Pedestrian Improvements Planned for Washington State Highway

The city of Edmonds, Washington is moving forward with Stage Two of the Highway 99 Gateway and Revitalization project, airports Shaun Kuo for The Urbanist. The city will begin implementing steps planned in Stage One to "improve the land use and transportation environment of the corridor" and increase pedestrian safety in an area that has seen two pedestrian deaths and twenty other injuries between 2017 and 2019. "The most significant improvement proposed for this phase are raised landscaped medians along much of the corridor with mid-block left turn/U-turn pockets. The raised medians will replace a center, left turn lane that contributes to the collision-prone environment."

The plan also calls for adjustment of left-turn and U-turn lanes through the area and new signalized "HAWK" crosswalks, which some critics argue don't do enough to protect pedestrian safety on a high-speed road. The city entered final engineering and plan preparation this month, and "if things go smoothly, expect construction to begin at the start of 2022 and complete sometime September 2022."

Beyond these Stage Two improvements, the project also calls for "wider replacement sidewalks, new street lights, landscaping and softscape treatments, and streetscape improvements," as well as "targeted utility replacements, potential undergrounding of overhead utilities, and better stormwater infrastructure."