By Scott Taylor,Staff Writer

AUBURN – Bill Higgins used to play football with his kids in front of his house on Park Avenue.

That was 40 years ago.

“Now, you take your life in your hands just backing out of the driveway,” Higgins said.

Before Wal-Mart or Home Depot opened in Auburn, Park Avenue was a country road. Most drivers hadn’t figured out that it was a handy shortcut between downtown and the shopping areas.

“It came with all the growth of Center Street, and it just won’t be getting any better,” he said.

Higgins and 45 of his neighbors have asked the city to come up with some way to make the road safer, for example by lowering the speed limit or putting up warning signs.

“You can’t walk on the street anymore,” he said. “We don’t have sidewalks. So maybe that might help, putting in sidewalks. Or maybe they could divert big trucks around the area.”

Police agree that Park Avenue has gotten busier. The road peels off from Court Street west of the downtown and continues north, ending on Mount Auburn Avenue, just west of Wal-Mart.

“The regulars have always known it’s a great shortcut,” said Auburn Police Lt. Rick Coron. “But with those retail stores up there, there is just so much more traffic.”

Residents learned just how dangerous it could be last weekend. An 80-year-old man was struck by a car near the Park Avenue-Court Street intersection Saturday afternoon while he was checking his mail. Coron declined to identify the man or his address, but said his mailbox is on the opposite side of the avenue from his house.

“It appeared he was stepping into traffic and was hit,” Coron said. “It doesn’t appear the person that hit him even realized what they’d done.”

The accident was ruled a hit-and-run, but a driver stepped forward after reading about the accident in Sunday’s paper, Coron said.

He said police are still investigating the incident, and he declined to identify the driver. Charges have not been filed.

It was bound to happen, Higgins said.

“People just come up that road so fast,” he said. Park Avenue peaks into a slight hill just before it reaches his house. A speeding car cresting the hill doesn’t have time to slow down for anything. That includes cars backing out of driveways or neighbors checking their mail.

City Planner David Galbraith said he hopes to meet with city department heads over the next two weeks to see what can be done for the neighbors. That could include posting signs marking the road for local traffic only and performing a traffic study on the area.

He said the city’s new elementary school, destined for the southern part of Park Avenue, could cut down on traffic as well.

“That’s when we put up flashers and signs, and designate that area a school zone,” Galbraith said. “When you do that, you slow down traffic enough that people may go another way.”

Police are watching the area, too. Lt. Coron said police regularly post radar details there to catch speeders.