Anaheim officials are moving to slow drivers down across 169 segments of roadway in Anaheim including parts of Brookhurst Street, Lincoln Avenue, State College Boulevard and Katella Avenue under a new speed limit law.
Last week, city council members voted unanimously to introduce a new law that will decrease the speed by 5-15 miles per hour across over 150 street segments in OC’s largest city.
Mayor Ashleigh Aitken said the changes were a positive move in the right direction.
“The nature of our city has just changed and it’s not just about slowing people down on our major arterial highways. It’s about trying to allow our residents who are trying to leave those residential neighborhoods get on to those highways safely,” she said at Tuesday’s meeting.
Aitken added that she believes much of the speeding concerns are not created by residents but rather commuters who drive through Anaheim to dodge traffic.
The change comes after Aitken highlighted a decrease in traffic casualties at her State of the City address earlier this month and highlighted efforts to make Anaheim streets safer.
The ordinance is expected to come back for a finalizing vote at Tuesday’s 5 p.m. city council meeting and if approved will go into effect in 30 days.
To view the full list of streets where the speed limit is decreasing, click here.
The change also comes after the city’s public works department hired a consultant to conduct a citywide survey to reassess speed limits across 328 sections of streets in Anaheim.
Under the new law, speed limits will remain the same in 158 street segments while the city will introduce a new 30-mile-per-hour limit on Frontera Street between La Palma Avenue and Rio Vista Street.
Most of the changes will be a 5 mile per hour decrease while nine street segments will have a 10 mile-per-hour decrease including State College Boulevard from the northern city limits to La Palma Avenue and Lincoln Avenue from Euclid Street to the 5 freeway South bound ramps.
Some of the biggest changes are coming to Brookhurst Street – a six-lane road that stretches through Anaheim from Garden Grove to Fullerton, while also taking people to the 5 and 91 freeways.
Officials are moving to lower most speed limits on parts of Brookhurst from 40 miles per hour to 35.
Katella Avenue, another major street, will see a 5-mile-per hour reduction throughout most of its stretch. Depending on the section, the new speed limits are slated to be 30 or 35 miles per hour.
And most of Nohl Ranch Road, a major street in Anaheim Hills, will see 5-mile-per-hour reductions, mostly reducing the limit to 40 miles per hour.
Manchester Avenue from Anaheim Boulevard to Katella Avenue will have the steepest decrease going from being a 40 mile per hour street segment to a 25 mile per hour segment.
Orangethorpe Avenue, which stretches through a sizable portion of the city’s northern border, will see reductions throughout most of its stretch by 5 miles per hour.
No streets will see an increase in the speed limit.
Why Now?
The changes in speed limits come after a new state law, Assembly Bill 43, went into effect in 2021 which officials say gives cities more control over how fast people can drive on public roads.
Prior to law, speed limits were determined by how fast 85% of drivers were comfortable driving on a given road.
“Transportation experts today widely reject the notion that the 85th percentile speed is the safest speed. Additionally, studies have shown that there is a direct correlation between the speed of a vehicle and the severity of a collision,” said Rafael Cobian, the city’s traffic engineer at Tuesday’s meeting.
Under state law, a survey of street speed limits are required every five years for police officers to be able to give out speeding tickets using a radar gun.
Cobian said the city exhausted all extensions on the previous survey conducted back in 2021.
He also said city traffic engineers and the consultant prioritized safety in the latest survey.
“We’re not recommending any speed limits to increase and in comparison, in the last ordinance, we were forced to increase the speed limit of 52 street segments,” Cobian said. “That’s a huge win for Anaheim and our traffic safety.”
Implementation, Education & Enforcement
Cobian said the city will start changing speed limit signs during the next month, inform the public through their social media channels and a news release as well as tell people about the change in the city’s July newsletter.
“There’s over 500 signs that are going to be changed so a lot of our speed limits are going down most of our major corridors so it’ll take time to get people used to that,” said Rudy Emami, the city’s Public Works director at the June 11 meeting.
Cobian said police officers will use their discretion in enforcing the new speed limits as residents adjust to the changes.
Councilman Stephen Faessel said the changes will help address traffic deaths in the city and it will be up to the police chief to get residents to follow the new rules of the road.
“Putting signs up is easy,” he said at Tuesday’s meeting. “Getting the residents to drive correctly is a lot harder.
Editor’s note: Ashleigh Aitken’s father, Wylie Aitken, chairs Voice of OC’s board of directors.
Hosam Elattar is a Voice of OC reporter and corps member with Report for America, a GroundTruth initiative. Contact him at helattar@voiceofoc.org or on Twitter @ElattarHosam.
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