The City of Morro Bay wants citizen input into the writing of a community-wide roads safety plan and is hosting an upcoming workshop to start the ball rolling.
The City is developing something called a “Local Roadway Safety Plan [LRSP] that will identify areas for roadway and safety improvements on local roads,” reads a news release sent out by the Community Development Department. “The City has received grant funding from Caltrans to conduct this plan, which will develop potential safety improvement projects for pedestrians, bicyclists, and motorists and in turn, make the City eligible for future state roadway safety funding.”
The safety plan, the City said, is supposed to:
• Identify high-risk crash areas with community input;
• Analyze crash data, maintenance logs, and safety audits to develop a locally focused safety plan;
• Proactively improve safety along local roads by proposing a list of prioritized safety projects;
• Provide an implementation timeline for the prioritized list of improvement projects; and,
• Host events for communities to provide input and ask questions with the project team present.
The workshop is set for 5:30-7 p.m. Wednesday, Sept. 6 at the Morro Bay Vet’s Hall, 209 Surf St. Go to: tinyurl.com/morrobayroadsafetyplanworkshop to pre-register for the workshop, which is free to attend. Email questions to: LRSP@morrobayca.gov.
What is an LSRP good for? It’s “a data-driven technical analysis that strives to understand the existing trends, factors, and causes of collisions within a community. Based on this analysis, the LRSP creates a framework to recommend and prioritize safety improvements on a citywide level for future planning and development efforts towards a safer community for pedestrians, bicyclists, and motorists.”
At the workshop the City wants to introduce the public to this concept, which has been done before but not in such an all-encompassing manner.
For example, the City conducted an accident history study of the intersection of Main Street and Hwy 41 in its investigations for possible improvements.
That intersection was identified as having among the worst accident records in town, justifying a major overhaul.
The City Council recently voted 3-2 to pursue a roundabout at that intersection, which has always been a 4-way stop. The council majority chose a roundabout over a stoplight array even though the costs differed greatly. Public sentiment was pretty evenly matched in favor and in opposition to a roundabout.
“The City,” the news release said, “is hosting this workshop to educate the public about the project and hear from residents about their thoughts and concerns on street safety in Morro Bay.
“We would like to hear your thoughts on things like:
• What safety concerns do you have on Morro Bay’s streets?
• What types of improvements would you like to see on Morro Bay’s streets? And,
• How do you get around Morro Bay?”
The plan is to put up a project website in the coming weeks with a survey and interactive map for residents to share their thoughts with the project team.
There will be more public meetings as the project goes along, the City said, starting sometime this fall.
Readers can email questions to: LRSP@morrobayca.gov.
