Melissa Nann Burke

The News Journal

City is to move the stop line for right-turning traffic on southbound Concord Avenue at Broom Street.

DelDOT engineer says move will fix sight-distance issues and answer complaints about unfair red-light citations.

Change likely won%27t happen until spring 2015.

Right-on-red violations for illegal rights on red more than tripled at the intersection last year.

Traffic officials say they'll adjust the line where motorists are supposed to stop on red along southbound Concord Avenue at Broom Street in Wilmington – one of the most ticketed intersections in the city's red-light camera program.

Residents have long complained about the stop line on Concord, which is set more than 60 feet back from the edge of Broom Street. That's where motorists must stop in order to avoid a red-light camera citation, according to the city's policy.

But to check for oncoming traffic, drivers have to pull forward to the corner to see around a retaining wall on the northwest corner of the intersection, before turning right on red.

Mark Luszcz, chief traffic engineer for the state Department of Transportation, said his division would work with the city to review the positioning of the stop line, after contacted by The News Journal for a September article.

The pavement will be restriped to stagger the stop lines for the right two lanes, and move them closer to the corner. According to plans, the stop bar for the right-turn lane will sit just ahead of the shrub line at the corner.

"The city and state agreed a staggered stop line would be more appropriate," said Mark Luszcz, chief traffic engineer for the state Department of Transportation.

"We are OK with this change to a somewhat atypical design due to sight-distance issues, as well as complaints about unfair red-light violations."

While Concord Avenue is a state road, Wilmington officials are coordinating the fix in part because the city's red-light camera vendor, Xerox, will need to relocate sensors in the pavement to enable red-light monitoring to continue, officials said. The work might not occur until spring.

"Unless we have a suitable stretch of weather, city forces generally would not apply such new pavement markings during the cold-weather months of the year," Dave Blankenship, Wilmington's transportation director, said by email last week.

"Also, in terms of state roads, the city generally maintains pavement markings as already installed by DelDOT, although naturally we are amenable to being as flexible as we can be under the circumstances, weather permitting."

Red-light camera citations cost $110 in Wilmington. Stricter enforcement of right turns on red drove a spike in tickets for the monitoring program for the year ending June 30, according to a News Journal review of city data.

Citations were up 44 percent overall with the city issuing 41,926 red-light tickets worth $4.6 million. The previous year, citations had fallen off 30 percent.

The jump in citations last year was largely the result of right-on-red citations, which soared by 95 percent to more than 16,900.

Right-on-red violations increased by 339 percent at Walnut and A streets, and more than tripled at two other locations: Concord Avenue at Broom Street, and Pennsylvania Avenue at Lincoln Street. Right-on-red tickets doubled at seven other junctions, also.

A violation generally occurs when the front of a vehicle crosses the stop line marked on the pavement after a signal turns red, and then continues into the intersection while the light is red.

Under Delaware law, where right turns on red are permitted, motorists have the right to proceed and turn after coming to a complete stop.

Contact Melissa Nann Burke at (302) 324-2329, mburke@delawareonline.com or on Twitter @nannburke.