Consultants present 13 interchange concepts as Boardman PAC weighs business access, freight and cost

Consultants from Kittleson presented 13 sketch‑level concepts for the Main Street/I‑84 interchange at a Project Advisory Panel meeting called by Boardman staff. The designs ranged from signalized diamond and roundabout hybrids to diverging diamonds, SPUIs and partial split interchanges; staff and consultants emphasized the drawings are ideas for discussion, not engineered alternatives.

"These are just ideas. They're not meant to be anything more than that just for generating discussion," said Matt Hugart, the Kittleson consultant leading the presentation. He said traffic volumes used in the analysis come from the Boardman Transportation System Plan completed about a year earlier and that several concepts will likely require bridge widening or replacement to meet long‑term capacity needs.

Local business owners and PAC members repeatedly raised concerns about concepts that would limit or close Front Street connections. David Jones, a local business owner and Planning Commission member, told the panel a plan that restricts Front Street access "doesn't even serve the community" and warned of significant economic impact. Kittleson and ODOT staff acknowledged that many concepts would impose property or access trade‑offs and that constructability and freight needs (including heavy, wide port traffic) must be weighed in later design phases.

The consultant asked PAC members to identify which concepts showed promise and to return sketch feedback within a week; he said costs will likely be well into the tens of millions of dollars and that funding and intergovernmental cooperation will be required. The TAC will review refinements later the same day and the project team will post materials and recorded sessions to the project page for public review.