You face a traffic fine if you drive a golf cart across a state highway, marked crossing or not.
The Peachtree City Council wants to change that so that some crossings are legal for carts.
The council on Dec. 18 decided by consensus to have city staff explore gaining Ga. Department of Transportation (DOT) approval to have two of nine identified state highway intersections permitted for golf cart crossing. Staff will work on a proposal to have golf cart crossings approved for the Ga. Highway 54 intersections with Lexington Circle and Sumner Road on the city’s east side. Currently many cart drivers break the law and cross anyway.
Staff made no recommendation as to the intersections that should be selected for further study. The request to council was that a small number of intersections be selected for study in what could be a lengthy approval process.
Explaining current law and the variables involved in gaining DOT approval for having golf carts (referred to in statute as Personal Transportation Vehicles–PTVs), Community Services Director Jon Rorie said there are no current guidelines addressing how a community can have cart crossings on state highways permitted by DOT.
House Bill 877 covering PTVs was adopted during the 2014 session of the General Assembly and signed into law by Gov. Nathan Deal on April 25.
“There are no current guidelines. There’s no picture. We’re basically flying in the dark,” Rorie said. “Any recommended site will have to be DOT-approved on a case-by-case basis.”
Staff chose nine intersections along Ga. Highway 74 and Hwy. 54 for the council’s consideration. With that, Rorie said it was likely that presenting all nine proposals as a whole could overload DOT.
“I think we need to prioritize them in smaller bites to DOT,” Rorie said, recommending that the council suggest up to three intersections for study and possible submission.
After the discussion of the nine possible intersections ended, the consensus was to have staff study the intersections at Lexington Circle and Hwy. 54 and Sumner Road at Hwy. 54 a short distance to the east.
Several on the council felt that the Crosstown Drive intersection carried the most significant need, though another perspective held that less complicated proposals might stand a better chance of being approved as DOT begins evaluating proposals from across the state.
Mayor Vanessa Fleisch suggested that Lexington Circle and Sumner Road intersections with Hwy. 54 on the city’s east side might be a good place to start since both intersections are already being used by golf cart drivers.
“If you do those two you’ll have experience working with DOT,” City Manager Jim Pennington said. “Sumner and Lexington could be the easier ones.”
Rorie said the city addressing the two intersections would work with Fayette County government to legitimize the need to have DOT approve them as golf cart crossings.
Other intersections up for future consideration include Cooper Circle at Hwy. 74, Crosstown Drive at Hwy. 74, Stevens Entry at Hwy. 54, MacDuff Parkway at Hwy. 54, Planterra Way at Hwy. 54, Walt Banks Road at Hwy. 54 and Willowbend Road/Flat Creek Road at Hwy. 54.
Rorie gave a sampling of evaluative criteria expected to play a role in gaining eventual DOT approval to have golf carts permitted at state highway intersections.
Among those were side street traffic volumes, the percentage of truck traffic, speed limit, variables associated with the intersection’s accident history and intersection specifics such as sight distance, signal timing and intersection configuration.
It was noted that Peachtree City might experience a better outcome than some communities across the state since golf carts are so numerous in the city and the city has significant experience dealing with issues involving golf carts.
