slow” sign to illustrate what many neighborhoods in the city are doing: installing signs to encourage drivers to check their speed.

The station’s question to School of Civil and Environmental Engineering transportation research Kari Watkins: do such signs have an impact?

“I think what these signs do is they come back to this idea of social acceptance, that it’s not OK with me if you’re going to speed in front of my house,” Watkins told WABE’s Stephannie Stokes.

Of course, the signs battle with all the other signs and roadside distractions for drivers’ attention, which can lessen their impact, Watkins said.

What’s often a more reliable deterrent for speeding, she said, is the threat of a ticket — and designing the road to encourage slower driving.

Read — and listen — to the whole story on WABE’s website.