Johns Island blind curve causes residents to demand change over fast drivers

CHARLESTON COUNTY, S.C. (WCSC) - Residents living on Patton Avenue in Johns Island are fed up with cars speeding around a blind corner. They say drivers are using this road as a shortcut near Savannah Highway, entering at Main Road to get to Brownswood Road.

Now residents are putting pressure on state agencies to put down speed bumps, rumble strips and blind driveway signs.

They say they’re at a breaking point. A woman named Lisa says she is going as far as to do daily tasks for her neighbors just so that they don’t need to go near the road.

“I have senior citizens that live across the street,” Lisa says. “I get their mail, I put up their garbage and recycling cans and bring them back in. It’s just too dangerous for them to be near the road.”

Lisa says that with a blind curve and speedy drivers using the road as a shortcut, none of her neighbors are safe.

“It just isn’t right for them to have to risk their lives when people don’t slow down for me, they’re not going to slow down for them either. "

One of Lisa’s neighbors, 88-year-old Gloria Simmons, says she doesn’t wander too far out of her front door.

“One day they might knock me up in the tree,” Simmons says.

Simmons says that, for her, this issue hits close to home.

“I was hit by a car downtown years ago. I was hit. And that ain’t no picnic.”

Lisa says she has tried to make a change.

“We’ve put up signs that this is a neighborhood, please slow down. We have ‘Children at play’ signs. They have made absolutely no difference,” Lisa says.

She says neighbors have also come together to send multiple letters to the South Carolina Department of Transportation expressing their fears while demanding a reduced speed limit, blind drive signs and speed bumps.

SCDOT responded, saying they moved the 35 MPH speed limit signs to better locations and put up curve signs. They added that they cannot install signs on private driveways and that the 35 mph speed limit is too fast for speed bumps.

“I would love to see us get some bumper strips at the very least. Speed bumps would be great,” Lisa says.

While Lisa continues to advocate for safer conditions, Gloria says she is thankful to have Lisa as her neighbor.

“I love her. She brings me joy.”

Simmons says she hopes for a day where she, too, can go outside to take a walk.

“I really want to come out and enjoy the outside… but I can show them that I can roll in the yard.”

If anything is driving you crazy on the roadways, submit your request here.