Terre Haute releases draft Safe Streets plan, seeks public comment through Oct. 24

Maitri Desai, city planner in Terre Haute’s engineering department, told the City Council on Oct. 9 that the city has a draft Safe Streets Terre Haute Safety Action Plan developed with a $200,000 federal Safe Streets and Roads for All (SS4A) planning grant and a consultant team led by Lochmuller Group.

The draft plan, Desai said, is available on the city engineering department website and is open for public review and comment through Oct. 24. The plan’s stated goal is to reduce serious injuries and fatalities on city roadways and to align with Vision Zero principles.

Peter Williams, a transportation planner with Lochmuller Group, told the council the plan’s analysis used seven years of crash records to map a high-injury network (excluding I‑70) and to identify locations with repeated fatal or serious-injury crashes. The team created three “buckets” of projects—targeted locations, systemic network improvements and policy/process changes—and prioritized a top-20 list for capital funding pursuit.

Williams also described a required public-engagement program that included an online survey, a mapping exercise that let residents flag problem spots, stakeholder focus groups and an open house held before the council meeting. The engagement informed the plan’s recommendations, he said.

The draft includes nine policy or process recommendations, Williams said, among them a complete-streets policy, revised city code standards, corridor access management, transit-stop design standards and Safe Routes to School programming. The plan also proposes performance measures and a five-year accountability framework so the city can track progress toward the stated safety goals.

Desai said the city has published an online crash dashboard on the Terre Haute Data Hub and a safety toolkit describing evidence-based countermeasures. If the council adopts the final plan, she said, Terre Haute would be eligible to apply for SS4A implementation funding in the next federal round.

Mayor Sackman summarized the presentation and told the council the administration will pursue implementation funding when the federal program is active; he noted the program’s funding status could be affected by federal appropriations actions but said the city will prepare to apply when the federal process resumes.

No formal council action was taken; Desai asked council members to direct residents to the online draft and to submit comments by Oct. 24.