‘I’m Taking My Life In My Hands’: Resident Pleads For Speeding Relief

After 54 years living along Newportville Road, Joyce Morelli told Bristol Township Council she’s watched traffic transform the road outside her home.

Now, she said, simply cutting the grass feels dangerous.

“I’m taking my life in my hands,” Morelli told council at its Oct. 15 session.

Her concerns prompted township officials and Police Chief CJ Winik to outline several potential responses, including deploying electronic speed feedback signs on Newportville Road and asking the township’s traffic engineer to examine circulation near Lower Road.

Morelli said she has lived along Newportville Road with her husband for 54 years and has been a Bristol Township resident for more than 70 years.

It was the first township council meeting she’d attended.

“When we moved there, there was no mall. There was no apartments, no houses in Bensalem like there are,” Morelli said. “The traffic has greatly increased.”

Her corner property sits near the bottom of a hill.

Morelli said a fence surrounding the yard has been replaced or repaired seven times over the years, including three times because of speeding-related incidents. In winter, vehicles have also left the roadway and entered the property.

The volume and speed of traffic have become particularly troubling during the past year, she said.

Morelli now cuts grass outside her fence because her husband is no longer able to do it.

“Those cars don’t even slow up when they see you’re out there,” she said.

Drivers sometimes blow their horns as she works, she said, and the lack of a substantial shoulder leaves little room between her and passing vehicles.

Morelli said she previously contacted Bristol Township about enforcement and was told the road presents difficulties because police have limited places to position officers or safely pull motorists over.

She also contacted PennDOT.

The frustration, she told council, comes from trying to determine who can actually address the problem.

“I’ve only lived there and I’m concerned about this traffic,” Morelli said.

Her concerns extend beyond speeding.

Morelli said she’s seen motorists pass other vehicles on Newportville Road despite its curves and recalled being passed herself and nearly ending up in the creek.

She asked the township to consider installing an electronic sign displaying approaching motorists’ speeds.

Township officials said complaints about speeding aren’t limited to Newportville Road and that multiple traffic studies have been conducted throughout Bristol.

But Pennsylvania’s restrictions on municipal police use of radar make enforcement considerably more complicated.

Without radar, Winik said, officers may need painted lines at measured distances and must manually time vehicles between those points. Police then must pull into traffic, catch the vehicle and find a safe location for a stop.

“It would be very dangerous to have to put white lines there and then trying to pull somebody over,” Winik said of Newportville Road.

The department does have portable electronic speed displays, but Winik said the trailer-mounted unit is too large to safely place on Morelli’s section of Newportville Road.

Smaller signs are already being used elsewhere in the township and generally remain at a location for three to six months to influence driving behavior.

“I think there’s one that’s going to be available maybe in the next 30 days that we’re going to be able to take and put on that roadway,” Winik said.

The chief said his proposed 2027 budget will also include money to purchase additional units.

“We’re looking at getting some signs,” Winik said. “We’re going to continue to put them on those roadways and troubled roadways.”

Officials also agreed to ask the township traffic engineer to examine circulation around Lower Road.

Morelli suggested the road should operate one-way, describing difficult conditions when vehicles and larger trucks attempt to maneuver through the area.

Township Manager Randee Mazur said that is something the engineer can evaluate even if speeding enforcement remains difficult.

“We can talk to our traffic engineer as well and we can ask them to look at the road and the one-way circulation,” Mazur said.

Morelli’s request ended with a promise that police would continue working to get a speed display onto Newportville Road.

“That’s the only way we’re going to be able to do it,” Winik said of the signs. “They’re going to help us and they’re going to help people like you.”