Agenda - Public Works Committee - 06/15/2004

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PW CASE # REVIEW STATUS OF TH 47/142"d AVENUE INTERSECTION By Steven Jankowski PE, City Engineer Background: In light o£ the recent fatality at this intersection it is appropriate that the recent history of this intersection be reviewed and that the City consider alternatives for its modification. This segment of TH 47 had a daily traffic volume of 18,500 trips in 2000. There have been a total of 25 accidents over the ten year period between 1993 and 2003 (data is missing .for 2001), or an average of two or three accidents per year. Records for this period show a high of six accidents in 2000 and a low of no accidents in 1994. In 1996 the City and MnDOT jointly prepared and adopted a corr/dor plan for the section Highway 47 which includes this intersection, That plan identified this intersection as ultimately having traffic signals. MnDOT has control over TH 47 and has held firm to their position that traffic signals will only be installed subsequent to the intersection meeting one of the eight possible technical signal warrants. When the High,way 47 improvement project was being designed, the City's engineering consultant SRF Inc. had prepared a si~ona[ justification report for this intersection which concluded that silo-hal justification warrants had been met. However, this report utilized as an element of its justification traffic which was exiting through the Rivers Bend Plaza onto CR 116. This traffic was not actually utilizing 142nd Avenue, but was visually observed and recorded, and projections were made as if this traffic were using 142nd Avenue as it should have been. The SRF justification study was rejected by ~LaDot, which argued that once a signalized intersection at Xkimo Street was installed and operating there would be less traffic using 142"d Avenue. A subsequent signal justification study was performed by SRF at the City's direction based upon traffic counts taken in late April 2001. The Xkimo Street connection to TH 47 had been functioning since December 2000 at the time of this study. The results of this second study showed the traffic volumes using 142nd Avenue had decreased over those identified in S1LF's earlier study. The City has not requested MnDOT to do another traffic signal warrant study since that time. Discussion: There are several modifications to this intersection that the City might'~vish to consider encouraging MnDOT to pursue. These include the following: '. Extend center median through 142''d Avenue This modification would result in the safest condition possible at' this intersection since it would eliminate all conflicting turning movements. This. change would also have a severe impact to the River's Bend Plaza which is still acclimating to the median closure on CR 116. ·