Cal State University Rewards Positive Driving While Protecting Students from Speeders

• By Devorah Warner
• September 03, 2024

Anyone who’s ever set foot on a college campus has experienced it. The sudden emergence of a speeding car as if from nowhere. The whoosh of a car passing as you crane your neck before crossing the street. The lurch of your stomach as you realize that vehicle could have so easily collided with you.

Erratic driving isn’t unique to the college-aged demographic, but it’s a predictable part of campus life. Students want to make it to class on time. Or they’re eager to finally get off campus after a long day. Either way, they’re often rushing. And the repercussions can be frightening, and even tragic.

At Cal State’s Monterrey Bay Campus, as on many campuses across the country, speeding was a concern. The campus is located in beautiful Seaside, California on a converted military base. The unique set up offers ample space for classrooms, faculty offices, and driving. But it doesn’t put a damper on students’ need for speed.

The university decided to take action to curb the speeding problem. But officials didn’t want to take the typical approach of penalizing drivers or finding ways to slow speeders down. Instead, officials wanted to take the inverse approach and simply reward and acknowledge students who were driving well. Every driver has their good moments and their logic was that by recognizing those moments, they’d encourage more of them while minimizing speeding and reckless driving.

The university got in touch with Traffic Logix, a provider of traffic safety solutions, and they presented their proposal. They wanted a way to start addressing speeding by simply acknowledging good driving habits instead of focusing on poor ones.

The company had a solution that could do just that. The interactive SafePace signs display driver speeds. They are mounted along with speed limit signs to both alert drives to their speeds while reminding them of posted speed limits. But they do more than just that. They offer the ability to completely customize messages in bright LED lights including an unlimited choice of any text or graphics. And what’s more, the messages aren’t generic or canned, they’re driver-responsive. Meaning, each driver can see a different message depending on their speed. And the University had a plan to customize the signs to single out good drivers and reward their positive behaviors.

The SafePace signs mounted on the Cal State Monterey Bay campus do something simple, intuitive, yet undeniably gratifying.

They smile.

When students drive at the posted speed limits, they simply display a smiling emoji face. Which may seem elementary, but in fact is enough to make students feel appreciated, recognized for their positive behavior, and encouraged to continue doing more of it.

The results of the new signs were startling. Students began to change the way they drove. Speeding significantly decreased. And the campus began to feel like a safer place. Simply displaying a smiling face to students who obeyed speed limits was making inroads in changing student driving behavior.

Suddenly, more and more students were slowing down and observing the posted campus speed limits. The signs were mounted at campus entrances and strategically throughout campus, displaying a welcome message to students, their current speed, and a smiley face- but only if the student earned it. The signs are portable and offer the option to be pole mounted or trailer mounted. The company also offers a universal mounting bracket that allows the signs to be mounted on a pole at multiple locations by simply sliding the signs onto a bracket. The signs are also available with a choice of several power options including battery power, AC power, or solar power to conserve energy.

The SafePace signs are cloud enabled and offer the ability to collect detailed data on speeds and traffic to monitor driving behavior and ensure that they are successful in changing driver behavior.

With the student reaction of safer, slower driving, campus staff began to be aware of trouble areas that needed further intervention. With more students driving slower and less recklessly, the campus staff was able to isolate where specific problem areas where instead of just trying to deal with widespread speeding concerns.

The interactive signs had helped to change the safety landscape, but in high traffic areas and on long straightaways, speeding continued to be a concern. Pedestrian safety also needed to be addressed with proactive solutions to help students cross safely.

Despite the fact that it’s the same student population that is both the driver and pedestrian depending on the time of day, drivers did not seem to always be considerate of students crossing. The school wanted to eliminate any element of danger involved in students crossing as they navigated to and from their vehicles and around campus.

Their goal was to continue to reward positive behavior while also working on these two additional problem areas—reducing speeds on longer stretches of road and protecting pedestrians so that students could safely cross streets in designated areas.

Unlike many other traffic safety providers, Traffic Logix isn’t simply a one-solution provider. The company offers a complete toolbox of traffic calming solutions and encourage campuses to integrate a mix of those that works best for them rather than just choosing one type of solutions and assuming it’ll solve all safety concerns. The company worked with Cal State to select additional solutions to address further speeding and safe pedestrian crossing.

Recycled rubber speed cushions were installed in high traffic areas and on longer stretches of roadway. These cushions are simply a series of small speed humps installed across the width of the road that compel drivers to slow down as they ride over them. They are constructed of interlocking rubber units made of 100% recycled tires. These units can be customized to any road width or length, adjusted both for practical configurations and for desired speed reduction. The recycled rubber cushions are long lasting and durable. They are embedded with bright highway tape to make them clearly visible to approaching drivers.

The cushions are quick and simple to install and are already making a difference in the way people drive on the Monterey Bay campus. As an added bonus, the split design makes them emergency vehicle friendly, since the wider wheel base of fire trucks can ride over the speed cushions without slowing down.

To address pedestrian safety concerns, the Cal State Campus installed Traffic Logix speed tables. These recycled rubber crosswalks are made of the same rubber units as the speed cushions but cover the complete width of the road with a flat top so that students can cross safely. They are also embedded with the same bright highway tape, available in a choice of several colors. The bright tape alerts drivers as they approach so that they’re aware of the crosswalk in advance and know that they need to slow down. The speed tables were placed at critical junctions where students cross campus roads to ensure that cars would slow to let them cross safely.

The combination of positive reinforcement, physical intervention in high-risk areas, and protected pedestrian crossing has changed the safety landscape at the Monterey Bay campus. Reckless driving is a thing of the past. Students drive safely and observe speed limits. And faculty and students alike feel safe driving and walking on campus without the fear of that familiar whoosh of a speeding car.

Protecting campus roads is never a simple endeavor. But on the Monterey Bay campus of Cal State, they’ve discovered that a combination of approaches and products can change the way people drive and protect campus roads and everyone who uses them.

This article originally appeared in the September / October 2024 issue of Campus Security Today.