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Engineers present low‑cost restripe and higher‑cost rebuild options for Bailey Boswell/Basswood; signal-equipment failures cited as priority
Summary
City staff showed two options to reduce northbound left-turn backups at Bailey Boswell and Basswood — a $15,000 restripe and signage option and a $250,000 option requiring new pavement and a new signal mast arm — and urged the city to prioritize replacing faulty signal detection (estimated $45,000 per intersection) for better corridor performance; regional COG funding is approved but delayed awaiting Text Out agreements.
City engineers on May 7 presented two alternatives to reduce northbound left-turn stacking at the Bailey Boswell/Basswood intersection and outlined signal-equipment and timing issues affecting the corridor.
Trenton described a less-expensive option that restripes an existing through/right lane to allow a combined through-plus-left movement and adds signage and a minor signal modification, with a preliminary cost estimate of about $15,000. The higher-cost plan would remove the raised median, add new pavement and replace the mast-arm signal pole to accommodate the additional lane; that approach was estimated at roughly $250,000 because of the pole and foundation work.
Trenton and staff cautioned that lane storage is only part of the bottleneck. Detection failures and pedestrian-signal malfunctions at nearby intersections have caused signals to default to maximum green times on some legs, reducing corridor efficiency. Staff estimated detection replacement at approximately $45,000 per intersection (about $90,000 for two intersections) and said the city was selected for Council of Governments (COG) funding to cover some equipment upgrades. Deployment of that funding and the equipment has been delayed while the vendor Text Out and COG finalize agreement signatures.
For eastbound right-turn geometry, staff presented options that avoid or require driveway and inlet relocations, with costs estimated at $200,000 and $275,000 respectively. Engineers recommended first testing the low-cost restripe, monitoring the results and pursuing equipment fixes and corridor timing via the COG-funded signal-timing study before committing to major pavement work.
Next steps: staff will discuss budget availability with public works leadership and, if feasible, pursue the restripe as an administrative action while working with the COG and vendor to finalize agreements for equipment replacement and a corridor timing study.
