HAGÅTÑA (The Guam Daily Post) — Guam “does not have good drivers,” Department of Public Works Director Vince Arriola said during a roundtable hearing Friday, adding later that he would be “real worried” about increasing the speed limit on island, but that is something DPW would have to study.
Lawmakers and various agency officials met Friday for a roundtable discussion on identifying major traffic issues, as well as potential solutions and preventive measures.
Around the tail end of that meeting, Sen. Roy Quinata, chair of the legislative committee on infrastructure, asked Arriola about any traffic study relative to the speed limit on Guam.
The highest posted speed limit on Guam is 35 mph, although, as any observer would notice, motorists tend to go much faster on stretches of road where that limit applies, as well as some of those with lower limits.
Arriola said a traffic engineer was on Guam about a year ago and he “really” wanted to increase the speed limit in certain areas.
“I said I need to talk to these guys. They’re boots on the ground, they see and live this every day,” Arriola told lawmakers, appearing to point to Guam Police Department officials in the hearing room. “And we also have to work this with our Office of Highway Safety.”
Arriola said Guam drivers need better education, need to pay attention more and need to be more cognizant of other drivers.
“We get these lane blockers who go into the inside lane, supposedly the passing lane, and then they drop their speed to 25 miles or 30 miles an hour. And so, everyone just starts swinging around lanes, … just trying to escape the slow driver,” Arriola said.
“If anyone has driven in the states and driven in the freeways, if you’re going to do 50 or 60 (mph), this is your lane. If you’re going to do 70 or 80 (mph) this is your lane here and everybody knows it. On Guam, it’s the opposite, the passing lane is on the outer lane. Why? Because drivers are uneducated. They’re not courteous. They’re not paying attention. We just have bad drivers here. So, I’d be real worried about increasing the speed limit,” he added.
But Arriola also said the department would have to study a speed limit increase, noting that in the Sumay area, for example, it is “a fact” that nobody drives at the 35 mph limit.
“We study it with data. We study it with GPD. How many citations have been done in that area? We control. We work with GPD to do the DUI checkpoints. We do the radars with them. That’s our Office of Highway Safety. So, they’ve got all the data on that. So, we’ll take a look at that,” Arriola said.
Traffic slows to a crawl as work begins on Marine Corps Drive in advance of moving heavy equipment for the construction of the Ukudu Power Plant on Dec. 12, 2022 in Upper Tumon.
