by Frank Schroth

Last night over 100 residents from Quincy discussed the traffic on Governors Plymouth and East Milton Square. They met with town officials at the Elks Lodge. There were also a smattering of Milton residents in attendance as well as Tom Hurley and Bob Sweeney from the Milton Board of Selectmen, interim Town Administrator Annmarie Fagan and DPW director Joe Lynch. Last week they got an earful from Milton residents. Last night they got an earful from Quincy.

Commissioner Daniel Raymondi, City Engineer Shawn Hardy, and City Councillor Brian Palmucci from Ward 4 were among the Quincy officials on hand to bring the public up to date on the construction on Governor’s Road and offer a mea culpa for the poor communication regarding road closures and the inconvenience that they caused.

Mr. Raymondi led the discussion. He began with comments that included a nod to the folks in Milton and good relationship he had with them. He turned it over to Mr. Hardy who gave an update on the construction. In short, it should be done in two weeks and the speed bumps will be retained. Both Raymondi and Palmucci apologized for the situation and made a point of reiterating that the city solicitor had written a statement regarding road closures. A municipality cannot close a road within 500 yards of an adjoining municipality without the permission of that municipality. They made it clear that they would nor be any more road closures.

Residents were then given an opportunity to speak and many did. The concerns ranged from safety, to traffic volume, and conditions and experiences they had on Upton, Bates, Governors, Gardiner and Plymouth. Many took exception to speakers who claimed drivers were doing 60mph down. Someone shouted “No they’re not!” when one speaker made the claim. There was one speaker from Milton who choked up when recounting some of the experiences she had. She did not receive much sympathy from Quincy residents. Councillor Palmucci chose an awkward time to introduce Chairman Hurley. A resident had complained about the traffic signal on Adams Street in East Milton and the delay it caused for northbound traffic on Granite Ave. Palmucci echoed the concern saying he had a hard time getting out of his driveway. And that is when he said,”Maybe this is a good time to invite Milton official to speak.” Hurley faced a little hostility. He explained that work was being done and that developing a solution to a problem that involved a major interstate running through the square was challenging.  When the interstate gets gridlocked, Granite Ave will become gridlocked also as people get off looking for alternate routes.

Mr. Raymondi said he had learned two things during the evening: Quincy drivers are safer and slower than Milton drivers and all the problems were in East Milton Square.

Both officials and residents believed that stricter enforcement of existing traffic laws (speed limits, observing stop and no left turn signs) would help that situation.

It took a middle aged Quincy resident in the back of the room to point out that these are shared streets, shared problems and we need to come together and find a shared solution. After hearing that  Councillor Palmucci  offered to form a citizen committee to continue to work on the issue.