I was delighted to see that the city responded to my posting regarding the traffic on 52nd Avenue between Garrison and Independence, and I appreciate the opportunity to respond to
Maria VanderKolk. I would have liked to have known what her role with the city is, but I must assume she is either with the traffic department or the city manager's office.
First, my concern was always with traffic volumes, and speeding secondary. The city chose to view the speeding as the primary issue and volunteered to do a study, which I appreciated. The traffic division compared their results to "similar collector streets" - which is where all of their logic falls apart.
They are in violation of their own posted traffic standards.
52nd Avenue from Allison to Independence is classified as a collector street, but there are actually two different road types in that length. 52nd from Allison to Garrison is 35' wide, no parking allowed, bike lanes, turn lanes, double lines. The road is a mix of single family, multi-family and business. Over a five block area, only 16 single family homes front the road, and a number of multi-family units. The road balloons to 42' wide at Garrison, where there is a turn lane.
From Garrison to Independence, which is four very short blocks, 25 single family homes front the road, the road is 35' wide, no lines at all and parking is allowed, and has been for the 50 years the road has existed. According to the city's traffic standards, a collector street is a road 36' wide with NO PARKING; if parking were allowed, the road would need to be 48' wide. A minor collector street allows parking on both sides.
52nd Avenue between Garrison & Independence was NEVER designed to carry high volumes of traffic. It used to be offset from 52nd at Garrison for that very reason and it ends at Independence for that very reason. How can the city not follow their own traffic standards, yet use them as the reason they won't fix the problem they have helped to create?
The city's traffic standards can be read at:
http://arvada.org/docs/117079381432-Details%20ST.pdf
The definition of a minor collector street can be found on page nine of the Arvada Transportation plan, which is at :
http://arvada.org/docs/11298513902005_Comp_Plan_CH_6.pdf
The city has repeatedly justified the traffic on 52nd Avenue by comparing it to Rensselaer Drive, West 68th Avenue and West 76th Avenue. Let's compare 52nd Avenue between Garrison & Independence to these streets. This section runs between Independence (a two lane collector) and Garrison (another two lane minor collector). There are stop signs on each end of this road, it is 35' wide and there is parking on both sides.
All three of the comparison roads intersect arterial or principal arterial roads. All three roads have traffic lights at those intersections. All of them are lightly populated - Rensselaer has 20 houses from 9600-10100; 68th & 76th Ave have 23 houses each from 6800-7600. In comparison, there are 25 houses on 52nd Avenue between 9200-9600, or half the distance of the other streets. 76th Avenue is 43' wide.
Our road is not the same as those cited roads, and it is not the same as 52nd Avenue from Allison to Garrison. To define something does not make it so.
According to Ms. VanderKolk, the staff has evaluated the accidents on the street and found them to be typical of incidents on other streets in the city. That is about
the worst analysis I think I have ever seen. Typical of what streets - Wadsworth? Kipling? Grandview? The three hit-and-runs occurred in the space of 225 feet. If that is typical , then according to our calculations,
Arvada should experience 27,456 hit-and-runs per year in its 780 lane miles of paved streets. .Also, is it typical to see houses crashed into as well? I notice she didn't mention the house statistic.
And speaking of statistics, I can give one. I have lived on 52nd Avenue for 16.5 years, and
WE NEVER HAD AN ACCIDENT involving parked cars until 2005, when my neighbors started getting their cars smashed. It was in 2005 that they began to consider us a collector street, I believe, because development was coming in, especially Target and that was what was expedient. In a traffic volume map dating from January of 2005, the city shows 52nd Avenue up to Garrison - and then doesn't show our section of the road at all (see map image). A strange way to view a collector street. The three comparison roads are shown on the map. So what I conclude from this is that we were not a collector road prior to 2005. They made us one - without our knowledge or consent.
How can a city be allowed to drastically change the volume of traffic down a street, to use that street for a purpose for which it was never, ever designed? How can a city fundamentally alter people's quality of life without ever consulting them? The city NEVER communicated with the people on my road about the plans they had for it, about the increase in traffic. Would Maria VanderKolk, Craig Kocian, and the City Council ever allow development that would do what has been done to my street to their own street? No, I think not. The price of growth is to be paid by others, not them. What they have tacitly and actively done to my street is in violation of their own traffic standards, and those of a responsible and just government. Ms. VanderKolk says that "West 52nd Avenue is functioning as expected." No, Ms. VanderKolk, it really, really is not functioning as expected. Not for those of us who have lived on this stretch of road for 5, 10, 15, 20 & 25 years. But it will again. I promise.