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Show Highway danger cited at parallel parking meet As submitted by Omar Hansen City Councilman At a special meeting of the City Council with James West, State Highway Engineer, held to discuss dis-cuss proposed street improvements, Mr. West cited evidence that Springville's Main Street is one of the most hazardous haz-ardous stretches in the state with approximately 15,000 cars traversing it daily. He reported that the accident rate has been extremely high costing motorists at the rate of $1000 per week in property damage to travel Springville's Main Street during 1960. These figures were based on accident reports filed by the city police department. It was noted that the accidents occurring per mile on Springville's Main St., was 37.0 per year, compared to the state average of 1.9 and 20.4 for Spanish Fork. A large percent of the accidents acci-dents have resulted from rear end collisions when a left turning turn-ing motorist stops in the line of traffic. This points up to the need of protective islands for escape avenues for those who plan a left turn, the engineer stated. His proposal for improvements improve-ments called for a 16-foot wide raised center strip with exit lanes; two 12-foot driving lanes each and a 15-foot wide parallel paral-lel parking on each side. He stated that the parking area as proposed was three feet wider than usual and hence would allow al-low parking outside of the deep gutters. Changing to parallel parking would reduce the number of cars on Main Street about one-third, one-third, he noted. Big job Mayor Haymond and the present pre-sent city council members then made the same request that the previous council under Mayor May-or Bird had made, that the high crown from the present roadway road-way be removed and the entire roadbed lowered considerably before the islands be installed. Mr. West then reported core drilling data which revealed four to five inches of asphalt, over 6 inches of concrete sub-base sub-base the old highway. He stated stat-ed that it would cost upwards of $50,000 to remove this material mater-ial and lower the road as re- quested. He further asserted that he thought it was impossible impos-sible to gain approval for this special request from the State Road Commission inasmuch as funds were in such demand for numerous other projects in the state. Skeptical Members of the city council seriously questioned the desire-ability desire-ability of parallel parking with as much a steep slope as is present on the existing highway high-way and also pointed out the hazard of the relatively deep gutters, Mr. West agreed that the gutters would have to be redesigned re-designed and that no plan had been completed as yet, but further fur-ther study would be made. He produced7 contour maps showing a maximum grade of 7.5 from gutter to crown, between 2nd and 3rd South Street, and stated stat-ed this was not excessive. He cited places in other cities (Continued on Page 2, Col. 3) City Main street termed hazardous (Continued from Page One.) where parallel parking was done on streets having grades as steep as 12. He explained that when leaving parallel! stalls, cars would actually be traveling on a slope approximately approxima-tely 2. (Note: 2 is a rise of 2 feet in 100 feet.) No decision No decision was reached by the council as to the ultimate resolution of the problem, but Mr. West urged that the go ahead be given in order that he might request the entire project from 3rd South in Provo to 7th South in Springvilie be completed complet-ed as one major job. He stated that it is a state law that parallel par-allel parking is a onust along all state highways passing thru cities, but that this is not enforced en-forced nor will it be enforced in the case of Springvilie. What they seek is the city's coopera- earlier been approved for this project. This he tried to make clear was not to be construed as a punitive measure against Springvilie, nor a whip, but simply that there are so many projects requested and back logged in the state that the fund must be kept active. tion in establishing this regulation, regula-tion, but that further development develop-ment of state roads in cities will not be done until it is adopted. adop-ted. Until adopted the project will terminate at the north city limits near Sage Motel, he said Present funds of $250,000 available to him will only complete com-plete the widening project from Provo . south to the infirmary hill, he said. Additional funds will have to be appropriated for the remainder of the project. He was quite sure that the delay de-lay caused by Springville's refusal re-fusal to approve parallel parking park-ing earlier was a contributing cause in funds being diverted to other projects which hadi |