It’s been a while since I’ve written about transportation issues, with a lot going on. Some of it has been good. Closest to “home,” I’m delighted to see the new “advance yellow warning” flashers working on LaSalle — there are far fewer fresh skid marks to wonder about since they were hooked up.
How about our new west side bypass? Nice. The north’s curvy alignment could be enjoyable, but not under a pathetic 55-mph speed limit — obviously calibrated to those who will inevitably drive the bypass on bald tires when conditions are wall-to-wall black ice.
As for the south end? Needs work. Let’s begin by changing those “traffic calming” circles to long, truck-friendly ovals aligned with the primary bypass traffic flow, with all the pavement at the same level for decent snow-plowing conditions. Further, any rebuild should provide for future traffic light installation without any new dirt work.
Over the past few years since the Flathead’s first, it’s becoming clear traffic circles work fine at busy four-way stops where the feeder speeds are 25 mph or less. But on main roadways, roundabouts requiring major speed changes (from 50 to 15 is major, kids) are asinine, a stupid, expensive fad that deserves to die.
One issue that shouldn’t die, however, is Willow Glen. The west side is grand, but let’s be honest with ourselves. Extending La Salle south past Snappy’s to the bridge and upgrading Willow Glen has been a dang good idea since 1947, and still is.
Willow Glen is heavily used because it is the right road in the right place for the right reasons. One reason — drivers taking highways 2 and 93 from Lower Valley to the Rainbow Bar encounter at least 17 traffic lights. Going via Willow Glen gets you three lights, one stop sign and one stop flasher.
In town, there’s Third and Fourth Avenues East, which since time immemorial have been one-way arterials for southeast town traffic hoping to avoid Main Street, another “local secret” not marked by any road signs. Well, the city of Kalispell is replacing a water main under Fourth, a darn good thing, but “[o]nce the project is completed, Third and Fourth will both become full-time two-way streets.”
Then what? Will everything dump onto First Avenue East, which doesn’t punch through to a controlled intersection on the south end? Or, gasp, shudder, Woodland and Willow Glen? What the heck happened? Apparently, the Kalispell political ecosystem has produced a new species, the NIMFY — that’s for Not In My Front Yard.
Then there’s Whitefish’s yuppified West Second rebuild. My first look at the final result was from shotgun in a lowboy truck coming south into town. The driver and I were stunned to find manhole after manhole located not in the center of the lane, not in the turn lane, not along the paint lines, but smack dab in the precise line that heavy trucks have to take. Seriously? As a roomful of engineers, apparently.
How many? Coming south/east, there are no less than 17 manhole-cover inserts. Now, that’s precision engineering, and yep, some of the inserts are already getting pounded below the grade line.
Finally, everyone’s special favorite, West Reserve, especially at Whitefish Stage. I can’t wait for those new 2016-17-vintage chuckholes to blow up again next winter. The intersection itself? Shameful. I almost never take Whitefish Stage going north from town, nor West Reserve going east because the design is so terrible.
For at least the past 10 years, it’s been common for eastbound traffic cars to bunch up nose to tail clear back to the Whitefish River bridge, especially when school lets out. Why? Because at least one-fifth of the traffic going east at Whitefish Stage turns south. Not only is there no right-turn lane, but the corner itself comprises that special class of cratered chaos that terrorizes coffee drinkers — if drivers go faster than 2 miles per hour as they turn right from 50-mph Reserve, they risk spilling their stevia-sweetened organosoyaccino smoothie lattemini. Me? I have a good cupholder, something darn few others seem to have.
And the fun’s not over yet — Rose Crossing is being extended.