If the overwhelming majority of drivers want to drive more than 35mph on the road than slapping a 35 or below sign on it is not going to have any meaningful effect unless you back it up with the kind of strict law enforcement that is incompatible with American ideals.

Edit: And as I said in the my other comment, if you want people to go slow you need road features that will make them want to go slow on their own. Speed bumps are far more of an insulting road feature than bushes or something to make the road feel narrow because they basically say "this road is capable of X but we're going to make you go Y and you can't do anything about it" which is why people are complaining. If you want people to go slow toss in a raised median and raised curbs to make the road feel narrow.