Crown Candy Kitchen owner Andy Karandzieff has worked for years to get traffic-calming measures installed at the intersection by his restaurant in Old North St. Louis, where motorists routinely blaze through stop signs.
“I tell people, ‘You shouldn't worry about getting shot in St. Louis, you should worry about getting T-boned,'” he told St. Louis on the Air in 2023.
Karandzieff has sounded the alarm about the problem via posts on X, formerly Twitter, suggesting that speed humps would help slow down drivers outside his business. This August, he finally saw those efforts come to fruition — and he credits 14th Ward Alderman Rasheen Aldridge for his work getting the speed humps approved and installed.
“When I became alderman, I knew that was going to be one of the first orders of business because living in that neighborhood, I knew how dangerous the intersection was,” Aldridge said. “I would just see cars literally just blow through the stop signs. It was very dangerous. … A person ended up getting hit.”
Since the speed humps were installed on Aug. 23, Karandzieff has seen a marked improvement in driver behavior at the intersection.
“It's getting people to slow down,” he said, “and some people are actually stopping now that they're slowing down.”
Andy Karandzieff and Alderman Rasheen Aldridge joined St. Louis on the Air to talk about traffic violence, what it takes to get speed humps installed and what else needs to happen to improve the safety of our region’s roadways. Listen to the conversation on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or YouTube; or click the play button below.
“St. Louis on the Air” brings you the stories of St. Louis and the people who live, work and create in our region. The show is produced by Ulaa Kuziez, Miya Norfleet, Emily Woodbury, Danny Wicentowski, Elaine Cha and Alex Heuer. Jada Jones is our production assistant. The audio engineer is Aaron Doerr.
