City Reveals Plans for Highway 93 Traffic Fix

Recently, I wrote an open letter about a busy Missoula intersection that, at certain times of the day, can take a long time to get through. I have also witnessed multiple near misses that could have been some serious traffic accidents. It’s the intersection of Highway 93, Lower Miller Creek Road, and Old Highway 93.

When I wrote the story, I also reported my traffic safety concerns to the city of Missoula on their website. I got a reply from Kevin J. Slovarp, P.E., City Engineer for Surface Transportation Department of Public Works & Mobility. It doesn’t look like this intersection is going to be changing anytime soon.

City and State Studies Ongoing

According to Slovarp, the city of Missoula and the Montana Department of Transportation have been studying this intersection.

For those who use Lower Miller Creek Road or Old Highway 93, that intersection is already optimized. Adding more “green time” to those roads will cause even more congestion on Highway 93/Brooks.

Why Adding Green Time Won’t Help

If the MDT were to add a left-turn-only signal, it would cause other issues. According to Slovarp, it would cause:

Through traffic would shift to the outside lane, adding more queuing where demand is already highest.
Right-turn-on-red capacity would be reduced, which currently provides important relief at this intersection.
Morning commuters could no longer turn right from the inside lane, which we’ve observed serves a notable volume.

At this point, to increase capacity from Miller Creek the option they see is “widening to three lanes (left-turn-only, shared through/right, and right-turn-only).” This would be a major project that would include coordinating with BNSF and Walmart. Not only that, but there is also the cost.

Slovarp said the city has recently hired a consultant “to help us look into the possibility of a new special impact fee district for the Miller Creek Area, that would allow for new residential and commercial structures to pay for the cost of future transportation safety and capacity improvements at this intersection.”

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It doesn’t look like that intersection is going to be changing any time soon, but I appreciate the response from the city and encourage anyone who has a traffic safety issue to use the city of Missoula’s website to let your voice be heard. Even though you may think it’s an easy fix, you may find it’s more complicated than that.