Pine residents raise traffic safety concerns

Pine supervisors heard from concerned residents about traffic safety concerns at their meeting on June 16.

June Sterling, a resident of Mars Valencia Road Extension for 50 years, remarked on the amount of heavy vehicle traffic on her road.

Mars Valencia Road has been closed since April for construction. Sterling said she believes the large trucks using the road are in violation of the weight limit for vehicles in the township.

“Trailer trucks and full dump trucks are using my extension, and there’s a 5 ton weight limit on my road,” Sterling said.

She also expressed dismay at the length of time PennDOT has taken on the project.

“They keep pushing out the completion date, this has been going on since April,” she said.

Township Manager Jason Kratsas responded that staff members have been in contact with PennDOT to see what can be done.

“We reached out to PennDOT … on it so we will be following up,” Kratsas said.

Also during the public comment on nonagenda items portion of the meeting, Angelo Spagnolo spoke up about the safety hazards surrounding East Ridge Drive.

“I love the walking trails, love that the kids are doing them. For some reason, it’s changed on East Ridge Drive. We have kids coming from the school and crossing. They’re going down through the tunnel, and they’re not stopping. We’ve had two children hit, I believe. It’s time to put signs up that say to stop and look or something. These kids have their headphones on, they’re not looking, they’re just not stopping. When you’re trying to turn in on the red belt and they cross in front of you, you don’t know if you’re going to be hit from behind or hit one of the kids,” he said.

His remarks seemed to surprise Stacey Graf, the assistant township manager.

“Even now, it’s still happening? We worked with the HOA and the golf course that put up signs to say all pedestrians stop and look,” she said.

Spagnolo noted it is especially bad around the Trees Estate area toward East Ridge.

“They’re not looking and they just don’t care. A couple of neighbors knew I was coming to the meeting tonight, and they asked me to speak on this,” Spagnolo said.