When you get old enough, watching drivers pass a radar speed sign is entertaining

It seems as we age it takes less and less to entertain us.

I can watch my granddaughter do anything, like eating or walking and find it infinitely entertaining. About anything out of the ordinary is appealing, which might explain the lure of bingo.

The other day the city of Belleville parked a speed limit monitor outside on my street. I watch it whenever I’m outside rocking on the porch. That was a lot when it was unseasonably cool. Last week, when walking outside felt like running into an oven wall, it was not at all.

I live on Mascoutah Avenue and in the 30 years or so I have been here, the street has been rough. That didn’t stop some people from driving fast but at least they were shaken a bit for their transgressions. There was a place in front of my house which would rattle anything being pulled on a trailer.

This summer the street got some new curbing and a pavement makeover from uptown to McKinley Street. It is so smooth now that it was eerie to drive on it at first. You kept waiting for the bumps and rattles. But that also seemed to mean people felt free to drive faster.

I can’t really say that without any numbers to back that up, but it caught the attention of the police department. So, we got a small trailer with a digital display showing how fast one approaching cars are driving. Anything over 24 mph and bright red and blue lights flash. I don’t know why it flashed on 25 mph which is the legal speed, but it did.

A lot of people probably didn’t realize the speed limit on that stretch is 25 mph. People apparently figure that the old drivers’ rule of thumb applies here and they add 5 mph.

It was interesting to watch reactions as the lights flashed. A surprising number (to me anyway) slowed enough to turn off the lights. Some would at least drop to 30 or a little below. A few didn’t seem to care. The fastest I saw was a guy in a pickup who hit 38 mph and was still accelerating when he passed the sign.

But those flashing lights are dramatic, particularly at night. Studies — yes there are studies — say that the signs do slow down traffic some. It is the best you can do short of a police officer checking speeds.

Of course it had little effect on traffic going the other way. Some cars did have to slow to avoid the cars going uptown who had to swerve around the sign which stuck out into the traffic lane.

I hope it stays for a while. I didn’t find any studies about what happens when the sign is removed. Hopefully it will have impressed on regular drivers on the street that 25 mph isn’t very fast. I’ll miss it when it goes.