Act Summary

1         

Residential roadway.  Narrows the definition of “residential roadway” to (1) eliminate segments of a road that are half-mile or shorter in length, so that only roads with a total length of under a half-mile are included, and (2) clarify that the road must be a city street or town road.

Residential roadways will have a speed limit of 25 miles per hour (reduced from other statutory defaults) if a road authority adopts that limit and posts signs accordingly.

2         

Rural residential district.  Modifies the definition of “rural residential district” to:

•  Broaden the classification to include eligible city streets;

•  Clarify that the distance between dwelling houses is measured along the centerline of the roadway, and measured between each primary access point (e.g., driveway) to the house; and

•  Measure the distance between dwelling houses over the minimum quarter-mile stretch of road based on the average spacing of the houses, rather than based on the spacing between each house on that segment of road.

Makes technical changes, to move the definition of the term to a different location in statutes.

A rural residential district is a road that has houses built up along it for a distance of at least a quarter mile, where the houses are on average spaced less than 300 feet apart.  These basic requirements are not changed in the revised definition, except as noted above. 

3         

Urban district.  Modifies the definition of “urban district” to clarify that it can be on a city street or town road.

4         

Speed limits.  Modifies statutory speed limits, to raise the speed limit in rural residential districts from 30 m.p.h. to 35 m.p.h. if posted, or 55 m.p.h. otherwise.

Makes technical changes, to move the definition of the term to a different location in statutes.

Prior to this change, the statutory speed limit within a rural residential district was 30 m.p.h. on a town road, and 55 m.p.h. on a city street.

5         

Speed limits on certain rural residential districts.  Creates a phase-in for changing posted speed limits of rural residential districts, so that the posted speed limit of 30 m.p.h. can remain until the signs are replaced.