Cave Creek council reverses course, adopts traffic calming lanes at Rancho Manana, Spur Cross

By Jeff Wendt
Mail

The Cave Creek Town Council adopted a new traffic pattern for Spur Cross Road and Cave Creek Road at its meeting Tuesday night, reversing course on what they voted on Sept. 1.

At that Sept. 1 meeting, the council had approved an all-way stop at Spur Cross and Cave Creek Roads, along with a lane reduction/traffic-calming turn lanes at Rancho Manana and Cave Creek Roads.

After discussion, the council voted to change the all-way stop to lane reduction/traffic calming lanes at Spur Cross and Cave Creek Roads as well as Rancho Manana and Cave Creek Roads.

According to Town Engineer Hal Marron, the traffic situation was originally brought to his attention from residents of Rancho Manana.

“This was not a staff-pushed agenda item,” Marron said. “However, when we got the recommendations (from the consulting firm), it made sense to bring it forward.”

Mayor Robert Morris talked about the traffic issues the town is experiencing.

“We have an ongoing issue of slowing traffic in general,” Mayor Robert Morris said. “Just to keep the speed down because we had pedestrian accident problems that came up in 2017.

“We have a lot of enforcement going on to keep us there, which it won’t keep us there if we ease off on that,” Morris added.

After a fair amount of discussion on the topic, council member Joe Freedman made a motion to only do the lane reduction/traffic calming lanes at Rancho Manana and do nothing at Spur Cross Road.

Morris seconded it for multiple reasons.

“We have an engineered solution that takes into account traffic flow, left turn lanes, right turn lanes, service, the delays,” Morris said. “It does not add the problem of increasing the amount of accidents which the other option does.

“It also has the add-on effect of generally slowing traffic in town, which has been an idea that has a lot of popularity for a number of years,” Morris added.

Council member Cynthia Driskell hit on a topic that a lot of residents have discussed with her while this has been an ongoing issue.

“In our discussion in September, along with comments from the community and discussion tonight, it seems like the common denominator in all this is speed,” Driskell said. “Speed coming into town, speed going out of town, and how it impacts the traffic flow.”

Vice Mayor Kathryn Royer was concerned why the traffic reduction at Spur Cross was not initially part of the plan, then offered it as a friendly amendment to Freedman’s motion. Freedman denied the request.

Royer then made a motion to include the lane reduction/traffic calming at Spur Cross along with Rancho Manana.

The vote went 4-3 in favor of both reductions, with council members Driskell and Freedman along with Mayor Morris dissenting.

Driskell asked if both lanes would be constructed at the same time or if they would be staggered.

“They can be done any way the council would decide,” Marron said. “They’re not required to go together. We could do this one at a time and see how the lane reduction works.”

Marron will come back to the council at a later date to get approval for the design of the lanes and the project cost.

Jeff Wendt
Reporter | Phoenix/Cave Creek

jwendt@iniusa.org

Meet Jeff
Jeff Wendt started at Independent Newsmedia in January 2023, after 25 years working for Gannett and The Arizona Republic. Started as a high school sports scoretaker, worked up to reporting high school sports and then became an associate high school sports editor in 2002. Also worked in the Design Studio as a copy editor.

Community: Jeff serves on the Board of Elders at his local church.

Education: Arizona State University with a Bachelor’s Degree in Journalism and Mass Communication

Random fact: Attended Game 2 of the 2001 World Series.

Hobbies: Playing video games (yes still the kid in me), watching reality TV, playing poker.