Traffic solutions
U.S. Highway 95 north of Coeur d’Alene isn’t as congested as Spokane’s North Division – yet. But don’t expect that news to comfort a driver who’s stalled in a turning median somewhere south of Hayden, looking for a break in the oncoming traffic.
On both sides of the state line, moving people and goods on a north-south axis has become a daunting challenge, the failure of planning and infrastructure to keep pace with regional growth and development. Time was, motorists bound for points north faced little to slow them down. Then newcomers moved in, population grew out and commercial establishments popped up along what has now been transformed from a route to elsewhere into a recurrent traffic jam.
An Idaho Transportation Department study showed that driving a 5.2-mile section of the route during peak traffic hours took 80 percent longer southbound and 65 percent longer northbound than during unimpeded times. Such delays compound the frustration of antsy drivers trying to make left turns off of 95 or waiting to enter it from side roads – frustrations that spawn recklessness.
Long-term solutions for both Spokane and Coeur d’Alene – the north-south corridor on the Washington side, the Huetter bypass on the Idaho side – are costly and years off.
Rather than just wait and growl about it, officials in Kootenai County have launched an effort to identify short-term, affordable improvements that can restore some of the north-south mobility that has been lost along U.S. 95 between Coeur d’Alene and Hayden. A public meeting has been scheduled for Tuesday afternoon to begin a community conversation about what should happen.
The Coeur d’Alene Chamber of Commerce wil host the session because of a desire to make sure businesses along most of the eight miles between Interstate 90 and Highway 53 get to air their concerns. But all community members should take advantage of this chance to share their views.
Critical to the discussion are questions about whether and where vehicles can cross the median on the busy highway. Among options on the table: prohibiting turns altogether except at signaled intersections; other, more modest turn restrictions; respacing signals to meet the state’s preferred half-mile intervals; or taking some signals out and disallowing turns where they used to be.
The Kootenai Metropolitan Planning Organization, which will conduct the study, is looking for strategies that can be implemented cheaply and fairly soon. Planning engineer Carole Richardson hopes to have recommendations by September.
But the Idaho Transportation Department, facing a $200 million shortfall, recently cut programs, including some designed to reduce congestion. So there may be no such thing as an affordable program.
Still, if this process can identify ways to mitigate safety and congestion problems in a reasonable time, it’s better than waiting 20 years or more for the Huetter bypass.