By Dawn De Busk

Staff Writer

NAPLES — If there is any public road on which the wrong speed limit is posted, then by default, the speed is 45 mph.

That is one of the policies of the Maine Department of Transportation (MDOT).

Unfortunately, many of the roads with the wrong speed limit signs were brought to the town official’s attention because people living there thought the speed limit should be lower. 

Nobody is coming forward with the origin of how the Town of Naples ended up with speed limit signs that are lower than the actual speed limit on multiple roads.

“Over the years, at some point, someone approved speed limit signs being put up randomly,” according to Naples Town Manager John Hawley. 

The Cumberland County Sheriff’s Office “won’t be pulling anyone over on mis-posted roads,” he said.

That is because the courts won’t uphold speeding violations on roads where the speed limit sign was wrong, he said.

“The courts won’t recognize a non-certified speed limit,” he said. 

Law enforcements’ hands are tied when it comes to people driving too fast on roads where incorrect speed limits are posted. On the other hand, the state’s process for reviewing speed-limits changes is as slow as a snail. 

Town Manager Hawley updated the Naples Board of Selectmen on the speeding subject on Monday.  

“As requested, I put forth formal request to the MDOT to have speed limits assigned to some of the roads in the town that received the most significant number of speeding complaints. The DOT engineer contacted me — one of the two that does this work, and he explained that each town is only permitted to submit up to three roads per year to be evaluated. Therefore it could take up to a year to get those evaluations completed,” he said.  

“Towns have the authority to assign their speed limits, if, per state law, the town has hired and retains a traffic engineer on staff. Towns are not permitted to contract with an engineer,” he said. 

The traffic engineer must be a year-round, full-time employee. 

The roads that Hawley submitted to MDOT for revaluation this year include Lake House Road, King Hill Road and Kansas Road.

“Each town is only allowed to have DOT do three requests per year. You can ask for more but that reduces the likelihood it will be reviewed,” Hawley said. “It does take almost a year to get the speed limit checked out and set.”