PORT ANGELES — Get over it.
Or, if you prefer, get under it.
Either way, the best way to get around the intersection of Deer Park Road and U.S. Highway 101 is an overpass or underpass, say Clallam County traffic engineers.
Traffic hazards at the junction east of the Morse Creek curve have plagued planners ever since cars began colliding at the crossing — often when northbound vehicles try to turn left across the highway.
Since 1999, the intersection has seen 37 accidents involving 62 vehicles, a pedestrian death in 2001 and three vehicular fatalities nearby in August.
Thirteen of the accidents involved left turns.
State aid application
Now the county has applied for $3.4 million in state aid to build an overpass or underpass.
Engineers say the costs of both options are roughly similar.
Costs would include $300,000 in preliminary engineering, $200,000 to buy right of way and $2.9 million to construct.
Planners sent their application to Olympia on Thursday.
They don’t know when they’ll get a response although environmental assessments could start as soon as June, with engineering beginning in August and right of way purchases in December.
Construction could start as early as April and end in June 2007.
Not a new solution
The overpass isn’t a new answer.
County commissioners considered the idea in February 2001, when a one-way, westbound project would have cost $2.3 million, $400,000 of which would have come from mitigation fees paid by area businesses.
The idea didn’t get off the ground.
They tried again two years later when the county asked for $4.5 million in Federal Highway Administration Funds for a two-lane bridge.
The money never materialized.
Now they’ve applied once more at the $3.4 million level, but admit they harbor small hopes of wringing so much money from a program that has $20 million for all of Washington.
