Council approves Ashworth Road construction access plan despite residents’ safety and access concerns

West Des Moines City Council voted 4-1 Tuesday to proceed with the city’s current construction-access design for the Ashworth Road reconstruction between Nineteenth Street and 203rd Street after residents urged a different approach to preserve driveway access and safety.

The issue centered on a city staging plan that labels some properties as having “zero” driveway access for the length of a construction stage. Resident Shane McClintock, 1910 Ashworth Road, told the council the plan would leave his household — and several neighbors — without direct driveway access for an extended period and said that posed safety and caregiving risks. “Two to four months is excessive, is prolonged, and it just it just doesn't seem right to put those risks onto us,” McClintock said.

McClintock and other speakers asked the city to install temporary gravel drive lanes or otherwise provide short-term vehicular access for every affected residence rather than the current plan, which the city says concentrates temporary access in reserved stalls and pedestrian routes.

Why it matters: The Ashworth reconstruction is a major neighborhood project affecting multiple households. Residents raised concerns about safe transfers of…