A more crowded Riverdale Road
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constant ordeal for Top of Utah motorists -- at least during peak shopping hours -- is traveling anywhere via Riverdale Road. The convenience of having a wide variety of shopping alternatives is pitted against the inevitable traffic jams, fender-benders, delays and exhaust in the air.
Transportation officials are aware of the current traffic problems. Last week an environmental impact statement was released offering several alternatives toward making traffic on Riverdale Road safer and more efficient.
"Right now, in peak traffic periods and on weekends, Riverdale Road is failing. The current capacity simply doesn't handle the demand," Andy Neff, Utah Department of Transportation spokesman, told Standard-Examiner reporter Jordan Muhlestein.
UDOT's preferred option would be to widen Riverdale Road on both sides "with a slight shift south, between 600 West and Chimes View Drive. ... Between Chimes View Drive and 37th Street, the widening would be symmetrical, and between 37th Street and Harris Street, the widening would be on both sides, but shifted to the south," wrote Muhlestein.
The public has less than a month to comment on the impact statement. It can be read online at www.udot.utah.gov/riverdaleroad. After the comment period, a decision will be made on what to do. If anything is done, construction will likely start in 2008.
One more alternative from UDOT -- it should be noted -- is to do nothing.
UDOT's Neff warns Riverdale Road businesses to start preparing for construction. "We want them to anticipate the impacts to their business when construction starts next year," he said.
We understand that something needs to be done to alleviate the traffic woes in Riverdale. It truly can be a nightmare for drivers.
Still, we reserve the right to express some frustration with the traffic effects of Riverdale's economic growth. It was only a relatively short time ago that motorists endured long, blood-pressure-increasing traffic work and construction on the roadway. We recall, too, that work was bad news for some of the area's businesses.
As we contemplate UDOT's new environmental impact statement to deal with the traffic monster that Riverdale Road has created, we ask this question: Was there ever any research by Riverdale or UDOT as to what the explosive business growth in Riverdale would do to traffic congestion before all the big-box stores were built? Or have local and state planners always been stuck in catch-up mode?
We'll be interested to hear whether simply adding lanes to Riverdale Road will make traffic flow more smoothly and/or rapidly through the current bottleneck. We have our doubts, based on hours and hours every year spent sitting in traffic along Riverdale Road.
Surely there must be additional roads or routes that can be improved, widened or rerouted, or overpasses built to connect other roads to give drivers more alternatives when traveling to and from various locations in the city.
Has there been any thought to restricting access to Riverdale Road from some side streets? That seems worthy of consideration.
We hope UDOT's and Riverdale's planners are thinking outside the box on this one.
