By Betty Janik | Scottsdale
“Is Scottsdale forfeiting a $31M federal grant to make our streets less safe?” The council appears poised to do this at the April 8 meeting.
The truth is roundabouts are safer than signalized intersections. The American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials and the Insurance Institute of Highway Safety report modern roundabouts result in a significant reduction of fatal, injury, pedestrian and bicycle crashes. Roundabouts avoid T-bone crashes, which produce the most injuries.
An added bonus is a 30-50% increase in traffic flow.
The roundabout at this high-accident location of Scottsdale/Dynamite creates operational improvement in Level of Service from E/F to A/A, with A representing the best conditions and F the worst.
The new city council has apparently directed city staff to scrap the roundabout and instead install a signalized intersection.
Interim City Manager Caton reported the difference in costs are nominal, each costing about $3.7M. However, this change will result in about $1.5M of additional expenses.
More importantly, City Manager Greg Caton confirmed that “continuing with … the scope change would result in forfeiture of $31,132,929 in federal funding.” The redesign will also result in significant construction delays.
If federal funding is lost due to the change, this $31 million will have to be paid out of Scottsdale’s funds.
There is also concern about how the council is making decisions. Why have there been no public meetings on this topic, while Councilmember Graham posted this change is a done deal? Why no council vote on returning $31M to the federal government?
Making decisions outside of public meetings is a violation of open meeting law.
Why was the transportation director’s position eliminated and why was his boss forced into retirement? Was this politically motivated?
If approved, these changes will make our streets less safe and cost us millions of dollars.
Betty Janik is a former Scottsdale city councilwoman. Please send your comments to AzOpinions@iniusa.org. We are committed to publishing a wide variety of reader opinions, as long as they meet our Civility Guidelines.
