Gardendale residents ask city council to address Fieldstown traffic issues

Officials say they are planning to take steps soon to help alleviate traffic problems on Fieldstown Road.

At the last Gardendale City Council meeting, three individuals stood to address the council about dangerous driving conditions on Fieldstown.

Located off of Fieldstown Road on Shady Grove Road, the subdivision has 25 homes. Many of the families have children and teenagers.

“Most of us are making our children go to the other end” to come out on Mt. Olive Road instead of on Fieldstown Road, said Frank Montgomery, president of the Carrington Subdivision Homeowners Association.

He said the biggest problem is an “odd angle” that forces drivers to lean forward to see oncoming traffic when pulling out.

Another problem, he said, is that the area has been developed since Carrington Subdivision was built.

Bryan T. Myl, president of the Longwood Subdivision Homeowners Association, said the biggest problem for Longwood residents is getting out of the neighborhood in the mornings.

The Longwood Subdivision has 340 houses, according to Myl.

Gardendale Mayor Othell Phillips said he is well aware of the traffic problem on Fieldstown.

He has met with a traffic consultant. The city council received a proposal earlier this week for a traffic study on Fieldstown Road from Odum Road west to the end of Fieldstown. He said the proposal included a “traffic count to see where it would warrant one or two traffic lights on Fieldstown Road.”

In other business, the council:

• extended for 180 days the moratorium in the licensing of money brokers

• authorized the solicitation of bids for wrecker services for the Gardendale Police Department

• voted to cut the grass and assess the cost back to property owners at six residences

• hired Molly Patterson as library youth services assistant; Jennifer Duchock, Laura Jones and Lula Smith as school crossing guards; and Lesley Baldwin as an accounting assistant in the administrative department

The next regular Gardendale City Council meeting is Sept. 19, 6 p.m. at Gardendale City Hall.