Foley is getting a jump on making traffic safer on one of its busiest roads, Miflin Road or County Road 20, as development continues rapidly on the connector road from the Foley Beach Express to State Route 59.
“We hired a firm to analyze that corridor and give us advice on how to safely control vehicular traffic within that corridor,” City Administrator Michael Thompson said. “The idea is to implement modifications to the corridor that will safely create turning locations for vehicles leaving and entering that corridor from the adjacent developments, businesses and streets.”
Skipper and Associates was hired by the city on Nov. 18 for $27,000 to conduct the three-phase study. The first phase will be from State Route 59 to Juniper Street. One of the conflicts the city wants to resolve there involves driveways into Home Depot to the north and Lowe’s on the south.
“An issue that we have is where the accesses to Lowe’s on the south and Home Depot on the north do not align and are very close to the 59/20 signalized intersections,” Thompson said. “Things like that create an area where accidents are more likely to occur so we want to fix those things and make sure problems like that are not duplicated as that corridor further develops.”
This first phase is the more developed of the three so it needs attention first, Thompson said.
“Phase 2 would go from Juniper Street to Pride Drive, and then Phase 3 is from Pride Drive to the Foley Beach Express,” Thompson said. “Those last two phases are much less developed than the first section, but getting them done before too much development transpires is obviously a good thing.”
Before the planning moves into those next two phases, Thompson said city engineer Chad Christian is working with developers in those two areas to better plan growth there.
“Chad works with developers along the corridor to help ensure that what they are building and the location of their access points that they need aligns with the future corridor plan,” Thompson said.
The City Council and staffers are also working to include street lights with the access improvements to make the road safer at night as well.
“It is pretty dark along this corridor so this is something that we know that corridor needs as well, particularly as it further develops,” Thompson said.
This study will be ongoing as Foley prepares to extend Juniper Street across County Road 20 southward and then west to connect with State Route 59.
“We are doing what we can on our municipal streets and the extension of municipal streets to help, and we will continue to work with ALDOT [Alabama Department of Transportation] on any options that they may have to address the state’s 59 corridor within the city of Foley,” Thompson said.
Foley has budgeted $2 million for this project spread out of two years and Thompson said it’s anticipated to be completed in fiscal year 2021.
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