The Washington State Department of Transportation- Eastern Region is hosting a public open house Thursday, June 7, 5:30-7 p.m. at Deer Park City Hall (3126 E. Crawford St., Deer Park) on intersection improvements – including two new roundabouts – on US 395 in Deer Park.
This project includes construction of single lane roundabouts at the Short/Main and Monroe/Crawford intersections in Deer Park. Turning modifications will be built at the Burroughs/Dalton intersection. Roundabouts should reduce the frequency and severity of “entering at angle” collisions at these locations.
Construction is scheduled to start Monday, June 18. Crews will begin reconfiguring the intersections of Short/Main, Monroe/Crawford and Burroughs/Dalton roads and update drainage, signing and pavement markings. The work should take about 12 weeks to complete and will take place Monday-Saturday of each week.
At the open house, WSDOT staff will be on hand to provide details about the project and answer questions related to traffic control, parking concerns and pedestrian access. There will be no formal presentation, and the public is free to stop in anytime during the open house.
And if the thought of two roundabouts on a state highway make you a little doubtful (there were a lot of questions from the public on this when it was first announced), you need to attend our Roundabout Community Conversation next week, 6-8 p.m. on June 6 at CenterPlace in Spokane Valley.
These roundabouts are going to ruin my already lengthy commute. The North side of Spokane is going to just keep growing. Why not just save money and build on and off ramps?
A study done by Citylab.com found that roundabouts increase accidents in an intersection by 12 percent. In the winter roundabouts that frost over are extremely deadly because of the sharp turns. On and off ramps are the way to go.
We do not under any circumstance need two round a about on high way 395. Like seriously these is a dumb idea we are going to have to change it in the next 10 years. Plus it slows traffic down. In addition there is no need for them. If a driver doesn’t know how to merge they shouldn’t be driving. This will add 5 to 10 minutes to my drive time into and out of Spokane. Look at the facts there is only about 10 car crashes on the 395 strip through Deer Park a year. For people who don’t know that is not a lot of crashes for a high way. Again, I can’t stress this enough, in about 10 years there will be so many more people in the area do to the completion of the North South corridor there will be a need for on and off ramps. Furthermore these round a abouts are a waste of tax payer dollars, they put us behind in advancing the city, there is no need for them, and finally it adds 5 to 10 maybe more minutes to my drive time to and from Spokane. I am a very concerned citizen, this a waste in time and money when we are going to need to change it within the next 10 years.
I am a concerned citizen. These two round abouts on 395 in Deer Park are a waste of time and tax payer dollars. Due to the completion of the North South Corridor more people will come in the area and then there will be a need to change the round abouts into on and off ramps.There is no need for this. If a driver doesn’t know how to merge into traffic there should have their license suspended until they learn how to. If this is meant to cut down on accidents well I ask you this how many accidents occur on the 395 strip through Deer Park? Well there are only about 10 a year this is not a lot of crashes for a high way. This makes no sense to me why spend the money and time to put in round abouts if they will be changed into on and off ramps within 10 years. If we put these in the high way it will set back advancement to the city by adding 5 to 10 minutes to my drive time to and from Spokane.
Can you send me a link to the article and I will take it to the panel of roundabout experts in town today to get their response. Thanks! If used correctly, a roundabout shouldn’t be deadly under pretty much any conditions because the only collisions that can happen are low speed rear-endings that aren’t severe enough to result in death. It’s hard to get in a head-on collision in a roundabout.
Thanks for the input Austin. The issue with 395 is that the collisions on it have often been serious or fatal so the safety aspect has to be addressed. As a concerned citizen, the best thing you can do is attend the open house and talk to engineers about your concerns or call or email them. They’re really good about taking your comments and analyzing them to see if there is a better solution.
Roundabouts may slow you down a little but not by 5 or 10 minutes. The beauty of roundabouts is traffic never stops, although it does slow down as vehicles yield to other cars in them. The whole point though is to keep traffic moving.
The aggravation and frustration of a prolonged commute time, traffic delays and of course taxpayer expense wouldn’t be quite so bad if every time I drive past a road construction crew one or two guys are working, two are holding signs, two or three more are watching the sign holders and six or eight more are doing nothing whatsoever. They are very publicly display a lot of expensive equipment and a lot of expensive man power doing bugger-all knowing that they will be paid handsomely for minimal work at our expense, for a project we don’t want. Is it any wonder people have nothing but distain for their so-called elected officials? The majority of the serious accidents on 395 are directly related to operator error of at least one driver. No amount of taxpayer spending will ever cure stupid.
Thanks for the comment Patricia. I’ve mentioned to project managers in the past that it sometimes appears construction workers aren’t doing a lot. They tell me you may have driven by when workers were on a break (the union requires breaks), or when something was happening in the project that is technical or requires a fine touch and only one person can do it. If you see this repeatedly and feel it’s not right, you should reach out to the project manager and let them know in case they have not witnessed it themselves/