Speed limit reduced on dangerous road in South Coatesville

CHESTER COUNTY, Pa - South Coatesville residents say their street is too dangerous so they spoke up and they were heard.

"That's totaled," said Gilbert Parker as he described the chain reaction caused by a driver he says was speeding along the road he lives on. The crash sent his neighbor's car crashing into his minivan.

"Her vehicle hit the front of mine and his hit the back," said Parker.

He’s not the only one affected by speeders along South First Avenue, which turns into Youngsburg Road in South Coatesville.

"Speeding is real bad.” Ron Suber says it’s so bad that he puts out a cone near his house to keep drivers from veering into his truck parked in front of his house.

"They'll come around the corner and they come all the way over here flying," he said. But now residents are getting some help slowing down drivers who don't obey the speed limit.

"On average speeders are going 50 plus so they're in for a surprise when they see we're going to start pulling them over a lower speed," said South Coatesville Borough Police Chief Kevin Pierce. He says last month borough officials got PennDOT to lower the speed limit on South First Avenue from 35 to 25 miles per hour.

"We've had pedestrian accidents on this stretch of roadway. The residents behind you there are several kids and those residents are close to the road and we had a child that was struck," said Chief Pierce. Last week new speed limit signs went up and a notice went out to residents about the change. This evening Chief Pierce set up a speed monitor sign to show us the traffic.

"I think the motorists traveling past the scrap yard don’t view it as residential not realizing that just up the hill there in front of me and behind me and it's dangerous to drive in excess of 25 mph," he said. Suber hopes the change will help but realizes it might take a while.

"It's a straightaway. You know what I mean, coming down the hill and going up the hill so people just hit the gas," he said.