The City of Steinbach is starting to prepare a new bylaw to govern speed limits. The province has handed that responsibility to municipalities as of September 1st. Mayor Earl Funk says it's important that this be done before the deadline or else speed limits on all city streets and roads would revert to 50 kilometres per hour.

"That would slow things down an awful lot (laughter), so we want to make sure that we do our due diligence. Our engineers have given us their look on it and what they would like to see and it makes a lot of sense. We need to work on this quickly. Technically, we have until September, but we'd like to have this in place before then."

As part of the new bylaw, city council is currently considering a number of changes to current speed limits as recommended by city engineers. One is to reduce the speed limit to 60 KM/H on Old Tom Road, Funk says that is because of safety.

"In the interest of safety, because it is abutting a residential area, I think we should be looking at changing it to 60 to bring the speeds down for the pedestrians that are on there. It just makes it safer and safety is job one."

The proposals also call for a reduction to 60 KM/H on Keating Road, all sections of Park Road, Hirschfeld Road, north of Highway #52 as well as Clear Springs Road, east of Highway #12.

Funk adds another proposal affects speed limits on country roads that are now part of Steinbach through annexation.

"It's going to be reduced from 90 KM/H to 70 KM/H. That is going to help us in a lot of ways. There are residences on those roads but also it will help with maintenance because they don't get pounded out as bad at a lower speed."

And, on Mckenzie Avenue, the 50 kilometre per hour speed zone would be extended west, past Bush Farm Road because Lexington Village is continuing to grow in that direction.

The changes are not final and will go through a public hearing process in the coming months.

The province will retain control over speed limits on the highways that run through the city.