The City of Weyburn is looking for the public to provide some feedback on a hot-button issue.

“I know it’s been a hot topic for a lot of people for a long time, so we just wanted to get out there, and see if we could get as much feedback as possible, just to provide council with an idea of what residents are looking for in terms of speed limits within the city,” explained Amber Wiggins, communications officer for the City of Weyburn. The city is using a pair of online polls to get the feedback.

The first of the two polls ask if the speed limit should remain at 40 km/h, or be increased to 50 km/h. The second poll asks if the speed limits should change in school zones. The options are to leave it at the 30 km/h it is now, increase it to 40 km/h, or have it remain at 30 km/h for certain time periods. The example used in the poll is between the hours of 8:00 a.m. and 8:00 p.m.

The polls are available online. You can find the link for the poll concerning the general speed limit within the city limits here. The poll for the changes to the school zone speed limits can be found here.

Speed limits in the city have been a topic of debate in recent years. Most recently, the city introduced a new traffic bylaw in 2016, which regulated the speed limits. The initial recommendation in the bylaw would have seen the speed limits in the city elevated from 40 km/h to 50 km/h and the speed limits in school zones reduced to 30 km/h.

After the debate at City Council during the passage of the bylaw, the option to increase the speed limit was increased was taken out of the bylaw, and the speed limit remained at 40 km/h. The speed limit for school zones was reduced to 30 km/h, in place for the entire day.

The issue saw a lot of comments from both sides of the debate, which played out over social media for a number of days leading up to the vote itself, and the in the days following when the bylaw took effect.

With the speed limit currently at 40 kilometres an hour in Weyburn, it is one of the few remaining cities in the country who have a speed limit below 50 km/h. Across the province, the statutory speed limit for urban roadways is 50 km/h. Weyburn is the only city where all streets unless otherwise posted have a speed limit of 40 km/h. Prince Albert does have a limit of 40 km/h for some residential streets within the city limits.