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Residents urge faster pothole repairs and safer sidewalks; retaining wall maintenance questioned
Summary
Residents at an Olivette City meeting raised safety concerns about potholes, sidewalks located next to traffic lanes, the open center turn lane, and a deteriorating retaining wall in a nearby subdivision; MoDOT provided a maintenance hotline and planners outlined options and constraints for sidewalk placement and right-of-way purchases.
Multiple Olivette residents used a public meeting to press city and state officials for faster pothole repairs, safer sidewalk placement and fixes to a deteriorating retaining wall along a local street.
Residents described recurring potholes along Olive Boulevard and asked why repairs sometimes take a long time. Sean Tuley of MoDOT said the agency maintains a call center with a live person to log maintenance requests and gave the number: (314) 275-1500. He said maintenance staffing remains constrained in many districts and that interdistrict staff and commercial drivers are sometimes reassigned to address urgent needs such as snow plowing.
On sidewalks, residents noted many sidewalks are directly adjacent to Olive Boulevard with little or no planting strip; some sidewalks have been damaged by plows. A resident asking about the open center turn lane said it is often used as an unofficial third lane. "Those center lanes and cars...the planners hopefully, you know, the planners in the center would kinda slow that down," a resident said during questions.
Carlos Trejo, Olivette's planning director, described two approaches to provide more separation between sidewalks and moving traffic: narrowing vehicle lanes where possible (for example, converting 12-foot lanes to 11 or 10.5 feet) or acquiring small amounts of additional right of way from adjacent property owners to create a planting strip. Trejo and MoDOT staff warned that acquiring even a few feet of private right of way can be complicated and contentious and may affect project cost and timeline.
Several residents raised a specific safety and maintenance concern about a retaining wall on Gilman/Dealman (near Natalie Circle/CastleGate and the Indian Meadows subdivision). Trejo said the wall was originally built as part of a development decision to save a tree and that jurisdictional responsibility is split among Saint Louis County, the developer (CastleGate) and the city; he said the wall "has probably gone beyond needing TLC" and that a decision about repair or tree removal will involve multiple parties.
Why it matters: Pavement condition, sidewalk placement and infrastructure maintenance affect daily safety for pedestrians and drivers. Residents requested clearer maintenance response times and long-term solutions for pedestrian safety on Olive Boulevard.
What’s next: Officials advised residents to report urgent potholes to MoDOT's phone line and said long-term sidewalk changes require coordination among property owners, the city, county and MoDOT; retaining wall repairs will require agreement among the responsible parties.
