The cities of Camas and Washougal are seeking grant funding from the state to improve dangerous roadways and intersections in their east Clark County communities.
The cities are seeking funds through the state’s City Safety program, which uses federal funds to target the most critical traffic safety needs in local jurisdictions, supporting road projects that seek to reduce fatal and serious injury crashes on city streets.
Camas: 15 fatal and serious-injury crashes
In the five-year stretch between the start of 2016 and the end of 2020, Camas experienced 516 traffic collisions, including seven serious-injury crashes and eight fatal collisions.
A study for the city by DKS Associates found a stretch of Northwest Lake Road to be particularly dangerous, with “a significant number of fatalities and serious collisions,” according to Brian Chandler, the national director of transportation safety for DKS Associates.
“Of all the cities we’ve worked with, this is the only road with this many fatalities on a segment of roadway,” Chandler said.
The DKS safety plan identifies the “narrow, two-lane, hilly, tree-lined” stretch of Northwest Lake Road that runs from Northwest Leadbetter Drive to Northeast Everett Street — noted as the site of two fatal head-on crashes and one fatal roadway-departure collision — as the No. 1 priority for safety improvements.
DKS Associates also found the following problem areas in Camas: Northwest 16th Avenue at Northwest Brady Road; Northeast Sixth Avenue at Northeast Adams Street; Northeast Goodwin Road from Northwest Friberg-Strunk Street to Northeast 222nd Avenue; Northwest Leadbetter Drive to Northeast Everett Street; and Northeast Third Avenue from Northeast Garfield Street to Southeast Crown Drive. All of these areas had at least one fatal or serious injury crash between 2016 and 2020.
Washougal: 11 fatal and serious-injury crashes
Eleven fatal and serious injury collisions occurred on city of Washougal roads in a five-year period between the beginning of 2016 and end of 2020, according to DKS Associates.
The consultant identified five particularly high-risk traffic corridors and intersections that the city should address and recommended treatments for each.
The list is topped by 32nd Street from Addy Street to Stiles Road.
“This was the highest priority on our list,” Chandler said. “We saw runoff crashes and head-on crashes, especially in the north section. At this particular location, I know there was more than one crash (that led to) serious injury or a fatality during the study period.”
The report also states that the city should address a portion of 39th Street, between “J” Street and Evergreen Way.
The report also identified 27th Street from state Highway 14 to the Index Street Terminus; “E” Street from Southeast Lechner Street to 22nd Street; and North Washougal River Road from North 18th Street to “E” Street as high-risk areas, and recommended the addition of treatments to address the city’s systemic stop-controlled intersections and roadway departures.
Camas and Washougal will submit road-safety plans to WSDOT this month.
The program funded four Clark County projects during the 2018 and 2020 two-year grant-funding cycles, including a $130,900 intersection-improvement project at Fourth Plain Boulevard and Stapleton Road in Vancouver; a nearly $780,000 “road diet” project to convert Fourth Plain Boulevard from four lanes to three between “F” Street and Fort Vancouver Way; and two Battle Ground projects worth nearly $250,000 that improved traffic safety near a residential subdivision and two schools.
