BG community members discuss city road project

Posted

BATTLE GROUND - A number of concerned parents and community members filled Room C-26 at the Lewisville campus in Battle Ground the afternoon of Oct. 1 during a meeting of the Battle Ground School District’s Facilities Improvement Team (FIT).

The purpose of the meeting was to discuss and understand a road project that is part of the city of Battle Ground’s Transportation Improvement Plan that proposes an east-west connection between North Parkway Avenue and SR-503. The city’s current proposal is designed to be less intrusive to the existing school sports fields and includes altering the intersection of Northwest 5th Street at North Parkway Avenue from 5th Street to 6th Street on the east end.

The intent of this street project would be to provide an additional east-west urban neighborhood connector between North Parkway Avenue and SR-503, thereby improving connectivity within this area and reducing traffic volumes on Main Street and Northwest Onsdorff Boulevard. This project is just one of several projects in the city’s six-year Transportation Improvement Program designed to help with congestion.

Several community members have expressed concerns with this road project throughout the process, as they are concerned about a roadway going through an area so close to ball fields and schools. Since the property is owned by the Battle Ground School District, the city is currently working with the district to determine the best option.

Kevin Jolma, the district’s director of facilities and operations, led the Thursday afternoon discussion. Jolma told those in attendance that the point of the meeting/discussion was to talk about options for the east-west road connector that would enable district officials to take some ideas and information back to officials at the city.

Several different options were tossed into the mix by meeting attendees, including ideas about using different roads as a connector, suggesting that the road not be constructed all the way through to North Parkway and others. Some attendees said the city should simply be told “no” in regards to the proposed project, saying a city road should not be put through the middle of school campuses.



In a previous interview with The Reflector, Battle Ground Public Works Director Scott Sawyer said that in 2005, when the city put the 20-year transportation plan together, they hired a company to create a model with land-use assumptions and basically of the projected growth over that 20 years. The company then builds a network with different lines on a map and puts that in a program with the model to see if it will all work with the existing roads.

“The model tells you that just having Onsdorff and Main Street isn’t enough,” Sawyer said. “What they’re talking about (citizens) is having something that actually counts the amount of cars, which we can do for the new road after it’s built to see how many cars drive on it. We can put out the counters, but there’s not going to be another traffic study.”

The 502/503 Congestion Relief Project is actually a series of projects that are included in Battle Ground’s 20-year plan. It will include the removal of the existing traffic signal at SR-502 (West Main Street) and Northwest 12th Avenue and the Northwest 5th Street project, both on the west side of SR-503 (north of Fred Meyer) and the connector between SR-503 and Northwest 5th Street that would be extended across the northern boundary of the Battle Ground High School to North Parkway Avenue. There are many other improvements and infrastructure associated with those plans that are included in the overall project as well.

Funding for this project is part of $7.7 million in funding that the city received as part of the state’s transportation package that was approved this year. Battle Ground will receive $1 million in the 2015-17 biennium, $3.8 million in 2017-19 and $2.9 million in 2019-21. The $2.9 million received in 2019-2021 is what is proposed to be used for the east-west connector project.

Now that the school district has gathered some input from community members, they will take some of the ideas and options to officials at the city. Jolma said the city also plans to present information about this project to community members at a later date.