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Residents Want Rt. 412 Speed Limit Lowered, Launch Petition

Two residents of Leithsville in Lower Saucon Township have launched an online petition as part of an effort to try to convince PennDOT to lower the speed limit on that section of Rt. 412.

Est. Read Time: 3 mins

Two residents of Leithsville in Lower Saucon Township say they are tired of speeding cars, overweight trucks and other traffic-related problems damaging their homes and threatening their safety and that of others in their community, so they have launched an online petition as part of an effort to try to convince the Pennsylvania Department of Transportation (PennDOT) to lower the speed limit on that section of Rt. 412.

Glenn Orwan and Clarann Filko are both longtime Leithsville Road residents who recently brought their concerns about the traffic before Lower Saucon Township Council, which was largely sympathetic to them.

Ultimately, however, council can do little about the roadway. Since it is a state highway, local officials have no say when it comes to setting the speed limit on it.

“Glenn has been contacting PennDOT since 2011, asking PennDOT to lower the speed limit on Route 412 because of the constant heavyweight dump, tandem and tractor-trailer truck traffic, not to mention the speeding cars at all hours of the day and night,” Filko writes in the petition. “This causes his 200-year-old house to shake from front to back. Some people have told us that they can hear the trucks and the constant brake noise at all hours of the night coming down Flint Hill Road (which intersects with Rt. 412 in Leithsville).”

In 2012, a dump truck driver’s brakes failed on Flint Hill Road and the truck careened across Leithsville Road at the bottom of the hill, striking and killing a passing driver before slamming into the Leithsville fire station, which was destroyed along with multiple fire trucks. The truck’s driver was also badly burned in the accident.

The station was rebuilt but two years later there was a close all involving a truck that lost its brakes and overturned on the road in front of it.

“Route 412 was opened to traffic in 1927,” Filko writes in the petition. “It was not built for these heavyweight trucks and it was not built for people to drive 50-55 mph on it, and people do!”

“In the 45 years we have lived here, we have had two cars demolished,” she said. “The first was in 1974, and the second was in 2015.”

According to Filko, with the recent repaving of Rt. 412 in Lower Saucon Township from Polk Valley Road to the Bucks County line, traffic is now traveling at an even higher rate of speed, endangering schoolchildren whose bus stop is in the village at Leithsville Road and Weavers Lane.

And, she said, she is worried about a gas line that runs under Rt. 412, because of the shaking and vibrations caused by the constant truck traffic.

So far, pleas made to State Rep. Justin Simmons (R-131), State Rep. Bob Freeman (D-136), PennDOT engineers and even PA Governor Tom Wolf have gotten no results, according to the petition writers.

Leithsville is located in Simmons’ legislative district.

Filko and Orwan are asking anyone who is concerned about the speed limit on Rt. 412 in Leithsville and especially residents of the area to sign their petition, which as of Tuesday morning had five signatures.

Most of the municipalities and villages nearby have lower speed limits, including Hellertown, Springtown and Richlandtown, where speed limits are 25 or 30 mph, according to the “PennDOT Need To Lower Our Speed Limits Now” petition authors.

“To fix this problem, the speed limit needs to be lowered and enforced,” they said.

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About the author

Josh Popichak

Josh Popichak is the owner, publisher and editor of Saucon Source. A Lehigh Valley native, he's covered local news since 2005 and previously worked for Berks-Mont News and AOL/Patch. Contact him at josh@sauconsource.com.

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