Board Endorses Several Low-Cost Safety Signs After Eaton—2Maple Road Safety Audit; Staff to Respond to Full RSA

City staff and the consultant presented the results of a road safety audit (RSA) for the Eaton and Maple intersection and asked the board to consider several near-term, low-cost sign changes. The Multimodal Transportation Board approved four sign actions March 6, 2025: (1) add R10 no-turn-on-red signs at select approaches; (2) replace an older “watch for pedestrians while turning” sign with a modern “turning vehicles yield to pedestrians” sign; (3) install an on-street “no straight through” sign on a Whole Foods access approach; and (4) add an advance low-clearance warning symbol and a one-mile advance height sign east of Maple Lawn and Coolidge to improve truck routing.

Staff briefed the board on the RSA process: the audit was conducted by a SEMCOG-funded consultant team and followed federal RSA steps (team selection, field review, identification and ranking of potential crash concerns). The consultant’s report identified a range of treatments, from simple signage to longer-term geometric or signal changes. Because the near-term sign items do not require a traffic-control order, staff said they can be implemented without additional City Commission approval; staff will prepare a formal written response to the RSA that explains which recommendations will be implemented, which will require further study and which are not feasible.

Board members discussed enforcement and the limits of signage, asked staff to prioritize measures that improve pedestrian visibility and crossing behavior, and supported starting with the low-cost signage while staff evaluates higher-cost RSA recommendations and returns a formal response to the board and commission.