Springfield scraps Main Street draft facility plan, new approach in the works

Springfield will work to develop a new plan for Main Street safety improvements in the coming months.

The City Council recently voted to direct staff to develop an alternative plan after a draft facility plan that included the potential for raised medians and up to nine roundabouts sparked concerns from residents and businesses.

The city is looking at improvements to Main Street — from South 20th Street near the Paramount Center to 72nd Street just before the Thurston Hills Natural Area trail head.

It was clear something needed to change, Mayor Sean VanGordon said. “There’s nobody that I’ve talked to that likes this plan,” VanGordon said before councilors unanimously approved the move to take a step back and rethink the project.

Though the city won’t move forward with the draft facility plan as approved by the planning commission, that document still can be a reference point, said Tom Boyatt, the city’s community development director.

Springfield isn’t throwing out all the work done so far, added Kristina Kraaz, the assistant city attorney. Staff can build on, supplement, add to and otherwise change what’s already been done, she said.

But it was clear the city needed to pivot, VanGordon said.

“We’ve heard from the community, we are listening to their needs and concerns, and we need to take the time to develop a vision for this corridor that is clear, supports business and improves safety,” he said in a statement.

Community members can continue to give feedback on the project at info@ourmainstreetspringfield.org as staff and officials work to develop an alternative program over the next nine months or so.

Why is the project necessary?

Main Street in Springfield is consistently ranked as one of the most unsafe streets in the state based on the severity and frequency of crashes.

During a work session in early June, Molly Markarian, a senior planner for the city, showed officials a series of headlines: Stories about children and dogs dying in crashes, a 12-year-old pedestrian critically injured by a car and a hit-and-run crash.

“We continue to see headlines like this year after year,” she said.

For more than five years, the city and the Oregon Department of Transportation have been working on the Main Street Safety Project to address the ongoing safety concerns, Markarian said.

Safety upgrades like reduced speed limits, signal upgrades at intersections and pedestrian crossing enhancements have helped, she said, but Springfield and the state, which controls the road, need to do more.

Though the number of crashes has stayed about the same in recent years, people are still dying and sustaining serious injuries, Markarian said.

The most common types of crashes also are consistent, she said — people continue to fail to yield the right of way and follow too closely, resulting in rear-end crashes and collisions while people are turning.

Almost every area of Main Street has crashes, Markarian added, and while there are hotspots, they move along the corridor over time.

Things are likely to get worse, she said, as traffic is expected to increase 20% to 30% in the next 20 years.

What was the plan?

The plan officials decided to set aside was a draft facility plan.

Markarian described it as “the roundup of all the work that’s been done since 2018.” The plan pulls together goals, objectives and values, and then describes the development of recommended solutions and identifies how implementation would work, she said.

The plan laid out alternatives as part of a toolbox for different intersections along the corridor, using three main tools:

• Raised medians: These move left turns to safer locations, which Markarian said is key because a lot of crashes happen while people are turning and when they don’t yield the right of way.

• Roundabouts: Markarian said while these would limit some left turns, people would be able to turn around within a minute of driving.

• Street cross-section upgrades: These would add dedicated room for walking and biking improvements while balancing property impacts, according to the plan.

People have been looking for more details, she added, but that’s not the purpose of a facility plan.

Read more:Springfield pumping the brakes on Main Street project amid community concerns

A facility plan doesn’t set things in stone, Boyatt said, but rather guides the project.

The design of the project then comes back to council for feedback, he added, and council can send it back for tweaks.

“The plan isn’t design level,” Boyatt said. “That, I think, is a significant point of confusion.”

City getting more feedback

As staff and officials craft a new plan in the coming months, they’ll be holding listening sessions with groups representing different interests along the corridor, Boyatt said.

The goal is to understand specific interests and concerns, he said.

Councilor Marilee Woodrow recommended doing listening sessions by ward because there are different issues relevant to each stretch of Main Street.

Boyatt said he likes that idea.

He added while staff works on an alternative plan that addresses concerns, they’ll also revise it to add clarity on what exactly a facility plan does to avoid some of the confusion that happened around the now-scrapped draft plan.

What's next?

Staff will spending the coming months holding the listening sessions, and council will discuss the project again after the summer break, which runs from July 4 to Sept. 5.

People can continue giving feedback on the project by emailing info@ourmainstreetspringfield.org.

There’s more information about the project and process at ourmainstreetspringfield.org/main-street-safety-project.

Contact city government watchdog Megan Banta at mbanta@registerguard.com. Follow her on Twitter @MeganBanta_1.

This article originally appeared on Register-Guard: Springfield Main Street: Safety project to get new plan after concerns