County commissioner highlights SHA roadshow, Lewes Way left‑turn safety fix

A St. Mary's County commissioner summarized local projects identified by the State Highway Administration during the agency’s annual "SHA roadshow," and urged attention to a left‑turn access issue on Lewes Way near Route 4.

The commissioner said the SHA presentation listed "another million dollars for engineering" for the Thomas Johnson Bridge and noted movement on the long‑running bottleneck at the Route 5 (Great Mills Road) intersection. He also described a local access problem on Lewes Way, a short side street between Route 235 and the bridge, where residents lack a left‑turn refuge to enter the road when driving toward the bridge.

"All you have to do is move the paint back probably about 60 feet, and you could include them with an area for these people to get out of the traffic lanes," the commissioner said, describing a low‑cost lane‑marking change that could create space for turning vehicles. He added the SHA list showed Lewes Way scored number 4 on the chart of local minor projects.

The commissioner described the traffic pattern in the area: two lanes that merge and then require drivers to merge left to turn and then merge right after the Patuxent Boulevard signal. He framed the lane‑marking change as a simple operational fix rather than a capital project, and said he is not an engineer but was encouraged the project scored highly on SHA’s local list.

Why it matters: the Thomas Johnson Bridge is a long‑standing county priority, and the Route 5/Great Mills Road intersection has been identified repeatedly as a local congestion point. A low‑cost stripe‑and‑sign fix at Lewes Way could reduce conflicts for a handful of families who currently must negotiate through a moving lane to enter their street.

Additional details provided at the meeting said the SHA ranked Lewes Way as the fourth priority among minor local projects and that roughly $1,000,000 was identified for bridge engineering; no further schedule or funding breakdowns were specified.