The in basket: Two more Central Kitsap residents have nominated two more intersections for the blinking yellow left-turn lights that Kitsap County has installed at numerous Silverdale spots.
Alice Gray would like to see them at Ridgetop Boulevard’s northernmost intersection with Silverdale Way, near the top of the hill north of town. And Linda Bruce points to the next signalized intersection north, at Bennington Drive and Crestview on opposite sides of Silverdale Way.
Alice adds a new element to her request, saying that while she waits needlessly before being allowed to turn, “one can see there is no traffic coming north on Silverdale Way for almost a mile and the left-turn light does not change to green until any northbound traffic almost comes to the intersection. I am sure I am not alone in my aggravation. When there are so many yellow blinking lights elsewhere, why isn’t there one here?”
The out basket: The two requests will have to be added to previous ones for the blinking lefts, at Provost/Old Frontier and Anderson Hill Road most recently.
As before, the reason is a lack of money to add those flashing lefts to any more intersections than have them now. When money becomes available, I’m sure those places will be considered,
As for traffic moving northbound on Silverdale Way looking at a signal that stays green until they are almost there, Jeff Shea, the county’s traffic engineer, says, “We do work with the state to coordinate signals when possible, and when the coordination of the signals increases efficiency for through traffic.
“The (federal) Manual on Uniform Traffic Control Devices (MUTCD) states signals located within a half-mile of each other should be coordinated. The signal at Silverdale Way and Highway 303 is about 1.5 miles from the Silverdale Way / Ridgetop intersection. In that distance there are many variables (speed, traffic volumes, opportunities to exit the roadway between the intersections) that makes coordinating the signals difficult. In light of that, coordinating these signals would not gain the efficiencies your reader desires.”
MORE flashing yellows, people don’t seem to understand that they don’t have the right away with oncoming traffic on a flashing yellow and the people coming at them have a GREEN light.I have had to wait while I had a green light to turn right on ridgetop while up to 6 cars have turned on a flashing light for them and I had the GREEN light. This has happened numerous times in my case and many friends have inicated that it has happen to them also. What is with the speeding on hiway 303 and 3 are getting more speeders, I have in the past 2 weeks had groups of cars going above the speed limit 10 mph plus by me and they include PSE, Kitsap county cars, semi’s, everyday. Thank you for the forum Travis.