Pasadena’s Data-Blind DOT: City’s Speed Signs Are Expensive ‘Feel-Good’ Failures

Across Pasadena, from leafy residential streets to busy arterials, they glow like electronic scarecrows: “YOUR SPEED IS…” signs, flashing a digital warning at passing drivers. For frustrated residents, they are a flimsy, “feel-good” gesture against a tidal wave of dangerous speeding.

But the real controversy isn’t just that drivers ignore them. The real scandal is that the Pasadena Department of Transportation (DOT) is actively ignoring the most valuable function these signs possess: data.

Recent public reports indicate that the DOT has decided to stop collecting the speed data from these devices. This decision, reportedly made to save staff time and resources, effectively renders these expensive radar-equipped signs “dumb,” turning a potentially powerful safety tool into a blinking placebo.

A Goldmine of Data, Willfully Ignored

This isn’t just a minor administrative change. According to the city’s own official traffic engineering policies, data is the bedrock of all safety improvements. To qualify for traffic calming measures like speed humps, a street must have “documented speeding issues as evidenced by higher operating speeds.”

The speed feedback signs are the most efficient and accurate way to get that 24/7 data.

This “uncollected” data is a goldmine that could be used to:

• Prove the Problem: Give DOT and the Pasadena Police Department (PPD) an undeniable, 24/7 log of speeding hotspots, rather than relying on anecdotal resident complaints.
• Target Enforcement: Tell PPD exactly where and when to deploy patrols for maximum impact, instead of random, inefficient enforcement.
• Justify Action: Provide the hard evidence needed to approve speed humps, road redesigns, or other measures that actually slow cars down.

Instead, residents who complain about speeding are in a “Catch-22.” They are told they need data to prove a speeding problem, while the city simultaneously refuses to collect the very data that would prove it.

Leadership “Chasing Shiny Objects”

This decision lands squarely at the feet of the Director of Transportation, Joaquin Siques.

Under Siques’s leadership, the DOT is aggressively pursuing massive, nine-figure grants for “shiny objects” like the hydrogen bus program. Yet, it claims it doesn’t have the staff capacity for the basic, fundamental task of downloading a data file from a sign that is already in place.

This move seems to directly contradict the DOT’s other major initiatives. The city is currently developing a “Vision Zero” plan to eliminate all traffic fatalities by 2035, identifying “Unsafe Speed” as a primary emphasis area. How can the city claim to be serious about a “data-driven” safety plan when it is deliberately blinding itself to its best source of speed data?

Critics from the community have been blunt. One resident recently stated online that the DOT’s claim that collecting the data is “not worth it” is “absolutely ridiculous,” especially as “accidents [are] increasing” and “pedestrians being hit.”

While the DOT busies itself with future-facing projects, its core mission of managing current street safety is failing. The “Your Speed” signs are a perfect symbol of this failure: a visible, expensive piece of technology deployed for public relations, but intentionally neutered of its actual power.