Busy, Dangerous Corner Is Just Going To Get Worse

If driving home you’ve ever sat out on Interstate 90 in a string of cars waiting to get up the off-ramp to Pines Road, you know it’s an ugly situation around rush hour.

Well, ugly is going to get really bad looking before too long.

As reported in previous Voices, a 316 multi-family unit apartment complex is going in near Mission and McDonald, a few blocks from the busy intersection at Pines.

The Ridgeview Estates project recently received approval from the county’s hearing examiner committee for a zone change allowing the apartments.

Having cleared the rezoning hurdle, the Frucci/Wolff project can proceed once a building permit is received. If all goes smoothly, it won’t be long before they’re building hundreds of apartments on land that was zoned for agriculture until a few years ago.

The traffic scene around Pines and Mission is going to be a mess.

Right now, the eastbound I-90 off ramp is so congested it earns an F grade from transportation planners. It is one of the three worst intersections in the Valley, causing average stops of more than 60 seconds per car during evening rush hour.

The Mission and Pines intersection is not much better, causing more than 30-second rush hour delays. That corner is expected to start causing minute-long delays as some of the already-platted housing projects come on line.

The Ridgeview Estates complex is one of several new or planned developments in the vicinity, and is notable for its size. With that many units, once it’s completed, it will generate something like 2,200 vehicle trips per day, according to traffic models.

You might reasonably ask: What were these people thinking when they voted, 2-1, to allow the rezone? Did they really consider the impacts on traffic of adding so many cars without any improvements to the roads and intersections?

The rezoning hearing was the perfect opportunity for the committee members to consider the overall consequences of such a development on transportation and other public facilities. It’s pretty clearly too much, too soon for that particular site, with existing, overloaded roads and intersections.

Granted, there are long-term plans for projects to ease congestion in this vicinity, but don’t hold your breath.

There’s no funding for key improvements at Pines and Mission recommended by the state Department of Transportation. The state would like to build another left turn lane off of Pines onto Mission, another right turn lane off the I-90 exit ramp onto Pines, and a right turn signal for traffic turning off Mission onto Pines.

But those projects are contingent on legislative funding.

The Ridgeview Estates developer is being required to chip in $36,000 toward traffic improvements at Pines and Mission, but that’s not going to move things along much faster. It is no more than a token mitigation figure that might pay for some lane stripes but not much else.

You don’t have to be against this particular project to make some noise about funding priorities for improving the Pines and Mission intersection and the I-90 ramps.

The Ridgeview Estates project is representative of what transportation planners see dead-ahead throughout the Valley: A network of roads and intersections that is inadequate to handle the development already approved for construction in the next few years.

, DataTimes MEMO: On Your Way is a column on commuter lifestyles and issues. Your views on any of the topics discussed are invited. Please write: On Your Way, The Valley Voice, 13208 E. Sprague, Spokane, WA 99216. Or call Jim Springer at 459-5441.