55 mph? 70 mph? 121 Drivers Just Go With the Flow
By BRETT JOHNSON
Updated 2:28 PM CST, Wed, Jul 22, 2009
Watch your speed while traveling Highway 121 near Grapevine Mills mall, because police are writing tickets along the area where the speed limit is clearly posted.
"There's one 55-mph speed limit sign. Then under the bridge, you will often see a police officer," motorist Lisette O'Neill said.
But some drivers said there is confusion about the speed limit on a stretch of Highway 121 before the new tollway.
"I think the signage here in this area is absolutely horrible," Jack Jewell said. "I don't know what the speed limit is."
It has been a common complaint since the Highway 121 tollway opened a few weeks ago.
A 55-mph speed limit sign at Bass Pro is the first speed limit sign motorists traveling northbound on Highway 121 see. But once they travel north toward the new tollway, the speed limit is up in the air.
Other than a few exit ramp postings, the only other speed limit sign motorists see is four miles away, when they happen upon a 70-mph posting just prior to the tollgates in Coppell.
A representative from the Texas Department of Public Safety said the speed limit for the time being is a non-posted 60 mph.
"I just kind of do what the other traffic's doing," O'Neill said.
The southbound lanes, however, are more clearly posted. The speed limit is 70 mph south of the tollgates and drops to 55 mph in Grapevine.
The Texas Department of Transportation will conduct a traffic study within the next week and then recommend speed limits to local city governments, which must approve the speed limits before they can be posted.
In the meantime, Grapevine police will be patrolling.
"An excess of speed anywhere -- 70 mph-plus -- we're going to see as alarming and concerning," said Grapevine police Sgt. Kim Smith.
First Published: May 26, 2009 4:55 PM CST
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