Skip to Content
Streetsblog USA home
Streetsblog USA home
Log In
Streetsblog.net

When the State DOT Thinks Your Local Street Is a Highway

This, my friends, is a great example of how myopic reasoning by state departments of transportation can lead to horrible results at the community level.

false

Today, Ron Beitler at Strong Towns tells the story of East Texas, Pennsylvania, where residents and community leaders agreed to reduce the speed limit on Willow Lane/East Texas Road through the heart of a residential area. Because this is a state road, the Pennsylvania Department of Transportation had to be involved.

PennDOT's response to the request was, as Beitler explains, as infuriating as it was predictable:

Residents submitted a petition signed by nearly the entire neighborhood requesting a speed limit reduction since they felt the speed didn’t match up with the residential character of the Village of East Texas. The township supported the request. In fact they even identify East Texas as a traditional town center area. In other words all interested parties who actually understand the context of the road agree.

But based on one-size-fits-all engineering guidelines, Penndot’s answer is ... wait for it ...

To actually increase the design speed of the road!!!

Let that sink in. This my friends is insanity. PennDOT’s answer is increasing design speed by widening the street, flattening the street, removing all trees so cars can drive faster, THEN posting a speed limit so they slow down?

PennDOT completely ignores the context and character of the roadway with its one-size-fits-all application of the 85th percentile speed. It applies standards blindly as if every road was a connector street. [85% speed followup post.]

This letter reflects everything parodied in this wildly popular Strongtowns.org Youtube video entitled “Conversation with an Engineer." Everything wrong with the “Ultimate Bureaucracy” ™ of PennDOT.

Here's a look at that animated "Conversation with an Engineer," which really does capture this situation perfectly:

Elsewhere on the Network today: The University of Oklahoma Institute for Quality Communities compares Tulsa and Oklahoma City's relatively pitiful walking, biking, and transit rates with those of other cities around the country, in a series of graphics that are worth checking out no matter where you live. Bike Portland reports that a local nonprofit is helping low-income families get bike trailers. And Savannah Bicycle Campaign celebrates the city's recent "Bike Friendly Community" award.

Stay in touch

Sign up for our free newsletter

More from Streetsblog USA

Friday Video: The Massachusetts Company That Traded the Trash Truck For a Bike

This small worker-owned cooperative is reimagining how to do recycling, composting, yardwork and more — no diesel required.

August 29, 2025

Friday’s Deadly Headlines

Reducing our reliance on fossil fuels would bring immediate health benefits for hundreds of thousands of people.

August 29, 2025

Talking Headways Podcast: The Menace of Prosperity

Daniel Wortel-London on his new book, "The Menace of Prosperity: New York City and the Struggle for Economic Development, 1875–1981."

August 28, 2025

Thursday’s Headlines Are a Sneak Preview

Want to see what happens when a city makes major transit cuts? Just look at Philadelphia. It's not pretty.

August 28, 2025

What I’ve Learned From Getting Transit Wrong

"Advocacy isn’t about pretending you’ve always been right. It’s about learning, adapting, and bringing those lessons into the fight for better transit and better cities."

August 28, 2025
See all posts