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The Villages
Thursday, March 28, 2024

Official says tougher enforcement could calm Morse traffic concerns

A golf cart and van collided on Jan. 13 on Morse Bouelvard.
A golf cart and van collided on Jan. 13 on Morse Bouelvard.

A Sumter County official has indicated that enhanced enforcement on Morse Boulevard, not capital improvements, could address concerns about traffic on the vital Villages traffic artery.

Villager Sherrie Hyer has gathered more than 1,000 signatures on a petition she plans to present to the Sumter County Board of Commissioners at 5 p.m. Tuesday at Colony Cottage Recreation Center.

She began collecting signatures on the petition after her De La Vista neighbor, 85-year-old Francis Hughes, was killed Jan. 13 when his golf cart collided with a van on Morse Boulevard north of County Road 466. In her petition, she calls on the commission to consider reducing the speed limit, posting more signs and moving the golf cart path off of Morse Boulevard.

In an email dated May 11, Sumter County Public Works Director Richard Baier points out that the county spent $1.09 million in 2009 making improvements to Morse Boulevard from CR 466 to El Camino Real. He points out that in addition to resurfacing, improvements included the addition of left turn lanes and widening of golf cart lanes.

“I would not recommend any future capital improvements, I would however, recommend additional sheriff regulatory enforcement insofar as speed, passing and aggressive driving by drivers of all types of vehicles,” Baier wrote in his email.

Ahead of those improvements in 2009, the Kimley-Horn & Associates engineering firm was retained by the county for preliminary design of the Morse Boulevard improvements.

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In its October 2008 report, Kimley-Horn had recommended the turn lane additions and widening of golf cart lanes.

“Based on 3.5 years of crash data, there have been no recorded incidents of automobiles striking golf carts and no personal injuries recorded either,” Kimley-Horn wrote in its report nearly seven years ago. “This crash history results in over 15 million vehicle miles traveled with no recorded personal injuries due to golf cart/automobile interaction. The history is significantly below national averages for crash rates.”

For her part, Hyer is hoping to pack the house at Tuesday’s commission meeting.

“There is strength in numbers,” she said. “We are the ones out there in our golf carts and cars every day. We need to stand up and be heard.”

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