Residents along Speed, Pearl and Klein streets could soon get the peace and quiet they’ve been asking for.

Tuesday, the Board of Mayor and Aldermen will discuss and potentially approve an ordinance closing and abandoning the railroad crossing at the intersection of Speed Street and the west side of Pearl Street.  It’s been a long time coming — so long that some residents thought it might never come.

“I’m looking forward to it. It’s been a longtime coming,” said Carolyn Stephenson, owner of Annabelle, a bed-and-breakfast on Pearl Street. “I’ve worked with three different mayors to get this. I’m so thankful it’s happening. I want to be there when they put the pen to paper so I can see it signed.”

Residents in the area of town and bed-and-breakfast owners have complained for years of late night noises caused by Kansas City Southern trains blowing their horns as they approach the crossing, which is marked by signs.

But the plan wasn’t without opposition. It’s taken a lot of wrangling and hard work to get quiet on Speed Street.

KCS requested the fence as part of the agreement to let the city use a portion of the yard’s eastern edge. Mayor George Flaggs Jr. and North Ward Alderman Michael Mayfield met last year with member Calvary M.B. Church at the dead end of Klein, which would be cutoff by closing the crossing.

Flaggs wrote a letter to the group explaining the two basic issues involving the crossing were to eliminate the noise from the trains’ horns and provide an emergency exit for the church. The emergency road has since been finished, and the last obstacle is out of the way. The city also proposed putting up a sign to give directions to the church and an emergency exit.

Now the work is done, and the papers will be signed soon. Then it will be time for residents and tourists to rest easy. They’ve fought for it long enough.