Learn about current and upcoming roadway projects, the key to hitting green lights and how the city is working to ensure traffic runs smoothly in one of the fastest growing cities in the country. Plus, hear the answers to some of our resident’s biggest traffic questions and how the Goodyear Police Department works to educate the community to make streets safe for everyone.
Learn about current and upcoming roadway projects, the key to hitting green lights and how the city is working to ensure traffic runs smoothly in one of the fastest growing cities in the country. Plus, hear the answers to some of our resident’s biggest traffic questions and how the Goodyear Police Department works to educate the community to make streets safe for everyone.
Coming up on this episode of Growing Goodyear,
Speaker 2:My question is actually about all the construction that's happening on Litchfield Road.
Speaker 4:Are the lights timed correctly? Or is there anything that can be done to change the timing of those lights?
Speaker 3:What's the deal with Cotton Lane?
Tammy Vo:Hey, everyone excited to have you here on our Growing Goodyear Podcast. I'm Tammy Vo, from the city of Goodyear.
Jordan Byrd:And I'm Jordan Byrd.
Tammy Vo:So one of the topics Jordan that I think brings us all together, I don't know that it matters where you live, you can live in Goodyear, you can live in another city, you can live in another country. One thing I think we are all very focused on is how much time we're spending in our vehicles on the road.
Jordan Byrd:Not only just the time of actually being in a vehicle actually traveling to a location, but just the amount of time that we talk about it, the amount of time that we think about it. I know a lot of times when I talk to family members, the two things I always talk about are weather and traffic. So it's like one of those just reoccurring topics that always seems to be on people's minds.
Tammy Vo:Sure. And even to the level of you know, over the years, we've had a large amount of our resident base here live in Goodyear, and then travel out to jobs in other cities in the Valley. And that's one thing we hear from them a lot is, you know, I'd love to stay in in my city and work here, live here, play here. So that's always a goal of the city. But I think as we grow our resident population, I mean, you know, we we always talk about, we're the ninth fastest growing city in the nation. Certainly the hottest topics we have at the city here is traffic and roadways.
Jordan Byrd:And rightfully so I mean, as the ninth fastest growing city in the country, the city on a daily basis continues to grow. And that means more housing, more retail, more restaurants. But that also means a greater need for facilitating all of that, and allowing people to get to their destinations in a timely fashion.
Tammy Vo:So Jordan, when you're behind the wheel, what is most important to you in getting to your destination?
Jordan Byrd:I don't know if I'm weird in this, but I'm always wanting to be on the move. If it's traffic, like if I'm on a freeway and it's bogged down. I'll get off and drive surface streets. It might take me longer. But I'm moving. And I think that's one of my biggest things is I just hate being dormant stuck in traffic. What about you?
Tammy Vo:Yeah, I'll say for me, it's, and I think this might be true for a lot of our residents, is not getting stuck behind red light. After red light after red light, you want to feel kind of like you like you're going somewhere, but that there's kind of like organization to the traffic flow. So you're not just stop and go all the time.
Jordan Byrd:A rhythm to it, and that it's not just herky jerky, it's a constant flow that you can kind of fall into and get a sense of it.
Tammy Vo:Absolutely. So you're going to hear it coming up in this episode today. But that's one of my key questions was for our transportation planning manager, who we're gonna be talking with is what is the key? Is there a secret sauce to getting those green lights? So we're going to hear from him and we've got an answer for you.
Jordan Byrd:We're also going to talk to the Goodyear Police Department about some of the more pressing safety traffic issues, speeding, red light running, school zones, all of that plays a factor in how we get from point A to point B in the city of Goodyear. But before we do all that we went out onto the street and talk to residents and citizens of Goodyear about their biggest traffic questions and concerns. We took those questions and we had Goodyear traffic engineer Hugh Bigalk answered those questions.
Speaker 2:My question is actually about all the construction that's happening on Litchfield Road, which seems to be ongoing. And we've never heard anything about like what the project is or how long it'll be or anything like that. So it just delays my time when I'm getting from one place to another.
Hugh Bigalk:The construction work on Litchfield Road is actually, it's not a city project. It's a project for Southwest Gas as they're upgrading their gas main. Timeline wise, they're almost completed in Goodyear.
Speaker 2:I was just wondering why the left turn signal on Van Buren and Estrella Parkway changes, sometimes it's after the red sometimes at a different time.
Hugh Bigalk:The left turn should always be coming up first. Now it may appear to come up at different times due to emergency vehicle preemption, which will interrupt the normal phasing that you would see. It's quite possible it's due to emergency vehicle preemption, which will override the usual sequence of the signal.
Speaker 3:So what's the deal with Cotton Lane? Like it's a complete mess. It's so congested and there's construction everywhere. And it's single lane. It's a nightmare. What what's happening with it?
Hugh Bigalk:There are several projects on Cotton Lane depending where you are on Cotton between MC85 and Lower Buckeye that work is more related to development. We flip around and go north of I 10. There are a couple projects going up there. Again, those are also developer related projects. And then there's been various work up towards Camelback Road. But that was more related to the development that's happening for the development that's in Glendale.
Speaker 4:So when I'm driving Bullard Avenue south of I 10, it seems like the lights are really tight and strange. I can think of times when there's been no traffic around, and I'm trying to make it onto I 10 westbound. And I'll sit for five plus minutes, just trying to get a green light, and there's no traffic around me. So I guess my question would be, are the lights timed correctly? Or is there anything that can be done to change the timing of those lights,
Hugh Bigalk:That traffic signal is coordinated. Also, those movements are also tied to the ramp movements. I'll give you an example, your westbound off ramp is also tied to your southbound left turn movement, those movements come up together. Sometimes that's why you can be there, you may not see any traffic in front of you, but you'll see traffic coming behind you coming from those ramps. But also, majority of the day, that signal as in many signals in the city run coordination meaning we're trying to hold the main line, which in that case is Bullard, trying to hold that green for a longer amount of time. So the signals not always flipping back and forth. Also at that location, which does cause it to hold a little longer on Bullard is the PED crossings, in terms of addressing that we plan on doing as part of maintenance project to this fiscal year is to install PED push buttons across those ramps and at least cut down some of that dead time that we're seeing.
Jordan Byrd:So Tammy, as you can hear there is a wide range of questions and concerns that the residents of Goodyear have. And I think it's one of the things that the city of Goodyear actively tries to stay on top of is addressing those questions and addressing those concerns.
Tammy Vo:That's right. And we're really unique here in Goodyear, because like I said, we all know we're growing, we've got more people on the street, we've got more people living in our city and working in our city, we've got new businesses who were adding to in changing some of that street infrastructure as we grow. And that really changes every day. And not only that we are in such a unique place here. We've got the I 10 freeway and the 303 coming right together in Goodyear. And you see a lot more traffic coming and going from the west coast. So really, we're in a unique spot, which lends itself to a lot more detailed questions that we wanted to get answers to. So we're going to check in with our transportation planning manager here at the city of Goodyear, Chris Bridges.
Chris Bridges:Hi, thank you for having me.
Tammy Vo:Thanks for chatting with us. You know, we get a lot of input on social media, I would say from people who are always interested in what's happening and Goodyear's roadways, it's a hot topic. What are you hearing from residents? What what's what's, what's the word on the street, if you will? Being the ninth fastest growing city in the country. How does
Chris Bridges:This is probably not surprising to anybody, but traffic signal timings is probably the number one hot button that we hear all the time. And it's usually when I'm going home, and I take this route, and I make this left and this right, how come they're red? Or how come I'm on my way to work and I'm driving on pick the road, and I'm driving the speed limit, why are they not green? I always hear that you should just be able to just drive the speed limit. And then the lights will be green. And it doesn't always technically work out that way for a variety of reasons. But we do try to make it as best as possible, and keep people moving as best we can. But the other complaint we probably hear the most is why is this lane end on this roadway. It's wide on this one side, but then all of a sudden it's gone. So those are really the two top things that we hear the most. And it makes a lot of sense. You know, we're a growing city, we have more people, we have more cars and the way we've developed in the past. That's really kind of why you see things like lanes stopping suddenly. Goodyear traffic try to stay proactive in keeping ahead of the growing changes, the growing population of the city? I guess I'll preface this a little bit. I'm brand new to the city, I just started April of this year.
Tammy Vo:And we're glad to have you.
Chris Bridges:And this is a new position for the city. So just the simple fact of the city thinking about having a transportation planning manager on board to help look for these types of opportunities to rearrange things or look for different partnerships or funding opportunities. That's right there, just me physically sitting here. That's one example. But in general, it's really a every day type thing. So you have to have a big picture, what's happening on the ground. So that could be traffic and or congestion or signal timings, but also taking into account what's going to be happening and being able to react and adjust accordingly. Constantly looking at it over and over and not just saying, here's our plan. That's what we're going to build and just go with it.
Tammy Vo:Being adaptable.
Chris Bridges:Being adaptable, core value.
Tammy Vo:Absolutely is one that we certainly value here at the city of Goodyear. And when we talk about things like looking ahead towards projects, being adaptable and changing with that, I'm sure that's causing a lot of people to wonder what is coming up for Goodyear, what street projects, construction, etc, what's coming up, that you could tell us, Chris, that you think will change how people commute around Goodyear?
Chris Bridges:Quite a few actually, there's a lot in our capital improvement program, some things are very small, where it could be an intelligent transportation system improvement, that is helping to make the signal timing at a specific location work better, or be able to detect vehicles. So we're adding more cameras, we're adding more fiber optic connections, those are continuing to come. But then there's the bigger things like the widening of Estrella Parkway going down towards MC 85. And towards Vineyard towards the Regional Park, that's going to get two new lanes. So you will have two northbound to southbound and a new bridge to get over the river. So that's a big project. And those things take a long time. But we also have the widening of Camelback Road between State Route 303 and 152nd Avenue. That's taking a two lane road to a six lane road. So it can be something as large as a big giant road widening or as little as adding some new cameras to a signal. But other things that help people that are that are coming along would be adding another westbound lane on Yuma road west of Cotton. If we add that additional lane westbound on Yuma, we can get more people through the intersection more efficiently. And then people that need the left turn arrow, they can get into the lane to use it. So those are just a few of the things. But those are the types of projects that you'll see happening in the near
Tammy Vo:One of the questions we get from our residents future. oftentimes are you know, I'm driving down the road. And you know, I see that the street looks incomplete. Or I've also heard from residents on social media say, the median on, for example, Indian School Road on part of the you know, one side of the 3033 looks a certain way, but it doesn't look the same on the other side of the road. Can you tell us a little bit more about why is that? Why isn't everything just uniform across the city?
Chris Bridges:Well, it would be awesome if it was but as we know, development doesn't occur in a uniform fashion. Because we're not as the city, the ones in charge of doing that all over. Misconception is, well, the city's going to build a Target over here. Now we don't do any of that stuff. But we do work with them on their improvements. Long term history of the city of Goodyear has been development pays for itself. So when a developer comes in, whether it's a shopping plaza or a subdivision, we would require them to build their improvements to mitigate their impact for traffic on their front edge of the street. But it's only for half of the street, so centerline towards their property and the width of their property, they would be responsible for doing that, well, like I just said, growth doesn't come in linear, the property across the street may not develop for 15 more years.
Tammy Vo:So could it also be the case that there's a business across the street that does not want to pay for the improvements on their side.
Chris Bridges:Or there before and they didn't need to do any improvements. But now it's a thing where you do need to do improvements. So we then would have to go back and fix that. So if you take that pattern, and it just hodgepodge in all over where available property is what's affordable, what fits the needs of a business or a subdivision. That's why it's not congruent. So growth paying for growth doesn't necessarily mean that it's just going to move straight down a road and be constructed equally. So we need to come back in and address how that's going to happen. And so that's where we're at now, is that the city is going to be taken in the direction of well, how do we fill in those gaps and get rid of what those, those things are called scallop streets? And how do we eliminate those at the same time, through our planning process to prevent from making them on the front end? So being much more proactive, and not as reactive or just sitting back and saying, yeah, let the developers handle it. Because it's, it's getting to be where it's a safety issue. It's a capacity issue, and it doesn't impact our traffic flow.
Jordan Byrd:So it's fair to say that the city of Goodyear now is taking a more proactive role in eliminating some of these traffic headaches that residents might experience compared to even just a few years in the past.
Chris Bridges:Yeah, correct. This is a fairly new approach. We have tools in the toolbox to be able to do this. We just haven't done it until recently because we have seen so much growth. The need is there and we do need to be much more proactive, to be able to keep people moving and safe.
Jordan Byrd:So when you talk about scallop streets or incomplete streets or widening necessary streets, everyone's perception is based off of their own reality. Based off of their own commute or their own drive to the store or wherever they may be heading in the city, so they feel like this has got to be one of the most troublesome traffic areas in the city. When it comes to you guys determining which projects get prioritized. How do you guys try to determine that?
Chris Bridges:One of the key things that you can do in transportation planning is doing a regular and update on a frequent basis a transportation Master Plan, which we happen to have just launched with a consulting firm. And what this process does is it goes through highly technical analysis, we do traffic modeling, to look at the land uses, and what the attractors are of those land uses, and what the potential needs are with a growth of additional residential, additional commercial, and that impacts your system. So it's not just a traffic model, per se, but it's also looking at, are there gaps in our system, we should be filling. And this could be all sorts of modes, it doesn't have to be just roads, it could be bicycle pathways, it could be bicycle lanes, it could be pedestrian opportunities, it could be scooters, and where they get staged and a variety of different multimodal options for people to take as they're trying to get around the city. This overall planning process at the end of it really gives you a prioritized look to say these are the priorities based on what's occurred in the recent past. This is what we think is going to occur in the near future. And here are the decisions that we think you should be looking at based on this plan over the next 234 or five years. Once you get beyond five years, you really want to update that plan. Again, our last plan was completed in 2014. And a lot of that is very outdated. Because the last five years, we've seen so much growth, that the information that was in there for the first five years was really good. But it's just, it's the nature of the beast in transportation that things change so much that you you need to constantly look at that again. So developing that plan and keeping the plan updated, helps us look at those priorities, to be able to plan for it. We want to be able to make the best decisions, first being fiscally responsible and choosing the right ones and the ones that make the most sense at that time. But this document really helps us guide that.
Tammy Vo:Chris, I'm going to bring up a topic that's probably going to fire up a lot of people and you don't have to just live in Goodyear to feel this way. But red lights. I think at any community where you live can be frustrating, especially if you hit a red light screen you go next red light. Oh, that's right. Again, it's a stop and go when you're trying to get somewhere can be frustrating. Is there a secret key to you know, hitting the green lights? Give it to us, what is it?
Chris Bridges:Some of the key corridors are coordinated. So if you do drive the speed limit or close to it,
Tammy Vo:Oh, that's the key.
Chris Bridges:The key is you need to drive the speed limit. They are coordinated, especially in the morning and PM peak times to be able to keep traffic moving. Like McDowell is a great example of that, it carries a lot of traffic east west. Hopefully, if you're driving the speed limit, you're going to hit those lights green. Now sometimes it's it's the dumb luck of when you get into the cycle. And maybe if you just get in, and you're only in for a couple of signals that maybe it hasn't caught up to where you're at yet, you might need to go a little bit slower. I know sort of crazy for people to think but if you go a little bit slower, you might actually catch up on that cycle then going faster. But the key is being able to hit on those major roadways like that. The right speed, drive safe, and you're gonna get rewarded.
Jordan Byrd:It's not just an urban legend?
Chris Bridges:It's not an urban legend. It is actually timed that way. And we try to make that happen. There are a lot of variables in there
Tammy Vo:Like a fire truck going through for example could trip it up.
Chris Bridges:Fire truck goes through, something happens. But we do set it up so that you have a greater likelihood of success of hitting that green than not. If you drive the speed limit.
Tammy Vo:Is it just simply timed or are there actual people behind the scenes monitoring traffic flow in the city?
Chris Bridges:Yeah, we have a couple really amazing city of Goodyear staff, that man the traffic management center, they are really the driving force behind this whole network. They're the ones that have pulled it together, literally, the fiber to get it connected to work on signal timings. And then the traffic management scenario just mentioned is actually really truly what you would probably picture in your head. It's a wall full of TVs, that they can pull up any camera from each intersection. If there's an issue, they can make adjustments. If there's a crash like say on I 10 and a bunch of cars are coming off, they can then tweak timings physically right there to be able to help people keep moving because dump of a bunch of cars that weren't there before, the system is not going to do it itself. So you do need real live human beings to actually monitor this stuff, and to program it. So it's not like you just turn it on and you say up, it's going to be 45 miles per hour, the spacing between the signals and the timing that's on that corridor, and that the volumes that are there, it's all taken into account. So it's not just magic, there's a lot of hard work.
Jordan Byrd:And I can only speak from my own experience, sometimes when I'm sitting at a traffic light, and I'm at a red light, and there's no other cars coming in any other direction. And you're like, come on, I mean, I wish that there was someone almost monitoring this that could page me through. And I'm not saying that's what your guys do. But it really is fascinating that you know, with I 10, and the issues that you mentioned, that could pop up there or even during spring training, a crowd exiting at Goodyear Ballpark where there's an influx of traffic on a roadway at any given time, that there's actual human beings behind the scenes that can alter how the traffic flows. That's fascinating.
Chris Bridges:And at some point in time, like, let's say, the Fourth of July, everybody was leaving the ballpark, there's not much you can do. There's just too many people at one time. So you know, there are some limitations there that you do have to take into account. But you know, having somebody there that can watch that and make adjustments on the fly as needed. That's a tremendous asset that we have.
Jordan Byrd:Chris, while we're on the subject of traffic signals, recently within the last year or so here in the city of Goodyear traffic has moved from lagging left turn arrows to leading left turn arrows. What was the thought process going into that decision? And how has the results been since that change was made?
Chris Bridges:There's obviously benefits or negatives to everything. So the the perception from people driving around is, well, this is different. So therefore, it must be negative. And I would say the opposite is probably true, because there are some benefits with this. So what would happen before and I think I mentioned, you know, cars backing up not being able to get into a left turn lane, well, you would also have the situation where people were sitting there and in the left turn lane not being able to make a left, and then the lights changing and you've got a conflict or you can't clear the left turn movement out efficiently. So by putting it on the front end, you're able to clear all those left turn movements, get them through the intersection. So you're able to get people moving quicker by having it on the front end, then on the back end, on the back end, everybody's waiting.
Jordan Byrd:Is there any studies or any data that you guys have come across, that says that one way is more safer than another?
Chris Bridges:I will tell you that we did confirm with PD, that there have not been any recorded additional accidents or crashes that we have seen after the change has occurred that had been attributable to leading versus lagging. So that's a positive thing right there to where we're able to move cars quicker and faster, and not putting more people at risk. And that's where that perception is it's different. Therefore, it's probably more dangerous. And it's it's just not the case, it's just different.
Tammy Vo:I know there's a strategy to planning all this out, it doesn't happen overnight, tell us more about how residents now can can get involved with basically planning what their street infrastructure looks like for the future.
Chris Bridges:Yeah, there's a couple of great opportunities that are starting right now. One is the transportation Master Plan update that we just launched in August. We are right now just in a data collection phase for that study, and will be probably through the end of the calendar year before we really start being able to reach out with some valuable information because there's analysis that has to be done and a lot of technical things that need to be run through traffic models and the like, before we can go out and show people anything meaningful. So it's not just I am a traffic engineer, I'm here to help. It's I've got some valuable information, we need your feedback. So from a transportation Master Plan standpoint, that'll start occurring after the first of the year, sometime, we do have a website set up on the city website, goodyearaz.gov/tmp transportation master plan, that website will be basically our hub for all the information that we're going to share with the public. Upcoming meetings, we're looking at having an interactive mapping, we're going to have surveys. So there's a lot of activities that people will be able to engage with on on that particular plan. The other part is the city's general plan is also going forward at the exact same time and there is a transportation element of which we are coordinating between the two and we're trying to tag team so that we're able to you know, kind of get a cost benefit here where we're both at the same event at the same time. Those two opportunities right now. You're going to see overlapping with public involvement and opportunities for people to contribute ask questions, hey, I drive this way and why is my light red when you know I leave my gym or whatever it may be.
Tammy Vo:So It must be so valuable for you to have that voice from the public. I mean, the people who are actually commuting on our streets every day, to be the ones that have a voice in this process.
Chris Bridges:Yeah, for sure. I can't drive every road all the time every day. I mean, I could, but then I would never get any work done, because I'd be driving around all day. But getting their perspectives, they see things on their commute every day that I'm not going to see or other staff members not going to see or consultant teams not going to even know about. So them pointing out key spots where they think there might be a problem. It can be a signal timing, it can be a pavement condition, it could be striping is gone. It could be Hey, wouldn't it be great if there was a turn lane here. So getting that feedback from more people, the better.
Jordan Byrd:I feel like that's music to a lot of people's ears, the gripes that you may have, can actually really help provide a solution for some issues that are presented to you on your daily drive.
Chris Bridges:Correct. And the more people that contribute, the better. And I found that the more you get, the more you can identify those problems and hopefully address those because if you don't tell us anything, and I'm not out there driving on that same route that you're on every day, how are we supposed to know?
Host Tammy Vo:Chris, is there a place that our residents can go to, you know, whether it be a pothole or something going on with a streetlight that doesn't feel right, where they can go to basically let you know about it?
Chris Bridges:Yes, we do. We actually have on our website at Goodyearaz.gov/report problem, you can send any of your problems there, or you can go to the city of Goodyear app. And you can also connect with us there. And that'll get to the appropriate staff people. And hopefully we can get right on it.
Jordan Byrd:Thank you so much for taking the time, and explaining some of the processes that take place here in Goodyear.
Chris Bridges:Thank you very much for having me, it was good time.
Jordan Byrd:As you can hear, there's a lot of thought and a lot of planning that goes into what actually happens on the roadways here in the city of Goodyear. And I thought one of the more interesting things that Chris mentioned, is the fact that he now has the job that he has the traffic planning manager, that's a step in the right direction that Goodyear is being thoughtful in what the future of traffic could be like.
Tammy Vo:Yeah, really proactive, I think is the key word. And I don't know if our residents know this, but every two years the city has a city wide traffic count. That is where we're actually counting traffic and vehicles at different places in the city. So we can get a better understanding of growth, get a better understanding of traffic patterns for not only planning for roadways, but even for new businesses that want to come to the city we're always hearing residents say, hey, you know, I want such and such restaurant or grocery store? Well, they want to know how many people are driving in front of that potential grocery store shopping center, if they're going to come here. So when we have actual data to back that up, that can mean to a new business, hey, I want to come locate in the city and this is all stuff that really happens years in advance. So I think Jordan is our residents and even we to that matter sitting in traffic sometimes that we might get you know, I don't know frustrated or say hey, I want this roadway to expand. Just know that there is a lot of thought process that's going into our roadways years in advance for a lot of different reasons.
Jordan Byrd:And anytime you talk about traffic, police and traffic enforcement is another piece to that puzzle in ensuring that things run well through the city. I recently caught up with Goodyear traffic unit Sergeant Curt Raine to discuss how the Goodyear Police department is working each day to keep you safe on city streets. This first question, kind of broad, kind of could go all sorts of directions. But when it comes to the types of issues the Goodyear police department typically deals with when it comes to traffic and roadways in the city. What are some of those key issues or the majority of the issues that you as a department see?
Sgt. Curt Raine:I think you touched on it when he first opened with that question that it is broad. We enforce traffic laws. We respond and investigate vehicle collisions and criminal investigations as a whole that might range from DUIs, to fatal collisions, broadly as enforcing the traffic laws.
Jordan Byrd:When typically people hear traffic and police I think a lot of people including myself, automatically goes to speeding right? That seems to be one of the key things that just anyone who's on the roads anywhere typically sees on a daily basis is people speeding. When it comes to that, how does the Goodyear Police Department try to detour speeders in the
Sgt. Curt Raine:Our biggest deterrent when it comes to city? speeding is frankly, its enforcement. It's the issuance of citations. That's the most effective tool in our belt. We are the second highest citation issuing agency when it comes to criminal speeding so when I say criminal speeding that's 20 miles per hour or above, over the speed limit. I'm not talking like from the speed limit five over 10 over, I'm not even talking about those 20 miles per hour and above. We issue more tickets than every single law enforcement agency in the state of Arizona, aside from DPS, so highway patrol, which has the whole state, so we write more criminal speeding citations than Phoenix PD, Tucson, then Mesa you name it. That's how many violators we have in that excessive degree. So there is that much excessive speeding going on. And that's how much we're we're doing our best to enforce it.
Jordan Byrd:That's really interesting. I mean, Goodyear is a growing community. It's a growing city, but it's not one of the most highly populated cities in the state. So, is that just by being second in the state only behind DPS, is that a testament to the enforcement you guys are doing or just Goodyear having that many more speeders than other cities in Arizona?
Sgt. Curt Raine:That is the question, right, I think a little bit of both. I mean, we are population wise, we're just over 100,000. We have I think over 1100 miles of roadway that run through our city. So we're a big city in terms of size, in terms of land area. Some of that is the part of our city is kind of on the outskirts a little bit more. We have some obviously some more dense suburban areas, and we have some more that are a little bit more rural that afford people the opportunity I think in their eyes to you know that they maybe they perceive that they can drive a little bit faster. Yeah, it could be both, I think is the answer.
Jordan Byrd:Staying on the topic of speeders real quick. I know some of the things that we hear from residents a lot is speeders within school zones. Now we just were talking about the enforcement and how many tickets you guys as a department distribute. When it comes to speeders, how many of those speeders are you seeing in schools zone traffic zones?
Sgt. Curt Raine:Our enforcement, when it comes to school zones, as is broad as well. So it's not just speeding. I mean, we have issues with people, vehicles, that'll stop in the middle of the road drop off or pick up kids. And that's just as dangerous, you know, as someone's speeding through a school zone, right? If someone's just randomly getting out of a car and You're obstructing a thoroughfare, when it comes to school zones, we take the safety of our children, I got kids that go to schools in this city. So you know, the officers that work in my unit and the all the officers in this department. So we are incredibly active in doing everything we can to make sure that our school zones are safe. We do enforcement, those areas, we do them on our motorcycles, which are harder for people to see. So we can be more effective. We have unmarked vehicles. So sometimes people call and they say I never see you guys in the area. Some of that's by design. We have radar trailers, people don't think they're effective. But the radar trailers are very helpful for us because they allow me to gather data and I can compile that data and show that to city council and show that to school boards and principals and parents and say, Listen, this is the number of cars that traveled through an area at a given time. And this is the speeds are traveling and and we move those around to all the different schools to do the best that we can to keep the school zone safe.
Jordan Byrd:Let's talk about red lights, because I feel like that's another thing that may be common residents see as something that happens quite often on roadways, not only speeding, and maybe speeding is sometimes hand in hand with red lights. People see that yellow when they're trying to get through the intersection before it goes red. When it comes to red light running, how prevalent of a situation is that in Goodyear?
Sgt. Curt Raine:I'd say the biggest red light violation we see are the right turns over lights that is much more prevalent than someone just blowing a red light.
Jordan Byrd:And by that you mean maybe a rolling stop as they're making a right hand turn?
Sgt. Curt Raine:Yeah, a rolling stop or not stop at all. And so like the right you come up to a red light, if you make a right turn, you're supposed to stop prior to making that turn. And that's the more prominent one that we might see. And we enforce those just as just the same as we do everything else.
Jordan Byrd:Let's talk a little bit about DUI enforcement. How does the Goodyear Police Department, how does any police department go about trying to keep roadways safe, other drivers safe from people under the influence?
Sgt. Curt Raine:Yeah, it's probably a two pronged kind of approach. Maybe if that's not an oversimplification, you have the enforcement and education is kind of how I would frame that. Enforcement obviously, actively out there looking for potentially impaired drivers. We participate in DUI task forces throughout the entire valley. That includes us hosting three ourselves. So three times throughout the year, we'll host a task force where other agencies will come into our city and they'll help patrol our city as well. So we have the enforcement side of things. And then on the education side, we participate in events like the know your limit, where it will show up at the at the ballpark during spring training. And you know, people they're having a good time and they're drinking and it's not an enforcement thing. It's not an entrapment thing. We're not trying to catch people, but we'll give people opportunity to volunteer breathalyzer so they could see however many beers they might have had at the game, and what their level of intoxication is relative to what the you know, the legal limits are. So the know your limit campaign is one thing we do we we engage with the schools, we work with our school resource officers and put on like mock crashes. So they can kind of see some kind of what the consequences might, you know, might be either speeding or driving impaired and what you know, the results of a serious collision looks like. So we try to educate people on all fronts. And we try to do enforcement as well.
Jordan Byrd:You talk about distractions and people eating food, or I know personally for me, I've seen people you know, putting makeup on or, you know, I've even seen people reading a book back in the day, back when people actually read books and not on their phone or tablet. For you. So someone who works in traffic on a daily basis, what is maybe the wildest thing you've seen a driver do where you're like, shake your head, I can't believe, never in my wildest imagination, what I thought someone would have done something like this but they did, what is maybe a memorable call or a memorable traffic pullover stop that you've had that comes to mind like that?
Sgt. Curt Raine:you know, I've seen some people wearing less than the amount of clothes that he or she should be in public. I've seen people driving with, with feet out the window and just strange stuff, you really do see it all. And every time you think you haven't, you know, you have seen it or something else happens. And you're like, well, there you go. There's a new one.
Jordan Byrd:Sergeant Raine, I appreciate you taking the time and educating us a little bit about traffic enforcement here in Goodyear, thank you for the job you and your traffic unit department do and for all of the Goodyear Police Department for the job that you guys do here keeping our residents safe. So once again, thank you, again for joining us here on the podcast. We appreciate it.
Sgt. Curt Raine:My doors are always open to you. And for anybody who's listening or listening to this. If you have follow up questions in regards to this podcast, or you just have traffic questions in general, you can reach out anytime your philosophy here is we engage in community policing, right? That means something that means that we actually do engage with with the citizens and the businesses and you know, the teachers and everybody that lives in our city. So if people have questions, or you're just curious when stopped by here in the lobby, that you want to talk to a traffic officer just just let us know, reach out to us. We'll answer questions and be more than happy to meet you.
Jordan Byrd:So as you can hear Tammy it takes the whole city across multiple departments that work towards making sure traffic runs smoothly and safe in Goodyear.
Tammy Vo:Absolutely. And I really hope our listeners have had an opportunity today to really digest this and and understand hopefully get a much clearer big picture of what goes into planning for the city and truly a little pitch for ourselves Jordan, next time you're stuck in traffic, you can always download the Growing Goodyear podcast.
Jordan Byrd:Well, that's gonna do it for this episode of Growing Goodyear. Thank you all so much for taking the time and listening to this and hopefully you took a little bit of information or education out of the information that we presented to you in this episode of Growing Goodyear. So until next time, for Tammy Vo, I'm Jordan Byrd and remember, it's a great time to be in Goodyear.
Close:That concludes this episode of Growing Goodyear. Make sure to leave us a review and subscribe on your favorite streaming or podcast player app. If you have any questions or comments, email us at communications at Goodyear az.gov And don't forget to follow us on the city of Goodyear's social media pages.